by Paul Almond
Lord, thought Jim, he’s off. Over the dark winter, he’d had one or two periods like this. Most of the time he was fine, but then he’d wake up and his mind would do funny things. Jim was never sure quite how to deal with that.
He went over to his father. “Look Poppa, if I help you get on your moccasins, will you come to the door and look out? You’re here at home, you’re safe, there’s not a Micmac for a hundred miles. You’ve been dreaming.”
The old man tried to rise, and then sat down rather suddenly. “Ship’s rocking,” he said. “Better be careful, Jim. I think we sighted the French. Must be getting under full sail.”
“Well Poppa, I reckon if we’re about to meet the French, the best thing would be, batten down the hatches, and hold tight. What do you say?”
“Good thinking.” He saw his father look around at the room. “Looks ready for a fight to me.”
“We’re all ready, yes sir.”
“Got to defend the church! That comes first, mind, the church!”
“Yes sir.”
“All right then, carry on.” His father struggled with the moccasins. Jim knelt beside him, helped get them off, and took his heavy coat to hang up in the porch. “I think with that big battle coming on, Poppa, you’d better take a quick lie-down. These here fights take a lot of energy.”
“Right you are, sailor. Well said.”
Jim watched his father turn to the stairs, and slowly start up.
Chapter Twenty-Seven: Winter 1863
The stiff crust of snow lay spread out like a starched apron across the field and up the backside hill that glistened under a low, bright moon. Jim burst out the door laughing with Margie. She was over her morning sickness now and her high spirits infected him. They were off to nephew John’s, where he and his wife Margaret had invited his brothers and sisters all to come and meet the new Andrew James, born a week ago. Margie ran on ahead and Jim chased her. What fun they had together, like children again. And after all, at nineteen, was not Margie bustling with youthful energy? They passed the Byers’ farmhouse and set off across the next acre to the modest home of John, inherited from his deceased father, also named John. Last November, James had given him that land, and also had designated this piece here to Thomas, Mariah’s husband. He’d made a will and helped Catherine — who could neither read nor write — make hers, at the instigation of the Rev. Mr. Lyster, who happened to be also the clerk of Port Daniel. Mr. Lyster had drawn up all the documents, and now, at twenty-four, John Alford owned his own farm and house. And James had let it be known, of course, that young Jim had been named as heir, in both their wills, of the Old Homestead.
Jim and Margie reached John’s house to find the others already assembled, having come directly from evensong. No doubt about it, everyone was cheerful, with piggins of beer to hand.
“She’ll be right down,” John announced. “It’s her first day up after the birth. She’s determined to show ya.” Happy comments greeted this.
“Now before Margaret comes,” Jim announced, trying his best not to appear overly rambunctious, though the revelry was continuing, “I need everyone’s help.”
“Something wrong with the Old Man?” Thomas Byers asked.
They fell silent.
“Oh no, it’s about... Well... Y’see, I figure Ol’ Poppa’s not going to be with us much longer, so we should all get together and figure out a way to give him a present.”
“And what might that be?” William Young asked.
Jim took a breath, then launched out: “I think we should get us a church built in Shegouac.”
This was met with puzzlement, and some frowns. Jim went on, “We’ve all heard Reverend Mr. Milne drop hints, and Mr. Lyster, but hints in church go nowhere. Best thing is to start talking, and maybe next winter a pile of us could go cut the foundations, and float ’em down the brook as we did for the school.”
His sister Ann Young interrupted, a thing women did not usually do. “Jim, I hate to say this, but with Ol’ Poppa not well and Old Momma on her way out, too, we have a lot on our hands. Why not take a few months, and think about it then?”
The room grew quiet as they looked at one another. Thomas Byers mumbled, “Jim, it hurts me to say it, but now is maybe just not the time.”
Jim felt his cheeks flush. “Thomas, you saw what happened with the school. That’s what everyone said: let’s wait. But when we got working, we swung the idea round.”
“Like my wife said,” Will Young interposed, “I’m not so sure it’s the time to start a project like that. Building a church, well, it’s a pretty big undertaking.”
“So what do I tell Poppa? We’re waiting till you die?” Jim still could not get his mind around it.
“I think it’s a great idea!” Young John appeared enthusiastic. “It’s a plan everyone could get behind...”
“I just have this feeling,” Jim urged, “that Ol’ Poppa would like nothing more than to know this community has agreed on working together again. I’m not a big churchgoer myself, but everyone else...” He paused. “Poppa’s mind might be wandering, and sometimes, he’s just not himself. But I just know for sure this’d cheer him up no end.”
“It’s winter,” brother Joe said. “We’ve got to get through that first. Some families down my way don’t even have enough to eat. Not a good time to go soliciting...”
Jim was silent. He’d never expected this. Well, they were wrong.
Perhaps because she saw the look on Jim’s face, his older sister Mariah got up and spoke. “Jim, we all know how important Old Poppa is. Look how many children Old Momma has delivered. And how many families Old Poppa gave a helping hand to, over the years. Everyone looks up to both of them. And when they’re gone, it’s all going to be different.” Nods greeted this announcement. “So, Jim, I agree, we just can’t wait. It would be wonderful to get talking. We could tell him it’s a kind of memorial to him. Something his family can all do, as part of Old Poppa’s last wishes.”
Jim was pleased that for some reason, his older sister, Mariah, almost twenty years his senior who had helped bring him up, was again on his side.
“Take more than this family,” Dan Bisson said.
“Of course, of course, but we gotta start somewhere,” John replied.
“All I’m asking is,” Jim held Margie’s hand for support, “for us just to start putting the word out. I’m telling you, Momma and Poppa, they don’t have long...”
“I like the idea,” sister Mary Jane said. “If we get talking, I bet in three or four years, that church would get built.”
Most were clearly now in agreement, so Jim turned to his host. “Now c’mon John, where is that barrel of rum I brought over in the autumn?”
John, who had been watching the conflict between his aunts and uncles with wide eyes, grinned and leapt to his feet. “Yes sir! But first, here comes Marg, with Andrew James.” He opened the door for his wife, now Mrs. Alford.
The proud mother, the former Margaret Dow, entered somewhat unsteadily with a tiny bundle well wrapped up. She looked up and announced shyly, “Your Ol’ Poppa and Momma’s first great-grandchild!”
So tiny, Jim thought as he watched the infant passed from one set of caring arms to another. “It’s awfully small.”
“Jim! He’s not an it,” Margie came beside Jim and took the baby. “And one of his names is James, after you.”
“More after Poppa, I guess,” Jim grinned.
“Fer shore, after Grandpa,” said John.
Jim took back the tiny infant. How light it was! Imagine, this tiny piece of living flesh, swaddled in wool, would one day grow up to be a farmer and work the land almost next door. Amazing!
“Well, I can’t tell you how tickled Ol’ Poppa’ll be to see this here great-grandchild,” Jim said, to general agreement.
He looked down at the new tiny James in his arms. Such a sweet smell. And such a breadth of years between this and his old father up in that bedroom, sleeping. Even for a brief moment, he conjur
ed up the glorious way in which these tiny creatures were created. And the not quite so glorious way in which they departed. With his own baby on the way, he would be thinking a lot of things like that. During these latter years, his father seemed to be raging so much against this dying of his light. Why not indeed? Old age should rage at close of day.
So similar and yet so different: this feather-light, tender bundle whose bones were still supple and pliant, and the gaunt scarecrow over home whose bones had grown as brittle as his brain, but still filled with feisty longing.
* * *
“You know,” Jim began slowly, as they strode happily back home along the beaten path between the houses, “I been thinking where we could place that church. What about that land there below the road, near the new school?”
“You’re not talking about Poppa’s land, are you?” Margie stooped to scoop up a handful of snow. Was she making a snowball to throw?
“I might be.” Jim was testing the waters...
“Jim, Poppa gave land for the school — you’re not asking him to slice off a piece more for the church?”
“Wouldn’t have to be a big piece, Margie.”
“Jim, what good is a church without a churchyard? And a walkway in. And space in front.” She let fall the snow, being too cold, and dusted off her hands. “You’re getting beyond an acre. You think Poppa’s the richest man in Shigawake? Well, he’s not. Your poppa is. I mean our poppa,” she corrected herself quickly, seeing the flash in Jim’s eyes. “I don’t see my father just giving and giving. What about someone else handing over their land?”
Jim was silent for a bit. “Look Margie, I’m not saying give. We could take round a collection. We could buy it.”
“You want Poppa to sell his best piece of land?”
“Margie,” Jim said, “I’m not saying anything, really. I’m just asking you to think it over. You know you’re Will Skene’s favourite daughter.”
“I am not!”
“No? You shoulda seen that look in his eyes when you and me got married. It was like he was losing his own soul. And,” Jim went on, “he’s a terble fine churchgoer. Every week, he drives down to Port Daniel. I bet he’d be pleased to have a church right here on his doorstep instead.”
Margie took that in as they paused at the kitchen door of the Old Homestead.
Well, thought Jim, I probably opened my mouth where I shouldn’t. But he knew his wife – she’d turn it over in her mind. And if the idea grew on her, she’d surely act on it.
* * *
Margie and Jim, their cheeks frosty, their eyes sparkling, ears icy, burst into the main room, where James Alford sat sleeping by a dying fire, a throw across his knees.
“Papa, we got the best news!”
James woke with a start, straightened himself and, with an almost regal air, prepared himself. Margie came and set kindling down by the fire as Jim spoke to his father. “Papa, we was just over at John’s. We was there for a sight of your first great-grandson. Remember we told you when we left?”
Margie, kneeling at the fire, turned; she didn’t want to miss one moment of the look in the old man’s eyes when he heard what James had to tell him.
James nodded. “I remember for sure. I came back downstairs; I figured I’d sit here till you came. I want to hear all about it.”
“Go on Jim, tell him.” The ensuing flames having caught, Margie sat facing; this was going to be a delicious moment.
“Well, Poppa, as you know, the whole family had gathered for the christening.”
James nodded.
Jim paused.
“Well, go on Jim,” Margie prodded.
“Well... we had a lot of talk about this here new idea.”
James lifted his head and looked directly at his son. “What new idea?”
Jim waited an appropriate and lingering moment. “A church.”
Growing interest spread across his father’s features. “Yes yes, the church.... Why ever for did you bring that up? I thought you were telling me about my new great-grandson.”
“I brought it up because, well, we’re kind of thinking of making a present for you...” Jim was partly drawing it out, but also finding it difficult to actually make it sound right. “You’ve been wanting a church built. And you knew the talk about it. But nothing’s happened so far.”
“You’re not telling me anything new, me son.” James’s eyes narrowed.
“Well, maybe it isn’t much, I guess.” James slumped a little because in truth, not that much had been achieved. “But what happened is...” He trailed off.
“Jim!” Margie exclaimed.
“All right, all right.” He took a breath. “Poppa, it looks like we’re all agreed, we’re all behind it, and right away, we’re gonna start talking, and somehow, we’re gonna get your church built.”
James got to his feet, elation written all over his face. Margie leapt across and gave him a big hug, and he shook his son’s hand. “Damn fine work, you two. Damn fine.”
“Well, ’tweren’t much, but...”
“’Twere so, Jim!” Margie said. “Poppa, he worked at the lot of them. First, they’s not too keen, but he worked, my Jim, he went at ’em. I’m proud of him.”
“You fellas are pretty good at that!” James grinned broadly.
“And your little great-grandson, he’s just as fine as any trout in Shigawake Brook,” Margie went on.
“Well, I reckon that’s two good bunches o’ news at one go.” James nodded to himself, and then moved slowly across to the stairs.
As he faltered on the first couple of steps, Margie crossed quickly and helped the old man into his bedroom above, up the steep, narrow stairs that turned sharply behind the stove just as decided by James himself and Catherine’s brother John in the building of the house forty years previously.
Jim took his place in his father’s chair and stared into the flames.
Margie came down shaking her head. “Poor old fella, he sure hates to be like that. He tries not to complain, but I seen it in his face. I bet he used to be some good-lookin’ man, and some fine sailor.”
After they got into bed that night, the love they made was just glorious. Having seen the baby, the beginning of one life, and another nearing its end, Jim reflected that right now he had everything he could ever want: a father who seemed mighty satisfied, a wife in his arms, enough land to keep him busy for years to come, and a family on the way.
Beside him, Margie felt the same joy. A contented couple, for sure.
Chapter Twenty-Eight:Spring 1863
Good Friday. After James had heard the family was ready to start on the building of a Shegouac church, he felt better. He knew that once his children got an idea in their heads, they were unstoppable. But tonight, the old fears came pouring over him like the torrents of water over the shingled roof of the Old Homestead.
All week long the house had been buffeted, first by a raging snowstorm on Palm Sunday, so severe that even though it was the beginning of April, the Rev. Milne could not get down to hold his service. Jim and Margie had come back from their long trek down to Port Daniel school, having only said a few prayers of their own, and more especially for their parents.
And now the temperature had risen, and rain beat about the house. Easter Sunday was coming up the day after tomorrow. Oh yes, oh yes, James said to himself, church definitely. Not getting out enough, lately. Couldn’t even make the Ash Wednesday service. Know that ye are dust, and to dust shall ye return. And as for Palm Sunday last week, well, no. But now that Easter was at hand, he would make a determined effort. So long confined. And confined in this tattered body, this ragged skeleton that must be dispensed with, so he could take on (and the Good Book promised) a body of light.
The Good Book, the Good Book. So what if it lasted two thousand years — hadn’t those pagan religions existed much longer? Wasn’t everyone now discussing those scientific discoveries refuting God’s existence? How dare they doubt? But doubt he did. Trapped there, too. The
prison of doubt. How he longed for an escape. A blazing path into wisdom that he could be sure of.
Aha! So that was why, he decided, he had wandered these rooms and hallway at night. Impelled strangely to rise up from his bed and search.
He had moved out of Catherine’s bedroom so that she might be better cared for. How much they had shared together! But now, the time for sharing was ending. He shuffled across the room, opened another door, went in, then shuffled back again. The Old Homestead was wrestling with its own angels, the spring storm pelting melted snowflakes against the windows. His own struggles, James knew, were of an altogether different kind. He felt like howling again, howling, as he kept wandering, like a hundred wolves. How else to express his agony, his longing, to find, to know?
In the darkness he bumped into a chair, nearly fell, but fortunately didn’t wake Catherine. The collision prompted a paroxysm of anger, why must one bang into things like a village idiot! I can’t even stand up and walk straight, he growled as fury built. But something stopped him. Was it the wind whistling around the house? Just like those many nights in the spars of the Bellerophon? He was back in his cramped deck with its five feet of headroom, well below the waterline, bounced in his rocking hammock with the other Middies. And clear as a bell, his wondering thoughts came back, as he had pondered the desire to jump ship and to brave those icy waters so many years ago...
“Think of a farm on the cliffs, built from the very trees among which it stands. Think of a wife, broad skirt blowing in the wind, holding a child — your own son. Think of trudging behind sturdy oxen, ploughing furrows in the rich, red Gaspé soil. Think of the companionship of settlers, their pounding hammers erecting your barn, just as you’d help with theirs. Think of the warmth on a frosty night by your fireplace, built from stones picked on these very beaches, while your wife roasts one of the chickens you’ve both raised.”
Well, had he not achieved everything?
Stupid old idiot! What was he doing, how dare he be angry at bumping into a chair! Why was he not praising the Lord above, as would any sane man? Here he was, a true pioneer who had done it all: made his home, raised a fine large family, created a substantial working farm, was that not a life of success? Yes, by any standards, James thought, standing stock-still in his bare feet in his comfortable and warm bedroom...
