by Byron White
“Where’s Albie Oake?” Charlie asked with a laugh.
“Alb is up in the other end of the bunkhouse with Bertie and Art,” Phil McCarthy related.
“Albie, get your boots on and come outside. I’ve got mail for you from Aunt Pressie, and it’s covered in perfume!” Charl shouted. Charlie was younger than his brother Stan, and his Methodist upbringing permitted him to enjoy a bit of fun—even on Sunday!
Albert scravelled out of his bunk and jumped into his boots.
“So that’s what Charlie came here for. He’s got mail!” Albert spoke aloud to no one in particular. The next instant, Albert was heading along the bunkhouse to meet Charlie. The rest of the men were not far behind.
“Well! Well! Charlie, you brung the mail! Well, my son! Well! Well!” Albert was happy to see Charlie. Pressie Oake was Albert’s wife— the “Aunt Pressie” Charlie had referred to earlier.
“Well, Charlie b’y, pass out the mail, my son,” said Uncle Aram Freake from Boyd’s Cove; he, too, was anxious to hear from home. He was expecting a letter from his wife, and no doubt his daughter, Bernice, would have a note or a drawing put in as well.
Jack Soper from Trinity Bay joined in the request. “Yes, Charl, let’s have the mail, me b’y.”
Charlie looked around at all the excited faces.
“Wait a minute! Wait a minute!” Charlie began. “My feelings are deeply hurt! I came all the way from Camp 12 just to see you fellas and all you want is the mail?” Charlie scanned the crowd with a mask of mock sadness.
A grinning Ben Critch stepped forward toward Charlie. Ben was another member of the Trinity Bay crew. “Charlie, me b’y,” he began. “If you don’t hand over the mail right now, you’re liable to be turfed out into the snowbank.”
With a roar of laughter, Charlie turned and led the men out of the bunkhouse.
“Come on,” he said. “We’ll go over to the cookhouse and pass the mail out sensibly. Hedley can be the postmaster.”
Parked on the road in front of the bunkhouse was Charlie’s red J5. The J5 resembled a small tank. It had wide running boards and moved on rubber and metal tracks. It was the ideal machine for travelling on snow-covered winter roads.
Charlie reached inside, took out the mailbag, slung it over his shoulder, then headed toward the cookhouse. The men paraded behind him like kids chasing Santa at Christmastime.
Stan, Allan, and the brigadier were waiting in the cookhouse. Stan and Charl had spoken on the old wall phone but had said nothing to the men of Charlie’s visit. If, for some reason, Charlie did not make it, the men would not be disappointed. If he arrived as planned, well, it would be a pleasant surprise. Stan was glad that it had been the latter.
The mail for Camp 13 had come up the lake by boat, and had been mistakenly dropped off at Camp 12. When the mistake had been discovered, Charlie had offered to fix the problem. Now here he was making the delivery on Sunday. Better to do good than evil on the Sabbath, the Good Book said. So, here he was playing the good samaritan.
In the cookhouse, Hedley Janes and Lewis Cull took their places. They had a table turned sideways to serve as a counter. The two men stood behind the table decked out in their white aprons. Their seldom-used cooking hats adorned their heads. Santa’s elves were ready to deliver the mail.
Charlie strode up to the table and hove the bag on top. “The Royal Mail from Sandy Claus,” Charlie announced.
Lew shot a scornful eye Charlie’s way. Hedley’s attempt at a straight face failed, and he and Lew broke into a fit of laughter.
“Lew, pass me the mail,” Hedley said after he had regained his composure. It was time to pass out the loot. Lew reached into the bag and pulled out a parcel wrapped in brown paper. This he passed along to Hedley, who held the parcel at arm’s length.
“Mr. Philip McCarthy!” Hedley announced. Phil stepped forward and received his mail. He retreated to a nearby table and tore open the package. Inside Phil discovered a fine pair of doubleball, sheep wool mittens and a white envelope containing a letter.
“Look,” he said, “my wife knit me a brand new pair of mitts. I knowed she was going to do that!”
“How did you know that, Phil?” Howard Parsons asked.
“Well, I wrote her a good yarn last mail, so she took the yarn and knit me these mitts,” Phil replied.
A wave of laughter washed across the room. Back at the table the mail was being distributed.
Hedley held another parcel at arm’s length and read the name with some authority. “Mr. Albert Oake. Mail for Mr. Albert Oake!”
Albert stepped forward and took a rather large parcel from Hedley’s hands. Albert tucked the package under his arm and strolled off to sit at a table. Charlie and Stan were seated nearby.
“Albie, I can smell the perfume from here,” Charlie kidded.
Albert placed his unopened parcel on the table in front of him. Though he was anxious to open it, he planned to do that later in the privacy of his bunk.
“Aren’t you going to open your parcel from Pressie?” Stan asked.
“Yes, Albie, open up the parcel so we can see. Pressie is right sweet on you!” Charlie teased.
Albert turned the package over in front of him. He could see where Pressie had written the address on the mail. My! His Pressie wrote in a fine hand.
“I’m going to open it later,” was all Albert said.
“Albert, you’ve got a good woman. Every mail she sends you something,” Stan said.
“Yes. Most every mail,” Albert agreed.
“Every mail it’s socks or mitts or long johns,” Stan continued with a laugh.
“Long johns! Underwear, too, Albert? She wants to keep you clean and fresh!” Charlie said with a wide, mischievous grin.
“You never mind, now, Charl. You never mind,” Albert replied with a smile.
“Charl’s kiddin’ aside, Albert b’y, you’ve got a good woman,” Stan reiterated.
Hedley and Lew continued to pass out mail to the men. Mail from home was anxiously anticipated at camp. These men had been away for more than a month now. When the mail arrived, it was indeed almost like Christmas.
“Mr. Cecil Cooper!” Hedley called out. “Mr. Cecil Cooper, please come forward!”
Cecil had been standing at the back of the crowd. He was not sure that he would be receiving mail. His wife, Aggie, sent him parcels from time to time, but perhaps he would receive nothing this mail. Cecil, himself, was not known for his letter writing. He pushed his way up to the table. Hedley waved a white envelope back and forth, and with a great flourish he passed the envelope under his nose and took a long, loud sniff.
“A letter for Cecil from his sweetheart,” Hedley announced with considerable mirth. A great roar of approval shot up from the crowd.
Cecil muttered a few choice words and turned a magnificent red. He snatched the letter out of Hedley’s hands and headed for a seat. His chest puffed out with pride. He was glad now that he had followed Stan’s suggestion and sent a letter home.
“Is that a letter from Aggie?” Charlie asked with a grin.
“Of course it is! Cecil wrote her a letter a while back,” Stan said.
“Cec! You old smoothie, you!” Charlie teased. “I bet there are lots of smooches in that envelope!”
Cecil was basking in the attention. It was good to receive a letter from home.
“You never mind, Charl,” Allan chimed in. “Cecil can send a love letter home. Can’t you, Cec b’y?”
“That I can, Allan! That I can!” Cecil replied happily.
“Yes, and when he runs short on love words, me and Stan, we help him out!” Allan threw his head back and shook with laughter.
All the mail was soon passed out. Some men were sitting around the cookhouse yarning, others were busy opening their mail. Still others were heading off to the bunkhouse to read their letters in the relative privacy of their bunks. It was good to hear from loved ones and catch up on the news from home.
“Thanks for the mail, Charl,” Uncle
Walter Cooper called out as he was leaving.
“Thanks, Charl! Thanks, Charl!” the men chimed in.
Charlie White stood up and pulled on his wool mitts and his leatherskin shucks. It was time to leave.
“I must get under way,” he said, looking at Stan and Allan.
“Yes, b’y. Take your time. It’ll be dark before you reach camp,” Stan said.
“Yes, take care, Charl b’y,” Allan added. “It was good to have you visit.”
With that Charlie turned and headed out the door. Moments later the J5 sprang to life and Charlie headed out the road past the barn and out of sight.
Back at the cookhouse, Hedley and Lew placed the mail table back in its correct location. Then they headed off to the kitchen. It was time to prepare supper for the men. Fun was fun and work was work. Both men were more than capable of handling both.
Stan lay on his bunk in the forepeak and read the letter from his wife, Dorothy. Dorothy, Stan mused—quite a name. She was named after Bill Dorothy, a friend of her father’s. Bill was immortalized in the well-known Newfoundland song “The Badger Drive.”
Stan read the letter carefully. It was good to hear from her. They had three children now; they kept her busy, she said, and another child was on the way. He had done well in marrying Dorothy. She was quite a woman: intelligent, feisty, a good verbal jousting partner for Stan. She was well-educated, too. Dorothy had gone to school at Rosedale, near her home in Traytown, Bonavista Bay, where she had been educated by the well-respected Briffett sisters. The Briffetts had written some of the texts used in the Newfoundland school system.
Dorothy had graduated and become a teacher. She had taught in Botwood and was the first teacher in the fledgling town of Port Hope Simpson, Labrador, when logging operations had begun there in the 1930s. It was there that Stan and Dorothy had met. They had fallen in love under the northern lights of Labrador. The cold winter nights had drawn them closer.
Later, they had gotten married and built a house in Comfort Cove, which, like most of the hundreds of tiny settlements scattered along the coast of Newfoundland, had few amenities and was isolated. There were no roads to the outside world. Coastal boats brought freight and passengers during the warmer months. Fishing boats were used to travel to neighbouring communities and for berry picking and other outings. During the winter months, travel was by horse, dog team, or on foot. There were no phones, electric lights, plumbing, or running water.
When Dorothy had first arrived she wondered what she had gotten herself into. They had started a family and Stan was away in the lumber woods for most of the year. There was no ready access to medical help and the nearest hospital was miles away by sea, on Twillingate Island, out at the entrance to Notre Dame Bay. But Dorothy had adjusted. People in these little communities pulled together and helped each other when needed. The social fabric was woven well. People leaned on each other, faced hardships together, and got on with living. Later, Dorothy was heard to say that there was no place on earth that she would rather be.
As Stan lay on his bunk this Sunday afternoon in February, he thought of Dorothy and the children. It would be wonderful to see them again. His mind took him back to the morning in December when he had left home.
Normally Stan and his men returned to Camp 13 on December 26, Boxing Day. This year Boxing Day had fallen on a Saturday. After much deliberation, and against his better judgment, Stan had informed the men that they would be heading to Glenwood on Monday, December 28, instead. No one worked on Sunday at Camp 13 anyway, and by waiting until Monday the men were given an extra weekend to attend church and spend time with their families. The extra time was important, Stan reasoned, but he did not like using Monday, a workday, for travelling. This he viewed as a necessary but regrettable waste of time.
BY FOUR-THIRTY ON MONDAY morning, Stan was in the kitchen with the lamp lit. He soon had a fire roaring in the stove and a kettle of water heating on top. It was a scene that was being repeated in other houses around the cove and in the other small settlements in the different bays around coastal Newfoundland.
Stan pulled on a pair of piss-pumps and stepped outside to check on the weather. The sky was studded with stars. Next door a light shone through the frost covering Allan’s window. Stan shivered; it was a cold, crisp morning. He pulled the door shut behind him and headed back into the kitchen’s warmth. Within a few minutes he had washed and shaved. Soon he was sitting down to a breakfast of hot tea, boiled salt cod, and plenty of homemade bread and bakeapple jam. He was just finishing his meal when the door leading to the hallway opened. It was Dorothy coming out to see him off.
“You never had to get up, sure,” Stan said, but he knew she always would. Throughout their married life, no matter the hour, she always made a point to be there when Stan left.
Dorothy shook her head. “What foolishness are you going on with? You know you’re not leaving without me saying goodbye.”
“You’re going to miss me, aren’t you?” Stan replied with a grin.
“Stop your silliness,” she said. “I’m more concerned with seeing that you’ve got everything you need to take with you.”
“Jingoes, you know I got everything I need and more. You checked it all last night.”
“I know, but I was lying in bed wondering. Do you have enough towels and face cloths?” Dorothy continued.
“Yes, I got plenty of everything,” Stan assured her.
“Are you sure?”
“Jingoes, Dorothy! I used to go off for the whole year at one time, with just the clothes on my back and one blanket in my pack,” Stan said, somewhat exasperated.
“Yes, but that was when you were young and before you had me!” Dorothy stated.
Stan just smiled and shook his head. There was no point in continuing this conversation. Dorothy would always have the last word anyway.
While Dorothy was double-checking Stan’s camp kit, he dressed in his winter clothing and pulled his logans on over his feet. He pulled his backpack over his shoulders and took his kit bag in his right hand. He was ready to leave.
“Do you have enough mitts and socks?”
“I’ve got enough,” he said.
He was standing at the kitchen door now, ready to leave. Dorothy came to him, kissed him, and gave him a parting hug.
“You be careful now,” she said.
“You take care, too, and look after the youngsters.”
“You know I will,” she replied.
“There’s lots of dried wood in the shed and plenty of splits to start the fire.”
“I know. Don’t worry.”
“If you have any trouble, get Pa.” Stan’s father lived down the lane.
“I know. You take care,” Dorothy said. He bent to give her a parting kiss, and then he turned and headed out into the darkness. It was a long journey to Camp 13.
It had been a cold fall. The bay had already frozen solid with thick ice. There was no road connecting the community yet, but since Confederation in 1949, roadwork was expanding around Newfoundland. A road was already being built from Lewisporte, at the head of the bay, to Campbellton. Stan had contacted Max Rideout, who lived in Campbellton. Max had a big, blue multi-passenger snow machine and would come down and take Stan and Allan and some of the men back to Campbellton along the new road, where Max and Bill Snelgrove had taxis waiting to take the passengers on to Glenwood. Some men would use horses or find other means of transportation to leave home. Stan and Allan travelled on in an old blue international truck that they had waiting. Uncle Ben Mills joined them in the truck cab. From time to time he would lower the window and fire up his old pipe, usually getting a few puffs in before Stan and Allan would assault him with a barrage of verbal barbs. Good-naturedly, Ben would take a last puff, tap down the fire with his finger, and put his pipe in his pocket. The scene would be repeated many times on the long and winding road to Glenwood.
Several men rode along in the open space in the back of the truck. Here they sat on their packs an
d bounced and shook and shivered. It was a long, arduous, and torturous ride over a twisting, pothole-filled, ice-covered road. It was late morning when the men arrived at the district depot in Appleton. The depot contained the district offices, the company store and warehouses, the forge and barns. Facing the lake were the company docks. It was from the docks that Uncle Rube Snow carried supplies up Gander Lake on the company scow. It was from these docks, too, that Sandy Parsons, on the Pine Lake, carried men and supplies to Southwest Gander. The Pine Lake, a much larger boat, had just recently been brought in from Bonavista Bay to replace the smaller company boat, the Crystal Stream.
The men were hungry by the time they arrived at the Glenwood depot. While they waited to board the boat, they headed off to Lew Hill’s establishment for something to eat. Lew had lots of good solid grub: beans and bologna, and eggs and bacon. Cyril Cooper fancied he was famished when he arrived. He promptly sat down and ordered up a dozen eggs and toast. He ate every bit!
By early afternoon the men were on Gander Lake heading for the wharf at Southwest Gander. On this cold winter’s day most men stayed inside or took shelter wherever they could. A few played cards, some yarned with old acquaintances. Some men stood outside smoking and a few poor creatures stood nearby looking seasick and half-frozen.
Gerald Head was one of the unfortunate souls feeling the effects of seasickness. When Sandy Parsons docked the Pine Lake at Southwest Gander, Gerald picked up his gear and, zombie-like, disembarked. Gerald was normally an outgoing, jovial fellow. Today, however, as he stood motionless on the dock shivering, tired, half-frozen, and desperately trying not to spray the contents of his stomach over the man standing in front of him, this side of his character was not readily apparent.
Within a few minutes, Greg Broderick backed the company truck down to the dock. The men threw their gear onto the boxed-in flatbed and climbed aboard. This flatbed truck was the company taxi. Greg put the truck in gear and the vehicle bounced and shook and jarred its way over the rough gravel roads on the far side of Gander Lake. At intervals the truck would come to a halt, and men would get off at the various lumber camps spread out along the way.
