by Debra Samms
***
As the days passed by, the women settled into a routine of sorts. They discovered almost right away that the men expected them to do all of the cooking whether they wanted to or not. Yet because it was a way to pass the time, as well as an excuse to spend most of their time topside at the brick furnace, Eulalie and Jemima soon volunteered to cook.
All day long they tended to the brick furnace behind the center mast on the top deck, using the store of firewood as sparingly as they could to boil water and beans and dried beef and molasses together, and to make crude biscuits from flour and lard. "At least we can stay up here in the fresh air and light," said Eulalie to Maeve.
"And keeping busy makes the time pass," added Jemima.
Maeve nodded. "I understand," she said, resting her shotgun on her shoulder, and sometimes even envied them.
Hattie and Ruby found themselves with the tasks of washing, sewing, and mending their clothes and cloaks and shoes and stockings, which on board the ship was a never-ending job. There was no fresh water available for washing, so they would use buckets of seawater that had been strained through a cloth – and even that was used very sparingly.
But there was always plenty of sewing and darning and knitting to be done, and as much as possible Hattie and Ruby would sit up on the deck near the brick furnace to do it. That way, they could have better light for their work and to stay close to Eulalie and Jemima.
Occasionally the four women would trade tasks with each other, just to give themselves a little change in the routine. But the one who may have had the toughest job of all was Maeve herself, for they were not alone on this ship.
Maeve's job was to fend off the men.
The five women knew that they were not what anyone would consider beautiful, especially after life in the hold of the Sea Spirit. But on a small ship out in the ocean, looks mattered very little . . . not to a pack of twenty sailors alone for weeks out on the ocean.
The tops of the masts had once been used for lookouts, where they would sit and try to spot whales. But the ship had not gone after the great beasts for a long time and was not doing so now. Yet there were always at least two men up in the rigging all the time, and Maeve knew it was because they could look down on the women as they cooked at the furnace or scrubbed clothes in buckets of strained seawater.
All of the women hated it, but there was little they could do except throw the men cold glares and keep their weapons close at hand. And Maeve immediately took it on herself to be the guardian of all five of them. She never went anywhere without her shotgun. It was right beside her on the crude pallet when she slept and always on her shoulder as she walked around the top decks or followed the other women if they had to go below decks for anything.
It was true that some of the men were not so bad. They learned to make conversation that was polite enough, and they quickly found out that talking to their passengers as all of them went about their work was a way to pass the time and ease some of the boredom that soon set in even for men who loved the sea.
The sailors would tell the women tales of the monstrous sea creatures they claimed to have seen while hunting whales, or the magical islands where their ships had put in and where the had found wonderful fruits and sweet spring water and beautiful, brightly feathered words.
The women, in return, would tell the sailors about growing up on small farms with chickens and goats and sometimes a cow or a horse, and of how they'd learned to shoot their own game, clean and dress it, and cook it up in the frying pan. And especially they would talk of what it was like working inside the deafening, monotonous, dangerous textile mill, and of how the thought of a life spent inside that place had driven them to the very hazardous voyage they were undertaking now with no guarantee of what they would find when they got there.
None of the five were afraid. They'd spent their lives facing the adversity that came with both poverty and being an unattractive female with little prospect of marrying well, if at all. They were not about to risk the opportunities waiting for them in the fresh air and sunlight of Oregon over a handful of rude, crude men.
But not all of the men were as decent as the others. None of the women went anywhere without a pistol, shotgun, sword, or club. And Maeve watched over them all with the double-barrel, even as she urged her friends not to take action with their weapons too quickly. "Try the soft answer first," she said. "We can't exactly run down the road to get away from one of these men if he decides to get rough. There's just no place to go."
Things went along fairly well for a fortnight or so. The men all had a great deal of work to do to keep the sails up, the decks and rails intact, and the ship headed in the right direction, and this helped to keep them occupied and out of any more trouble.
Then one evening, just after the evening meal had been served – beans, biscuits, and dried fish this time, for variety – there was a huge uproar from the stern of the ship.
The men went running to see what it was about. The five women stood up but couldn't see much, so Hattie stood up on the edge of the brick furnace and looked out.
"Fight," she said, stepping down to the deck. "It's Alf Jackson and Hogg Mahoney."
"Stay here," said Maeve. "If it rolls down this way, we'll all step up onto the mast ladder and get out of the way."
But the fight never left the stern of the ship. In a moment, Captain Carver and a couple of the others had it broken up and the participants ordered the two to stay apart. "Good," said Eulalie, with a sigh of relief. "Glad that's over with."
Before long, both of the fighters came trudging back to their posts near the bow and the foremast. Hogg Mahoney was a little battered but didn't look to much the worse for wear. But Alf Jackson was blood-covered and limping, with one eye already swelling shut.
The women watched them out of the corners of their eyes, relieved that things were returning to normal. They finished eating their food and then cleaned up the dishes and utensils so that all would be ready to start again tomorrow, and at last retired to sleep for a time on their pallet down in the prow of the hold.
At dawn, Maeve took up her shotgun and she and Jemima went up to the top deck to start the fire in the brick furnace. But just as they reached the top of the steps, Maeve threw back her arm to stop Jemima in her tracks and then raised the shotgun.
Hanging from the rear mast was the body of a man. "It's Hogg Mahoney," whispered Maeve.
"I thought he was the winner of the fight?" said Jemima.
"He was," said Maeve. "That's why he's swinging from the yardarm."
CHAPTER NINE
A week passed by, and another, and the shipboard routine – dreary and tedious as it was – continued with little in the way of incident. The farther south they went, the warmer the weather became. "At least we don't have to suffer with much in the way of cold," said Hattie, as she and Ruby and Maeve once again cleaned up the furnace after the evening meal.
"That's right," added Ruby. "At the far end of the world, where we're going, it's summer there when it's winter up north. By the time we get to San Francisco, it'll be spring there again – almost summer. At least that worked out well for us!"
Maeve grinned. "Nice to know that something, at least, has worked in our favor."
The night was an especially clear and beautiful one, with a black sky and a river of stars and a full moon just rising in the east. The three of them lingered for a little while to enjoy the peaceful and spectacular sight, and to enjoy the breeze that still held a little of the soft afternoon warmth in it.
"I should go down and have Eulalie and Jemima come up here," said Hattie. "They might like to see this. Don't get to see much that looks pretty on board this ship."
"You can say that again," laughed Ruby. "Go and get them. We'll wait here."
The sailors, too, seemed to be taking advantage of the moonlight and clear sky to get some extra work done on maintaining the rigging and hammering a few new nails into the boards of the deck. "Looks like most of the men ar
e up here," remarked Ruby.
"Yes, it sure does," said Maeve, glancing around. "Keep your wits about you." She sighed. "We really shouldn't be up here at night, but that sky is too pretty to pass up."
"Sure is," said a familiar voice.
Maeve whirled around. "Eulalie! Jemima! What are you doing up here?"
"Same thing you are, I guess," said Eulalie.
"Too fine outside to stay down in that hold," said Jemima.
"Where's Hattie?" said Maeve. "Isn't she with you?"
"We thought she was with you," said Jemima.
"Well, she isn't," said Ruby. "Most of the men are up here – "
"And Hattie is down there – alone!" Maeve turned and ran, shotgun in hand, back to the door leading to the lower deck. The other three women followed her – and just as they reached the steps, they heard a scream from down below.
"Hattie!" Maeve reached the steps first, shotgun at the ready, and all of them raced into the hold. In the shadowy light of a couple of small hanging lamps, which were moving back and forth with the slight motion of the ship, they could see that two men had grabbed hold of Hattie up near the pallet in the prow of the boat.
"Let her go! Now!" ordered Maeve, trying to get a good aim with her shotgun. But the other three women didn't wait for that.
Ruby drew her saber and ran in and immediately began slamming it down on one of the men with both hands on the grip. The weapon wasn't too sharp but she was beginning to draw blood from his head and neck nonetheless. Jemima got her club in her hand and did the same to the other man, hitting him as hard as she could with both hands on the weapon.
The men dropped Hattie and tried to turn around to fend off their attackers – and walked right into Eulalie's pistol and Maeve's shotgun. The two men froze, but the women were not about to show any mercy – not after what those two had tried to do to Hattie, and would have done to the rest if they'd had the chance.
The five of them continued beating the men with sword, club, pistols, and shotgun, until both of them staggered to the deck – and even then, they kept it up. "Can't kill a snake with just one blow," Maeve said, finally taking a step back but keeping her shotgun trained on the two. "Got to keep going, just to be sure."
"All right. Better stop now, while they're still breathin'," said Ruby, lowering her sword. "Let's get 'em out of here."
"We'll take them to the captain," said Maeve. "Everybody grab a leg and drag."
The women got the two men moving across the deck. They found that their task was made easier by sliding them through the puddles of rancid whale oil near the center of the hold, and then they all worked together to get the men up the steps one at a time.
They almost had the two men to the side of the ship when Captain Carver walked over to them. "Miss Harrison," he said, "one of the men told me you were having a little trouble with some of my crew."
"We were," she said, catching her breath as she and Jemima hauled the first man up to hang over the rail. "But not now."
She and Jemima then grabbed his legs and started to roll him over the side, down to the bottomless sea rushing past them far below – when the man suddenly woke up and grabbed hold of the railing. "No. No! Captain – don't let them do this! Don't! Stop them! We didn't do nothin'!"
"Hold on there," said the captain. "I see you've got Alf Jackson and Burney George. I'll have to ask you not to throw either one of them over the side."
"Why not?" asked Maeve, looking at Captain Carver even as she and Jemima kept a tight grip on their thrashing, yelling prisoner.
"I need him."
"What for?"
The captain paused. "Now that you mention it," he said, "I can't think of a single thing that either one of them is good for."
"That's what I thought." The two women started to push the man over the side, but he flailed about and managed to grab hold of the captain's arm.
"Stop them. Stop them!" he screamed. "I'll do anything. Anything at all!"
Maeve and Jemima looked at each other, and then at Captain Carver. "I've got a suggestion," Maeve said, and then allowed Alf Jackson to fall to the deck where he lay cringing and crying like an infant.
A short time later, both Alf Jackson and Burney George were down on their hands and knees in the shadowy darkness of the hold with a bucket of sea water and pieces of old rotted sail, scrubbing and scrubbing at the wooden planks of the floor in an effort to get out the last of the old rancid whale oil.
***
Just after the turn of the new year, the Sea Spirit arrived at the docks of Rio de Janeiro. "That name means 'river of January,'" said the captain. "I suppose that's auspicious." They stayed docked there for three days while the crew made what repairs were needed and, especially, the captain bargained for more supplies.
Barrels of sweet water soon filled the hold, along with plenty of dried salt fish and more dried beef. Maeve and the other four women ventured out to walk along the docks, grateful to walk on solid ground again and greatly enjoying the fresh fish and vegetables and hot flatbread that they were able to buy for pennies there in the marketplace.
By the time they departed Rio, they were well supplied – and the women were delighted to find that there were a few crates of fresh oranges in the hold, too. None of them had ever tasted an orange. "I think this journey was worth it just for this," said Maeve, as the sweet and tangy golden juice ran down her chin, and all of them agreed.
The Sea Spirit turned south once again. The waters were smooth enough, but this time there was a different feeling in the air – a tension on board ship that had not been there before. And it had nothing to do with the presence of five women among the crew of some twenty men.
"We're getting near the Cape now," said Maeve to the others, as they prepared to lie down to sleep one night.
"I know," said Ruby quietly. "Cape Horn."
"Dangerous?" asked Eulalie.
"You could say that," said Jemima.
"We'd better sleep while we can," added Hattie.
They all lay down and got as comfortable as they ever could on the very crude pallet – but it soon became evident that sleep was evading them. "All I can think about is how rough they say it is to go around the Horn," said Ruby.
"Me, too," said Hattie.
"I'm trying not to think about it at all," said Maeve.
"But I don't think that will help," said Eulalie.
Jemima sat up. "Maybe we should talk about something else."
"What?" asked Maeve.
Jemima grinned. "What else? The men we're going to meet and marry!"
CHAPTER TEN
"You start, Maeve," said Hattie. "What sort of man do you hope to meet out in Sawyerville?"
Maeve sat up on the crude pallet they all shared down in the hold, leaning back on the wall in the darkness as the ship moved smoothly on its way.
"Well, now," she began. "I want a man who won't argue with me. A man who will listen to my advice. Do things my way."
The other four were silent. Then they all broke out laughing. "Since when do men listen to women, Maeve?" asked Ruby.
Maeve shrugged. "My father and I worked together on our farm, scratching out a living for ourselves and Mama and my four brothers and sisters. As Daddy got older, he let me make more and more of the decisions. Pretty soon I ran the place myself. And we did all right."
"Then . . . how'd you end up at the mill?" asked Hattie.
"Daddy died. Then Mama, two years later. The younger ones went to live with aunts and uncles. I couldn't work the farm alone. The mill let me earn my own way. But it's no life. You all know that."
"Sure do," said Eulalie.
"I figure I'll fit in just fine out at a logging camp. Those men work long days. I think they'd be grateful for a woman who can take care of things and will do what needs to be done when I tell him. He'll learn quick enough that I'm good for that. We'll get along just fine."
The rest of them nodded.
"I'd like that sort of thing, too," sai
d Eulalie. "A strong and responsible men who will work hard and provide."
"And who wants a family," added Jemima.
"I'll admit," said Hattie, "that I'd sure like to have a home of my own, with room enough to be comfortable, and plenty of good food, and wool to make warm shawls and blankets . . . "
"How wonderful that would be," said Ruby. "I don't think I'll ever forget living in that freezing dormitory. I'd do almost anything if it meant I'd never again have to be a mill girl."
***
On a very cold, clear day in mid-February, Delilah Marie Michaels struggled to see over the heads of the nine other women in front of her as they all gathered together on the New York docks beside the SS Michigan. "How big is the ship?" she asked, trying to stretch up on tiptoe to get a look at it.
"It's big," said Ellie Benson, her closest friend. "Oh! They're ready for us. Come on! Stay up here with me!"
Ellie grabbed hold of Delilah and pulled her up onto the wide gangplank, and then Delilah got a good look at the steamship that would be their home for at least the next four weeks. The two of them picked up their bags and made their way on board.
It was very large, some two hundred feet long and thirty feet wide, and had three tall masts with sails. But the real power was supplied by the two enormous paddle wheels, one in the center of each side, driven by steam from the coal-fired boilers deep within the ship.
But Delilah and Ellie and the eight other young women on their way to Sawyerville had little time to see the ship, for they were all hurried directly down to steerage to settle in. "Over a hundred people down here, four to a tiny room," grumbled Delilah, throwing her threadbare carpet-sided bag onto the narrow bunk. "I think I'd rather be back at the mill."
Ellie glanced up. "Oh, you can't mean that. You're going to be living in a cabin of your own with a warm stove of your own and no end of wood to fire it, along with all the fresh meat and good food you could ever want."
