CHAPTER XVI
_Describing How Billy Topsail Set out for Ruddy Cove with Her Majesty's Mail and Met with Catastrophe_
THROUGH the long, evil-tempered winter, when ice and high winds keepthe coasting boats from the outports, the Newfoundland mails arecarried by hand from settlement to settlement, even to the farthermostparts of the bleak peninsula to the north.
Arch Butt's link in the long chain was from Burnt Bay to Ruddy Cove.Once a week, come wind, blizzard or blinding sunlight, with fourdollars and a half to reward him at the end of it, he made the eightymiles of wilderness and sea, back and forth, with the mail-bag on hisbroad back.
No man of the coast, save he, dared face that stretch in all weathers.It may be that he tramped a league, skated a league, sailed a league,sculled a league, groped his way through a league of night, breastedhis way through a league of wind, picked his way over a league ofshifting ice.
To be sure, he chose the way which best favoured his progress andleast frayed the thread upon which his life hung.
"Seems t' me, b'y," he said to his mate from New Bay, when the greatgale of '98 first appeared in the northeast sky--"seems t' me we _may_make Duck Foot Cove the night, safe enough."
"Maybe, lad," was the reply, after a long, dubious survey of the risingclouds. "Maybe we'll get clear o' the gale, but 'twill be a close call,whatever (at any rate)."
"Maybe," said Arch. "'Twould be well t' get Her Majesty's mail so faras Duck Foot Cove, whatever."
When Arch Butt made Duck Foot Cove that night, he was on the back ofhis mate, who had held to him, through all peril, with such courageas makes men glorious. Ten miles up the bay, his right foot had beencrushed in the ice, which the sea and wind had broken into unstablefragments. Luff of New Bay had left him in the cottage of BillyTopsail's uncle, Saul Ride, by the Head, the only habitation in thecove, and made the best of his own way to the harbours of the westcoast of the bay. Three days' delay stared the Ruddy Cove mailman inthe face.
"Will you not carry the mail t' Ruddy Cove, Saul Ride?" he demanded,when he had dressed his foot, and failed, stout as he was, to bear thepain of resting his weight upon it.
"'Tis too far in a gale for my old legs," said Ride, "an'----"
"But 'tis Her Majesty's mail!" cried Arch. "Won't you try, b'y?"
"An I had a chance t' make it, I'd try, quick enough," said Ridesharply; "but 'twould be not only me life, but the mail I'd lose. Theice do be broken up 'tween here an' Creepy Bluff; an' not even ArchButt, hisself, could walk the hills."
"Three days lost!" Arch groaned. "All the letters three days late! An'all----"
"Letters!" Ride broke in scornfully. "Letters, is it? Don't you fretabout they. A love letter for the parson's daughter; the price o' fishfrom St. John's for the old skipper; an' a merchant's account for everyfisherman t' the harbour: they be small things t' risk life for."
The mailman laid his hand on the leather bag at his side. He fingeredthe government seal tenderly and his eyes flashed splendidly when helooked up.
"'Tis Her Majesty's mail!" he said. "Her Majesty's mail! Who knows whatthey be in this bag. Maybe, b'y--maybe--maybe they's a letter for oldAunt Esther Bludgel. She've waited this three year for a letter fromthat boy," he continued. "Maybe _'tis_ in there now. Sure, b'y, an' Ibelieve 'tis in there. Saul Ride, the mail must go!"
A touch of the bruised foot on the floor brought the mailman groaningto his chair again. If the mail were to go to Ruddy Cove that night,it was not to be carried on his back: that much was evident. Saul Ridegazed at him steadily for a moment. Something of the younger man's fineregard for duty communicated itself to him. There had been a time--thedays of his strength--when he, too, would have thought of duty beforedanger. He went abstractly to the foot of the loft stair.
"Billy!" he called. "Billy!"
"Ay, Uncle Saul," was the quick response.
"I wants you, b'y."
Billy Topsail came swiftly down the stair. He was spending a week withhis lonely Uncle Saul at Duck Foot Cove. A summons at that hour meantpressing service--need of haste. What was the call? Were they all wellat home? He glanced from one man to the other.
"B'y," said Ride, with a gesture towards the mail-bag, "will you carrythat bag to Ruddy Cove? Will----"
"Will you carry Her Majesty's mail t' Ruddy Cove?" Arch Butt burst out.His voice thrilled Billy, as he continued: "Her Majesty's mail!"
"'Tis but that black bag, b'y," Ride said quietly. "Will you take it t'Ruddy Cove t'-night? Please yourself about it."
"Ay," said Billy quickly. "When?"
"'Twill be light enough in four hours," said the mailman.
"Go back t' bed, b'y," Ride said. "I'll wake you when 'tis time t' beoff."
Five minutes later the boy was sound asleep.
* * * * *
No Newfoundlander ventures out upon the ice without his gaff--anine-foot pole, made of light, tough dog-wood, and iron-shod. It waswith his own true gaff that Billy felt his way out of Duck Foot Cove asthe night cleared away.
The sea had abated somewhat with the wind. In the bay beyond the cove,the broken ice was freezing into one vast, rough sheet, solid as thecoast rocks on the pans, but unsafe, and deceptive over the channelsbetween. The course was down the bay, skirting the shore, to CreepyBluff, then overland to Ruddy Cove, which is a port of the open sea: inall, twenty-one miles, with the tail of the gale to beat against.
"Feel every step o' the way till the light comes strong," had been oldSaul Ride's last word to the boy. "Strike hard with your gaff beforeyou put your foot down."
Billy kept his gaff before him--feeling his way much as a blind mantaps the pavement as he goes along a city street. The search for solidice led him this way and that, but his progress towards Creepy Bluff,the shadowy outline of which he soon could see, steadily continued. Hesurmised that it was still blowing hard in the open, beyond the shelterof the islands; and he wondered if the wind would sweep him off hisfeet when he essayed to cross Sloop Run, down which it ran, unbroken,from the sea to the bluff.
"Her Majesty's mail!" he muttered, echoing the thrill in the mailman'svoice. "Her Majesty's mail!"
When the light was stronger--but it was not yet break of day--hethought to make greater haste by risking more. Now and again he chancedhimself on a suspicious-looking black sheet. Now and again he rannimbly over many yards of rubber ice, which yielded and groaned, butdid not break. Often he ventured where Arch Butt would not have daredtake his massive body. All this he did, believing always that he shouldnot delay the Gull Arm mailman, who might even then be waiting for himin Ruddy Cove.
But when he had covered six miles of the route, he came to a widechannel which was not yet frozen over. It lay between two large pans.How far he might have to diverge from his course to cross without risk,he could not tell. He was impressed with the fact that, once across,the way lay clear before him--a long stretch of solid ice.
"Sure, I must cross here," he thought.
He sought for a large cake of floating ice, that he might ferry himselfacross with his gaff. None great enough to bear his weight was to beseen--none, at least, within reach of his gaff. There were small cakesa-plenty; these were fragments heavy enough to bear him for but aninstant. Could he cross on them? He thought he might leap from one tothe other so swiftly that none would be called upon to sustain his fullweight, and thus pass safely over.
With care he chose the path he would follow. Then, without hesitation,he leaped for the first cake--passed to the second--to the third--tothe fourth--stepping so lightly from one to the other that the waterdid not touch the soles of his boots. In a moment, he was whistling onhis way on the other side, leaving the channel ice bobbing excitedlybehind him.
Soon he broke off whistling and began to sing. On he trudged, pipingmerrily:
'Way down on Pigeon Pond Island, When daddy comes home from swilin',[6] Cakes and tea for breakfast, Pork and duff for dinner, Cakes and tea for supper,
'Way down on Pigeon Pond Island.
At noon he came to an expanse of bad ice. He halted at the edge of itto eat a bit of the hard bread and dried venison in his nunny-bag.Then, forward again! He advanced with great caution, sounding everystep, on the alert for thin places. A mile of this and he had grownweary. He was not so quick, not so sure, in his estimate of thestrength of the ice. The wind, now blowing in stronger gusts, broughtthe water to his eyes and impaired his sight. He did not regret hisundertaking, but he began ardently to wish that Creepy Bluff werenearer. Thus moved, his pace increased--with ever-increasing peril tohimself. He must make haste!
What befell the boy came suddenly. He trusted his feet to a drift ofsnow. Quick as a flash, and all unready, he was submerged in the waterbeneath.
FOOTNOTE:
[6] Sealing.
The Adventures of Billy Topsail Page 19
