The Watermen: Selections From Chesapeake by James A. Michener
That was it, a clean-cut rugged race of up-and-back with no furbelows or fancy diagrams. When this was agreed, the drinking began and some of the crews did not get to bed till dawn. Owen Steed, who by now was totally immersed in the race, got his men home reasonably early and felt that the Eden had a good chance, unless Captain Boggs got an early edge, in which case he would be tough to beat.
Prizes for the race were not exorbitant: $75 to every boat that lined up for the start, and an additional $50 to each one that finished. The Bugle awarded a silver cup plus first prize of $100, second of $50 and third of $25, but most of the crews put together purses for wagers against boats of their class. The Deal Island men were especially eager to gamble, and Captain Boggs’ Nelly Benson would go to the line with some $400 placed against various other boats.
The commodore for the race was a surprise, and a pleasant one. By acclamation, the watermen wanted Pusey Paxmore to serve as starter; in the old days he had been a man aloof, working at the White House and rather withdrawn from river life, but now that he had served time in jail he was more like them, and they insisted that since his family had built the oldest boats in the competition, the Eden and two others, his presence was obligatory. He had wanted to decline, but the Steeds would not permit it.
Since the race occurred in October, just before the start of the oystering season, the twenty-three skipjacks were in prime condition: all had been hauled out to have their bottoms painted, and all had been cleaned up on deck, their dredges neatly stacked, their lines coiled. Mr. Steed had purchased a complete new dress for the Eden: for halyards dacron rigging because of its inflexible strength; for docking lines and anchor cable nylon because it did yield. He had gone to Henry Brown down at the tip of Deal Island for new sails and he had specified canvas rather than dacron because the stitching in the latter chafed too easily. In its eighty-six years the Eden had rarely looked better.
The race was to start at the edge of the mud flats west of Devon Island, run up to Patamoke Light, turn it and tack back to a line between Devon and the mainland. A skipjack race started in a peculiar way: the boats jockeyed till they were in a straight line, then dropped anchors and lowered sails, waiting for the gun that would spring them loose.
It was a tense moment, for the honor of every settlement on the shore was at stake—the rough watermen of Deal Island against the dudes of the Choptank. Each boat had a crew of six experts, plus seven or eight casual hands to man the lines. The Eden had five extra Turlocks and two Caters, each with his own job to do. Little Sam Cater, aged nine, would perch as far aft as posible and stare at the water, prepared to utter his warning cry, ‘Mud! Mud!’
‘You can fire, Pusey,’ one of the judges said, and what ensued made devotees of regular racing shudder. On each of the anchored skipjacks four men began hauling in the anchor while a team of two pulled heavily on the halyards that raised the huge mainsail. Since the crews worked at uneven speeds, some boats got under way quicker than others, which meant that they were free to cut across the path of the slow starters, impeding them further. But sometimes the early boats miscalculated, and the slow starters generated enough speed to ram their opponents and delay them. When this happened, crews from both boats cursed and threw things and tried to cut rigging.
One of the judges, a gentleman from a Long Island yacht club, said as the big boats slammed into one another, ‘This isn’t racing. This is marine suicide.’ And when Pusey Paxmore said, with some relief, ‘We got them off to a good start,’ the visitor replied, ‘Start? Good God, they’re all disqualified.’
The first leg was a long run eastward with the wind directly aft, and Captain Boggs depended upon this to give him an early advantage; indeed, it looked as if he might outdistance the field, but the Eden and the old H.M. Willing from Tilghman lagged only a short distance behind. The latter was a memorable boat; it had been sunk twice, refitted three times: ‘Cain’t be more than seven percent of the original timbers left. All rebuilt, but she’s still the H.M. Willing, because it ain’t the timbers that determines a boat, it’s the spirit.’
‘We’re in good shape,’ Captain Cater assured his crew, ‘because in ten minutes we swing onto a starboard run, and then we fly.’
He was right. Halfway to Patamoke the skipjacks had to veer to the southeast, which meant that the strong wind would blow from the starboard quarter, the exact advantage the Eden needed. How she leaped forward! Her great boom swung out to port; her bow cut deep; she heeled well over and rode on the chine.
‘Stand back, you Black Bastard!’ Captain Absalom shouted as his boat passed the Nelly Benson and headed for the turn at Patamoke Light.
A real yachtsman who had twice raced to Bermuda watched the turn in frozen amazement; when the Eden negotiated it this gentleman said to people near him, ‘Why, that man broke six rules! Doesn’t anybody say anything?’ A waterman who heard the question replied, ‘They better not.’
When the turn was completed, it was traditional for the cook to break out a spread and for the first mate to open the portable refrigerators for beer. From here on, the race became a little looser, for emptied beer cans refilled with water began flying through the air, and men with long poles tried drunkenly to impede their competitors.
The food aboard the Eden was excellent: ham hocks and lima beans, krees, as the watermen pronounced the biting watercress, biscuits and honey with large slabs of yellow cheese. But as each plate was wiped clean, its owner began staring toward the cook’s shack, and in due time Amos Turlock appeared with a wide grin, to announce, ‘Gentlemen, we got pie-melon pie!’ and the crew cheered. When he brought the first pies on deck he said, ‘We got lemon on the sour side, vanilla on the sweet, and Sam gets first choice.’ He carried two pies, brown-crusted and rich, aft to where the boy watched for mud, and the lad said, ‘I takes lemon,’ and a large chunk was cut.
A pie-melon was a kind of gourd raised along the edges of cornfields, and when properly peeled and stewed, it produced one of the world’s great pies, succulent, tasty, chewy when burned a bit and unusually receptive to other flavors; the proportion was usually three lemon to two vanilla, and today that tradition held, but as the men ate, little Sam shouted, ‘Mud! Mud!’ and this meant that the centerboard had touched bottom. This did not imperil the skipjack, but if the drag continued, its racing speed would be impeded, so two men jumped to the pendant of the centerboard and raised it until the lad cried, ‘No mud! No mud!’ and this meant that the Eden was making maximum speed, and that its centerboard rode as deep as practical to ensure adequate protection against lateral drift.
It was now apparent that the race would be decided on the two final tacks, and although the Nelly Benson had picked up a slight lead on the port tack, the boats must soon switch to starboard, and there the advantage would move to the Eden. ‘We’re in strong position!’ Captain Absalom cried encouragingly, but as he prepared to jibe, Captain Boggs ordered seven of his crewmen aft to launch a barrage of water-filled beer cans at the wheel of the Eden, and Captain Cater had to step back to avoid being maimed. In that moment the Eden lost headway; the sails flapped; and whatever advantage the Patamoke boat might have gained was dissipated.
But the Eden was not powerless. As soon as Absalom regained the wheel, he shipped his skipjack onto a course that would allow its bowsprit to rake the stern of the enemy, and when his tactic became evident the Deal Islanders cursed and threw more beer cans, but Absalom hunkered down, swung his wheel and watched with satisfaction as his long bowsprit swept the Nelly Benson, cutting a halyard and forcing the crew to quit their bombardment and try to put together a jury rig that would enable them to finish the race. They did this with such promptness that they entered the final tack only a few yards behind the Eden and well ahead of the others.
Captain Boggs now showed why his men called him the Black Bastard. Raising his sails to maximum height, keeping his keel as close to the wind as possible, he started to overtake the Eden, and when it appeared that he would succeed, he s
‘Fend off, back there!’ Captain Absalom shouted, but it was too late. The Nelly Benson crunched on, her bowsprit raking the Eden, and by some hellish luck it banged into a gasoline can carried in accordance with the rule that each boat must be in working dress. The can bumped along the deck, emptying some of its contents before it bounced overboard. The volatile liquid spread rapidly, with one long finger rushing into the galley where Amos Turlock was cleaning up.
A great flame filled the galley and flashed along the deck. Amos, finding himself ablaze, had the presence of mind to run topside and leap into the river. Hugo Pflaum, suspecting that his ancient enemy could not swim, as most watermen could not, grabbed a rope and jumped in after him, and so spontaneous was Pflaum’s action that he was able to reach the struggling cook and hold him fast as men on deck pulled the heavy pair back to the Eden.
All hands turned to fighting fire, except Captain Absalom, who kept to the wheel, hoping that the starboard tack would allow his boat to pull ahead, but when confusion was at its greatest, the boy aft began to shout, ‘Mud!’ and Absalom bellowed, ‘Man the centerboard,’ but there was none to hear, so he indicated that the boy should quit his post and try to haul up the dragging board.
A centerboard is a huge affair, often made of oak and a task for two grown men, so the boy accomplished nothing. ‘Take the wheel!’ Absalom shouted and the boy ran aft to steer the skipjack, while his father ran to the rope attached to the aft end of the centerboard and tugged on it mightily. It rose a few inches and the dragging ceased.
With the fire under control, the Patamoke crew turned to the job of bringing their damaged boat to the finish line. They had lost their lead, but they kept in mind that this was a starboard tack. With burned hands and sooty faces they began to cheer and throw beer cans and trim their sails, but they were impeded by a situation which had never before developed in a skipjack race: the intense heat of the gasoline fire had melted some of the dacron lines into blobs of expensive goo. But Patamoke men were ingenious, and the crew found ways to improvise substitutes and to pass their shortened lines through sheaves and thus keep their boat moving.
It was to be a photo finish, with the Nelly Benson slightly ahead, the Eden closing vigorously. Crews of the trailing skipjacks began to cheer and big Hugo Pflaum with two of the black crewmen stood forward to repel any new assaults.
‘We can make it!’ Amos Turlock bellowed, throwing beer cans like mad at Captain Boggs. But the Deal Island men knew how to handle their boat, and while the Eden crew was working on their sails they heard the cannon. The race was over and they were forty seconds from the line. The cup, the money, the honor—all were lost. The deck was scarred with flame, their fingers burned with gasoline.
‘Damn,’ Absalom growled as the Eden crossed.
‘We almost made it,’ his son said.
‘Ain’t nothin’ in the world pays off on near-’ems ’ceptin horseshoes.’
‘It was fun,’ the boy said.
‘Fun!’ his father exploded. ‘Goddamnit, we lost!’
That night, when the crews assembled to celebrate and collect their awards, Absalom had the graciousness to approach Captain Boggs, shake his hand and admit, ‘You won fair and square.’ Those standing nearby cheered and the Deal Islander said modestly, ‘God was on our side. Ninety-nine times out of a hunnerd we wouldn’t of hit that gasoline can.’ And Absalom conceded, ‘That’s how the dice rolls.’
Mr. Steed, elated by the showing of the Eden and pleased to have been accepted into Choptank life so quickly, delivered the final judgment on the race: ‘All things considered, we gained a moral victory.’
The fact that Hugo Pflaum saved the life of Amos Turlock during the fire aboard the Eden did not mean that the stubborn old warden relaxed his determination to capture The Twombly. In semi-retirement, the thick-necked German reported to his office only three mornings a week, but whenever he saw the empty space on his wall of pictures, he resolved anew to find that gun.
His superiors in Annapolis were neither amused nor patient. Tor thirty-nine years you’ve been telling us, ‘I’ll find that gun any day now.” Where in hell is it?’
‘We think it’s hidden close to where the old marsh used to be. And we know he’s using it because on some mornings when he comes to town we can smell powder on his clothes.’
‘Sign out a warrant and search his trailer.’
‘I been through that trailer four times when he was out. Found nothing.’
It was decided that since Amos used the gun as many as nine or ten times each season, he must keep it hidden somewhere close to the trailer, and Pflaum was directed to hold the place under surveillance, but this raised more difficulties than it solved, for the Turlock establishment had certain extraordinary features. From the enthusiastic potteries in North Carolina, Amos had enlarged his collection of lawn statuary to twenty-one major items, and casual passers-by were usually on hand to admire the art collection. Older people liked the white cement replica of an Italian marble; it showed a naked girl scrunched over from the waist, her hands in position to hide those parts deemed most vulnerable. But children preferred Santa Claus and his eight reindeer.
When Pflaum initiated his regular spying, things were complicated by the fact that Amos had imported an ensemble of eight fairly large pieces which gladdened his heart: Snow White accompanied by seven dwarfs, each carved with maximum cuteness. When trailed across the lawn, the sculptures captivated the public, and the local policeman said approvingly, ‘Sort of rounds things out. More grass to trim by hand, but also more fun for ever’body.’
Hugo, seeing the eight additions for the first time, said, ‘Place looks even junkier than when it was a shack,’ and this was true, for in the old days the cabin, weathered and dilapidated though it was, had shared the dignity of the surrounding woods. But this chrome trailer with its little picket fence and lawn sculptures had been offensive at birth and got worse as it grew older.
What Pflaum particularly disliked was the stiff manner in which Amos had placed the three dwarfs Smiley, Bashful and Grumpy. ‘He’s got them lined up as if they were soldiers. The others, he at least has them strung out.’ He was so offended by the awful aesthetic of this lawn, and so irritated by his failure to find the gun, that one morning he pushed open the low gate guarding the path to the trailer, then jumped back as a hidden spring triggered a set of auto: mobile horns which sounded Do ye ken John Peel?
Alerted, Amos Turlock came to the Dutch door and opened the top half. ‘Do you like the tune, Hugo? Me bein’ a hunter and all that?’
The klaxon greeting had been the last straw, so without extending the amenities Hugo said, ‘Amos, I want you to turn in the gun.’
‘What gun?’
‘The Twombly. I know you have it hidden, and I know you love it. But the time’s come, Amos. I want it.’
‘I haven’t had my hands on that gun—’
‘You fired it four nights ago.’
‘How would you know?’
‘Up and down the river, Turlocks eating geese.’
‘We’re good hunters, Hugo, all of us.’
‘You are good, and you don’t need that old cannon any longer.’
‘Where could I hide a gun twelve feet long?’ With a generous gesture he invited the warden to inspect the trailer, and even shouted, ‘Midge, have we got a gun in there?’
‘We sure have,’ his toothless paramour called back, and forthwith she produced a shotgun. Amos laughed, and Pflaum said, ‘I should of let you drown.’ Then his irritation got the better of him, and he said, ‘Those seven dwarfs look like hell,’ and with that judgment he stomped off the premises.
Five nights later, when there was a strong frost in the air and no moon to betray the midnight hunter, Amos summoned Rafe, the grandson in whom he had most confidence. ‘We ain’t obliged to get ourselves some geese, because we ain’t finished the ones we got last time, but
At eleven he and Rafe left the trailer, walked out into the yard, bent down and cautiously pulled on two rings hidden in the grass on which the three dwarfs stood: Smiley, Bashful, Grumpy. Slowly the dwarfs rose in the air, falling backward from a grave twelve feet long. It was a scene from a Dracula movie—even the hinge creaked—except that when the grave was opened, it revealed not a vampire but The Twombly.
With loving care Amos lifted it, stared at the moonless sky and told Rafe, ‘Fetch the dog,’ and as the Chesapeake bounded out of the trailer, Amos lowered the lid, checked the three dwarfs and led the way through the woods to where the skiffs lay hidden.
It was a perfect night for goose hunting, cold but not blustery, starry but with no moon. When they reached the spot where La Trappe River joined the Choptank they detected large numbers of fowl rafting at the proper distance, and as Amos primed his massive gun and checked the seating of its stock against the bags of pine needles, he whispered to his grandson, ‘Best thing a man can do in this world is hunt, or fish, or go arsterin’. God put all these things down here for us to enjoy, but He hid ’em so’s only a resolute man can catch ’em. It’s our manly duty to try.’
As he sighted along the polished barrel of The Twombly, he saw the glimmer of Orion and he showed the boy how that constellation stalked through the heavens, a mighty hunter seeking game. ‘It ain’t by chance he comes out in winter. Stands up there to protect us … and the gun.’ Softly he touched the brass cannon, and then asked, ‘How old are you, Rafe?’
‘Ten.’
‘God A’mighty, boy, this here gun is fifteen times older’n you are. Think of it, fifteen different boys your age coulda’ cared for this gun, and now it’s your responsibility.’