The Watermen: Selections From Chesapeake by James A. Michener
With a giant embrace, Big Jimbo caught the exhausted man, clutched him to his bosom and pressed water from his lungs as the men aboard the Jessie T pulled on the rope to drag the two men aboard. At supper that night, after the oysters had been sold and the profits calculated, the six watermen joined hands as Caveny poured out their thanks:
‘Almighty God, Thou didst send the storm much like the one that swamped the fishermen on Galilee, and in Thy wisdom Thou didst sweep our sailor Ned from us. But just as Thou didst rescue Jonah after forty days and forty nights in the belly of the whale, so didst Thou urge our nigger Big Jimbo to dive into the rolling waters to save Ned. St. Patrick, patron saint of fishermen, we thank thee for thy intervention. Greater love hath no man.’
When the prayer ended, everyone had objections: ‘The forty days and forty nights were Noah and the ark, not Jonah.’
‘They were both a long time,’ Caveny said. ‘I thought Ned was gone.’
‘Last week you said St. Peter was our patron saint.’
‘A fisherman needs all the help he can get,’ Caveny said.
‘You should of finished the last bit.’ And Captain Jake misquoted, ‘ “Greater love hath no man than this, that he lay down his life for his brother.” ’
‘I didn’t forget. I just thought Ned might take it unkindly, bein’ told he was brother to a nigger.’
With the near-drowning of Ned Turlock, the suspicion that the Jessie T might be a bad-luck boat gained so much credence that Captain Jake found it difficult to enroll a crew. One cynic at the store reminded the men, ‘Like I told you, that skipjack was doomed from the start. Its centerboard is out of whack. Side-assed, you might say.’
And one of the Turlock boys who sailed in it confided, ‘Thing you really got to watch is Captain Jake. In the fall, when arsters is plentiful, he pays his crew a salary. Come winter, when they ain’t so many arsters, he smiles at you like an angel and says, “Boys, better we work on shares this time.” I ain’t sailin’ with him no more.’
When an Eastern Shore skipjack found itself unable to enroll a crew, it was traditional for the captain to make the big decision, which Captain Jake now did: ‘Caveny, we sail to Baltimore,’
With only Ned and Big Jimbo to help, they headed across the bay, past Lazaretto Light, past Fort McHenry, where the star-spangled banner had flown that troubled night, and into one of the finest small anchorages in the world, Baltimore’s inner harbor. Its merit was threefold: it lay right in the heart of the city; it was surrounded by hotels and stores and warehouses immediately at hand; and it was so protected by their tall buildings that no storm could imperil a ship docked there. Also, it was a joy for any ship’s cook to enter this harbor, because on the waterfront stood the huge McCormick Spice Company, its odors permeating the area, its shelves crammed with condiments the cooks sought.
As the Jessie T approached her wharf in the corner formed by Light Street, where the white steamers docked, and Pratt Street, where the skipjacks tied up and the saloons clustered, Captain Jake warned his companions to be especially alert. ‘We may have to pull out of here in a hurry,’ he said. ‘Jimbo, you guard the boat while Tim and me goes ashore to tend to our business.’
‘Cap’m,’ the big cook said, ‘I watch the boat, but first I got to get me some spices,’ and as soon as the Jessie T made fast, Big Jimbo was off to McCormick’s, returning with a small, precious package which he stowed below.
Now Turlock and Caveny started toward the row of saloons, and as they swaggered ashore, Jimbo called out, ‘Good luck, Cap’m. I be waitin’.’
There was one saloon, the Drunken Penguin, at which captains needing crew often had success, so it was natural that the two watermen should head there. ‘What a fine sign!’ Caveny exclaimed as he saw for the first time the besotted penguin leering at him. Turlock, ignoring the art criticism, banged into the swinging doors with his shoulder, and smashed his way into the darkened bar, standing for a moment to survey the familiar scene. When he moved to a table at the rear, two young men who recognized him as an Eastern Shore skipper quietly rose and slipped out a side door.
He and Caveny had a beer, then a plate of food from the free lunch. ‘Many people droppin’ by?’ Jake asked the bartender.
‘Nope,’ the barman said, wiping a glass much longer than required. ‘They’s mostly at the other places.’
‘They’ll be comin’ in,’ Jake said as he attacked his food. ‘Tim, fetch me another pickled egg.’
There was no action that first afternoon, and Caveny suggested they explore some other bars, but Jake refused. ‘In other years I’ve found what I wanted here. We’ll find it this time, too.’
Toward dusk laborers from sites nearby dropped in for their evening beer, and Caveny said, ‘Reminds me of those great opening lines of Grey’s Energy:
‘Homeward at the close of day
The weary workmen come.
Tired with their honest toil
And all lit up with rum.’
Midnight approached and nothing happened. ‘I told you they was at the other bars,’ the barman said.
‘I heard you,’ Jake grunted, and that night he and Tim slept sitting at their table. Dawn broke, and along Light Street came carriages with passengers for the early steamers, and soon Pratt Street was alive with draymen. The heavy business of Baltimore was under way.
At about nine o’clock in the morning the two watermen were wide awake, and Tim suggested, ‘I ain’t never seen Hotel Rennert. Let’s see where our arsters goes.’ So the two watermen walked a dozen blocks in the clean, brisk air, crossed a park and stood on the Belgian blocks that surfaced all the streets near the great hostelry. ‘Magnificence brought down from heaven to earth,’ Caveny said. When Turlock made no reply, the Irishman pointed to the towering façade and the beribboned doorman. ‘It’s an honor to provide arsters to such an establishment.’ Again there was no response, so Tim plucked at his captain’s sleeve. ‘Jake, I think St. Peter, patron of us sailors, would look upon it kindly if we had a beer at the Rennert, seein’ as how we help keep it in business.’
‘St. Peter might look kindly, but that flunky wouldn’t,’ Jake said, pointing to his rough clothes and Tim’s unshaven face.
‘There’s always welcome to an honest workman,’ Caveny replied, and he strode up to the doorman and said, ‘My good man, Captain Turlock and I provide the arsters used in your establishment. Would you extend the courtesy of allowin’ us to enjoy a beer?’ Before the surprised functionary could respond, Caveny said grandly, ‘At our expense, of course.’
‘Are you indeed oystermen?’ the doorman asked.
‘That we are,’ Caveny replied, ‘best of the bay. Which is why Rennert buys from us.’
‘Gentlemen, the oyster bar is through that door. I feel sure you will be welcomed.’
Gingerly Jake Turlock entered the mahogany-lined room. There was the glistening bar of which he had heard, the black man shucking in the corner, the chalked board proclaiming the many varieties of oysters available, and three men in business suits having an early snack. It was a handsome room, ideal for the purpose to which it was dedicated.
‘My good man,’ Caveny said to the barman in charge, ‘my mate and I catch the arsters you sell here.’
‘Is that true?’ the bartender said.
‘As true as I stand before you like the honest fisherman I am.’
‘And would you be wantin’ to sample the oysters you’ve caught?’
‘God forbid that we should come all the way to Baltimore to eat arsters. What we want is a cold beer.’
‘And that you shall have,’ the barman said. ‘Compliments of the Rennert.’
‘We can pay,’ Caveny said.
‘I’m sure you can, but we rarely see our oystermen, and this beer is on the house.’
Caveny sipped his beer as if he were a gentleman, making various observations on the quality of the hotel. As he placed his glass on the bar, depositing it gently with ten fingers embracing it, he asked,
‘From sailors like yourselves …’
‘Watermen,’ Caveny corrected, and onto the bar he tossed a sum of coins which would have covered not only the two beers but also a generous tip. ‘This is a grand hotel,’ he told Turlock as they returned to the street, but Jake merely said, ‘Back to the Drunken Penguin. You never know when they’ll straggle in.’
The first prospect arrived at two that afternoon, an Englishman about twenty-four years old, seedy, bleary-eyed, underfed. He had just enough money to purchase a beer, which entitled him to gorge on the free lunch.
Turlock, watching his ravenous appetite, nodded to Caveny, who moved to the bar. ‘From the fair city of Dublin, I’m sure.’
‘London,’ the Englishman said.
‘None finer in the world, I always say. Would you be offended if I suggested another beer?’
The young man was not disposed to argue about such an invitation, but when the drink was paid for, and the glass stood empty on the bar, he discovered the heavy cost of this courtesy, for suddenly he was grabbed from behind by the strong arms of a man he could not see, and his generous friend Timothy Caveny was bashing him in the face. He fainted, and when he revived, found himself bound hand and foot in the cabin of a strange boat, with a very large black man standing guard and threatening to knife him if he made one move.
Jake and Tim returned to the Drunken Penguin, resumed their seats at the back table and waited. After dark a young man came into the bar, loudly announced he was from Boston, waiting for his ship to arrive from New Orleans; he lounged awhile, had a desultory beer and picked at the spiced beets, licking his fingers as he finished. He was a sturdy young fellow, and Caveny doubted that he could be easily subdued, so as the Bostonian looked aimlessly about the bar, Tim approached the bartender to make a whispered offer. It was accepted, and when Tim took his place at the young man’s elbow to propose a drink in honor of the great port of Boston, where Tim had served in many different ships, the glass was ready.
The Bostonian took one sip, looked at the bubbles, then placed the glass on the bar. ‘Drink up!’ Tim said brightly, gulping down a large portion of his own drink.
‘I’d like a pickled beet,’ the young sailor said.
‘Best food in the world with beer,’ Caveny said as he passed the glass bowl along.
The sailor ate two beets, took three gulps of his beer and fell flat on the floor. ‘Grab his feet!’ Captain Turlock ordered, and watchers at the bar, who had seen this operation before, stepped reverently back as Jake and Tim lugged their second hand to the Jessie T.
When a crew had been conscripted in this way, a captain was afraid to put into port over weekends lest his men desert. He stayed out on the Chesapeake during the whole fall season, loading oysters onto the buy-boats, picking up fresh food from them when necessary and watching his shanghaied men every minute to prevent their escape.
‘Don’t feel sorry for yourselves,’ Captain Turlock told the two men. ‘You get paid just like everyone else. By Christmas you’ll be rich.’
The impressed seamen had to work like slaves. They threw the dredges into the water; they pulled them up; they sloshed them when there was mud; they stayed on their knees hours and days at a time picking through the haul; and when the buy-boat came, it was they who shoveled the oysters into the metal buckets.
Oystermen had a hundred clever tricks for hoodwinking shanghaied helpers: ‘Well, you see, the earnin’s I’ve been quotin’ ain’t clear profit. You’ve got to pay for the clothes we provide, the gloves, and so forth.’ They also had to pay for their food. Also deducted were fees for mending the dredges, the cost of new ropes.
Captain Turlock favored a simpler method: ‘You men are gettin’ richer by the day.’
‘When can we go ashore?’ the Englishman asked.
‘You mean, when can you leave our boat?’
‘In a manner of speaking, yes.’
‘At Christmas,’ Turlock promised, and Caveny added, ‘On that holy day all men yearn to be with their families.’
During the third week of December, when ice formed on fingers, the two impressed seaman came to the aft cabin and demanded to speak with Turlock. ‘We want your promise that we’ll be off this boat by Christmas.’
‘You have my solemn promise,’ Turlock said. And then, to make the deal binding, he added, ‘Mr. Caveny will swear to that, won’t you, Tim?’
‘As sure as the moon rises over Lake Killarney,’ Caveny assured them, ‘you’ll be off this boat by Christmas.’
Two days before that holiday, when the last buy-boat had loaded itself with oysters, Captain Turlock convened his crew in the galley and said brightly, ‘Jimbo, if one of the lads could fetch you some milk at Deal Island, could you make us a mess of he-stew?’
‘I likes to,’ the big cook said, and Turlock studied the two shanghaied crewmen. ‘You go,’ he said to the Bostonian. Then, as if changing his mind for some deep philosophical reason, he said to the smaller man, ‘Better you take the pail. I want to talk wages with this one.’ So the Englishman grabbed the pail and went on deck.
Caveny, Jimbo and Ned Turlock followed him up to maneuver the Jessie T into the dock at Deal Island, so that the Englishman could step ashore to find his milk. While this was under way, Captain Turlock engaged the Boston man in serious conversation. ‘Where will you be headin’ with the pay we’re givin’ you?’
‘Home. I’ve a family waiting.’
‘They’ll be proud of the money you’re bringin’ ’em.’ The young man smiled bitterly, and Turlock said reassuringly, ‘You mustn’t feel angry. This is the way of the sea. You’ve learned about arsters and you’ve saved some money.’
Such moralizing was repugnant, in view of Turlock’s harsh commands on this cruise, and the Bostonian rose in some anger to go above, but the captain detained him by holding on to his arm. ‘Sit down, young fellow. We’ve taken a lot of arsters this trip and you’ll be takin’ a lot of money to Boston.’ He added other sanctimonious truisms, at the end of which the young man said, ‘Captain Turlock, you’re a fraud. You’re an evil man, and you know it.’ In disgust he moved toward the ladder, but this time Turlock interposed himself physically, saying, ‘I cannot allow you to depart in bitterness … before we’ve discussed your wages.’ And the talk continued.
On deck the others understood why their captain was keeping the Bostonian below, for when the Englishman started ashore with his pail, Caveny yelled, ‘The house at the far end,’ and as the young man started off toward the little fishing village, the Irishman gave a signal, and Ned Turlock at the wheel swung the skipjack away from the dock and back into the bay.
‘Hey!’ the young man shouted as he saw his boat, and his wages, pull away. ‘Wait for me!’
There was no waiting. Relentlessly the oyster boat left the island and the young man standing with his empty pail. He was beached, ‘paid off with sand,’ as the watermen said of this common practice, and if he was lucky, he could straggle back to Baltimore at the end of two or three weeks, without recourse or any chance of ever recovering his wages for long months of work. Tim Caveny, watching him standing by the shore, said to his two companions, ‘I told him he’d be ashore by Christmas.’
When the Jessie T was well out from the dock, so that the abandoned man could no longer be seen, Captain Turlock bellowed from below, ‘Mr. Caveny, come down here and pay this man!’
When Caveny appeared in the galley, Turlock said forthrightly, ‘This man has honest grievances, which he’s expressed openly. Calculate every penny we owe him and pay him in full. I want him to remember us with kindness.’ And he went on deck, where he took the wheel.
With all the Irish charm at his command, Caveny reached for his account books, spread them on the table and assured the Bostonian, ‘You’ve worked hard and you’ve earned every penny,’ but as he was about to start handing over the cash, there was a wild clatter on deck.
The young sailor from Boston leaped automatically up the companionway, not noticing that the paymaster remained stolidly at the table. Bursting through the cabin door and leaping forward to help in whatever emergency had struck, he arrived on deck just in time to see the massive boom sweeping down on him at a speed that was incredible. With a great cry he thrust his hands before his face, failed to break the blow and screamed as the thundering boom pitched him wildly into the muddy waves.
Now the four Patamoke men lined the railing of their skipjack and shouted instructions: ‘You can make it to shore. Just walk. Put your feet down and walk.’
They were distressed when he flopped and flailed, too terrified by his sudden immersion to control himself. ‘Just walk ashore!’ Captain Turlock bellowed. ‘It’s not deep!’
At last the young fellow understood what the men on the disappearing boat were trying to say. Stumbling and cursing, he gained his footing, found the water no deeper than his armpits and started the long, cold march to Deal Island.
‘It’s a Christmas he’ll never forget,’ Tim Caveny said as the sailor struggled to safety. There were now only four to share this season’s riches, and when they gathered for their evening meal, two days before Christmas, they joined hands and listened attentively as Tim Caveny prayed:
‘Merciful and all-seein’ God who protects those who go upon the waves, we are poor fishermen who do the best we can. We go forth in our little boat so that others can eat. We toil in blizzards so that others can bide at home. We thank Thee that Thou hast brought us safely through this long and dangerous cruise, and we ask Thy continued blessing on our wives and children.’
Oyster dredging had ended for 1892; this night the buy-boats would rest in Baltimore. Tenderly the Jessie T came about, steadied her sails and headed home. The watermen would always remember that Christmas as one of the best in their lives, for the weather was crisp, with a bright sun during the day and a helpful mistiness in the moonless nights. They had a lot of hunting to catch up with, because guarding their shanghaied crew had prevented them from enjoying their guns during the prime months of November and December; they went out every night.