‘That is exactly what we seek in Canada,’ said Robert Norris, seeking something else as well, to keep the evening civil.
‘You’ll find it, sir, so long as you’re not frightened of hard work, plain food … and ice! They’ve winters there that make the weather here seem tropical.’ The captain called along the table to a stringy, grey-haired sailor, the one whom Walter Howells had hauled out of the sea that day. ‘John Peacock, tell these good people that tale we had the other night, about the frozen boat.’ Anything to keep Smith quiet!
John Peacock put his pipe down on his plate and, winking at his comrades, commenced with ‘It was last October and …’ He told — in fixed and tested sentences which seemed as mannered as a psalm — how two brothers from below Quebec agreed to row a gentleman from Boston across the St Lawrence to the southern bank: ‘They should’ve known better. At that time of year! But they couldn’t refuse the fare he’d promised them. They’d end up rich, and wouldn’t have to row a boat again, except to get back home. And why go home when you are rich? They got midstream. And then they felt the tugging on the oars and something banging up against the boat. They thought it must be beavers, snapping at the wood. A beaver’s got more tooth than brain. But it was ice. And ice with teeth that’s worse than beavers’ teeth. It lay hold of the keel. And all their rowing, all their prayers, all their cursing language, couldn’t get them to the bank.’
The Norrises were grimacing, not sure how seriously to take the sailor’s tale. The talk of storms and ice was not encouraging.
‘Perhaps we’d better take a passage to Australia,’ said Katie. ‘They’ve no ice there.’
‘There’s ice-mountains floating in the Tasman Sea,’ said Aymer. ‘You should read the journals of Captain James Cook or Sir Joseph Banks. They had their share of bergs off Botany Bay …’
Comstock hushed Aymer with the flat of his hand (the selfsame hushing gesture that Matthias, his brother, used) and said, impatiently, ‘Listen, sir, if you will. He’s not done yet. Come on now, John. Let’s hear the end of it.’
‘The end of it is that the brothers’ boat was frosted into solid water, so suddenly they hadn’t any chance of being saved,’ continued John Peacock, looking Katie Norris in the face.
‘Why did they not simply walk ashore on solid ice?’ asked Aymer. He would not be an uninquiring listener.
‘Like penguins, sir?’
‘Why not, indeed?’
‘Because their hands were frozen to the oars and — excusing me my language, Captain, and the lady — their backsides had iced on to the boat …’
‘Then why not shout for help?’
‘Ah, when they opened up their mouths, to cry for help, as you advise them, Mr Smith, their tongues and lips were welded by the cold.’ He pointed at the Norrises. ‘You’ll need to watch for that when we set sail for Canada. Best not to talk on deck.’ For once the laughter from the parlour matched the drunken din in the Commercial. ‘Their families drove a cart and horses out on the ice to rescue them. They lit a fire — midstream — to thaw them out. But that hard river ice did not give way. Nor did the boatmen or their passenger begin to melt. It wasn’t till mid-March that the ice released the boat. And then it went downstream towards the sea before it could be saved.’ He held a finger to his lips. ‘It isn’t over yet.’ He picked his pipe up, drew on it to keep the tobacco burning. He made the silence at the table last. He took his time. He much preferred to smoke than talk.
Now — his voice macadamized by nicotine — he told the diners at the inn how the brothers and their passenger floated down the St Lawrence ‘sitting as straight as three proud men in church’, with backbones of ice and oars frozen to their hands. ‘You’d think they were alive,’ he said. ‘Or ghosts.’
‘They were picked up within a day by a sailing ship. She was the Lizzie Wilce, and she was heading out off Anticosti Island in the Gulf for Liverpool. The boatmen and the Bostonian had been dead five months. But they looked as fresh as eels. The captain tried to bring them round with slaps across their backs. And brandy. He thawed them out in front of the little grate in his cabin. Two of them had to be buried at sea. They stank like mackerel. The third, though, looked more like salmon. He had a touch of pink around the gills. So they put him in a hip-bath and covered him in steaming towels and let him soak. By the time the Lizzie Wilce had crossed the mid-Atlantic ridge the man was calling out for grog. And by the time they’d reached the Irish Sea he was full enough of life to win ten dollars off the captain in a game of five’n’one. You’d never know he’d been iced up all winter. Except the ship’s surgeon had to cut away two toes. And half his nose. He could neither walk nor talk without a limp. He drank and gambled his way to Liverpool. He liked it there; the mildness of the winters, the thinness of the ice. He stayed. Now he’s got a chandler’s business, on the dock. He vows he’ll never step aboard a boat again, nor risk another nostril in the ice. I’ve seen the man myself. I bought this pipe off him. We shared a drink together. He told me how he’d lost his nose. I didn’t see his feet, or count his toes. Nor can I tell you who he was. One of the brothers? Or the Bostonian? He wouldn’t say, for fear of it getting back to his family. And every word is true. What say you, Mr Smith?’
‘I say, you’d think the way he spoke would give the man away,’ said Aymer, meaning to demonstrate his good humour. ‘What kind of accent did he have? I suppose a gentleman from Boston can be distinguished from a Canadian boatman.’ John Peacock pinched his own nose between his fingers. ‘I gould nod dell,’ he said. ‘I gould nod unterdand a wort he sait. He hagn’d gok no dose!’
‘Then, if you did not understand a word, how, how did this story …?’ said Aymer, but his question was drowned in the applause which Aymer took to be at his expense. Even Katie Norris had clapped her hands.
The captain slapped him on the back: ‘What would your chemists say to that?’
Aymer did his best to join the laughter. He clapped his hands too — a little late — and swung round on his seat to deflect their attention. He saw that Mrs Yapp, who’d been listening at the parlour door, had a pair of arms around her waist and was holding a man’s finger in her hand. It was Walter Howells, less muddy than he’d been but still with traces of the coast on the lappets of his jacket. He laughed longer than the rest, and then stepped forward to the table. ‘Captain Comstock. Good evening, sir.’ They shook hands. And then the agent offered his hand to Aymer, without the least trace of discomfort or apology. ‘Mr Smith. I’m pleased to see you so established in Wherrytown. You should have sent me word of your arrival.’ There was no choice for Aymer but to be civil.
‘Perhaps we should go to a quieter place so we can talk. I’ve bad news …’
‘There’s no news that’s so bad it won’t wait till tomorrow,’ Howells said. ‘Enjoy your supper and your beer. I’ve business with the captain for tonight. And they are pressing matters.’ He gave a short and portly bow to Mrs Norris, nodded at her husband, banged John Peacock on the back with a ‘Bravo, sir!’ and went out of the parlour with Captain Comstock at his heels.
Aymer did his best to recompose himself. He entertained the company with his opinions on Reform, Phrenology and Agriculture. He disclosed for them his whole budget of alerting anecdotes. When the treacle pudding was dished he refused his portion, and was admired for it, he thought, especially by Mrs Norris, who was unable to clear her plate entirely.
‘I take no sugar,’ he explained. ‘I eat my supper bitterly, but with good conscience, sugar being the consequence of slavery. Slave dust, that’s my name for it. There is no place for sweetness on my plate.’