If Two Are Dead

I scanned the panorama and was briefly entertained only by a flock of sandpipers on the shore. I walked back to sit on the bench. The ferry was still tied up on the far side. After a few seconds of self-irritation, I recalled I’d brought paper and pencil, and that, if I didn’t start writing down some of the bewildering details I’d heard, I’d never remember them. So I fell to. It improved my disposition, no matter how useless it all seemed. “Mr. Dordrecht! Mr. Dordrecht!” a man called. But looking up, I could see no one. Surely it couldn’t be from the ferry, still a quarter-mile away. “Mr. Dordrecht!” “Mr. Brush!” No wonder I couldn’t see him: he was sitting in his rowboat, hanging onto one of the ferry dock’s pilings, the top of his head below the level of the dock. I stowed my notes and walked over to him. There were three pails full of oysters on the floor of the rowboat—plus a great deal of reeking mud. “Looks like you’ve had a profitable afternoon!” “Oh aye, but I thought of something else I wanted to tell you.” “Oh yes? What’s that?” The ferry would arrive in five minutes. “I remembered why I went in by the cow, you see. That morning.” It took a second to understand what he was talking about. “Well, it’s moored near your house. Don’t you usually go past the cow?” “No. I was coming back from Hoboken, along the shore, so it was out of my way. And by that time I was fighting the current.” “Uh huh. So …” “When I was fishing, earlier that night, I was … Oh, you see where the ferry is now? About three cables further south.” “Yes?” “And I seen a light. On the cow.” “On the cow? A lantern?” He’s just now remembering this? “Aye, and there were men there too, at least three of them.” “On the cow? In the middle of the— What time was this? Can you guess?” “It was just after eleven. I could hear the church bells that night, like we said.” “What on earth were they doing? There was no moon for working, yes?” “Right. I dunno. Could be crabbing, I suppose.” “They could do that right here at the dock! Did anybody else see this?” “Anybody else? I’m the only body ever up, that hour.” “Could you hear anything?” “Couldn’t make nothing out. They’d talk loud, and then they’d shush each other.” He smiled. “One of them called somebody a ‘Jackass!’” “Aye?” “Sounded just like the gent who bought all the rum!” Like Steve! “I thought maybe I should go in and see if they needed any help …” “Yes?” “But I got a bite just then—finally, nice big shad!—and when I looked over again later, it was all quiet.” “You think they were gone?” “Not sure, but the light was out.” Though grateful he’d come forward, I was completely exasperated with his dullness. “Had you ever seen anybody working on the cow at night before, Mr. Brush?” “Uhh … well, can’t say I have, no. That’s why I thought I’d go by it, in the morning. Just curious, you see.” “And you found the hat.” “Aye. And I gave it to—” “To Mr. Van Narden, right.” The ferry thumped against the other side of the dock, nearly pitching me over on top of the oysterman. “Listen, good sir,” I said while running back for the luggage, “thanks for telling me this! And, um, if it should happen that you would be needed as a witness in a court of law—” “A court of law!” “Just in case! You’d be willing to do your duty and go across to testify in court, wouldn’t you?” “What, across the river?” “Aye.” “I’ve never been to New York City!” he said, grinning. Uncontrollably, I looked at New York City to make certain it was still there, just one mile away. Some depths are beyond the fathoming! “Well then, it’d be a real exciting novelty for you!” “Huzzah!” The ferryman rang his bell. “Huzzah!” I called back to him as I scrambled aboard. * * * There had been a light on the cow that night. “If you’ll all please sit on the port side,” the ferryman said. “He means the left side, mother,” a smug seven-year-old asserted. In something of a daze, I found myself amid a gaggle of children who’d apparently come across with their mother for a picnic. At least three men had been aboard the cow that night. “That’s it, you can brace your feet against the far thwart. It will be a bumpier ride than usual, this afternoon.” “Sit down, Jeremy, oh please!” the mother moaned. The ferryman cast us off, the sails caught the wind, the boat immediately heeled sharply to starboard, and the children screamed in unison. But I remained lost in my own thoughts. A man who sounded just like the gent who’d bought the rum had called another a jackass. Two of the older lads, probably eight or nine, recovered themselves and began to skylark about. “Sit ye down, boys,” the ferryman warned—to no avail. He’d bought a jug of rum, not gin or whiskey—the same spirit that had permeated— The mother shrieked with all her might as one of the little wretches tumbled overboard. “Damn!” roared the ferryman. “Sit down, all of you!” he commanded, struggling to bring the boat around. “I can swim for him!” I shouted, tearing off my jacket. “No!” the ferryman roared, shoving me back down. “Need you to pull him out! All of you, sit! He’ll last until we get there!” The boat rounded onto the other tack. “Haul that line about for me, mister,” he said to me calmly. One further tack brought us to a halt abreast of the terrified youngster within two minutes of his immersion. Not knowing even how to paddle, the child was frantically slapping the water. A few minutes more, and exhaustion would overwhelm him. “You hold onto the man’s legs!” the ferryman instructed the other boy, as I leaned far over the gunwale to catch the flailing arms. Several muscles were strained as it took all my might to haul the sopping lad, and then myself, back inboard. The family crumpled together in a heap of tears as I collapsed, panting, back on the port side, and the ferryman stoically regained the way of the boat. “You all right?” he asked. It was the same man I’d interviewed in March. “Aye. I’ll feel it tomorrow. You?” “Ugh. Hate it when that happens! Second time this year! Never lost one, though—Thank you, Jesus!” He strained to hold his tiller against a sudden puff. “I’ve lost chickens, lost purses, lost hats by the dozen, but never lost man, woman, or child—Praise God!” He scanned ahead for other boats. “Ten more minutes, folks!” One had to admire his composure. Mine was tested by the aches I felt in my struggle to get my jacket back on, plus the discovery that I’d torn my shirt and scratched my belly on the gunwale. Still wheezing, I leaned back, enjoying the warmth of the sun. My eyes lit on the distant shore of Staten Island, about where we’d been that first snowy morning when my hat had blown over the side of the Dorothy C., and Parigo had impudently told me the only reason anyone would have tried to save me was because they assumed I was Leavering’s grandson. In my lessons with Fox and O’Malley, I’d learned much that would justify his assertion that the ship, ten times the size and burden of this ferry, would have taken far longer to maneuver its way back to any specific location where a man had been lost overboard. Yet still, had I … Had anyone explained simple doggy-paddling to this child, today, he’d have survived without trouble for an hour in the river, rather than being endangered in minutes by his own panic! But I’d told Parigo I could swim, and yet he’d still doubted my survival, because of the … Because of the cold. And suddenly I had in my mind’s eye a complete and hideous picture of the foul manner in which the worthy Daniel Sproul had been brought to his untimely end.