more exercise than I cared for. I also had to have plenty of boiled water on hand for the boys to make lemonade and such. The water for dishes and laundry was kept outside in a large milk can. The drinking water was carefully strained (in case there were any wigglers) then boiled and lowered down the hole to cool. Having small living quarters gave me very little housework to do and although house-keeping was awkward, I must admit I’d never had it so easy.
I had one little problem, though, and that was garbage disposal. Everything burnable was burnt, but the tin cans, bottles, and jars were not so easily disposed of. I finally solved the problem with cans by washing and flattening them, then every few days I took them into the woods, dug a little hole, and buried them, carefully covering them over with the dirt I had dug up.
Someone went ashore a couple of times a week for mail and supplies. Not having a fridge this meant that we only had fresh meat twice each week. Cooked meats and bacon were bought vacuum packed, being the only kind we could rely on to keep. If anything was forgotten we had to manage without until the next trip. No running down to the corner store here.
Early in the spring, four young steer had been brought to the island, to grow and fatten up for the market. They were quite a nuisance. Apparently Mr. Chappell often allowed locals to use the other end of the Island for logging, hunting, or grazing. Of course, animals know no boundaries. They wandered all over the Island, but mostly they were where we were. They meandered in and around the workings and, much to the disgust of my sons, left a messy trail wherever they went. They were particularly determined to share our water pond, and we were just as determined that they would not. We put up fences, they knocked them down. Whenever Ricky and I saw them we chased them away. By fall they were chasing us.
Once, Rick and I were going for a swim. We were almost halfway down the hill, when the cows came lumbering around the corner at the bottom, and charged towards us. We went into our yelling and hooting routine to frighten them off, but on they came. Rick and I turned and scooted up the hill. Behind us came the thundering herd. We shot across the clearing, hollering at the top of our voices for help. We made a grand dash for the shack with me in the lead. I’ve never run so fast in my life. We locked the door, then peeked out the window.
Nothing. Absolutely nothing … except some tourists by the pits, looking this way and that and then at one another in bewilderment.
The summer wore on, hot and dry. Wells were drying up all along the shore, but our supply of water seemed inexhaustible. The mosquitoes were thinning out and before the end of August were nearly gone. We spent evenings on the beach by a big fire, toasting marshmallows, or just talking. This was when we liked the island best, when we had it all to ourselves.
Our friend, the teller-of-tall-tales guide, sometimes came out to the island of an evening just to pay a social call. We would listen as he spun yarn after yarn about the different legends of Lunenburg County, and there were many … among them, he swore that he had seen the lights of the Teazer.
The Teazer was an American privateer ship that made daring raids along the coast of Nova Scotia in the early 1800s. One day the Teazer was trapped by the British at the mouth of Mahone Bay, and while the officers aboard her were arguing whether to fight or surrender, a young lieutenant, a British deserter, threw a burning coal into the powder magazine, and suddenly the ship exploded. All but eight men died.
To this day people tell that on certain nights you can see a bright light moving across Mahone Bay. As the light comes nearer, you can see a sailing ship and hear the creak of oars. Suddenly it vanishes in a great burst of light at the exact spot where the Teazer blew up.
Our friend told us of another island where no one dared to spend the night, for it was haunted, and shook and shuddered the whole night through. Invariably our storyteller managed to bring in something about Oak Island. He told of the strange fires that were seen on the island on foggy nights. How people who rowed out to investigate were never seen again. He related the sounds of fighting, gunfire, cutlasses clashing, heard by fishermen passing near the Island on their way home; and the ghost of Captain Kidd walking the island, that had been seen several times in the past few years. As for himself, he wouldn’t spend a night on Oak Island, no sir. Looking around fearfully in the gathering gloom he would start up his outboard motor and yell a last parting shot, “I wouldn’t like to be youse guys sleeping on this here island,” as he took off. We were always amused at this display of concern.
There was a black horse on the island, put out for summer pasture. It joined the ranks of the cows. The five of them roamed the island together. The horse was quite adept at nosing up the bar of the gate and letting the cows into our enclosure where, I suppose, the grass was greener.
At the back of the shack, behind the hillocks, a steep bank leads down to a meadow which in turn slopes gently to the beach. This was the way the animals came to get to our clearing, taking their time, munching grass on the way. As soon as we spotted them in the meadow, Ricky and I would hoot and holler, at the same time banging stones together or tossing small stones at them. This was very effective; the animals would stay away for days after that. Eventually they stopped coming — during the day that is. Instead, they came at night.
Several times they had roused me from a sound sleep, clumping around and chomping at the grass nearby, so I always kept a supply of stones at the door ready for use. One could always see at night, even if there wasn’t a moon. There seemed to be a grayness to the sky that reflected its own light. Objects like trees, machinery and animals too, were black smudges that could be identified. Lying in bed you could look through the window and see the tops of the spruce trees, their edges feathered with silver, standing solid and clear against a lighter sky.
One night I woke up and could hear the horse nudging at the bar on the gate, which kept slipping back into the slots, making quite a racket. I knew it wouldn’t be long before they would all be inside the fence. I got up, fumbled my way to the door, opened it, picked up a couple of stones, clattered them together, peered out through half open eyes, and saw the animals amble away. I closed the door and managed to make it back into bed without actually becoming fully awake.
I don’t know how long I slept, but suddenly I woke up with a start to the most awful din. The shack trembled and shook, and the front of the building creaked and groaned. It was as if the whole place were about to collapse. I clung to Bob, terrified, wild thoughts running through my head. There must have been a cave-in down the pits, and we, along with the building, were sliding in. Then there was silence. Suddenly it started again … clump, clatter, thud, thud, at the front of the shack. Then, before our startled eyes, a huge pair of horns sailed by the window. At once we knew what the ruckus was. The cows were walking across the 24” wide platform that ran in front of the shack, spanning the deep ditch. And as they lumbered across the narrow walk, their wide bodies, swaying from side to side, thumped repeatedly against the front of the cabin with a force that threatened to break it down.
With indignation taking the place of fear, I sat up in bed. “You know,” I said to the room, “this is ridiculous,” then stopped, for the noise was starting again. “Here comes another one,” I warned Bob, expecting him to do something, but he just lay there laughing. That was the final straw.
Jumping out of bed, I ran out of the shack, stopping only long enough to grab some stones at the door, then I took off after them. I chased them around the shack and down the hill, throwing stones for all I was worth. By the time I got to the bottom, they were disappearing into the bushes along the side of the meadow. I stood there panting and hopping mad. They won’t be back in a hurry, I told myself, and turned to retrace my steps.
Carefully, I picked my way up the stony bank, for I hadn’t stopped to put on shoes and now I could feel the sharp stones under my bare feet. Behind me, a low hanging moon showed the way. It also showed me my own shadow, queerly misshapen, bobbing ahead. Quick glances here and there revealed other strange-looking
