When a lantern appeared in the distance through the clouded horizon he could not even muster the strength of voice to call it, having no speech left in him, nor energy even to save himself with. The lantern came from a ship, which had nearly run past him before the pilot spotted his small shape on the water.

“Ahoy!” the pilot cried out, but his call was echoed by silence. “Ahoy, if thee be alive,” the man yelled again.

Beneath the hulking ship Caleum called out very weakly. “Aye,” he said, before being seized by a coughing fit, as the salt water washed over his face and into his lungs.

The bottom was too rocky and dangerous for the ship to come to him, but they did drop a boat, manned by two sailors, who piloted it to where he was and lifted him out of the cold. When they pulled him up he was completely gray and shriveled, and could feel nothing at all as they tucked their arms beneath him and hoisted him into the boat. When the boat reached the ship, they had to lower a sling to lift him up by, as he was unable to grasp hold of the rope they put over the side for the men to climb.

They pulled the harness onto the deck of the Meredith, as the ship was called, and unfastened him — then covered him quickly with a blanket, before offering him hot rum to get warm by.

“It is miraculous you survived out there,” the ship’s mate said, as they led him across the planks of the vessel. “Not one man in a thousand who goes down on this coast lives, and I bet not one in a million in this storm. You are lucky too that we weren’t another kind of ship.” Caleum could only nod at everything the man said, for he was exhausted beyond all knowing.

They moved him to a bunk belowdecks, covering him with another blanket, then added another very carefully every hour after that, as they were superstitious and it was a good omen for them to save a man from the ocean.

No matter how many blankets he was given, though, Caleum Merian could not get warm and began shivering there in his bed. The sailors, who came from Nova Scotia and had seen men suffer exposure before, took it as a good sign that he responded at all, and kept adding more blankets, ministering warmth by degrees so that he was not shocked by the difference. When he could feel his hands again, late that night, his body finally carried him off to sleep.

He awoke the next morning to find he had been moved to the ship’s galley during the night, although he could not remember it. He startled when he looked around, not understanding how he came to be in that place, or indeed where he was at all. The cook, when he saw him stir, shoved a bowl of hot soup at him, without comment, which he took up and began to eat.

He was comforted as he brought the hot fish to his mouth, for he had not eaten in more than a day, and quickly finished the bowl. When he was done he was given another, which he ate at a more leisurely pace, still not slow as was usual for him when sitting at table, but at least like one who had sat at table before.

When the ship’s mate, a man called Silas, came in and saw him, he began to beam broadly, much pleased that Caleum had made it through that night. “I see you have an appetite too,” he continued, though he was usually very strict with rations for his sailors. “That is good.”

“Thank you,” Caleum answered. He could think of nothing else to say, for he was humbled by their hospitality and their having saved him. “I cannot thank you enough.”

“It was not us but Providence who made it possible,” Silas replied. “This voyage is surely blessed by Him.”

Caleum was not pious as some men, but he had been near to death and was now eating cod chowder so he could not argue without offending his host. But he did allow himself to comment on the man’s sentiment. “I did not think men who made their living on the ocean were so believing.”

“On the contrary,” said Silas. “I’m afraid we believe too many things. Now tell me, friend, where you were headed when the storm caught you, so we can deliver you there safely.”

When Caleum answered, Silas said they were very near there, and would reach that port well before the end of the day. The ship continued on under a fair wind, and it was hard for Caleum to believe that it was the same ocean that had treated him so roughly the previous day.

When they docked, not long after noon, Caleum wished again he had some better way of thanking his rescuers, as he tried to make them know how grateful he was.

“We may all need to be fished from the ocean yet.” Silas waved him off, refusing all thanks, and telling how it was custom with them not to remind a man of a favor, lest he come to resent it.

“We have a legend Down East of a man who saved his neighbor from certain starvation one winter by giving him a firkin of smoked cod. All that spring he kept harkening back to it, and all the next spring, never growing tired of reminding the man or of letting their other neighbors know what a good turn he had done for his luckless friend.

“When winter next fell, and there was nobody else on the road that passed by their part of the world, the man who had been saved murdered the one who saved him, unable to bear his gloating any longer. That following spring, when it all came to light, the neighbors were sympathetic toward him, and did not prosecute the crime half so harshly as you might expect.”

Still Caleum was humbled that the Meredith had stopped again, just to let him ashore, but, as he went on land he was even more grateful to be back in the stable world.

When he touched dry earth again it was a strange sensation, and he needed quite a few moments to grow used to it. He vowed then he would never go again upon the water, but he would not think of seafarers at all the way he used to. He turned then to see the boat that had saved him one last time and wave to the crew, but search as he might he could not catch sight of it anywhere.

When he finally had his bearings, he began to look around the port where he had disembarked. It was not so busy as Manhattan, but its business was much the same, and he was careful as he waded his way through the lanes of traffic. Once he had come into the town proper, he inquired about where he might find a horse, not wanting to waste any more time but to get on to where he lived.

He had but a few coins left in the little purse that was sewed to the inside of his pants. However, he was able to secure a decent colt and furnishings for the trip, but it was almost his last money.

When he set out from the coast then, it was already the middle of the afternoon, and he hoped to cover much ground still before night fell.

eight

After the death of Magnus Merian they tried to put their grief behind them at Stonehouses, telling themselves and one another everything would still manage to right itself by spring. The winter was hard that year — stretching on for weeks longer than it should have — until they had eaten their stores so far down there was little left to them but seed grain. Finally the weather looked as if it was going to relent, and they had a whole week that was warm enough for the lake to begin thawing, which was always the first real sign of the new season. However, by the time warm days should have been upon them, they were besieged again with bad weather.

Several animals had already died from cold during the last storm, and Adelia tethered a lamb that had lost its ewe in a bower behind the house, intending to slaughter it as soon as she decided how best to preserve the meat from spoiling. The old woman was used to hardship from her childhood, when they were first settling that part of the country, and could work as well as any man, so never despaired before her task, as there was little on a farm she had not done before. The girls had also adjusted to this new way of life, following Adelia about as she carried on all the farm chores she knew from her first days at Stonehouses and even made games around all the rigors of their new existence.