Purgatory Ridge

She rocked back slowly and pushed herself up, trying to stand from her kneeling position. She’d almost made it when she lost her balance again and fell against the shelves. Her shoulder bumped a paint can, which fell to the floor with a clatter.

“He’s coming back,” Grace whispered sharply.

Holding desperately to the knife, Jo hopped toward the place next to Stevie where she’d been sitting when John LePere had left them. She was keenly aware that if she fell, she risked a terrible wound in her back. Grace had already resumed her position next to Scott. Jo was not quite to Stevie when she heard the crunch of LePere’s feet on the gravel outside the fish house. She hopped once more, a long, dangerous move that brought her up against the wall. The lock clicked open and the metal hasp clanked as it was unlatched. Jo dropped the knife and let her body slide down quickly, her butt covering the blade.

LePere stepped in. He turned the light on and looked carefully at Jo and the others. “I thought I heard something.”

“I was uncomfortable,” Jo said. “I was trying to get into a different position.”

He nodded but seemed distracted. He said to Jo, “I want to talk to you.” His eyes shifted to Grace. “And you.”

He took out his pocket knife and cut the tape around Jo’s ankles. He moved to Grace and did the same. Jo was thinking fast, trying to figure what to do with the knife hidden under her. Stevie bumped against her and she caught the look in his eye. As LePere helped Grace to her feet, Jo slid left and Stevie followed, hiding the knife with his own little body. Jo glanced down at her son. Good boy, her look said.

LePere stepped to Jo, helped her up, and said to the boys, “They’ll be back.” He indicated Jo and Grace should precede him. When they were all outside, he turned and locked the fish house. “Follow me.” He led them to his tiny house, opened the door, and said, “Inside.”

When John LePere switched on a lamp, Jo was surprised by what she found. It was a cozy place, well kept. There was a good feel to it, to the way everything seemed to have a proper place to be. She’d always thought of men alone as a little barbaric in the way many of them lived comfortably with disorder and dirt.

“Sit down.”

He indicated a small sofa with a floral design. When they were seated, he left them, went into another room, and came back in a few moments with a stack of newspapers in his hands.

“I want you to understand why I’m doing this.”

He put the newspapers on the clean surface of the coffee table, moved behind Grace, and cut free her hands.

“Read,” he said, and he pointed to the newspapers.

Jo, too, read what LePere had offered them. They were old newspapers, old by a dozen years. The date on the first was November 19, 1986. The headline read ORE BOAT SINKS IN SUPERIOR; CREW FEARED DEAD. The story reported that the ore carrier Alfred M. Teasdale, bound for Duluth harbor, had foundered in a terrible gale on Lake Superior and had apparently sunk with all hands aboard. Winds of ninety miles per hour had been recorded at the weather station on Devil’s Island and radio reports from other vessels on Lake Superior indicated the gale had produced thirty-foot waves. The last communication with the Teasdale had been at eleven-thirty-seven P.M., nearly a day and a half earlier, when the captain reported to the Coast Guard station at Duluth that he was altering the ship’s course to seek shelter in the lee of the Apostle Islands. Because no other communication occurred, it was assumed the ore carrier had made it safely and was waiting out the storm. Official report of the ship as missing wasn’t made until nearly thirty-six hours later. The search was being carried out in a large area centered on the ship’s last known location north of the Apostle Islands. The Coast Guard held out little hope that anyone had survived.

“Now this one,” LePere said, and he handed them a second paper.

It was dated the next day, November 20, 1986. The headline read SOLE SURVIVOR OF SHIPWRECK FOUND. The article reported that the Coast Guard had located a single pontoon raft from the lost ore carrier Alfred M. Teasdale. Three men had made it onto the raft before the ship went down, but only one man had survived the long ordeal of the wait to be rescued. John Sailor LePere had been found, barely alive, as the raft floated in open water nearly twenty miles from the area believed to be the site of the sinking. LePere had been flown by Coast Guard helicopter to Ashland, Wisconsin, where his condition was reported as serious.

“Here.” LePere handed the women another paper.

It was dated November 22, 1986. SOLE SURVIVOR TELLS TERRIFYING TALE was the headline.

Grace Fitzgerald let the paper lie unread in her lap. She looked up at LePere. “What does any of this have to do with us?”

“With you,” LePere replied brusquely. “The Teasdale was owned and operated by the Fitzgerald Shipping Company. She was an old carrier, too old. She should have been scrapped long before that last passage.”