Peter was first. He pretty much went Natalie Wood-style — found overboard enmeshed and bloated like something strange pulled from the Hadalpelagic zone. There was talk of foul play. There was certainly fouled line — pot warp in a clusterfuck tangle of toggle buoys, wrapped ragweed and human remains. Maybe he got unlucky while fetching dinner lobsters late at night from his dummy trap off the waters of Kennebunkport. Maybe something else; jury’s out. Anyway, he was dead and The Cove was abuzz. Peter was our cook aboard an aptly named 49-foot ketch that served up Jack and my first and almost last passage delivering a sailboat from the American Virgins to the southern coast of Maine. “Cook” doesn’t really cut it to describe Peter. He was an elite, experienced chef when he ventured aboard our little almost-doomed trip. That’s another story involving a fierce maelstrom in the shipping lanes off Cape Hatteras during the cold March spring of 1981 — a harrowing tale we all lived to tell.
Peter was my first death at sea — the first of anyone I was acquainted with. Fishermen’s wives, loved ones, live with a secret, a secret fear, best not spoken out loud, best kept deeply embedded in subconscious but, some of us find that fear clawing its way to surface far too often. Peter was a nice guy, young, hale, bearded, with a good sense of humor, what seemed a kind heart, and a fabulous flair with raw ingredients. But he had been taken by the sea. Or, a fatal mistake. Was he drunk? High? Murdered? Like I said, jury’s out — this, his link to Natalie Wood. Doesn’t matter — Peter is gone and the rest of us feel the chill of the thing we don’t name. The water waits. As does fate. We get back to work aboard the boats on which, in one manner or another, we make our livings.
Chris Linney was an ambitious youngster whose dad irritated the hell out of my twenty-something year-old self the way he’d follow Chris down the ramps to the water at The Cove, goading him, it seemed, in what I guess was his manner of encouragement. Seemed harsh to me. Chris was always at the docks bright and early, toting his weathered skulling oar — the classic accoutrement of every fisherman and sailor — and his 5-gallon buckets teeming with fresh mackerel, lobster bait. I liked to watch him from my perches aboard the various tour boats on which I was first mate. From May through October, those vessels toted paying customers, tourists, on sight-seeing, lobstering and cocktail-cruise excursions along the rocky southern coast of Maine.
Chris fished in an open skiff — notorious for additional dangers — hauling his traps by hand. Hand-hauling is hard work — pulling each trap from the deep, cold depths, hand over gloved-hand, squeezing off sea grass clinging to lines as you go and, with one knee up on the rail for leverage, “breaking” the trap over it to reveal your catch. He was a determined lobsterman and just eighteen years old when, on a cool, bright early morning, the sun broke in our cozy kitchen and I was struck by an eerie psychic dread. Jack was too, which is odd for him; we both knew we needed to get to The Cove, just a few hundred feet from our house, fast.
Everyone was there. Every fisherman. Everyone with a “going interest” in The Cove. Chris’s skiff had been found near the mouth of the harbor. Chris wasn’t in it. I see his pretty Mom sitting, staring out to sea, expressionless, on what, in years since, I’ve come to think of as “The Rock.” It faces Oarweed Cove and is just to the left of a popular restaurant serving the delicacy men and women daily risk their lives for. It seems to be the rock loved ones sit on, wait on, hoping the thin hope of every struck fishing family.
Fishermen, being wary of northeast storms, fish offshore in winter, and bring their traps in near shore during summer months, setting them in what’s known as “the bushes” — meaning as close to land as possible. Lobsters move inshore to warmer waters to mate during summer and this makes inshore the best fishing grounds at this time. It’s common to hear the refrain: “So many traps you can walk across the pot buoys.”
Chris fished in the bushes. Days before this fateful one, a “blow” had passed through the Gulf of Maine bringing storm swells all the way to shore. These are gorgeous to watch from a safe distance and make wonderful photos of your time by the sea but, in a boat, you never want to be caught broadside to any breaking swell and certainly not near shore. It wasn’t hard to imagine what befell Chris as we made our way, Jack and I and all the other fishermen — each in our respective boats — up and down the piece of bottom Chris fished. His white and green-striped buoys were all hugging the shore. One rogue swell likely overtook him right at exactly the wrong time. A fisherman found his body weeks later. The image of Chris’s Dad being called to The Cove to identify his gruesomely transformed son is seared into my eidetic memory. I wish I could cut it out.
In the time between this horror and the next, there were less personal losses but horrific ones nonetheless. On one black Columbus Day weekend in the ‘80s three people were swept off the Marginal Way in Ogunquit and Bald Head Cliff in York while seeking the thrill of viewing the tremendous surf left by a recent ocean storm. Again, my husband, another captain and I, steamed out of The Cove aboard the Lizzie to try to find the boy, 11, who’d been taken off a far rock he never should have been allowed on that day, into the roiling white water off the Marginal Way.
We found his winter jacket and were almost caught broadside to a 20-foot wave that snuck up on Jack as he maneuvered the Lizzie as close to shore as he dared. Quickly recovering, Jack swung hard to starboard pointing the boat up into that mountain of seawater at breakneck speed and we barely made it up over the top of the enormous swell as it crested and broke, when suddenly, the VHF marine radio hailed us, saying two people, a young girl, 9, and her father, had been swept off Bald Head Cliff. Jack slammed the Lizzie, his 38-foot Jonesport/Beals Island wooden lobster boat to full throttle and we shrieked forward hugging the shore as close as surf allowed along the mile to the Cliff, where waves were topping the ninety-foot precipice and a horrified crowd had backed away but was still held, rapt. We later learned the girl, who’d been swept off, never resurfaced but, her Dad, who’d jumped in after her, had come back up once, seconds before the Lizzie was on scene, before going down forever. We found his sneaker. His body was discovered weeks later inside the The Flume, a narrow crevasse that cuts the rocky shoreline of The Marginal Way where spectacular spray abounds when the waves are just right. The little girl’s body was never found.
That Columbus Day had been stunningly beautiful along the Maine coast. Bright, bluer than blue sky, crystal clear vision all the way to every horizon. Crisp, clean Fall air. Then it turned blacker than black. And, bluer than blue. I see it unfold as if it were yesterday.
“Billy Mac is lost at sea.”
It’s an early morning phone call from my ex-husband with devastating news. His voice over my landline is laden with finality.
“Noooo! He’s WHAT?????!!!!!!!”
This is too much, unbelievable, incredible in the literal meaning of that word — without any credibility. Billy McCyntire, Billy Mac, cannot be lost at sea. Billy, larger than life Billy — full of energy, fun, verve — a veritable human dynamo who lit every room he walked into and made everyone feel seen and loved, cannot be taken by water. Billy, an extraordinary fisherman, tuna fisherman, lobsterman, born with bait on his hands, came from one of the most celebrated and famous fishing families on the New England coast. Legendary, with fishing in their very DNA — grandfather, father, three sons — so beloved and integral to the fabric of the entire fishing community as to seem they would all live forever.
“What are you talking about?! That’s not possible! What happened????!!!!!”
Nothing anyone would believe. Just pure tragedy. Maybe pure Karma. There may be a couple of people who know what happened that late night off the coast of Wells but, they’re not talking.
Did I mention that my son is a lobsterman? Has been since he was born but began apprenticing, following in his Dad’s footsteps, when he was fourteen. My brother, my children’s Dad, good friends — they’re all lobstermen. I’ve fished occasionally with my son since he was a kid and for a few memorable winter seasons. He fishes five to eight hundred traps hard and well, usually setting his gear about 8 to 12 miles off the straight line coast of Ogunquit. It’s difficult being Mom to a fisherman. It’s harsh to know, firsthand, how much can go so easily wrong on a fishing boat.
Billy meant the world to Luke. They tuna-fished one season at Georges Bank — prime fishing grounds about 60 miles off Perkins Cove. They were to be at sea for a week and the experienced Captain Billy and his crew packed food and all needs accordingly. Uncharacteristically, however, they left the grill on the dock and so lived on granola bars, cold cereal and whatever could be eaten raw for the next six days of fishing. Still, Luke loved his time with Billy.
It’s difficult to think about, never mind put ink to paper, this one that hits so close to home. I’ve known Billy, his brothers, sister, parents, grandfather, since he was a kid, one of the “Cove Rats”— always hanging out near the wharfs or heading out to sea and, when not, up to mischief and fun. Billy always had a huge smile and and a big, heartfelt “hello!” for everyone. Seeing him at The Cove was a highlight of my day. But, it’s not my loss I’m thinking of now.
Billy became like an older brother to Luke — or, a fun-loving uncle. Luke looked up to him, loved him. They respected each other’s savvy on the water and shared the unspoken, deep, salt-encrusted link between fishing families.
When I fly into The Cove on this wretched morning that lives in infamy for those who loved Billy, I snag a rare parking space for my silver Jetta, and leap out. I see my son standing by the bait wharf with Billy’s brother, Bobby, and a group of fishermen who’ve all been out searching, in vain, since early morning. I can’t recall seeing Shane, Billy’s youngest brother, but, I’m sure he must’ve been there. I see Alicia, Billy’s Mom, and Sonny, Billy’s Dad — likely the best fisherman ever in The Cove — sitting on The Rock staring blankly out to sea. Someone, I can’t tell who, has their arm draped over Alicia’s shoulder. Another image I’ll never unsee. How does a mother, anyone, live through this?
For his part, Luke has one arm raised up over his right shoulder, his right hand snaked down behind his neck like he’s either trying to adjust his “Eat Fish” t-shirt or to desperately hold himself up by some unseen tether. He looks completely lost. Lost. At sea. Turns out, this moment seems to change him forever, forever change his feelings about fishing. I didn’t know this at the time but, in years since, it’s become as crystal clear as a crisp blue sky framing a diamond sparkled ocean on a dazzlingly beautiful day when you’d never imagine anything bad could ever happen.
Lisa is the author of two books, both, memoirs: Make Me and Chimera/A Shapeshifter’s Journey. Her first children’s book, Forsythe, The Forlorn Firefly is soon to be published. Find out more about her work at lisastathoploswriter.com