The Lighthouse Keeper

Jan Gorshhiemmer was the lighthouse keeper at Kreigh's Landing near Aillik, Newfoundland.  The small jut of rock where the lighthouse sat was one of the bleakest places on God's good earth, but Jan had signed the contract and he was good to his word unlike previous keepers had been.  

Those that knew him, however, sensed that there was another angle on his self imposed exile at the lighthouse.  Burt Decker, the town manager of Aillik, suspected there was a  tragic story that followed him to this desolate forgotten corner of the world.  He just wished he knew what it was. For as long as Burt knew Jan never disclosed the reason he had migrated to Aillik.  Everyone knew Jan was a loner and did not talk very much when he did come to town for his supplies.   

From the hill where Burt had constructed his house of stone, the only building material readily available in the area, he would drink his morning tea and look out his window at the view of the lighthouse his great grandfather had built with a rugged crew of convicts.  His great grandfather had built the lighthouse to warn the merchants of jagged rocks along the shore. 

There were stories of despicable scoundrels who would douse the light so ships would wreck on the rocks and then they would then salvage the wreck for anything worthwhile from the cargo.  If apprehended, the criminals would be hanged by the port authorities, but the sad truth was the port authorities were usually short handed and unable to bring all of the scoundrels to justice.

Times had changed since those days and the whale oil lamp was replaced by an electric beacon.  It was more reliable as long as the electricity wasn't waylaid by a Nor'easter.  Also with better and more accurate navigation instruments, the sea traffic had been greatly reduced.  Few freighters ever ventured this far north anymore. 

Kreigh's Landing was nothing more than a large flat rock.  Most of the rock was occupied by the lighthouse.  There was a ten meter separation from the rock to the mainland where the ocean would swirl and eddy, making the short journey treacherous. Jan was adept at navigating the long boat to shore and back when he needed supplies, but he only ventured out when necessary.

Bert could still recall when Jan first came to Aillik a decade ago when he first scanned the flat gray horizon.  The sidewalk was covered with a slick coating of ice.  Careful not to slip, he walked into Burt's office wearing a peacoat and watch cap as if he had just stepped off the deck of a ship.  Standing behind the counter, Burt eyed Jan carefully since there weren’t many newcomers in town. 

"Are you Mr. Decker?" He held one of Burt's advertising flyers in his large hands that appeared to have taken part in their fair share of hard labor.

"I am, what can I do for you?" He asked, but was fairly certain of what he wanted seeing the flier in his hands.  

"My name is Jan Gorschheimmer.  I am here to inquire about this ad." He put the flier on the counter.

"Have you ever manned A lighthouse before?" Burt asked the young man.

"No sir, but I am able bodied and willing to do what needs to be done." He smiled.

"Well if I must be honest, you are the only person who has answered my ad in weeks." Burt removed his cap and scratched his bald head. "You will have to sign a contract, but the job will be yours.  There isn't much to it and the pay isn't a lot, but you won't need much.  Let's face it, there isn't much here."

While Burt let A chuckle free, Jan did not even crack a smile. "Here is the key.  We will take the steamer out there.  You are lucky, the swells aren't too bad today." 

"It's okay, Mr. Decker, I've been in worse." Jan sniffed as they walked to the docks.

"Please call me Burt.  Mr. Decker was my late father." Burt paused before asking, "So are you a sailor?"

"Merchant marine. At least I was at one time" Jan nodded as Burt waved to the steamer captain.

"Hey Burt, did you finally manage to shanghai a lighthouse keeper?" The captain chuckled as the two men came on board the small noticed vessel. The captain was a caricature of an old nautical sea hand with his bushy silver mustache.  

"Hush now, Captain Bowman." Burt waved his hand. "This is the new lighthouse keeper, Jan...ah...Jan..."

"Gorshhiemmer." Jan suppressed a grin.

"Where ya from?" Captain Bowman asked with a twinkle in his mischievous blue eyes.  

"I was with the merchant marines." Jan nodded.

"You don't say?  Cross ocean?" Captain Bowman pulled the rope that sounded the whistle that the ship was leaving the dock.

"Yup." Jan turned his head away from the captain.

"Run into any German U-boats?" Captain Bowman raised A thick white eyebrow.

"Seen a few." Jan said curtly as he shoved his hands into his coat pocket.

"I've heard they've really clamped down on the shipping lanes now that Roosevelt signed that pact with Churchill." Bowman jerked the wheel and with a whoosh of whitewater the boat began to chug toward Kreigh's Landing.

"Had a few close scrapes." Jan shook his head. He did not wish to go into details.  Details brought on nightmares and nightmares brought on horrible memories. 

"Took one on starboard!" A voice rippled in the intercom overhead.  The smell of diesel filled the air along with the thick black smoke.  

"All hands!  All hands to the lifeboats! Abandon ship!  Repeat-"

The explosion rocked the boat and the men with it.

"We going under mate." The man next to Jan exclaimed as he burst into flames.  Jan's last memory of the man was his scream as the oily flames consumed him.  Other sailors were screaming as they ran for the ocean consumed in flames.

There were no lifeboats when Jan got to the deck.  All boats were either rowing away or ablaze.  Jan found something to keep him afloat, so he grabbed at it.  It bobbed up and turned out to be the charred bodies of one of his mates.

He was still holding onto the body when the sea rescue planes reported his location.  In the hour before the patrol boat plucked him from the North Sea, Jan nervously watched the U-Boat floating a few meters away, but close enough to see the captain pack his pipe with tobacco.  The U-boat submerged A few minutes before he was rescued.

He spent the night in sickbay screaming at his vivid nightmares.

"Seaman Gorshhiemmer, we are reassigning you to another ship." The admiral of his Merchant Marine unit told him when he was discharged from sickbay.

"I won't go." He swallowed hard.

"You are under my orders.  You will do as I say." His face turned red as Jan walked away. "Desertion is A criminal offense."

"Try and find me then." He did not look back.  He vowed never to set foot near another merchant Marine facility.

Jan started a fire in the fireplace on the living quarter level of the aging stone structure.  The small room heated quickly and he would hang his meal in an iron pot hanging on a tripod over the flames.  In minutes the room was filled with the hearty aroma of rabbit stew. 

He looked out the portable as the open sea raged in the windswept winter storm.  Not a single vessel dared challenge the White caps that were as large as most of the houses in the village.  Climbing the steep steps to the beacon deck, Jan turned on the light just in case a vessel was struggling in the storm.

Returning to his living quarters, Jan was planning to settle in to dine on his stew as he read Thomas Hardy's Far From the Madding Crowd, one of his favorites.  He could not believe his ears when as he was reading, there was a knock at the door.  Placing a marker in his book, he rose out of his reading chair to answer the door.  Burt stood there, red faced with a stranger standing next to him.

"Hate to bother you on such a frightful night, but this man here would like to speak to you." Burt nodded as he spoke.

"Jan Gorshhiemmer?" The man spoke.

"Yes, what can I do for you?" Jan eyed the stranger with suspicion.

"I'm Investigator Reynolds from the Department of Defense." He identified himself.

"Department if who?" Jan shook his head.

"Formerly OSS." The investigator said.

"Ah, what brings you to this godforsaken place?" Jan opened the door so the two men could enter.  Both stepped inside still dripping from the icy rain.

"Do you recall the date February 22, 1940?" Reynolds showed Jan his identification badge.

"Not offhand." Jan shrugged before offering them a seat on his couch.

"You were aboard the Hartford from Boston to Portsmouth."  Reynolds read from a report he pulled from his briefcase.  "Crew of twenty five went torpedoed off the coast of Ireland.  Only six known survivors until now.  You are the seventh."

"I don't have any idea what you are talking about." Jan had always been a poor liar, because he had trouble hiding his facial expressions.

"This report was very thorough. Your photograph still captures you quite well even if it has been over ten years now." He tossed the photograph on the small table in front of the couch. Jan picked up the black and white photograph.  He remembered having it taken before the voyage on the Hartford.  

He could hear the screams of the dying men echo in his head.

"Any of this ringing a bell?" Reynolds asked, " The guy in charge, Gordon DeMont, filed criminal charges against you for desertion."

"I remember.  I've tried to forget the nightmare, but it won't let me go." There was a catch in his throat which he cleared with a cough, " So, are you here to put the cuffs on me?" . 

" No, just trying to verify the facts." Reynolds smiled, "DeMont died a hero's death.  Nobody is interested in prosecuting you for this."

"Then why come all this way to ruffle my feathers?" Jan shrugged glancing at Burt and his blank expression.

"The ripples in the water are still there." Reynolds nodded, "The Nuremberg trials are still going on trying to piece together why six million Jews were exterminated.  No one seems to have a good answer.  What we are attempting to do is piece together our best version of the truth. I have traveled around the world, talking to people about the war.  Some of the stories I’ve heard have shaken me to my core and I was in the second wave at the beaches of Normandy on June 6, 1944.  When I got home, my new assignment was to gather and archive as many stories as I could in search of the truth of what really took place." 

"Good luck with that." Jan allowed himself a chuckle, something Burt had never heard coming from him in the ten years he had known him, "I came here, because this seemed like the place I could put the shattered pieces of my life together. Up until a few minutes ago, it was working.  The waves against the rocks, the screeching of the gulls, it fed my soul.  Even though my duty is simple, I have faithfully done it since coming to Kreigh's Landing."  

Burt smiled and nodded in confirmation.

“So if it’s all the same to you, I would like to stay here.  This is where I belong.” Jan said as he glanced at Burt. 

“I have no intention of taking you anywhere.” Reynolds shook his head, “I just want to hear about your experiences.” 

“I’d rather not.” Jan shook his head, “I spent eighteen hours in the ice cold water watching some of my shipmates go under for the last time. Everytime I think about it, I start to shudder, because it all becomes real all over again.”

Reynolds sighed and put the paper back into his briefcase, “I’m sorry if I drudged up any ghosts, that was not my intent.”

“It’s alright.  I wish I could exorcize the evil spirits that live in here.” He patted his chest. “Since I have been the lighthouse keeper, I have found a place in the world where I can be at peace if only for a short time.”

“He has become a part of this town.” Burt declared as he stood up.

“I guess sometimes the truth can be hidden in places we never think to look.” Reynolds stifled a grin.

“So what do you think of our lighthouse keeper?” Burt patted Reynolds on the shoulder, “We’d better get back, because I see some nasty looking clouds on the horizon.” 

“Yeah it was a choppy ride over.” Reynolds nodded. 

Jan watched them go to the dock.  The gangplank went up after they got on board.  The water was choppy, but Captain Bowman had the boat back at the docks in town in short order.  Jan sat down in his chair to resume his reading as the storm outside raged.  The beacon swooped over the rocks and white water.  He had never felt such peace in quite a while.