Red Hill and the Stranded Scow

Reckless Rabbit, under the cover of darkness, went tearing through the fields outside the reservation and into Niagara Falls Town some four miles away. He managed to wake Tommy without arousing suspicion and the two of them headed down the hill to the falls slinking between the trees to avoid being seen by the adults who would have scolded them for being out so late and sent them home. The commotion was happening at the power station and picking up Tommy meant hiking an hour out of the way, but Tommy was Reckless Rabbit’s best friend and if he was going to watch someone go over the falls he wanted to have someone to share the experience with.

A crowd of nervous onlookers had gathered outside of the power station as floodlights lit the water. In the raging river, two men were now marooned having opened the flood compartments and grounded their flat-bottomed boat that had broken away from its tug. Emergency crews had successfully shot a grappling gun some hundred metres across the water to the stranded scow and operations were underway to send over a breeches buoy to retrieve the men. Travelling along the ropes on a pulley, the makeshift saddle was the only hope for the men stranded in the water – sending out a boat into that section of the river was impossible and would only endanger more lives.

Tommy and Reckless Rabbit arrived just in time to see the emergency workers set their breeches buoy out into the water along the ropes dangling from the power station. They slunk behind the bushes at the shore of the river so as not to be seen, though the harrowing scene taking place on the river was so captivating that no one would have noticed them or said anything. Tommy could feel his heart beating out of his chest both in anticipation of the possible fate facing the men trapped on the river and for fear of his being caught out well past his curfew. Morbid fascinations filled his and Reckless Rabbit’s heads knowing that this could be the moment that they would see someone die. Reckless Rabbit’s uncle had been stabbed in a bar fight and spent over a month in the hospital, but neither he nor Tommy had ever had direct contact or firsthand knowledge of anyone who had ever died before.

A muted cheer went up from the crowd as the breeches buoy was launched into the water and began to make good progress. About 30 metres from the scow the breeches buoy suddenly stopped moving. Teams of men tried to shake the heavy ropes and move them from side to side hoping to loosen the buoy and set it back on its course out to the scow but to no avail. The ropes in the water had twisted upon themselves preventing the buoy from moving any further. They would need to be untangled but it could only be done at the site of the obstruction which was right in the middle of the raging river with the 60-metre Horseshoe Falls drop just two hundred metres away.  

Rescue workers scrambled discussing how to untangle the lines. It was clear that someone would have to cling to the ropes and venture out into the rapids and volunteers for the suicidal mission were in short supply.

“Is that who I think it is?” Tommy said raising his voice above a whisper for the first time. “Joseph, look!”

“Not so loud, or we’re going to get caught,” Reckless Rabbit urged.

Over by the shore, a lone figure could be seen testing the strength and readiness of the ropes clinging to the power station.

“That’s Red Hill!” Tommy said with amazement.

“No, no, it can’t be,” Reckless Rabbit replied.

Red Hill was already a local legend whose face Tommy and Reckless Rabbit would have recognized from the local paper. He had only returned home a few days ago from the fighting in France where he had been relieved from service after being shot twice and gassed. He was the one the crowd looked upon to assist in this daring rescue. His war wounds had left him pale and undernourished, though still handsome and recognizable, and his heroic reputation preceded him – no one has ever singlehandedly been credited with as many river rescues as he. A resident of Niagara his whole life, there was no one who possessed a more intimate knowledge of the river. But there was a catch: Red Hill’s rescues took place in the lower falls beyond the most ferocious part of the river – this was going to present a brand new challenge.

Without even so much as clasping himself to the ropes, Red Hill began to wade out in the darkness into the river. He had barely made three cautious steps when he lost his footing and went sliding with the current. But his grip on the ropes held firm and he was able to lift himself up and regain his balance. A few steps more and the river was now above his waist and too strong for his legs to fight the current. Readjusting his grip on the ropes, Red Hill let his legs surrender to the current using them only to feel around for rocks that he might be able to push off from and toward the scow. Inching his way hand over hand, using the floodlight focused on the scow to guide him, the water now raging above his neck he called out to the shore for workers to pull on the ropes to try to lift them from the water. Hill was forced to retreat a few metres to pull his head from the water. The workers pulled with all of their might on the ropes but were unable to raise them more than a few inches. Red Hill braced himself for an underwater sprint. He plunged his head into the water and continued to pull himself along the ropes toward the scow.

Several tense minutes passed as onlookers scanned the reflecting sparkles of the moon and stars along the water searching for signs of human movement.

“Do you see him?” Tommy shouted.

“Shhh!!!” Reckless Rabbit hushed still more concerned about getting caught than anything else.

“Well, do you see him?” Tommy whispered this time.

Reckless Rabbit was no longer looking at the line between the power station and the scow and instead was searching further down river expecting to see Red Hill’s body flailing in the current. “He must be a goner,” he said. “Nobody can stay underwater that long.”

A collective sigh of muted relief grabbed hold of the crowd when Red Hill emerged back on the shore shaken but unscathed. Winded and soaked through he needed assistance to get back up to the power station. Tommy and Reckless Rabbit could see Red Hill in the distance, wrapped in a towel, giving a report to an official in a hat. “What are they saying?” Tommy asked.

“They are way too far away for me to know that.” Reckless Rabbit replied.

“Well, what do you think they are saying?”

“He’s probably telling everybody that there’s nothing that can be done.”

The official shook his head and watched as Red Hill began to walk toward the woods where Tommy and Reckless Rabbit were hiding. They looked at each other, sweat dripping from their brows from the stifling heat of late summer, with an understanding not to utter a single peep. Still wrapped in his towel, Red Hill sat on a rock and looked up at the stars. Down by the power station, officials and rescue workers scrambled to communicate instructions to the men still clinging to the stranded scow. All of the uproar by the river seemed to fade away as both Tommy and Reckless Rabbit, their hearts leaping from their chests, could only focus on the few steps between them and the meditative Red Hill.

“You boys are a bit young to be out so late, don’t you think?” Hill said as he lit up a cigarette. The crackle of breaking branches broke the stillness as Tommy and Reckless Rabbit instinctively prepared to sprint away. “Hey, hey, hey, boys! Don’t go nowhere. You’re gonna wanna see this. Besides, I won’t tell no one.”

“W-w-w-what are we going to want to see?” Reckless Rabbit stuttered.

“Oh, quit hiding! Don’t make me be talking to no trees. Now, what was you askin’?”

Tommy and Reckless Rabbit crept out from the bush behind which they were hiding and stood still and obedient and stunned.

“What are we going to want to see?” Reckless Rabbit repeated.

“Well, you might just see the last few breaths of old Red Hill is what you might see, followed by the demise of two old men who got themselves and myself into this damned fool situation. That is if you wait long enough. Or, you might just see the daringest most lame-brained rescue this ol’ river has ever seen. You see that buoy out there that can’t move? Now them ropes have gone and gotten snagged upon themselves because they’re lying too low in the water and are caught between a couple of rocks. And it’s too far out so that old Red Hill here can’t hold his breath long enough to get through along the ropes under the water to the far side to loosen them up and get the ropes free. Now, what if I swim out into the river and catch the current just right leading me between the buoy and the scow? If I can get myself on the far side of the buoy, I figure I might be able to loosen it up. But, in order to do that, I’ll need to be able to see the rope as I’m heading downriver. And for that I need some light. Real light. Not this electricity crap that they’re making down there at that station.”

Nothing much happened over the next three hours while waiting for the dawn to come though it seemed to pass in the blink of an eye. Suddenly, the sun was beginning to break over the eastern horizon lighting up the sky and sending streaks of sunlight across the water. Red Hill got to his feet as the group of onlookers by the power station, upon seeing him stand, let out a collective gasp. With the morning come and the news swiftly circulating through the town every resident, permanent and transient, of Niagara Falls was now by the water waiting with bated breath for the final act of this terrifying saga.

With the light of the morning, Tommy and Reckless Rabbit had once again sneaked out of sight behind their bush. Red Hill, without ever shifting his gaze from the water, called out them: “This is just about it boys. I’m only gonna get one shot, so wish me luck.” The boys were trembling with fear and stayed silent. Red Hill was no longer just a recognizable face from the papers and the boys, having sat in silence with him by the river for the last three hours, now felt like they knew him. They were excited that he might die, but they did not want him to. “You see how the water makes foam as it rolls?” he went on. “The trick is to follow the line of the foam. You gotta watch where it goes, position yourself where it is and you’ll go where it goes. Can’t start too far upriver or you’ll get too tired and won’t be able to catch the rope. Can’t start too far downriver or you won’t have enough time to swim into position and you’ll miss the mark. Can’t go racing in either or you’re liable to hit a rock on the way and knock yourself out. Get it wrong, even just a little bit, and it’s bye-bye birdy. It’s gonna be just like charging through no man’s land and into the trenches behind enemy lines. Once your running, never look back. Just get the job done.”

Red Hill took a few deep breaths and then took three long strides from the rock upon which he was sitting and thrust himself as far and as flat as he could into the current then throwing his feet in front of him after three strong swimming strides into the middle of the river. The people on the shore, seeing Red Hill swept away by the raging current wailed with fear. Red Hill’s head bobbed up out of the water as it went sailing toward the horseshoe. In just a matter of seconds, he had been swept from his spot on the shore to within a few feet of the boat when his head suddenly disappeared below the water. The crowd held their breath but in a moment Red Hill’s head bobbed back up above the water. He pulled himself over to near where the buoy had gotten stuck and for a moment it seemed as though he was standing on top of the water. He waved his arm to those waiting by the power station signalling to them to pull on the ropes. He heaved backward thrusting the ropes from the water and grabbing onto the buoy which was now free.

With the breeches buoy now able to get all the way to the scow, and the ropes stable and high enough from the water, the two men who had been stranded out in the river the entire night could now saddle themselves in and use the pulley to get back to shore.

Tommy and Reckless Rabbit went running down to the power station. What could anyone do now? If they got in trouble for being out they didn’t care because they had just witnessed the most amazing thing they had ever seen in their life. When Red Hill arrived back at the shore the whole crowd converged on him hoping to shake his hand. He was already a riverman of some renown and a war hero too, but to those who witnessed his reckless bravery that night in the river, he was a legend.

“Mr. Hill, Mr. Hill!” Tommy cried out. “It happened just like you said it would! Mr. Hill, you did it!”

Red Hill barely noticed Tommy and Reckless Rabbit among everyone else who was trying to get his attention. Reporters were nudging their way through the masses looking for a quote as flashbulbs snapped every second like a strobe light. Their questions came in so fast they were flying in one on top of the other: “Where did you find the courage?”, “How did you come up with your plan?”, “When did you know you had succeeded?”, “How does it feel to be a hero?”

Red Hill hadn’t uttered a single word in response to any question when, in a short window of near silence, Reckless Rabbit’s high-pitched prepubescent voice rose above everyone else’s, “Mr. Hill, were you scared?”

Red Hill stopped dead in his tracks and the crowd realized that that question had got his attention. Hill turned his head and looked Reckless Rabbit straight into his starry eyes. “Kid, I was terrified. I still am.”