Chapter 23
Maritimers are always ready for a party.
They will declare a festival over nearly anything you can imagine.
There’s an annual pumpkin regatta Windsor, Nova Scotia, where people paddle pumpkin-boats across Lake Pezaquid, and in Wolfville, they stage a rubber duck race every spring. Every summer, there is a bathtub race in Marion Bridge, Nova Scotia. In New Brunswick, there’s even a festival for fiddleheads, those chewy little ferns that Granddad Angus swears are as tasty as all get out.
So why not have a Fogopogo Festival?
“It’s perfect,” I said. “The town council has finally got it right. Now there is no way on earth that Mom can say Deeper Harbour is dying.”
The four of us stood there in Warren’s boat shed—Granddad Angus, Warren, Dulsie, and I.
“It’s time we called an end to this,” Granddad Angus said. “It is getting way too risky.”
“What do you think is going to happen?” Warren asked. “Do you figure they’re going to send in the Canadian Navy?”
“We haven’t finished what we started,” I pointed out.
“Yeah,” Dulsie agreed. “There’s still a lot more that needs doing.”
Granddad Angus shook his head like a tired old bull.
“We’re in the papers,” he said. “And we’re on the national news. Tourists are hearing about us. Now we’ve got this Fogopogo Festival happening. What else do we need to do?”
We all started arguing at once but Granddad Angus wasn’t hearing any of it.
“It’s too risky,” Granddad Angus said. “I never really dreamed it would go as far as it has.”
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.
Here, all along I had been scared and worried and looking towards my granddad to keep my courage afloat. This was absolutely the first time that Granddad Angus had shown the least bit of doubt.
“But it’s perfect,” I repeated. “Everybody will be there. They’ll all have cameras, and there will be reporters and film crews, and booths selling popcorn and candy and balloons.”
“Cutting into my business, they will be,” Warren said with a worried look.
“Warren,” I said. “Your business is t-shirts and a painted ostrich egg. How badly do you think that’s going to be hurt by someone selling sea monster balloons?”
“It’s too risky,” Granddad Angus repeated. “All of those people. Somebody is bound to notice that their sea monster is nothing but a couple of old fogeys and a pair of young kids in a tarted-up dory.”
“Who are you calling a fogey?” Warren wanted to know.
“If the shoe fits…,” Granddad Angus began.
Only I wasn’t about to let the subject get changed.
“This is our big chance,” I argued. “If Fogopogo turns up for the Fogopogo Festival, we’ll have tourists in town year-round, hoping for a sea serpent sighting.”
“It’s too risky,” Granddad Angus repeated.
“Buck, buck, buckaw,” Dulsie began.
All three of us turned to see Dulsie Jane Boudreau doing her world-famous chicken dance. I joined right in immediately, jamming my fists up under my armpits and flapping my elbows like there was no tomorrow.
“Buck, buck, buckaw,” I said.
It was wearing on him. I could tell. Not even Granddad Angus could resist the power of a well-timed double-dog dare.
“All right,” he said. “All right. You have talked me into it.”
He fixed a hard stare in Warren’s direction.
“Buck, buck, buck?” Warren asked.
“Go buck yourself,” Granddad Angus said. “Fogopogo is going to ride again. But this is the very last time.”
Granddad Angus was almost right.