the compound. Outside again, Blakenship squints into the sun, plants his feet, folds his arms and tells me the tale of his betrayal. How Triton, in which Blakenship is a minority shareholder, had refused his request for the $350,000 more he says he needs to solve the mystery. How instead they inked a deal with Oak Island Discoveries, owned by a Boston millionaire and an Emmy-winning film director, which wanted to conduct its extensive scientific research of the site.
“My partners seem to have a new theory every six months,” says Blakenship, who is on the move again, heading towards the tents erected to house the celebrations. “I’d rather tell you who it
could
have been. Whoever did it took many years to complete the job. We only know 10 per cent of what went on there. You have to look for someone with the time, the purpose and the drive. Who controlled religion at the time? The Knights Templar. They controlled all the wealth in Europe and the Mediterranean. They controlled all the shipping. They were looking for a new world. As far as possible you have to look at the evidence. Nolan”—a competing treasure hunter—“found a perfect symmetrical cross at the end of the island. I think there is something to it. I’m not saying it was the Knights Templar. But there’s a good possibility. I will say it has merit.”
The most merit of any of the theories? I ask.
“Well, that’s a strong statement,” he says, and pauses. I can hear the surf break, the wind jostling the tall oaks, just as it always has on the island. “I’ll just say it has merit.”
Stories like Oak Island live on because they are haunting and wonderful. But in Nova Scotia even the apocryphal-sounding yarns—the tall tales—have a faint ring of truth. What is one to make of the story about the Cape Breton mortician who opened his door one day and found a couple of boys off the fishing boats with a body they’d hauled from the ocean? None of them recognized the unfortunate’s face. So the undertaker reached the novel conclusion of pumping the cadaver full of embalming fluid, clothing it in a nice suit and propping the body up in the corner in the hope of jogging someone’s memory. Nobody recognized the body though, and after eleven months he gave up and buried the corpse. It was forgotten about until he received a call from a mortician in the United States who explained that the body was likely that of a sailor from Maine who had gone missing at sea. The remains were dug up and the casket stuck on a train, bound for a proper funeral. As an afterthought, and a rare moment of professional vanity, the undertaker from Cape Breton pinned to the body a note for his counterpart handling the wake at the other end. It read: “You can open it if you want.”
Now, true or not, I love that tale, which seems as perfectly formed, as funny, horrible and true as a Flannery O’Connor short story. Some, admittedly, are less original. Take this variation on theold ashes-as-egg-timer joke, which involves a woman I know from Lunenburg County, a widow whose husband died early leaving her to raise three kids alone. When they were all grown and gone and she was well into middle age, she remarried, a doctor who had immigrated from Scotland and was renowned for his frugality. He died too. One day a visitor arrived to make sure she was coping with widowhood. (It helps here to imagine the local dialect, the extreme lilt and emphasis on unusual words and syllables that stretches and transforms the county’s name, for instance, into
Loon-an-bahg
, which always sounds to me like an accounting firm in a Monty Python routine.)
“Well you know the docta he left all his money to charity you know,” she said, cocking an eyebrow. “But you know he was a funny one. All he left me was that old Volkswagen of his. I was very angry about the whole thing. Very angry.”
I can imagine, said the visitor.
“Now you know things are funny. All along he told me that he wanted
“My partners seem to have a new theory every six months,” says Blakenship, who is on the move again, heading towards the tents erected to house the celebrations. “I’d rather tell you who it
could
have been. Whoever did it took many years to complete the job. We only know 10 per cent of what went on there. You have to look for someone with the time, the purpose and the drive. Who controlled religion at the time? The Knights Templar. They controlled all the wealth in Europe and the Mediterranean. They controlled all the shipping. They were looking for a new world. As far as possible you have to look at the evidence. Nolan”—a competing treasure hunter—“found a perfect symmetrical cross at the end of the island. I think there is something to it. I’m not saying it was the Knights Templar. But there’s a good possibility. I will say it has merit.”
The most merit of any of the theories? I ask.
“Well, that’s a strong statement,” he says, and pauses. I can hear the surf break, the wind jostling the tall oaks, just as it always has on the island. “I’ll just say it has merit.”
Stories like Oak Island live on because they are haunting and wonderful. But in Nova Scotia even the apocryphal-sounding yarns—the tall tales—have a faint ring of truth. What is one to make of the story about the Cape Breton mortician who opened his door one day and found a couple of boys off the fishing boats with a body they’d hauled from the ocean? None of them recognized the unfortunate’s face. So the undertaker reached the novel conclusion of pumping the cadaver full of embalming fluid, clothing it in a nice suit and propping the body up in the corner in the hope of jogging someone’s memory. Nobody recognized the body though, and after eleven months he gave up and buried the corpse. It was forgotten about until he received a call from a mortician in the United States who explained that the body was likely that of a sailor from Maine who had gone missing at sea. The remains were dug up and the casket stuck on a train, bound for a proper funeral. As an afterthought, and a rare moment of professional vanity, the undertaker from Cape Breton pinned to the body a note for his counterpart handling the wake at the other end. It read: “You can open it if you want.”
Now, true or not, I love that tale, which seems as perfectly formed, as funny, horrible and true as a Flannery O’Connor short story. Some, admittedly, are less original. Take this variation on theold ashes-as-egg-timer joke, which involves a woman I know from Lunenburg County, a widow whose husband died early leaving her to raise three kids alone. When they were all grown and gone and she was well into middle age, she remarried, a doctor who had immigrated from Scotland and was renowned for his frugality. He died too. One day a visitor arrived to make sure she was coping with widowhood. (It helps here to imagine the local dialect, the extreme lilt and emphasis on unusual words and syllables that stretches and transforms the county’s name, for instance, into
Loon-an-bahg
, which always sounds to me like an accounting firm in a Monty Python routine.)
“Well you know the docta he left all his money to charity you know,” she said, cocking an eyebrow. “But you know he was a funny one. All he left me was that old Volkswagen of his. I was very angry about the whole thing. Very angry.”
I can imagine, said the visitor.
“Now you know things are funny. All along he told me that he wanted