Lost Man's River (55 page)

“Lee Harden knew some days ahead that them Chokoloskee men would be layin for Ed Watson, cause even way down in the Islands rumors traveled fast. He aimed to warn him. But after the hurricane, when Mr. Watson came back to Chatham River hunting Cox, our Harden family never seen him. If my dad could have got to him first, he might never of gone back to Chokoloskee.

“Lee Harden declared for the rest of his whole life that E. J. Watson had got flat tired of running, or else he had a purpose no one knew about. Said E. J. was too smart not to know that some of them men was out to make their name by killin Bloody Watson, and that the rest was jealous because he made so much money on his syrup. They was jealous because he had ambition, and wanted a good education for his children.

“Course rednecks never give a hoot about them things. Want their kids to grow up with the same religion and the same old set of prejudices that was passed down to 'em from their own pappies. They never let go of an old notion once they got it nailed down in their brain. Ain't got no room for new ideas, and they are proud about it.”

“Mr. Watson kept apart from all their lowlife goings-on,” Sally said, “and they never forgave that.”

“Well, I reckon that ain't fair,” said her husband mildly. “The most of 'em—Houses included—are very good people in their way. Churchly people,
hardworking and honest. All the same, I am very proud there weren't no Hardens in that crowd at Smallwood's landing.” He winked at Lucius. “Us Hardens wanted to be redneck crackers, too. Couldn't join up because folks'd never let 'em, you remember?”

Sally cried, “How can you speak up for Houses, Whidden! They were snobs, just like the Smallwoods! Mamie Smallwood was a House, and she was meaner to your family than anyone on Chokoloskee Island, that's what your ma told me! And I bet Mister Colonel knows that, too!”

“After 1910, I hardly went to Chokoloskee,” Lucius admitted, “but I talked with Sadie Harden plenty of times. Right or wrong, she had it in for Mamie Smallwood.”

“You think she was wrong?”

“Mamie was judgmental, all right.” Lucius shrugged. “But she was a good strong woman in her way.”

Whidden put his hand on his wife's arm, to stop an outburst. “Know what my mama believed? That Mrs. Smallwood resented our family because we were kind to Henry Short. She had grown up with Henry, don't forget, and bein good Christians, the Houses might of felt guilty way down deep cause they made a good Christian eat off by himself all them long years. Mamie liked Henry well enough, I reckon, so long as he kept his place, but she never forgive us for having him eat with us when he showed up at Hardens' with her brother Bill. Bill House might of minded it some, too, but not enough to say nothing about it, cause him and Henry was good friends in their way, they done everything together since they was boys.

“Them few black people who set foot in the Islands, they never stayed no longer than it took to get away. But if one showed up hungry at the Hardens', he was treated the same as other men and that was that. Grandpa Robert said, ‘Set down and eat,' and Grandma Maisie put it on the table. We was taught to believe that God made man in His own image, so He never give a hoot about the color. Any man had the right to sit at the table with the rest—that's what Grandpa said. Grandpa Robert was born ornery. He had no use for Bay people and he lived as far away from 'em as he could get. He couldn't never understand how them Bay people could call themselves good Christians, then go treat a feller Christian in ungodly ways; said
no
man was created in God's image only to sniff scraps in the corner like a dog. So rumors got back from some them fishermen who ate with Hardens, first at Chatham Bend, then Mormon Key, and later on at Lost Man's River, too. Said, ‘We seen a nigger eatin at them people's table.' That's the way they put it, and word spread. Some said we was ‘spoilin a good nigger,' and others called us ‘nigger-lover,' and a few started in to saying that if them damn people was lettin niggers eat with 'em, they must be niggers or leastways mulattas, and bein
mulattas, they didn't have no right to them good fishing grounds. Well, that was the beginning of the Fish Wars, which went way back to the turn of the century, when Hardens was workin them good sea trout banks north of Mormon Key. And that skirmishin followed 'em when they went south to Lost Man's River.

“Henry Short had to fit in with the Bay people so he done his best not to make any commotion. Because he passed most of his days steerin clear of trouble, he never talked much, and it got so those Bay folks clean forgot Henry was there. But there were times he got so lonesome for human company that he would go to visit with the Hardens, and the time came when he placed his trust in us. Took him years before he learned to do that. Our family listened to him with an open heart, and he told 'em things he wouldn't tell nobody else for fear the men would come for him and lynch him.”

“He could never, never trust another soul,” his wife agreed. “Maybe the House family knew Henry longer, but the Hardens knew him better, and maybe that's why Mamie House resented them.”

“It was Henry Short who warned Lee Harden that the Chokoloskee people, and Smallwoods especially, resented Hardens even worse after the Watson killing. Our family could never figure out the Smallwoods' attitude, cause we were Mr. Watson's friends and they were, too. We agreed with Ted and Mamie that judging E. J. Watson was God's business or the business of the law, not something to be took in their own hands by vigilantes.

“When Ted Smallwood give his opinion that his friend Ed Watson had been lynched, the House family got very, very angry. Old Man Dan House once declared where Henry heard it that his son-in-law was two-faced about Watson's death. Said Ted always wanted to be known as Watson's friend but in his heart he dreaded him, and wanted him out of the way as bad or worse than the ones who done the shooting. What he ducked out of, Houses said, was going down there with his neighbors and looking his friend E. J. in the eye and taking his share of the responsibility for their community.”

“Smallwood's excuse was, he had flu that day, malaria,” said Sally. “Said if he didn't get better pretty quick, he might send Henry to fetch Sadie Harden to come doctor him. I don't know if she'd have gone or not. Sadie told me herself she would go all the way to Everglade to trade at Storters' rather than go to Chokoloskee, because Mamie flew across the store and perched right over her like a fat little old owl every time she came in for her supplies. Declared right out for all to hear how afraid she was that one of these mixed people was aiming to steal her whole store out from under her—”

“—said that to Mama! Who never stole a grit in her whole life!”

Sally looked at Lucius a long time, tears in her eyes, until he had no choice
but to look back. “Does this look like a mulatta man to you?” She pointed at the fair-haired man beside her.

“Now, honey,” Whidden sighed, “the man just got here.”

“Talk about big frogs in a small pond!” his wife exclaimed. “And now they're all split up and bickering over their land while Hardens are doing fine. Those Bay folks can't stand it that those darn people they used to call mulattas are more prosperous than they are, all around Lee County and Collier, too!”

Sally seemed almost feverish with the injustice. “Hate and envy and mistrust! Nobody could trust
anybody
on Chokoloskee Bay, and that's because a lot of 'em came down from criminals and fugitives. Otherwise why would they settle the most godforsaken wilderness in the whole country? At least Robert Harden would admit that. He deserted from the Confederate Army and never denied it. He said, ‘Why should I die for their Great Cause, which I don't believe in? Why should a poor man have to fight the rich men's wars and lose the only life he will ever have on God's good earth?' ”

“My granddad took no chances, and they never caught up with him,” Whidden said. “He changed his name three or four times, hid away down in the Islands and stayed down there until he died, watchin the wars go by. Before he give up in 1946—and a good thing, too, because the Park come and drove us out the very next year—he told his family how he'd lived through five American wars, not countin Injuns, and couldn't recall to save his life what even one of them damn things was all about.

“Grandpa Robert Harden said, ‘I love my country! I love the U.S.A.! Ain't no place like it here on God's green earth! But all I know about them wars is thousands and thousands of poor brave young fellers screamin out their lives in woe and terror, with no more dignity than screechin hogs—shot, bayoneted, torn limb from limb in a barrage, bloody and dyin in their own mess and stink!' Grandpa took one look at that craziness and deserted from the War, lit out for the farthest frontier he could find, cause he just couldn't see no sense nor justice to it. War made him furious! Said, ‘War ain't nothin to wave flags about! War is pure stupidity and sacrilege, a terrible insult to the Lord above and all Creation!' ”

Whidden himself was a combat veteran. His voice had grown stony as he spoke. Not used to such intensity from her soft-spoken husband, Sally listened respectfully, but she was not to be deflected from her subject. “Old-timers get things bogged down in their heads, and they're too cranky and worn-out to change opinions,” she resumed after a while. “If their gossip was true, I could accept it, but I can't stand people slandering my husband's relatives, who were the first pioneers to settle in the Ten Thousand Islands and the last to leave!”

“Well, things are better now.” Whidden grinned slyly at Lucius. “Least they ain't shootin at us.”

“Don't make dumb jokes like that!” cried Sally angrily. “What was done to Hardens can never be forgiven or forgotten!”

“Not by Sally Brown.” Harden closed his eyes, and his mouth set in a line, and his wife backed off a little.

“All I'm saying,” she complained, “is that people who are prejudiced, and have to worry about who they are supposed to be, because that is all they have in life—well, that is pitiful!”

“Is that right, Sal?” Her husband's voice was quiet but no longer mild. He opened his eyes again. “How come it's all you talk about no more if you ain't worried about it?”

“I beg your pardon? It's
your
family I'm worried about!”

He said, “That's right. My family. And my family has been gettin by a good long while without your help.”

“Whidden?” She paused. “Have you been drinking?”

“You think I got to be drunk to speak the truth?”

She rose with a bored cold exhausted look. “I was going to mention a few things,” she said to Lucius, who was busy with his fork tines, tracing the lacy patterns on his plastic doily. “But I think I'll let Whidden air out his opinions.” And she left the room.

Whidden drummed his fingers, glanced at Lucius, looked away again. “Darn it now if my own wife ain't put me in mind of some bush lightnin. You join me in a drop if I could find some?”

“You know something? I bet I would!”

Whidden came back with blue tin cups and a brown jug of moonshine. “Yessir, I love that pretty woman and I always will, but I might be the only one in my whole family that sees her good points, other than her looks. All that ugly hate and gossip was died right down until Miss Sally Brown come swoopin in to denounce that old-time prejudice that our younger ones never even heard about. She got that poison all stirred up again with that big heart of hers, is what she done.

“That was one reason we split up, a couple of years back—that and the fact I was workin for her daddy. I was drunk one night and told her to shut up about the Hardens, mind her own business, and she said she'd be very glad to do that, cause she weren't goin to bother her head no more with no pathetical damn drunk sonofabitch—” Here his eyebrows shot up and he whistled in astonishment, and they both laughed. “Good thing I knew it weren't her
husband
she was talkin about!” He shook his head. “No pathetical damn drunk sonofabitch so shiftless or so spineless, likely both, that after
all that happened to the Harden family, he would still go out and do his dirty work for a crooked mean-mouth bigot like Speck Daniels!

“Bigot!”
Whidden raised his eyebrows high in awe. “And she meant every word! Next thing I knew, that pretty thing had left my house and home! Went back to college for a while to pick up some more of what her daddy likes to call her nigger-lovin communistical ideas.” Whidden grinned broadly. “A while ago, I sent her a nice card:
W. T. Harden has the honor to announce he has left the employ of Crockett Senior Daniels
. She didn't believe it but she reckoned she'd have a look, and day before yesterday, there she was! Peerin all around, sharp-eyed and flighty, like a wren sneakin back onto the nest. Pretended she was here to see the lawyers!

“Well, I don't say a word, not even Hi, honey! cause one wrong move and that li'l bird would fly. Her first word to her darlin was, Any spirits in this house?' And I says”—he reached across to slosh more into Lucius's cup—“I says,
‘Spirits?'
I says. ‘Good gracious, no, God bless your li'l heart!' ”

Sniffing his liquor, Whidden was still smiling, but his eyes seemed sad. “Born to tell lies, I guess.” He sighed in regret over his sins and slumped back with relief on the wooden chair, lifting long denimed legs and work boots and resting them on the corner of the table. His wheaten head, laid on the chair back, cocked his blue baseball cap far forward on his brow, shading his eyes, as Lucius brought him up to date on Speck and his activities at Chatham Bend. Afterwards, Whidden was quiet for a while, sipping his shine, pulling his thoughts together.

The huntin and fishin all around the Glades was the best in the whole U.S.A., wouldn't surprise me, but when they started messin with the water flow, that was the beginning of the end. Plume birds went first, then panther, bear, and otters. Then the federal Park took over, in the same year as that first red tide—think that red tide was a warning from the Lord? Killed fish all around this coast, and the fish never come back, not like they was, cause the Glades water system they depended on for breedin was just shot to hell.