Peter Matthiessen - Shadow Country

Ed Watson was humorous, told a good story, and most folks claimed they was always glad to see him. But after his wife and kids moved to Fort Myers, his riffraff crew made a mess of Chatham Bend. He went back to hard drinking and got heavy, kind of mean, and didn’t waste no time at all hunting up trouble.

It weren’t Tucker and his nephew, the way Bay people tell it. Wally Tucker run away with his young Bet, come north from Key West in a little sloop. Took work on the Watson place to get some farm experience, save some cash, then start out someplace on their own. Like most young people, Bet and Wally thought the world of Mister Watson.

One day that couple upped and quit without no reason, asked for their back pay. Mister Watson needed every hand to finish up his harvest, which went from autumn right into the winter, so naturally he was furious. Hollered that they broke their contract, never give notice, called ’em ungrateful after all he taught ’em, run ’em off and never paid a penny.

Headed south, the Tuckers stopped over at Wood Key for water and a bite to eat. Wally was still raging about their pay, so when he muttered that him and Bet left Watson’s place because they was scared to stay, we never paid too much attention. They wasn’t accusing nobody of nothing, they said, all they wanted was what they had coming.

The Tuckers had learned enough at Chatham Bend to farm, fish, and get by. When they asked our advice on a place to settle, we suggested Lost Man’s Key, which had some high ground in the mouth of Lost Man’s River: across the south channel, at the north end of Lost Man’s Beach, was a freshwater spring and good soil for a home garden. The Atwells back in Rodgers River had never used their quit-claim on this key so they was glad to let Wally knock down the scrub jungle, build a shack and dock in payment. We give ’em a gill net and some tools and seed to get ’em started.

Still, we worried. Us Lost Man’s people had big families for support in time of trouble. Without that, few would last long in the heat and insects, all that rain and rainy season mold and always that green mangrove stillness all around. The men had ways to fight the silence-work like mules, drink moonshine, curse and yell-but the women, half bit to death in the same old muddy yard, faced the same toilsome chores every day for years with nothing to look forward to. It was mostly women who went crazy in the Islands.

Tuckers was different said my sweetheart Sarah when she got to know ’em. Said Bet had the real pioneer spirit. The husband seemed a bright enough young feller but Sarah found out he was on the run from bad debts in Key West and also from Bet’s daddy, having never took the time to marry. Sarah figured he might lack the backbone to hack him out a life here in the Islands. His Bet could take the hardship and the loneliness but Wally Tucker would not last the year.

Turned out that Wally had a lot less brains and a lot more grit than Sarah give him credit for. He was ready to stand up to Watson, which few did, because Ed could shoot and Ed would shoot, that was the story. Us Hardens could shoot as good as most but we wouldn’t trade shots with no desperader less we had to, and by the time we knew we had to, we’d be dead, said Earl, who knew everything bad there was to know about Ed Watson.

Storters in Everglade and Smallwoods at Chokoloskee held registered land claims, and both them Bay families are well-to-do today, but Hardens didn’t want no part of surveys. All we knew was, no good could come from letting no surveyor anywheres near to Lost Man’s River. What filing a land claim meant to us was claiming land we was already entitled to, having cleared it off and hacked and hoed for years. Pay taxes with nothing to show for it-no school, no law, no nothing. And it weren’t only just the payment we was dodging but the whole damn government, county, state, or federal, don’t make no difference, because any folks who would think to live on a coast as lonesome as Ten Thousand Islands don’t want no part of the law, we never cared if the whole world passed us by. Never got it through our heads that without that claim we’d wind up losing everything to some damn stranger that aimed to steal all our hard work right out from under us. Show up waving a paper giving him title to our land that we had cleared before this feller ever heard of such a place. Got a couple of fat-ass deputies along to make sure these squatters clear off quick, don’t try no tricks on this slick city sonofabitch that calls himself the rightful owner.

Watson was smarter. Watson knew that whoever had title to the few pieces of high ground on the mangrove coast would control development of the whole Ten Thousand Islands. Watson knew that, he was first to see it. He had filed claims on Possum and Mormon Keys as well as Chatham Bend, but the linchpin of his plan was that small key in the mouth of Lost Man’s River.

Mister Watson’s grand idea was to salvage the huge river dredge that the Disston Company had abandoned up the Calusa Hatchee, ship it on barges south to Lost Man’s, dig a ship channel upriver through the orster bars and dredge out First Lost Man’s Bay for a protected harbor. Docks, trading post, and hunting lodge, bird shot, bullets, fishing tackle, wild meat, fresh fish, homegrown garden produce, fine quality cane syrup, maybe cane moonshine of his own manufacture. Yankee yacht trade in the winter, hunters, trappers, mullet netters, and maybe a few Mikasuki all year round. That long mile of Lost Man’s Beach with its royal palms and pure white coral sand would beat any touristical resort on the east coast.

Maybe six months after Tuckers got there, E. J. Watson spread the word that he aimed to buy up Lost Man’s Key just as soon as them conchs up Rodgers River seen the light. Not rightly knowing what he meant by that, the Atwells felt uneasy. Wanting to be neighborly to Mister Watson, they let him know they was considering his offer, then laid low back in Rodgers River, never went nowheres near to Chatham Bend.

It weren’t that Atwells didn’t like Ed Watson, they sure did. The year their field got salt-watered by storm tide, Old Man Shelton and his boy Winky went to Watson to buy seed cane for replanting. Ed put ’em up for three days at the Bend, sent ’em home with seed cane, hams and venison, anything they wanted and no charge.

Atwells was twenty-five years in the Islands, had two good gardens, fruit trees, melons, all kinds of vegetables, but before that year was out, they moved back to Key West. Old Mrs. Atwell said she was going home to the place where she was born to die in peace and any offsprings who wanted to tag along was welcome. Turned out the whole bunch was raring to go but they needed some quick cash to make the move. So Winky and his brother sailed up to the Bend to pay a call on Mister Watson, have a look at his fine hogs while waiting for his generous offer for that key. Never let on how bad they needed money to move the family to Key West till after Winky pocketed the cash.

Watson was so excited his grand plan was working out that he offered shots of his good bourbon and a toast to Progress, declaring that the U.S.A. was bringing light to the benighted, spreading capitalism, democracy, and God across the world. Said, “You boys ever stop to think about them Filipino millions? Just a-setting in the jungle thirsting for Made-in-America manufacture and Christ Jesus both?” Ed was overflowing with high spirits, Winky told us, and hard spirits, too.

When Josie Jenkins served ’em up a fine ol’ feed of ham and peas, E. J. got boisterous, hugged her round the hips, sat that dandy little woman on his lap, introduced their daughter Pearl. (His oldest boy Rob, he come in, too, but soon as he seen his daddy drinkin, he headed back outside without his meal.) Ed gave them Atwells lots more whiskey, told comical stories about black folk back in Edgefield County, South Carolina: No call to go arrestin dis heah darkie fo’ no Miz Demeanuh, Mistuh Shurf! Ah ain’t nevuh touched no lady by dat name!