“Made himself scarce for a few years, ol’ Henry did. Can’t say I blame that poor sonofagun, neither, with hard-hearted young fellers lookin to hunt him down.”
This last speaker, a small man in the front row with squirrel cheeks and merry eyes, smiled benignly at Lucius. His old-fashioned yacht club attire—sky blue trousers, navy blue polo shirt, crisp deck shoes with marshmallow white soles, bright sweater so yellow that the old man looked like a seated lemon—seemed rather at odds with his windburned hide and weather lines. Lucius grinned back at his good old friend Hoad Storter, whose father Cap’n Bembery had run the cargo schooner for the Storter trading post at Everglade and had been Papa’s best friend. Like Whidden Harden, Hoad would be discreet, but Lucius realized that his identity might be exposed at any moment by Crockett Junior Daniels or some other person, and that as at Fort White, the longer he waited, the more awkward it was sure to be. Trying to decide how to go about it, he asked old Brown for some good evidence that E. J. Watson had killed those Tuckers. His query made him feel dishonest, since he knew there was no “good evidence” and never had been—nothing but a vague account related by Lee Harden and his brothers who (with Henry Short) had found the bodies. In his Lost Man’s years, the Hardens had never spoken of the Tuckers, nor had he ever wanted to ask questions. His reluctance to know the truth had disturbed him, even at the time.
“Killed that Audubon warden, too,” snarled an old man with a broken face empurpled by long falling years of drink. The man wore a soiled Panama hat and nobody sat near him or behind him. His arms were folded tight across his chest and he would not face Lucius as he spoke. “Nineteen and oh-five, that was. I was running Watson’s cane plantation for him. That spring, Watson went over to Flamingo with a crate of bird plumes, and the story about Guy Bradley’s murder got back before he did! That’s when our family packed up and got away from there.”
Preston Brown said, “Heck, I knowed Guy Bradley! Knowed him before he went over to Audubons! Him and his brother Lewis Bradley, they was partners with the Roberts boys, huntin plume birds down around Cape Sable. Ed Watson sold his bird plumes through Gene Roberts and I reckon the Bradleys done the same. Then Guy went over to wardenin, he was goin to put Watson in the jail, so Watson shot him—”
Lucius said in a flat voice, “Guy Bradley was killed by a sponge fisherman and plume hunter named Walter Smith, who was tried for that killing in Key West.”
“That’s right. Walt Smith. Knowed him all my life,” said Preston Brown.
“Tried and acquitted,” Fred Dyer insisted sourly. “Cause the word had got around that Watson done it.”
“You know better than that,” Lucius snapped too sharply. People stared at him, alarmed. “I have talked many times with Gene Roberts at Flamingo,” he told the audience, frowning down at Fred Dyer but unable to get his eye. “Gene Roberts was Guy Bradley’s friend and neighbor, he was the man who picked up Bradley’s body, and he knew that whole story better than anybody.”
“Gene Roberts was Ed Watson’s friend, that’s all I’m sayin!” Dyer cried. “Used to come by Chatham Bend when I was workin there! No wonder he spoke up for him, he had no choice about it!”
“Walter Smith never denied that he killed Bradley. He even boasted of it.” Lucius turned to Preston Brown. “Another correction, sir, if you don’t mind. Eddie Watson took no part in the Tucker killings.”
“Yessir! Eddie Watson! Knowed him all my—”
“Excuse me, Mr. Brown. In 1901, Eddie Watson was still a schoolboy, living in Fort Myers with his mother. He never lived down here along this coast.” He gazed bleakly at the audience. “I realize it’s a lot more fun to implicate someone like E. E. Watson, who sits up front in church. But it isn’t true.”
“Well, E. J. Watson, he’s the one I’m talkin about. He liked his alcohol, he visited all the bars,” Preston Brown said. “My dad had nothin against alcohol, he was in there, too. One time there was a bunch of ’em around the bar, with Old Man Watson settin up the drinks. And a couple of nigra women come in there, wanted a bottle—weren’t uncommon, because Key West was more a Yankee town than not. So Watson mutters, ‘Well, boys, I will take care of this.’ And he got up and went outside where their big ol’ bucks was waitin on them women. Might of seed Watson through the window and figured it was healthier outside. One of ’em said real nervous, ‘Evenin, Cap’n,’ and that was about all he got to say before Watson started in to cuttin on ’em with his bowie knife. Never said a word. He had one down, pretty well killed, and the other one, he was pretty well cut to pieces. Might of finished the both of ’em, for all I know.
“So Watson had enough of it and walked away from there, but on the way over to the dock he run into some deputies who was comin to investigate all that hollerin. So Watson told ’em, ‘You boys better get on up to Jimmy’s Bar.’ And they said, ‘Ed, what in tarnation is making all that racket?’ And Watson said, ‘My goodness, boys, they are cuttin up a couple of perfectly good niggers over there!’ Tipped his hat, climbed back aboard his schooner, and went on north to Chatham River.”
Lucius closed his eyes, disgusted. He appealed to the audience’s good sense. “See what I mean? These Watson tales are passed down from our parents and grandparents and we just repeat them, never bothering to find out if they are true.” He was aware that his weary tone was casting a pall over the room, which had started grumbling. He could not help it.
“Who the hell is we?” a voice shouted hoarsely. “You come from around here?”
“Hell yes, he comes from around here! I know this feller!” Fred Dyer had hauled himself straight up in his seat and was pointing a bent arthritic claw at Lucius, who took a deep breath, braced for the worst. “That ain’t no professor! That is Lucius Watson!” Dyer actually stood up, staring wildly around him, but no one would let him catch an eye, no one would look at him, as if so many years of drunkenness and reckless tirade had invalidated anything that he might say. Knowing this, he protested no further but sat down slowly, alone and aggrieved, refolding his arms upon his chest. Under Lucius’s gaze, he shrugged and looked away.
“Well, it sure weren’t Colonel Watson killed them Tuckers!” Preston Brown declared. “I knowed Colonel all my life, and a nicer feller you would never want to meet! Colonel been on my boat about a thousand times. Sweetest person that you ever seen—good sense of humor! Oh yes, I fished with Colonel Watson many’s the time. He liked his whiskey!”
Lucius had never drunk with Preston or set foot on his boat. “No, it wasn’t Colonel,” he said quietly, embarrassed by the old man’s exaggerations and plain lies and suffocated by the greater lie he himself was perpetrating.
“How come you know so much about them Tuckers?” an old woman hollered at the podium. “They’s only the one feller could know so much, and that’s the one who done it.”
“Know somethin funny?” Preston Brown was pointing at Lucius. “This feller right here, he’s the spittin image of ol’ Colonel Watson!”
Fred Dyer groaned loudly. “Ain’t that what I said?”
“Well, let’s see now,” Hoad Storter interrupted. “Old Man Watson had four boys that he owned up to. There were just four brothers”—he paused ever so slightly—“that we want to talk about.” His chipmunk cheeks rounded a little when other people laughed. “The oldest boy who ran away after that Tucker business, no one remembers him anymore”—he stopped Preston Brown with a raised palm—“not even Preston. Next one was Eddie, who stayed there at Fort Myers, wouldn’t surprise me if he’s up there yet. Then came Lucius—well, some of us know Colonel. Never met a man yet who had bad words for Colonel Watson, not even the men who were on that list he took so many years putting together, scaring everybody half to death, himself included!” He winked at Lucius. “Then came the youngest—the little boy who saw his daddy killed.”
“How about that other little feller, supposed to been drowned in the Great Hurricane? The one Speck Daniels always claimed to be!”
“Well, Speck
’s mama,” a woman called, “got herself hitched up to her own first cousin, and a good half of their ten, twelve head of kids come out not so smart or something worst.”
Somebody hee-hawed but the rest of the hall filled with coughs and chair scrapes, whisperings, and indignation. “Well, Aunt Josie had a girl named Jenny,” another woman said carefully, “and she was supposed to been a Watson, too!” And the first woman said, “No, no, honey, what they claimed, Jenny was raped by Mr. Watson!” This was vehemently disputed by a third. “Say what you like about Mr. Watson, he were not the kind to go around rapin his own daughter!”
“Ain’t that Jenny Everybody we’re talkin about?” Preston Brown inquired, in the first lull in the tumult. Detecting titillation, he cried out over the hubbub, “Yessir! Called her Jenny Everybody! Cause she weren’t particular!” He looked confused when his joke was met with a disjointed silence. The elderly audience fretted and knitted, shifted, itched, and coughed in disapproval. “Called her Jenny Everybody cause she weren’t so particular,” the old man repeated without heart.
“If Speck was in that bunch, he got the brains of all them other ten mushed into one!” an old voice cackled. “That feller been called names aplenty, but nobody never called him Not-So-Smart!”
“Nobody that ain’t lookin to outsmart hisself!” Crockett Junior bellowed. Whidden Harden gazed straight ahead, expressionless, as Sally rose and hurried toward the rear.
Preston Brown came forward to peer more closely at “Professor Collins.” His prolonged scrutiny was already encouraging cranky speculation from the audience about whether this darned know-it-all professor should be trusted. Concluding his inspection, Old Preston brooded. “I always heard it was Young Ed that helped his daddy—heard that all my life. Them old-timers had no reason to lie to us. Seems kind of funny this here man would just walk in here and go to sayin that our old folks would lie to us like that.” Pointing at Lucius, the old man said, “You’re coverin up for Eddie Watson, ain’t that right?”
Lucius turned toward the night windows, imploring forgiveness from the old man who might be out there in the dark. He said quietly, “No. It wasn’t Eddie. The most likely witness—if E. J. Watson killed the Tuckers, and if there was a witness—was the oldest boy, who left this part of Florida long, long ago.”
“I never heard about no older boy in that darned Tucker business.” Old Brown pointed accusingly at the speaker. “You must be some kind of a Watson. ‘L. Watson Collins’—they got that wrote right down here on my program!”
“L. Watson Collins is my pen name,” Lucius told him. He smiled at his friends, then lifted his gaze to the whole room. “Mr. Brown is correct. My name is Lucius Watson. Most old-timers on this coast know me as Colonel.” He scanned the audience for Watson Dyer. “The late Mr. E. J. Watson was my father.”
The silence was broken first by a low groan, then a squeaked “I knew it!” then “No wonder!” An old man called out, “How you doin, Colonel? I’m pleased to meet up with you again! I was just tellin these folks here how much you looked like you!” But an old lady toward the back held up his History. “If I was to ask you to sign this book, which name would you sign? If your daddy never murdered nobody, the way you’re telling us, how come you’re so ashamed of him that you don’t put your own name on your own book?”
In the hard light, the church hall hummed with anticipation. Preston Brown cried, “Didn’t I tell you this was Eddie’s brother? See why he claimed it weren’t Eddie killed them Tuckers but that older boy?”
“It was the older boy, you cock-eyed old idjit! The man is telling you the truth!”
At that slurred shout careening through the window, the young men in the doorway rushed outside. Lucius jumped from the stage and hurried up the aisle. In the door he was blocked by the one-armed man, who grasped him by the shirtfront. Crockett Junior growled, “Don’t come no further south, you understand me?” Shoving Lucius away, he went out into the darkness. Sally Brown was dragging at his arm, entreating him not to follow. By the time he fought his way outside, the men were gone.
Most of the audience, disgruntled, was rising to leave, and Preston Brown had taken advantage of the speaker’s absence to regain the floor. “See, nobody wanted to go up in that wild river looking for Watson,” he was shouting. “But there was one deputy was running for Sheriff, and his platform was, I will arrest Ed Watson, bring him up before the bar of justice. So he went up to Chatham River and Watson got the drop on him and took his guns away and put him to work in the cane harvest. That feller come back in two weeks’ time with a neck bad sunburnt and calluses on his hands, and very very glad to be alive. Said Ed J. Watson was as fine a feller as any man could ever hope to meet, and the only planter worth a damn on that whole coast.”
“That’s quite a story,” Lucius told the audience as he reached the podium. “Does anyone else have anything they’d like to add?” Upset by Rob’s folly in coming here at all, he was anxious to bring the evening to an end.
Old Brown stood there in his high black shoes, the last of his life aglimmer in his eyes, and still he would not take a seat, as if afraid that his decrepit apparatus might never propel him back onto his feet. His fingers worked the back of his steel chair. When he raised his hand again, clearing his throat, Lucius interrupted gently, observing how helpful it would be if these old stories had any sort of documentation. He invited the audience to empathize with the frustrations of the historian, who had to be conservative about unconfirmed stories, however colorful. Lucius had hoped that this approach would be approved by an old-fashioned community which felt not only protective about “Mister Watson” but superior in their inside knowledge to people from outside the county. Nosir, Ol’ Ed weren’t near so bad as what outsiders try to tell you, not when you knowed him personal the way we done. How often he’d heard old-timers say that!
Realizing that his testimonies had been discounted, the old man suddenly sat down, and his chair creaked loudly in the hush of disapproval. In questioning an elder’s recollections, consigning them to myth, the speaker had undermined the integrity of local legend and tradition, and now his hearers made it plain that any diminishment of the Watson legend, even by his son, would not be tolerated. The faces pinched closed in their suspicion that this fake professor had tried to pull the wool over their eyes. More old people tottered to their feet with a loud barging of chairs and the rest followed, as Lucius called, “Good night! Thank you for coming!”
He remained at the podium, shuffling his notes into some sort of order, upbraiding himself for letting the evening collapse so swiftly into such a shambles. The plastic glass, with its tired lemon, was a silent rebuke in the corner of the rostrum, but mercifully the Program Director had fled. Only Hoad Storter came up to shake his hand, and even Hoad, who was keeping people waiting, had to leave quickly, saying he hoped to see Lucius in a day or two at Everglade.
Last to depart was old Fred Dyer, who limped past in a syphilitic shuffle, evading the speaker’s eye. When Lucius followed him up the aisle and touched his elbow, the empurpled man tottered around in a half circle with a grimace of alarm, backing like a crayfish into a row of seats. “You remember me, Mr. Dyer?” Lucius asked quietly. “I guess I wasn’t much more than fifteen when your family left the Bend.”
“Family!” The man spat upon the church hall floor. “My own children would like to see me dead, they’re so ashamed of me!” He kept on going, but Lucius moved beside him.
“Your son—”
“He’s your damned kin, not mine.” Fred Dyer stopped short and looked Lucius in the eye for the first time that evening. “What’s that ungodly bastard up to anyways? Couple months ago, he shows up real friendly where I drink, buys me a round or two while he sits there sucking a damn cherry soda. Says, ‘You still tellin people that I’m Watson’s son?’ Hell, yes! ‘You willin to sign that in a affidavit?’ Hell, yes! Next thing I know, there’s a legal paper settin in front of me which says it is the opinion and sincere belief of t
he undersigned, Fred Dyer, that Watson Dyer, born December fourth of 1905 on Chatham Bend in Monroe County, is the natural son of the planter E. J. Watson!” He shook his greasy head. “Here I been sayin that same thing for forty years, and now this damn contrary bastard wants me to sign it!”
Yet Fred seemed bewildered, even a little hurt. “I said, ‘Wattie, for Christ’s sake, what’s this all about? Ain’t it a little late in life to renounce your name?’ And he told me, ‘Fred, you got sick of living a lie, and I feel the same.’ Said he aimed to live in truth just as soon as he could get around to all the paper work. Called me Fred! Made me feel funny—the cold mean way he said my name. When I signed that paper, he was grinning like a alligator. Tucked it away, stood up, and winked. Never said so much as a good-bye.”
At the door, Fred Dyer yanked his bent straw hat onto a head of yellowed silver hair, which straggled to his collar. “You was always a pretty good feller, Lucius, even as a boy. Only thing, you never done right by my little daughter.” He went on outside into the night.
Sally and Whidden greeted Lucius at the door. When he had seen Whidden last, a few years earlier, Lee Harden’s son had been pretty close to thirty, a fishing guide and gator hunter and a hell-raiser. Outwardly, he had changed little—more weatherworn, perhaps, still lean and fit. The wheaten hair had iron wisps and the sun-squinted green eyes had crow’s-feet in the corners.
“This here’s my ex-husband-to-be,” Sally said affectionately, taking Whidden’s arm. “I guess you’ve known him a lot longer than I have.”
“Watsons and Hardens always been in friendship, right back into the old century”—Harden smiled—“and Mister Colonel was my dad’s best friend from 1919 until we left the Islands.” As her husband spoke, Sally’s expression entreated Lucius to put their recent intimacy behind him and let it stay there.