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:
One time at our Harden table, Ed told that same old story. When we didn’t laugh much, he opined, “Well, I don’t guess Choctaws care too much for darkie jokes.” We knew he was baiting us and didn’t like it but Daddy Richard never seemed to mind. Said something like, “That’s us dumb Indins for you, Ed.” And those two men would grin and nod like they knowed a thing or two, which I reckon they did.
Indins was one thing but nigras was another. Most of the settlers in southwest Florida came south in the old century to get away from Yankee Reconstruction, and they brought hard feelings about nigras to our section: just wouldn’t tolerate ’em and still don’t to this day. Ed Watson, now, he joked with nigras, talked with ’em like they was people. Got mad at ’em, sure, like anybody, but he was one of the few men on this coast who didn’t seem to have it in for ’em on general principles-one reason why us Hardens had to like him.
When our guest departed, Webster said, “You notice how he mostly uses that word ‘darkie’?” I reckon we all noticed that, which don’t mean anybody understood why it was so. And naturally Earl told his dark brother, “Don’t matter what you call ’em, boy, a nigger is a nigger.” And Webster said, “Takes one to know one, don’t it.” Webster’s tongue could whip Earl back into his corner, and if Earl went for him, ol’ Web could handle that part pretty good, too.
That day, Watson told them Atwells how he didn’t need no damn Corsican like Dolphus Santini to instruct him about land surveys, not no more, because his daughter had married her a banker and his son-in-law’s friends the cattle kings had such good connections in the capital that any bureaucrat who messed with E. J. Watson over deeds and titles might be hearing about that from Ed’s good friend Nap Broward, the next governor of Florida. Yessir, Ed said, he was on his way and didn’t care who knowed it.
So they all drank to Ed’s great future and their own safe journey to Key West, and after that he stepped out into the sun in his black hat and spread his boots and stuck his thumbs in that big belt of his and stood in front of the only house white-painted on this coast. Yessir, says Ed, I’ll be down that way tomorrow, have a look at my new property. That’s when Winky finally got around to notifying the new owner that those young Tuckers were still camped on Lost Man’s Key.
Before saying that, Winky let go his bow line-let the bow swing clear of the dock and turn downstream with the current. But hearing that news, Watson put his boot down on the stern line that was slipping off the dock, and the sloop swung back hard against the pilings. Still had his whiskey in his hand and still looked calm, but that calm was only just his way of getting set for the next move, same as a rattler gathering its coils, and his face warned ’em that good news better be next and damn quick, too.
Winky’s words come out all in a ball. He assured Ed that Wally Tucker had no claim on Lost Man’s Key, no rights at all. It was just that Atwells never used the place so they never seen no cause to run him off.
Watson nodded for a while, with Atwells setting in the boat saying nothing that might turn him ugly: they was nodding right along with Ed like a pair of doves. “I’ll tell you what you people do,” Ed said in a thick voice. He cleared his throat and spat the contents clear across their bow into the river. “What you do,” he said, “you notify that conch sonofabitch that E. J. Watson bought that quit-claim fair and square. And you tell him to get his hind end off that property just as fast as he can dump his drag-ass female aboard his boat and haul up that old chunk of wormrock that he calls an anchor. That clear enough?”
Watson’s fury was so raw that Winky got a scare: he had clean forgot Watson’s quarrel with the Tuckers. But what with all the whiskey he had drunk, he got his courage up and tried again: Only thing about it, Ed, young Tucker has built him a thatch-roof cabin and small dock, cleared a piece of land across the channel, got his crops in; also, his wife is about to bust with her first baby. Knowing how generous Ed could be, his neighbors hoped that maybe he could let them young folks finish out their season, have their child in peace. Reminded him that as the rightful squatter, he would get to inherit Tucker’s cabin and any and all improvements-
Watson’s boot was still pinning the stern line. The only sound in that slow heat was the current licking down along the bank. Waiting out that silence, Winky said, they felt like screeching. Finally Watson said, “I sure do hate to hear that kind of talk. Pride don’t give him no damn right to dispute the man that has paid cash for the title. Law’s the law.”
Winky couldn’t believe that a man so generous to his neighbors could turn cold-hearted so quick but he knowed Atwells was in the wrong. They should of got it straight with Tucker first, they would have to return the money. Being so nervous, Winky stuck his hand into his pocket kind of sudden, and the next thing he knowed he was eye to eye with a.38 revolver.
Very very
Winky’s nerve broke and his voice, too. All he meant was, Winky squeaked-he was squeaking just describing it!-Atwells would be happy to return Mister Watson’s money until they got this Tucker business straightened out. Watson shook his head. “That’s your money,” he said, “You can stick that money up your skinny damn conch ass for all I care. That island’s mine. So get your squatters off my property by Monday next.”
Winky said, “Why, sure thing, Ed, just write it on a paper what you want and we’ll take that paper straight to Wally Tucker.”
Ed Watson reared back and throwed his whiskey glass over the water as far as he could throw it, then stomped inside and scratched a note and brought it back. Never said good-bye, just headed straight into his field.
At Lost Man’s Key, Tucker read that note, read it again. He looked up at the Atwell boys, who could not read. Winky said, Well, what’s it say? And Tucker read it out:
Wally Tucker was a fair-haired feller of a common size, took the sun too hard, went around with a boiled face. Reading them words out loud made him redder still. He turned to look toward his little cabin, where his young woman stood watching from the door. In a queer voice, he told ’em how Ed Watson, drunk, took to patting Bet’s backside and how Bet had to slap him. “That’s why he calls her ‘trash,’ ” he whispered, dazed. “Bet’s fixing to have our baby any day now. She sure don’t need this kind of aggravation.”
Him and Atwells hunkered down and talked it over. “You fellers have sold our home right out from under us,” Wally told ’em, making angry
