Lost Man's River (95 page)

Us Houses knowed somethin was up pretty soon after it happened. Walker Carr rowed up Turner River to where we was farmin near the Trail.
Showed up one night, never said what he was after—might of muttered about hard times and prospectin for gator holes or somethin. At first light, he walked off toward the east. He was a strong little feller but not young no more, so my dad was worried and he follered him a ways before he give up and let him go.

Back then there weren't much traffic across Florida, and the few trucks and autos never picked up drifters, not in the Depression, not way out there in the middle of the Glades. Anyways, he must of walked a good ways east over the Trail, cause he never come back through till near a fortnight later. Might of spent that second night at Monroe Station, then headed off on some Injun path south and east across the Cypress and out across that long pine ridge on the old Chevelier Road and on down into the Shark River Slough. That's hard goin, bogs and saw grass and limestone solution holes that slash your boots, never mind the varmints, and no dry place to sleep after the summer rains.

That's a big country down there, so Carr must of had a rough idea where he was headed. But why he would take that hard overland journey is a mystery, unless he was aimin to make sure that there weren't no bodies layin out in the Shark River savannas where turkey buzzards might find 'em, maybe draw some Injuns that was out huntin. Wouldn't want to go in there by river in case he might run across the Hardens, who was out searchin for them bodies, too. The difference was, the Hardens had nothin to hide. They was searchin for sign along the edges of the creeks in broad open daylight. They wanted to find their boys, take 'em home for burial. I reckon Carr wanted to bury 'em for good right where they lay.

Them Hardens had a heavy cross to bear, and we all felt bad about it. Lee Harden lost his oldest boy, and Earl did, too. Earl could be likable, but he was hard. All his life, he seemed kind of discontented, and he complained a lot as he grew older. Rounder than Lee, a little shorter, but not fat. Lee was a big man, and he looked real tough and craggy with that ax-scarred face, but he was easygoing, he could laugh at himself, which Earl could never do. All the same, nobody messed with Lee, because when he drank, he had that dangerous temper.

For a few years, Lee come up to Everglade and haunted them young Carrs. Never harassed 'em directly, just anchored his boat in the river off Carrs' fish house. Couldn't shoot 'em only on suspicion—though men done a
lot
just on suspicion, back in them days! Never called out, never said a word, like he was studying on what to do and had probably come to the right place to do it. That big boat anchored out front was Lee's way of saying that Carrs and Hardens had unfinished business, and it might of been what caused one of 'em to crack.

Well, the truth finally come out, like Sally says. The Carr boys said they never meant to shoot, they was just nervous, and when Wilson Harden heard somethin and reared up under his miskeeter bar, a gun went off. They claimed they thought the Harden boys was up and shootin so they fired—a pure case of self-defense, to hear Carrs tell it. They admitted they run down Roark in the swamp, admitted they was shriekin at each other, tryin to decide what they should do, because Roark Harden wasn't likely to forget what he had witnessed.

Those Harden boys was angry wild young fellers, no doubt about it, but Walker Carr's boys, they weren't angels neither. One of 'em was always fidgetin his eyes, and I reckon he's still doin that today. Got so you always had to watch what was laying around loose—life weren't never that way in the old days.

Whatever them Carr boys done or didn't do, they are the ones who has to live with it, die with it, too. But it was a shame, the way they killed that poor young feller beggin for his life—that was the part that ate at Turner Carr. Said shootin Roark Harden while he crawled away was the worstest thing he ever had to do. Well, I sure hope so!

I won't speak for Owen Carr, but I known Turner all my life and I don't believe he ever bragged about that killin. Nosir, he was real upset and very close to tears just in the tellin of it—this was two years later! Told me that all they wanted was their coonskins, and how when one boy got shot by mistake, they went ahead because they could not leave a witness. I warned young Turner that he better keep his mouth shut, pray for forgiveness, but he could not stop talkin—not braggin, the way Sally tells it, only talkin, like confessin his sins over and over was his only hope of getting shut of what they done.

After the news got out, the whole Bay hunkered down, expectin trouble. The guns come out every time them Harden men come up from Lost Man's, and them young Carrs was pretty hard to find.

Outside of their family, most people took that coonskin story with some salt. Roy Thompson who married my cousin Ernestine, he fished with Lee Harden for some years, and fished with one of them Carr brothers, too, so he heard the inside story from both sides. Roy Thompson told me he did not believe them Hardens stole no coon hides. Whether he'd say that to the Carrs, I just don't know.

What it comes down to, the Carr boys knew that no matter what, the community was behind 'em. There weren't no law south of Caxambas, that was understood by everybody, Sheriff included. Carrs knew they could take the law in their own hands, like was done with Guy Bradley and the Rice boys and Ed Watson and a lot of other men who come to a bad end down in this country.

Like I say, Earl and Lee was tough old boys, and crack shots, too. Robert Harden was an old feller by that time, might not of known what he was shootin at but could still hit it if you got him pointed in the right direction. Even the women in that clan were as handy with shootin irons as they were with hoes. Besides that, they had Webster Harden, who usually finished what he started, and a feller named Watson right next door who could shoot as good as any of 'em and maybe better. Altogether, that was not a gang you would want to mess with.

So everybody on the Bay was set for trouble, but the years went by and not a thing was done about it. Maybe Lee and Earl was startin to get old, or maybe too much time had passed before they learned for sure what really happened, or maybe they never did agree on what to do. They was good brothers as boys, is what my dad told me, but later in life them two men could not agree on the best place in the woods to take a piss.

Crossing her ankles, Sally Brown sank down on the sand. Hands in hip pockets, Whidden stood behind her. In the Gulf wind, they had come up quietly, and Andy House, not knowing how long they had been in earshot, looked chagrined.

“What was done to those Harden boys,” Sally said brusquely, “was what those people wanted to see done. The whole community was behind it, as you say. And those murders were excused by calling the Hardens mixed breed or mulatta. Well, if Hardens are mixed, then the Bay people are, too, because most of those families are blood kin to the Hardens whether they admit it or not. Sandy Albritton is not ashamed of it, but the rest will try to let on to this day that they are no kin to Hardens whatsoever. Probably think that after fifty years of telling that old lie, it might be true.”

Andy House said carefully, “Them young Carrs were not the least bit proud about what happened.”

“Back then? I'm not so sure.”

“You weren't born back then.”

Cutting off their wrangling, Whidden sounded tired. “Owen Carr was hot after my sister Edie. He never came around, not once, after Roark disappeared, that was one reason our family suspected him. But we knew that if we done anything about it, we would give 'em their excuse to stage a raid down here and lynch them mixed-breed sonsabitches once and for all. My mama
heard
that lynch talk. Folks made sure she heard it. In the store.”

“And even if Hardens got the case to a grand jury,” Andy said thoughtfully, “they knew that the Carr boy would testify how he never confessed to no such thing. And they knew a jury would accept that coonskin story
whether they believed it or they didn't because no self-respectin jury was going to sit still for no supposed-to-be mulattas takin white folks into court, not in Collier County nor in Lee nor Monroe neither.”

Slowly he turned toward the Hardens. “I sure do hate to be the one to say that, Whidden, but ain't that about right?”

Whidden and Sally stared into the fire and did not answer, and Lucius did not know what to say to make things better. Andy's conclusion was also self-condemnation, a gagging down of bitter medicine, but unable to see anyone's expression, hearing no comment, the blind man, too, seemed cast down, filled with despair. Even in firelight, Andy looked ashamed of his own need to hammer out his “truth.” Yet his calm and measured voice would not relent. “And even after it come out who done it,” he resumed, “I never heard no Harden claim they was deprived of legal justice. Why?”

Sally burst out, “I know what
you
think, Mr. House, because people like you all think the same! You think it's because the Hardens knew that as ‘supposed-to-be-mulattas,' they were not going to get justice, no matter what!” Sally Brown was very close to tears. “On the other hand, they couldn't claim race prejudice, because claiming prejudice would seem to be admitting that there might be something for people to be prejudiced
about—that about right?
” She mimicked him sarcastically, voice quavering.

Yet a moment later she spoke to him without rancor. Picking up cool sand, watching it pour away between her fingers, she blurted finally, “Oh, I guess what you've been saying is ‘true' enough, Mr. House. A half-truth, anyway.”

Whidden hauled the bow of the
Cracker Belle
onto the sand. Followed by Lucius, he clambered aboard and ducked down into the cabin, where he fished a bottle from beneath the coils of anchor warp in the forward cuddy and brought it back on deck. Each took a snort and gasped as the liquor eased him.

“Like Andy says, they was wild and they was angry, they sank boats and broke up traps, they was reckless with their mouths and with their guns. And knowin how people talked about our family, that made 'em angrier than ever. Them boys swore over and over they would never be run off their home territory without a fight. Roark and Wilson was the most ornery amongst the Hardens—or bravest, depending how you look at it.” Whidden paused, observing Lucius. “So you might say—and people did say—that they had it comin.”

“Do you believe they had it coming?”

“I guess I do. If you believe them Carrs about them coonskins.” Whidden shrugged. “Carrs are my wife's kinfolks. I sure do hate to call 'em liars as well as murderers.” He smiled with Lucius but his eyes were serious. “Sally wonders how them Carrs could shoot another boy while he was beggin for his life—she can't get over that! Well, don't let on I said this, Mister Colonel—and I'm not just sayin it, I have done some thinkin on it—but I never wondered about that, not for one minute. Back in them Fish Wars, in the Depression, with poor people so hungry on this coast, and all the ugly bitter feelins that there was? In them Carrs' place, so scared and angry, I might of done no different than what they done.”

“Are you saying the Hardens have forgiven it?”

“No, I sure ain't. I'm only sayin that most of us can understand how it could happen. That make sense?”

Lucius supposed that the Bay people had suspended the feud after those deaths, since Whidden had been accepted when he courted Sally.

“Not by all of 'em. Someone seen us holdin hands and commenced to holler and take on, tell the old bad stories. The Carr cousins said, ‘Why, honey, he's a
Harden!'
And Sally said, ‘That's right, folks, and I'm fixin to marry him, cause I just dote on this here Harden boy for his sparkly green eyes and his blond hair!' Well, she had 'em there, they couldn't say too much, they just kept bleatin at her, ‘He's a
Harden!'