Arly (2 page)

A mule let out a long series of hee-haws, a sound that worked back and forth, cutting through the gray of morning like a bucksaw. Up ahead, I saw Addie Cooter, the big woman who drive the picker wagon, holding the ribbons to the four mules.

I liked Huff's mama. Papa did too, because she'd bring drinking water to the vegetable fields, ever workday. She had a big body that near filled the wagon bench and her face usual scratched a big smile to go with it. She was our nearby neighbor in Shack Row. Addie Cooter had five kids. And claimed she'd popped four before she'd knowed what caused it.

When I waved to Mrs. Cooter she waved back, motioning with a frown and a toss of her head that I'd best get Papa loaded on quick.

“Hurry up, Papa.”

His lungs were heaving in air, but those bandy old legs kept a trot to his feet. I could see we'd make the tailgate and he'd not be the last one to skin aboard. Papa
let loose of my hand and run for it. Roscoe Broda stood at the tailgate of the picker wagon, holding his roster board under one of his bully arms. Roscoe wasn't fat. He was just built solid as a plow ox. When he eyed Papa, he spat into the dust of the wagon ruts.

“Arly Poole,” said Addie, from up on her wagon seat, “you best look yourself tidy come tomorrow.” She said it righteous bold, as if she didn't care a sniff if Mr. Broda heard her say it.

“Yes'm, Mrs. Cooter.”

I was thankful to see that Papa wasn't going to load on last, because old Dinker Witt was a good twenty steps back of Papa, limping along on his twisted knee. Mr. Witt put an eye to Roscoe Broda's big boot, like he knew he'd load on last and take whatever meanness come due.

But then I saw Papa drop his noon bag.

He run a couple-three steps beyond it, looking at Roscoe as if he couldn't decide whether to go back and fetch it or miss eating until sundown. Quicker than a spooked rabbit, I made a dive into the dust for the sack and got to it just as Papa did, making him fumble it again. Our four hands seemed to tie into a knot.

“Hurry,” I said.

Ahead of us, Dinker Witt threw his lame old body up and over the tailgate and into Addie's wagon bin, joining the twenty others already aboard. This meant that Papa would be last and he'd have to work at half pay.

Roscoe Broda put a mark on his roster sheet and said, “Dan Poole,” in a voice deeper than dirt. “Half wages for Saturday.”

Papa tried to hasten over the tailgate, but he couldn't move fast enough. Roscoe whipped a kick into my daddy's backside, making Papa sprawl into the floor
of the wagon bin. A few of the pickers reached out hands to help him up and made a place for him on the long bench boards.

I knew it was the rule.

The kick was sorry enough, but the half wages for a whole day's work would hurt us Pooles a lot meaner when we had to trade at Mrs. Stout's store in Jailtown. Captain Tant own the store. Just like he most own everthing on earth, even the peacocks that he'd brought here. And people usual said he charge the tourist folks ten cents a bag to feed 'em. I'd once saw a city lady fish out a dime so her kid could feed the peacocks. Like ten cents was nothing.

Dan Poole would have to sweat bent over in the cucumbers all day for not much more than ten cents, at half wages.

I spotted a hunk of mud at my feet, which I sure did want to pick up, to chuck at Roscoe Broda. Yet I didn't. All I did was just stand there in the morning light and wish that I was anybody except who I'd got born to be. I just feeled like a dumb and dirty boy, standing there, watching Addie Cooter cluck at her four mules, and see my daddy ride off to picking. He didn't wave to me, like usual. Mr. Broda followed the wagon on horseback and all I did was stand there, hurting inside for Papa.

I hated being Arly Poole.

Huff showed up.

We stood behind the row of gray shacks tossing bits of bark and loose rock into Lake Okeechobee, listening to the
plunk
sound.

“We was lucky last night,” he said.

“How so?”

“First off, because we didn't hurt ourselfs when we tumble off the tree. Second, we didn't let Roscoe's men see us, or hear us neither. If so, we'd got whupped for sure.”

“But we didn't see much of Flossie and the necktie sport she was socializing.”

Huff agreed. “No, I don't guess we did.”

“Hey, do you want to walk over to the cane crusher, and see if maybe they're shorthanded at the sugar mill?”

“Won't do no good,” Huff answered, throwing a pebble to the quiet morning lake water. “Until you're twelve, nobody'll take you on. Captain's orders. And it's Captain Tant or Roscoe Broda that'll decide when you're twelve. If'n we're thick enough, we'll sudden be on the labor docket. No questions asked about birthdays.”

As I sat in the dust, my back against the trunk of a custard apple tree, I looked up at my friend. “My daddy say that when Sunday come, that's tomorrow, things'll bound to change.”

Huff shook his head.

“No famous outsider is gonna do squat. Captain owns Jailtown. Nobody else.” Huff sighed. “I seen the old Captain one time. He got white hair. Walks with a cane, he do. A mite bended over. But he wearing a white suit of clothes. Clean as a cloud. And sporting white shoes.”

“Did ya run?”

“Yeah,” said Huff, “but not until Captain look right at me with those burny eyes of his. Fever eyes, my mama calls 'em. It was sort of like meeting up with God.”

I laughed. “God don't pay visits to Jailtown. But come tomorrow, a famous person is due on the Queen.”

“Arly, I believe it when I see it happen. Folks aplenty git off the Caloosahatchee Queen at the town dock. But they seem always to git back up that gangplank and leave with the boat whistle.”

Leaving where we live, Shack Row, the pair of us head toward Jailtown with the hopes of maybe earning a dime, or even a nickel. We took the shortcut, the one only us picker kids use, because so much of the path was through muddy water. Shoe people didn't use it.

Of all the sights to see in Jailtown, perhaps the only, the one that captured a stranger's eye, would be the big lady's leg atop the Lucky Leg Social Palace. It stood up taller than a shack. Twice as tall, and painted a blushy pink color of female flesh. Covering most of it was a see-through black lace stocking, wove out of real rope, like a catfish net. The rope was coal black. Yet the wide garter that held it up was redder than raw.

As we walked close to the front door, I spotted Miss Angel Free and her silvery-gold hair, dressed in orange satin. Yawning, she was saying a goodnight to a pair of customers, using a sugary voice.

“Come again, gentlemen,” she said. “At my place, we're sort of akin to an Irish tenor's mouth.” She giggled. “We never close.”

Miss Angel Free continued to smile until the two dredgers tipped their hats to her, turned their backs, and final went stumbling along the red dust of Jailtown's main street. Her smile quickly faded and she spat over the porch rail.

Seeing the two of us kids, Huff and me, her face twisted into a hurried frown.

“Beat it,” she told us. “If'n I catch either one of you young tomcats within a sniff of this establishment, I'll ask Mr. Broda to sic his redtick hounds after you, and chase you into swamp.”

As she cussed at us, waving her arm to spook us away, I could hear the many bracelets rattling on her arm. It was said that Miss Angel own over a hundred bracelets, and each one a gift from an admiring man. They was, I was thinking, a lot to admire with Miss Angle Free. She was about twice the size of Flossie.

Huff and I trotted away.

When we stopped, Huff said, “Miss Angel don't own the Leg.”

“She don't?”

“Naw. Captain own it. Old Captain Tant own everthing, near about.” He pointed across the dirt street at Mrs. Stout's trading store, a place where Papa would have to report to, ever Saturday at sundown, to collect his wages. “Captain own the store too.”

There was usual no wages to collect. Somehow us Pooles fell into owing, so the debt and our shack rent
ate up what little Dan Poole had sweat to earn for six days. You couldn't leave Jailtown in debt. It was one of Captain's rules. Once in a spell, a man would try to run off. But there wasn't no safety to reach. Lake on one side. A swamp on two. The swamp held some gators longer than a wagon. The alligators, jaws and all, would treat you kinder than Broda's dogs.

One night, some years ago, Papa had got hisself more'n a mite shiny on moon, and had whispered secrets he knew to me. About how, a long time ago, Miss Angel had been a kiss or two closer than cozy to Captain Tant. My daddy warned me that I wasn't ever to repeat it.

I didn't. Not even to Huff Cooter.

“Gee,” said Huff, “I sort of hoped we could say a howdy to Flossie.” Looking back over his shoulder at the Lucky Leg, he added, “But I don't guess Miss Angel would allow her to talk to picker kids. Not if she's watching.”

Flossie was one of the few ladies we knew by name. But that was all.

Ruby and Amber were two others, but Flossie was our favorite lady to say hello to. Then we'd run into the swamp and giggle. Only one time did the pair of us ever work up the gumption for chatter. That was the day Flossie had just arrived in Jailtown and was crying, on account she was homesick. It'd be the only time in her entire life that she'd strayed off from home. She talked to us about her little sister and her dog. Then told us how old she was.

Flossie was thirteen.

It wasn't Flossie I was sweet on. Instead, I had feelings for Huff's older sister, Essie May. In all, there was five Cooter children. But really only four. Anybody man or boy, who looked at Essie May Cooter knowed
right away sudden that she wasn't no child. At thirteen, Essie was a small woman.

Huff and I moved through town. We had secret routes, in shadows, along board fences and through alleys, that kept us hid from view. We avoided people who wore shoes on their feet. Shoe people were rich folks, my daddy warned me. Men in shoes could hire you, fire you, tell you where to go, how to live, what to breathe and eat and think. So I never looked at a stranger's face first. It was always his feet. If a man wore shoes, or big boots, I didn't dare look up at his face. Because I was too afraid. I looked down.

Huff found a pack of CAMEL cigarettes. They'd gotten wet, turned brown, and their owner had throwed them away. As Huff usual carried matches, we hid underneath an empty house and puffed ourselfs silly.

Butting out his smoke, Huff swore. “Dang it,” he told me. “I just figured out that old Captain Tant even own that pretty little Flossie gal. He own her outright. Miss Angel Free bosses her at the Lucky Leg, but it be Captain who own her, mind and soul.”

His face seemed to be so sad as he was sharing his thoughts. It was as though his own secret candle had sudden blowed out.

“Captain Tant own the jail,” said Huff. “And he own the judge, Jailor Jim Tinner. Own it all. Name me one thing around here that old Captain don't hold a claim on. Name me one free thing, Arly.”

“Huff,” I said, “the Captain don't own
me
.”

“You hungry, Arly?”

My stomach jumped to Huff's question, so I told him I was. “Sort of. Got anything in your pockets?”

“Nope.” Huff grinned. “Fact is, these here pants don't
got
no pockets. Let's push over to the dock and see if'n we can scare up some catfish.”

We started on our way, rounded a corner, and saw the lake. Out across Okeechobee seemed like the end of the world, and where the distant waterline met the sky it looked like one got seamed to the other.

“Catfishing sure is a business around here,” said Huff. “You wonder who eats it all.”

My belly was so empty I near telled Huff that I could eat a catfish raw. Catfish in Okeechobee be good-size, fatter than prosperous, and some of the whoppers balance near as much as a dog on the weighing scales.

Fishcamps was ample plenty, so folks told it, all along the lake banks, as well as up into the dead rivers. People called 'em dead because they didn't seem to go nowheres. Folks at the fishcamps be city men mostly, trying to booze it up, play poker, and maybe hook a keeper. Some of the city gents fetched along costly gear,
poles and reels that was worth as dear as way up into dollars. Huff and I used beanpoles, or a stalk of cane would do; and for a float bobber, the corky woodpulp of a custard apple served out really fine. At least the catfish never seem to fuss over it.

“Ain't no better meal than a slice of Okeechobee catfish,” Huff said. “So, seeing I don't guess we got us hooks or heave lines, let's go find Brother.”

“Suits me.”

We found him. He was setting his dock, mending a seine. It had sinkers along one edge and floats lining the other. The net was in his lap and over his beefy legs. Even seated, Brother Smith was taller than I was standing. He was a giant, the only colored man that got treated decent. Even the white folks spoke to him … all except Captain. Brother Smith's hair be as gray as his shirt and pants. He never wore no shoes.

“Well,” he said in his soft voice, looking at me and Huff. “Hither ye be.”

Brother Smith talked like a Bible, people enjoyed saying. Folks said he was neighbor close to God and would still be so even if he hadn't been a fisherman. Jailtown didn't have a church or a preacher, but Brother Smith come righteous close to serving the settlement on both counts. He was, I reckoned, near to big as a church and about as holy as any man, dead or alive, or any lady. Holier, I figured, than a few of the ladies with the red lips who worked for Miss Angel Free back in the Lucky Leg Social Palace.

“Bless you, brothers,” said Brother. He called all men
brother
, which is how he earn his nickname.