I doubted the dirty old motor would work, but watched her every move as she tinkered with the engine. Her small fingers worked quickly as she pulled on this and pushed on that. I couldn’t wait to learn how to do all this myself.
I looked out over the water. The tide was moving in fast. The mud was already completely covered. Only the tips of the marsh grass were visible.
Lovie straightened and wiped her hands on her shorts again. “Okay, I think we’re ready to see if it’ll work.” She crossed fingers for luck.
I smiled and crossed my fingers too.
Lovie bent over the engine and did one rapid pull on a cord. Instantly the engine sprang to life.
We looked at each other in shock, then fist-pumped the air.
“Yeah!” we both hollered.
“I can’t believe it actually works!” she cried. “Okay Jake, you’re getting your first lesson in boating.” She pointed as she spoke. “Fuel line… choke knob… throttle handle… kill switch.”
I hovered close and watched, listened, and learned. My blood was pumping like fuel through the rumbling motor.
Lovie lifted her chin. Her eyes were gleaming. “The engine’s working. The tide is high. It’s time to take her out and see what she’s got.” She looked at me. “I need a push.”
“What?” I looked at her dumbly.
“A push. We need to get out of the mud.”
It took me a minute to understand what she meant. “You want me to get in that mud? With all those bugs and crabs?”
“Uh, yeah. We can’t go unless you do. I can’t do it. I have to drive the boat.”
“But…,” I sputtered, looking back at the marsh.
“Do you want this boat or not?”
I thought of the other things that could be lurking—like alligators and water moccasins. But I wanted the boat more.
“Okay,” I said grudgingly.
“You’d better take your shoes off,” Lovie said. “They’ll get stuck in the pluff mud.”
“No way I’m stepping in that muck in my bare feet.”
Lovie merely shrugged. “Suit yourself. But don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
With a grunt I climbed over the kayaks to the rear of the boat. Making a face, I said out loud, “Yuuuuuuck!”
Lovie giggled. “Oh, go on, silly. It’s just mud.”
Slowly, thinking of crabs, I eased myself over the side of the boat. First my toes, then my feet sank down deep into the slippery brown goo.
“This is so gross,” I muttered. It felt like I was walking in slime. “Now what?”
“The front of the boat is called the bow. Go there.”
The mud made a sucking, slurpy sound with each step I made. Step by step, I plodded through the thick mud as it got deeper. Then I raised my foot—and my sneaker was gone.
“My shoe!” I cried. “It came off.”
“You’ll never find it,” Lovie called back. “Just keep going.”
“But…”
“I tried to warn you.”
I fumed but couldn’t stop now. I was up to my knees in it.
“You sure this isn’t quicksand?” I yelled back.
“It’s just pluff mud, but it can suck you down… a bit. Don’t worry, Jake,” she called to me. “You’re almost there.”
I finally reached the front of the boat, lifting my knees high to plow through the mucky mud.
“I’m going to put the engine in reverse,” Lovie called out. “When I do, you push hard. With all your might. Got it?”
I gritted my teeth and lowered my weight onto my left foot. I sank a few inches deeper into the goo, then stopped, praying it wasn’t a bit like quicksand. “Hurry up!” I shouted. “I’m sinking!”
“Ready?” she yelled. “Now!”
I grunted and pushed with all my might as the engine rumbled low in the water. To my surprise—and relief—the boat slowly eased away from the muddy bank.
“Woot!” I called out, feeling the boat slide forward.
“Hop on!” Lovie called.
I tried to move, but my feet wouldn’t budge. The mud was gripping my legs.
“Lovie, I can’t move!” I called out. My heart was pounding fast as I imagined being sucked down into the mud, disappearing forever.
“Don’t panic,” Lovie called out, and put the engine in neutral. She hurried to the bow. “You can get out. Bend forward and try to lie on the mud.”
“Lie on it?” I shook my head as fear licked my spine. “I’ll sink faster.”
“No, you won’t. It’s a trick. We all know it. Do you trust me?”
I nodded.
“Lie flat. Then slowly wiggle your legs out of the mud. Then crawl on the mud to the shore. The mud is harder there. You can climb back in the boat. Go on now, hurry!”
I decided to trust Lovie. She was my friend. And she knew a lot about living in the Lowcountry.
I leaned far forward till I was lying on my belly in the thick mud. I didn’t sink! My face was getting coated with the stinky mud as I wiggled my legs. At last, one by one, I got them out from the mud’s gooey hold. Without shoes!
I crawled a foot or two closer to shore and could feel the mud thicken. When I lowered my feet again, I was able to stand. I quickly reached out and grabbed hold of the boat before it drifted farther away. Lovie grasped my arms, and we groaned as together we dragged my body back into the boat.
“Ugh,” I said in relief when I landed hard on the bottom of the boat. I was covered from head to toe in mud. Even my face was smeared with it.
Lovie released another high, trilling laugh. She hurried to the steering wheel and looked over her shoulder. “Look at you. You’re covered in pluff mud.”
“It smells like rotten eggs.”
“You’re now officially a Lowcountry kid.”
I looked at my mud-caked legs and clothes and laughed too. I liked that title.
Lovie moved like a pro as she maneuvered the skiff into the deeper water of the creek. I have to admit, I was pretty impressed with her seamanship.
“Take a look and see if there’s a leak,” she called back to me. “We don’t want to go far if we take on water.”
“Aye aye, captain!” I moved the kayaks to get a good look at the floor of the boat.
“Looks good.”
“Here we go!”
I held on to the side of the boat as Lovie accelerated. The little flat-bottomed boat took off down the creek, skimming over the water. Feeling the wind on my face felt so good I couldn’t stop grinning.
“Let’s get over to Macon’s dock,” I shouted. “He’s going to flip out when he sees us!”
When we reached Macon’s dock, Lovie slowed the engine to a low growl.
“Hey! You guys!”
We both turned to see Macon standing at the end of his dock, his hands on his head and his mouth wide open in shock.
“Told you he’d be surprised,” I said.
“Look what we found!” Lovie shouted to Macon.
Macon ran up to us, his big feet pounding on the wooden boards. When he got close, I could tell he wasn’t surprised. He was mad.
“What have you done?” Macon shouted. “You stole a boat?”
“We didn’t steal it!” I called back. “We found it. It was abandoned.”
“Mom’s going to freak out when she sees this.” Macon paced the dock, muttering to himself, then stopped short. “No. She can’t see this. I can’t let her get upset.” He pointed to the boat. “Get this… thing outta here. Now!”
“Wait, wait,” I said, trying to calm him down. “We’re just leaving it for a little while. Until we figure out what to do with it. We’ll move it. But come on. You’ve got to admit, it’s pretty cool.” I grinned wide.
Macon wasn’t convinced. He looked at me covered in mud and raised his brow. Then he sniffed and made a face. “You stink.”
I laughed and nodded. “Pluff mud. It’s bad.”
Lovie and I climbed up onto the dock. We all crossed our arms
and stood side by side on the dock and looked out at the dirty little boat in tense silence.
“It can’t stay here,” Macon said.
“Okay, we should’ve asked your permission,” I said. “But you weren’t there and here we are.”
“And out it has to go.”
“I know you’re mad,” I said.
“You think?” he snapped back.
“Come on, Macon,” Lovie said. “It’s a real find. A treasure!”
“Oh sure, a treasure,” Macon replied with sarcasm. “Are you looking at the same boat I am? This thing looks like it was pulled out of a dumpster and then pooped on by a flock of angry pelicans. Even they thought it looked bad. And it stinks!”
His comment triggered a burst of laughter from me and Lovie.
“Yeah, but it works,” Lovie said smugly.
“Can we dock it here? Just till we find someplace else?”
“Please,” Lovie begged. “If you let us keep it here, we’ll clean it up and make it our own. Jake could get his boating certification. So could you.”
This argument made a dent in Macon’s resistance. I could see him considering that possibility. We’d talked a lot about getting our boater’s licenses.
“Hey, it might be our only chance for it,” I added pleadingly.
“We’re actually doing a good thing,” Lovie said. “We’re cleaning up the creek. The boat was lying there. We’re giving it a new lease on life.”
“Come on,” I said. “It can be our boat. All of ours. We’d be the crew.”
“Fine,” Macon said in a clipped tone. “I’m only agreeing to this because my mom is usually stuck in a bed or in a sofa chair by windows that don’t face the dock. She won’t see it. But let’s be clear.” He pointed his finger at each of us. “I have nothing to do with this stupid idea of yours.”
“You don’t want to own it?” I asked.
He shook his head. “If you did something like this back in the city, you can bet a cop would be knocking on your door asking a lot of questions.”
“But we can keep it here?” I clarified.
“For a little while. Just till you find somewhere else.”
“Thanks, Macon,” I said, punching him in his shoulder.
“Yeah, yeah,” Macon grumbled back. “And for the record, y’all are crazy people. And you need a shower. You smell like a giant fart.”
Lovie drew near, her face serious. “We’re sworn to secrecy, okay? This is our boat now.”
Macon was doubtful. “I thought you said you found this boat.”
“We did.”
“Then why the secrecy?”
“ ’Cause after we fix it up and scrub it clean, we don’t want someone claiming it, do we? After all our work?”
“Okay, I get that,” Macon said.
“We’ll make it shine,” I said, feeling ownership of the boat already. It was my first boat, after all.
“We need to name the boat,” said Lovie.
“How about the Buzzard?” Macon suggested.
We all laughed. The boat was covered in gray mud and looked like roadkill.
“No, it needs a noble name,” Lovie argued.
“How about the Fiddler Crab?” I asked. “It was found in the mud, it’s little, and it’s quick.”
“Perfect,” Lovie exclaimed. “Now let’s scrub the Fiddler Crab clean before we return the kayaks.”
Journal of Jake Potter
A fiddler crab has one large claw. They got their name because when they wave the claw in the air, it looks like they are playing the fiddle. Nature is full of funny surprises.
CHAPTER 13
Crime and Punishment
Just when things start looking up, they all come crashing down again.
THAT NIGHT MY MUSCLES ACHED, and I was so tired I could barely eat the hamburgers Honey fixed for dinner. She wasn’t a fancy cook, but all the food was fresh, and to a starving man it tasted great.
I’d returned so dirty, I showered in the outdoor shower—twice—and removed my clothes before entering the house wrapped only in a towel. I didn’t know how I’d tell Honey that I needed a new pair of sneakers.
After sunset, the night songs of insects swelled loud then soft, repeatedly. Their sounds seeped through the windows in the kitchen, where I sat writing another letter to Dad. I smiled when I wrote to him about finding the Fiddler Crab and capturing every amazing detail I had seen out on the water.
Honey came close and rested her hand on my shoulder. “Are you writing to your dad?”
“I just finished.”
“That’s fine. I started writing to him too.”
I smiled up at her. She was really trying hard. The house was much cleaner after all the work she and Mrs. Simmons’s maid, Miss Dana, did today. Honey had also showered and was wearing a pink shirt I’d never seen before.
“So, what do you have to show me tonight?” she asked me.
I was eager to show her my drawings. “We went kayaking today. I found a lot out on the mud.” I moved my notebook closer to her. I showed her my sketch of the white bird rising from the mudflat. “I think that’s an egret.”
“I think you’re right. Let’s see what we can learn about it.” Honey went to the guidebook and quickly located the snowy egret. She brought the book back to the table.
“It’s an egret, all right. The egret is all white with black legs and those showy yellow feet. Years back, all the fine ladies wanted the white curving feathers of the snowy egret for their hats. So much so, the egrets were hunted to near extinction.” She shook her head with sorrow. “All for women’s hats. Thanks to the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, the egrets have been protected and the population has bounced back.”
I thought that was a cool fact I could share with Macon.
“What else have you got there?” She turned the page and chuckled. “A fiddler crab! Aren’t they comical critters?”
Together, we laughed.
“You know, the male’s the one with the lopsided claw,” she said. “The females don’t have the oversize claw. He waves that claw into the air to attract a mate. He uses it for fighting, too. But mostly for showing off.”
I thought about our boat, the Fiddler Crab, but I didn’t tell Honey about the boat or draw a picture of it. Macon, Lovie, and I made a pact to wait for the right moment to show everyone.
“You went kayaking in the marsh…,” she said wistfully.
“It’s real pretty out there,” I said.
“True enough,” Honey said, settling into her chair. “The marsh is the mother of our three favorite foods: shrimp, crabs, and oysters. She bathes them and feeds them. And we love her for it. But looks can be deceiving,” Honey warned with a raised finger. “You’ve got to be careful out in the marsh. The tides are the masters of the marsh and they don’t suffer fools.” She gave me a firm look.
“You should know. The water recedes fast and fills back up quick too. If you aren’t mindful, you can find yourself stuck out there in the mud. Lots of folks do. They get lost, too. Have to wait to be rescued.”
“Lovie told me that.”
“She’s a smart girl. Listen to her. She’s lived here all her life. I want you to learn all about the Lowcountry too. Her beauties and her dangers.”
“I already know about the pluff mud,” I said with a wry grin. “It stinks.”
Honey laughed. “I grant you, it’s an acquired smell,” she replied. “To me, pluff mud smells like home.”
“I’m getting used to it.”
“I thought you might. But mind you know what’s lurking in the mud. You can get cut up by those razor-sharp oyster shells something fierce. They’ll slice right through your boots.”
I swallowed hard, thinking of walking around in the mud in my bare feet.
“And that muck can suck you in, good and proper.” Honey chuckled. “You won’t smell too good when you finally get out.”
“Nope,” I said, and shook my head.
The phone rang and we
startled. We looked at each other, and I knew we were both thinking it was my parents. Honey rose to answer the phone and I trailed close behind.
“Hello?” I heard the tension in her voice. Then the surprise. “Why hello, Chief Rand. What?” Her smile fell and she glanced again at me. “Yes, all right. We’ll be right over.” She hung up the phone. “That’s odd. Fire Chief Rand said there’s a little problem and he needs you at the station right now.” She raised an eyebrow. “What’s going on?”
I swallowed hard but only shrugged. I had a very bad feeling about this.
“Well, hurry and get your shoes on. We’d best go.”
“About my shoes…”
* * *
We drove the golf cart in a silence as dark as the sky. The trees felt like towering, beastly shadows hovering over us. Honey maneuvered the cart carefully along the dark roads. No speeding tonight. We could see only as far ahead as the headlight beams.
When we arrived at the fire station, the big garage door was open. I saw a small group of people clustered in front of the red fire truck. No one was smiling. Their stern facial expressions made my stomach flip-flop like a fish on land. We parked and approached the group. I spotted Lovie first, her head hung low. She was standing next to her Aunt Sissy—a tall woman with short hair the color of sand.
“Hello, Sissy,” Honey said as we approached.
“Well, Helen Potter,” Aunt Sissy said with a smile of recognition. “It’s nice to see you again. How are you, neighbor?”
They hugged and Honey replied, “I’d be better if I knew what was going on.”
Aunt Sissy’s lips were tight with worry. “I was just told to bring Lovie here.”
I walked up to Lovie. “Did you have to come all the way from your mom’s house on Isle of Palms?”
Lovie shook her head. “I was so tired, I asked my aunt if I could spend the night.” She leaned closer and lowered her voice. It shook as she spoke. “Do you think this is about the boat?”
“I don’t know.” I could tell she was as scared as I was. “Where’s Macon?”
Lovie shrugged. “I don’t know. But his cart is here.”
Fire Chief Rand was standing in the crowd with his arms crossed. I couldn’t read his face to tell if he was mad.
The Islanders Page 9