Lost Man's River

by Peter Matthiessen

  “He had a sincere attachment to these woods,” Hettie reflected. “He’d drive into the yard and get out and look around at these old hickories and oaks, hands on his hips, then heave him a big sigh and say, ‘I sure feel like I’ve come home when I come back here!’ We never could figure why this poor of place meant so darn much to him, cause he hardly went outdoors again after he got here!”

  “Free bed and board, that’s all it was!” Ellie Collins said. “Penny saved is a penny earned—that’s Cousin Ed!”

  “Put you right out of your own room because you were just a kid!” April scowled at the older women when they laughed.

  Hettie said, “I guess it was a place where he felt welcome. After his children were all grown, and Neva died, he thought nothing of bringing a female friend, might be a week! One friend he brought before he married Augusta, she was the weirdest woman we ever saw. Before she sat down to her supper she would take her belt off, put it around her neck!”

  “Didn’t want to constrict her stomach till she had eaten up all our food, that was the only thing that we could figure!” April was doubled up with laughter, egging her mother on. “And Gussie! Tell about the one he finally married!”

  “Now our Augusta didn’t sweat, y’know. Too ladylike to sweat, didn’t even perspire! All us poor country females, we’d be all worn out and soaking wet from the damp and heat in these old summer woods, our hairdo slack and all collapsed and beads of sweat, you know, on brow and lip. And here was Mrs. Augusta Watson there beside us, buttoned up tight right to the collar, sitting straight up on the edge of her chair, cool as a daffodil!”

  “Those two were buttoned up, all right! I never once saw Cousin Ed without white shirt and tie, even when cooking!” Ellie said. “He was a churchman and a businessman who kept up appearances or else, and Augusta Watson kept ’em up right along with him!”

  The women whooped and gasped for breath, falling all over one another now with the exploits of Cousin Ed. And Lucius was laughing, too, delighted by tales which tended to affirm his years of exasperation over Eddie, even while feeling dishonest and disloyal. Such stories would never have been told had these good women known that he was Eddie’s brother.

  “Oh yes, Cousin Ed dearly loved to cook! But he was like most men who get the idea that they are cooks, they make your kitchen such a mess that you wish they’d just stay out of there, go read the funnies! Before Edna Bethea came into their life, Cousin Ed cooked for his daddy in the house on the hill, that’s where he learned it, and each time he returned, he’d fall back into it. March up to the stove, bang pots around, and take right over.”

  “Uncle Edgar usually kept a cook when he was married, but in those five years while he was a widower, he figured he didn’t need a cook just for the two of them. Cousin Ed never tired of telling how hard his daddy worked him, how he had to rake the yard by moonlight after doing chores all day. And each time he told that old story, Gussie would cry out, ‘Rake the yard at night?’ And she’d turn real slow, hand to her mouth, and stare round-eyed at the rest of us, just a-marveling, you know, like she was trained to it.

  “And Cousin Ed would be chuckling along, shaking his head over his own anecdote to warm us up a little bit, and let us know something pretty good was coming our way. Then he’d bust right out with it—‘Well, heck! We never had free time during the day!’ And those two would just double up with all the fun, they’d enjoy the heck out of that one right through supper! ‘Never had free time during the day!’ Just couldn’t get over it, you know! Year after year! And later Cousin Ed would tell us how Augusta’s sense of humor was the thing he liked the best about her, by which he meant that poor ol’ Gus would spare no effort laughing at his jokes. She never said anything humorous herself, not so’s you’d notice.”

  Hettie smiled gently at Lucius, to remind him that all of this was in the family, all in fun, that none of this irreverence meant any harm. “ ‘Raking leaves by moonlight’—that one never failed! They never let that grand old story die!”

  “Well, Daddy said that Uncle Edgar was a neat man in his habits, liked the place neat as a pin even out of doors,” said Ellie Collins. “So I bet it was true about raking in the moonlight, because he was a stickler for getting things done right, he was famous for it all around the county. He was a hard worker, and saw to it that everybody on his place worked as hard as he did. But he never did mistreat his nigras, at least not in Fort White. Even after Uncle Edgar was safe under the ground, Doc Straughter claimed that his ‘Mist’ Edguh’ was the best boss man he ever worked for.”

  “Doc wasn’t taking any chances!” April laughed. “Best stay on the good side of Mist’ Edguh, dead or alive!”

  Hettie rummaged from her box a letter from Cousin Ed, of unknown date.

  My dear folks

  I know you are interested in getting up a family tree, just sorry I know so little that would be of help to you. I did not even know Grandmother Watson was buried in Columbia County. I do know Grandfather Watson’s first name was Elijah, and from what I heard when I stopped in Edgefield, South Carolina, he died in Columbia, S.C. He was a Colonel in the Confederate Army and fought under Wade Hampton, which is why Lucius has that middle name. That is all I know about him. I know I know the least about my family of any person alive.… Neither of my brothers kept in contact with me unless they needed money.

  Much Love

  Cousin Ed

  P.S. Dear Hettie, we think of you often and talk of the “good old days” when we were young. Much Love Gus

  “Among the many things that Augusta didn’t know was that Cousin Ed had had a second wife before her, nor had she been told one word about his father. He told her that his father died of heart failure down in the Islands, and I guess that was true because his heart sure failed along with everything else. But after they’d been married quite a while—she told us this herself—Cousin Ed’s older daughter, who didn’t care for Gussie, took her out to the Fort Myers cemetery one afternoon to show her her mother’s grave. And she showed her Edgar Watson’s grave while she was at it, and gave poor Gus the lowdown, too, informing her that she’d got herself hitched up to the son and spitting image of a famous murderer! Because Cousin Ed had grown up husky like his father, big man, six foot, that dark auburn hair.

  “Well, Gussie got flustered up, for once, and Cousin Ed had to assure her that his Katherine had exaggerated, that his father had been innocent, that he’d only kept quiet about the scandal to spare her feelings, and so on and so forth. After that they never spoke of it again.

  “For many years, Cousin Ed had his own insurance agency in Fort Myers, he was doing fine, but he still had his little ways when it came to money. Our family was dirt poor thanks to Great-Uncle Lem Collins and his forfeited bail, and even Granny Ellen and her daughter, who’d had servants all their lives, had to be buried under wooden crosses when their time came. My father-in-law died early in the thirties and there was no money for his headstone, either. It wasn’t until recent years that the family recovered just a little, and scraped the wherewithal together to put some stone memorials on its graves.

  “Anyway, it was untrue that Ed didn’t know where Granny Ellen was buried,” Hettie said sadly, “And despite all his lengthy visits, and his strong feelings about ‘the Family,’ and his sentiments about Fort White as ‘my real home,’ he would not help out with his grandmother’s tombstone, nor his Aunt Minnie’s, either. Now that he thought about it, Ed told us, he couldn’t recall being close to either one.”

  Another letter in Hettie’s cigar box was postmarked Somerville, Massachusetts, January 14, 1910, about a month after Leslie Cox’s conviction for the Banks murders. It carried two green one-cent stamps bearing the profile of Ben Franklin, and was addressed to Mr. Julian E. Collins, R.D. #2, Ft. White, Florida.

  Dear Julian,

  Your very nice and interesting letter reached me yesterday and as usual was delighted to hear from you. Glad to hear that all of the folks are well. As to May, I have
not heard from her. I am very sorry that she blames me for my opinion of Leslie, but I am sure that I have not wronged him and that he himself is to blame for the opinion held of him by all good people. She must be entirely bereft of reason if she believes him innocent. Also in this case there do not seem to be any extenuating circumstances and most assuredly no chance for a plea of justification.

  The taking of human life is only justified when taken in defense of life or home. If I understand his case correctly, robbery was his motive, therefore making it a most dastardly crime. God knows I have only sympathy for her, and as she grows older she will realize the seriousness of her plight.

  I doubt very much if Leslie cares for May as such people are not capable of true affection.

  You spoke of my buying a place down there but I am not ready as yet. Hope that eventually I will be able to come back and settle down and probably marry some fair southern maid. I have not time to bother with the girls now as I have to work Sundays and holidays. Hoping that you will grow more prosperous as you grow older and with my very best wishes to Laura and babies I remain

  Sincerely,

  Rob

  “We think that must be Rob Watson, though we can’t be sure,” Hettie told Lucius, who was startled by this unexpected word from his lost brother.

  “Rob never came back here to Fort White?”

  She shook her head. “Papa Julian would have said something about it.”

  “And that’s the last letter signed Rob?”

  “That is the only one. Rob makes it sound like my father-in-law had a regular correspondence with him, but that wasn’t true. All Julian Collins ever did was notify Rob about May’s marriage, and being upset, he must have mentioned something about those dreadful murders.” She looked distressed. “Perhaps poor Rob pretended to be in close touch with the family because he was homesick but could not come home.” She looked at the others. “Later we wondered if he might have been in prison.”

  Lucius read the letter again, trying to recall what Rob had looked like the last time he had seen him more than fifty years before. Lucius had been eleven at the time, and the older brother he remembered was a handsome dark-eyed youth with black hair to his shoulders like an Indian, nothing like the righteous author of this letter.

  “Long ago,” Hettie said carefully, “there was some trouble in the Islands, and Rob took his father’s ship without permission and sold it at Key West. At least that’s what Uncle Edgar told this family. He said Rob did that with the help of a young kinsman named Collins.”

  Lucius nodded. “R. B. Collins,” he said, looking at Ellie.

  The women glanced at one another. “We don’t know who this R. B. Collins could be,” Ellie reminded him a bit too sharply, pointing at Hettie’s lineage sheets, spread on the table.

  In a long and awkward silence, Lucius said, “R. B. Collins is an old man now,” as if this changed things. Upset for Arbie, he resisted the intuition that was fighting its way to the surface of his mind. “He’s in Lake City right this minute, he almost came with me today,” he pled, as if Arbie’s physical presence in Fort White might somehow validate him.

  “You see”—in her distress for him, Hettie was whispering—“Rob’s cousin Thomas Collins told us many years ago that he was the young man who helped Rob at Key West.”

  “There is no R. B. Collins in this family.” Ellie said flatly. “I tried to tell you this the other night, but you didn’t want to hear it.” She pointed at the sheets again. “We rechecked every sheet before you came this morning, to be certain.”

  “Now R. B. Watson—Robert Briggs Watson—that is Rob, of course,” Hettie said slowly. “And Rob’s mother was a Collins, as you know—”

  September 13, 1879. Of course. That date had nagged at the corner of his mind ever since this morning at the Bethel churchyard. The date of Ann Mary Watson’s death was Arbie’s birthday.

  In disbelief, he studied Rob’s letter. He knew Arbie’s hand from the rough notes in his “archive,” and this oddly familiar script, with its looping y’s and g’s, could indeed have been written by a young, stiff, priggish Arbie, working seven days a week to gain a meager living, pathetically tending the frayed threads that still connected him to home and family.

  “We can’t find any L. Watson Collins, either,” Ellie was saying. “If that is your real name, then we have no idea who you might be.”

  He put the letter down. For a moment, looking away, he could not speak. Then he took a deep breath, saying, “I’m truly sorry. I am here under false pretenses, as you suspected. L. Watson Collins is a pen name.” He stood up slowly and went to the window, making unnatural loud creakings on the warped pine floor. Behind him, no one spoke.

  “I am Lucius Watson,” Lucius said.

  He turned in the sun shaft from the window and apologized for his deceit, and for imposing on them. In preparing a biography, he had needed to know the truth about his father’s life here in Fort White and had feared that they might be less candid had they known that he was Uncle Edgar’s son. Having failed to identify himself in the phone call to Cousin Ellie, he had decided to withhold the truth until he could learn a little more, though of course he would have told them who he was before departing. He stopped and raised his hands and dropped them in despair, sickened by his own wretched excuses.

  And still the Collins women made no answer. When he went toward the door, nobody stopped him. “I’m sorry,” he said again, speaking to Hettie, and seeing a mist of tears in her eyes, he felt bewildered, too. “For some reason, it seemed … important. To learn the truth, I mean.” Again he stopped, unable to bear the crushed innocence of her expression. He had no place here any longer. He stepped outside and closed the door behind him.

  The window beside the door was open. Inside the old schoolhouse, his kinswomen would still be sitting there in shock and ire. Cousin Ellie’s voice would be the first to speak, and would not speak kindly. He hurried to his car.

  At Tustenuggee

  Seeking to compose himself before confronting Arbie—Rob!—Lucius drove to the Fort White cemetery, probing his brain for the right components to fit things back together. Who would have recognized Rob Watson in that furious, foul-mouthed old drifter in rags and scraggy beard at Gator Hook!

  Was his rough crust and cryptic coloration an evidence of prison life? Had “Poor Rob” (as even the sly Arbie had referred to him) taken his mother’s maiden name because he was a fugitive? It had never occurred to Lucius that a disreputable old drunk with an urn filled with “Rob’s” bones might be Rob himself! That urn was simply part of his disguise!

  The taking of human life is only justified when taken in defense of life or home—that tone had certainly worn off in Rob’s long years as a drifter, along with the manners and good grammar that his stepmother had taught him in her years of patient tutoring in Oklahoma. But perhaps that moralizing Rob, outraged by injustice all his life, was still hidden in there at the heart of him.

  I have no time to bother with the girls. Had he had time or opportunity in the years since? How could such a cautious fellow reprove wild-hearted May, borne off by the baseball hero Leslie Cox, all unaware, that morning at the schoolhouse, that her elopement would be paid for with the earth-greened silver dollars of poor Calvin Banks?

  Beyond the trees at the new high school in Fort White, a boys’ baseball game was in full progress. The faraway shrill of the small players, the proud cheers of their parents, flew like bird cries through the dry branches in the cemetery. Lucius Watson was swept by poignant reveries of some intimate midsummer sadness, infused with melancholy for something forever lost and far away—an innocence of “home” that he himself had never known since leaving Chatham Bend decades before.

  He wandered out among the stones in search of Cousin May. Here lay Cousin Martha, Wife of Jos. Burdett, died on March 21 of 1912, shooting her broken heart out on that cold first day of spring so that she might join the sweet seven-year-old who lay beside her. Little Frank had perish
ed in that same fateful month that his brother Herkie had left home for good to marry Edna Bethea Watson in north Florida, and the loss of both boys had undone poor Mattie, said the Collins women.

  In her photograph in the Collins album, taken not long before her death, Martha Collins Burdett had sad bruised eyes and a heavy downturned mouth. At age forty-eight, she shot herself, leaving no note—proof to her sister (Hettie’s grandmother) that Aunt Mattie’s death was not a suicide—“Why, poor Mattie was just deathly afraid of guns!”

  Aunt Mattie got her men off to the field, fixed dinner, cleaned the house, hung out the wash. On the wood porch—“She didn’t want to nasty up the house!”—she spread out an old quilt on which to die. Down she sank onto this hard bed in her last lonely meeting with her Maker, clutching the cumbersome cold weapon, shivering and self-condemning even in this final act, with only a moment left of life on earth, because this good old quilt with years of life in it would be stained by her life’s blood—“and bloodstains are so darned hard to get out!”—and others would be obliged to clean up after her. That’s where they found her, cold and staring on the quilt, shot through the heart. A country woman, she figured out how to work the trigger with her toe.

  At the far end of the cemetery, the Herlong brothers rested in peace, attended by the monoliths of kith and kin, each with its heavy skirt of well-mulched grasses. The tribe was still dominated by the patriarch, Old Dan, upon whose headstone was inscribed “AN HONEST MAN’S THE NOBLEST WORK OF GOD”—an honest man, Lucius reflected, who had perjured himself by signing a mendacious affidavit, assuring the court that Neighbor Watson could depend on a fair trial in a county already aboil with men who sought to lynch him.

  On his way toward the cemetery gate, where two old men fetched in green wreaths for a fresh grave, he came upon the stone memorial to “Maria Collins Cox.” Sweet Miss May of the oval photograph who had posed so prettily in her white dress lay in an untended grave, unclaimed by the Cox family, unwelcome in the Collins plot at Tustenuggee. There was no epitaph, no wire container for vanished flowers, nor a fallen vase. Because of her fatal elopement and her importunities in the years since, there had been no mourners and no witnesses, only the two thin dutiful embittered brothers, standing stiffly in hot black Sunday suits on the baked ground under dry oaks. The vast suet of their sister, wedged into a pine box in the dress she died in, had been delivered to her Maker in the July heat of Independence Day, in the racket of fireworks staccato from the dying phosphate town beyond the trees.