by Shelley Katz
Aaron took another swig from his jug of corn liquor, picked up his rifle, and unsteadily made his way out of the house. He closed the front door quietly, though he knew he didn't have to worry about waking his wife, Lizbeth; she couldn't care less where in the hell he went to or how long he was gone.
He could remember a time when she had felt something for him, gratitude at least, but that time was long gone. At first she had gone cold, almost as if she were slipping away into another world; then one day she locked herself up in the attic and left him entirely. If he were to be truthful, he had been half relieved. Aaron had married her for her house, and he had gotten it. After a while the house and its broken-down chandeliers and overgrown garden no longer meant much to him. The only thing that meant something at all was Lee, and Lee had never felt anything for him but disdain.
Aaron took a deep breath of cool air as he stepped onto the porch. The thought of what he was about to do made him smile. He was a daring son of a bitch, he decided as he slipped off toward the swamps in search of the alligator.
It was five forty-five when Aaron passed Sam Pruett's house, and the hot summer sun looked as though it were rising right out of the water. It cast a red glow into Sam's bedroom, waking him gently to the morning.
Sam slipped out of bed and padded into the bathroom. He ran through the list of supplies he would need: first-aid kit, axe, rain parka, tent, knife, rifle, Spam...
He looked back into the bedroom. His wife, Lizzie, lay on the bed like a sack of dirty laundry, her mouth partially open and a thin wheezing sound coming from it. He thought how strange it was that she hadn't seemed to mind his going gator hunting with Ben Ferguson. Perhaps she thought she could catch up on some gardening, her new hobby. Lizzie was laying in gardening supplies like Lipton chicken noodle soup. Sam rejected the obvious thought and picked up his razor. He took one swipe and started to laugh. Who was he shaving for, anyway? The gator? He couldn't remember the last morning he hadn't shaved. Maybe there wasn't a morning. He had fallen into a pattern and he'd never broken it, never even questioned it. But things had changed. Son of a bitch, he'd even made it with another woman.
Sam sat on the toilet, though he was too excited to concentrate. He laughed with pleasure. Now he was going hunting for a gator. He was one crazy bastard to be going out there.
A few minutes later, as Aaron neared the docks, he noticed that the light was on in one of the bedrooms of the Collier house.
Selwyn Collier, commonly known as Ace, though no one could remember why, caught sight of Aaron as he passed by, but he didn't think any more about it. He sat on the edge of his bed and kneaded the muscle of his right leg; it always bothered him most in the morning. He limped over to his father's gun cabinet, took out the key he had had made at Hendricks's, and very quietly removed the .20-06.
He pulled back the safety. The click seemed to thunder through the room, and he froze in fear. Finally, reassured by the undisturbed snore which came from his father's room, he tiptoed back toward his bedroom. For a moment he thought he saw a flash of pink, the color of his mother's robe, but everything was still.
He dressed quickly and ate a candy bar he had bought the day before.
As he left his bedroom, he looked back at his brother Dinks's bed. He had never liked Dinks. He tortured himself with that thought often. It was easier to believe that he was responsible for his death than that there was no reason at all.
It was close to. six A.M., and the sun was just about eye level, when Aaron poled his leaky old skiff past crazy Luke's shack. He thought he heard a scream coming from the house, but decided it was probably just a nightmare. A geezer like him, with cataracts in both his ancient eyes, probably slept with death at his side every night. Still, the scream spooked Aaron, and he felt a strange foreboding as he left Everglades City far behind and headed into the swamps and toward the sun.
The sun was beginning to burn through the morning mist by eight A.M., when Lee got to the pier. Several men had arrived before him, and were hurrying to transfer the heavy cartons of supplies from their pickup trucks to their skiffs before the day got too hot.
Ben Ferguson and Archie Marris were mooching around the gas pump, smoking cigarettes and drinking steaming-hot coffee laced with bourbon from styrofoam cups. They were so excited and keyed up that they even called a greeting to Lee as he passed. Albert Johnston came screeching up in his station wagon and almost backed it into a ditch, he was so eager to get started.
Lee had been impatient and angry all morning, but as he heard the clatter of gas tanks and the banging of cartons echoing in the morning quiet, it thrilled him, as gearing up for a hunt always did. He stripped to the waist so that he could feel the gathering warmth of the sun on his back, and began loading supplies onto the Saurian with the smooth, rhythmic mindlessness of hard work that always pleasured him. He whistled to himself happily, and for a while forgot the anger he was nursing.
A family of blacks, blacker than polished slate, black like you see only in Africa and in the South, passed by. They were carrying long fishing poles, and tin baskets with little crabs wriggling in the water. They stopped to watch the loading up. It was better than a Saturday-night brawl.
By eight thirty, people were arriving in a steady procession. Lee knew that most of them didn't belong to the skiffs that were going out, but had just come down to the docks because they felt that by watching they would be participating in a way. They'd be able to say, "I was there when they set out all right. I saw 'em as they left." It didn't seem strange to Lee; he had always regarded life as a spectator sport.
Every once in a while he glanced toward town, looking for Cindy. He had a fear that she wasn't going to come. Something had passed over her recently and changed her. He wasn't sure whether she knew it yet, but he did. He had first sensed it that morning of the bear hunt, but he said nothing about it to her. He knew there was nothing to be said.
Perhaps it would be better if she didn't come, he thought as he turned away from the town and back to the swamps. Cindy needed much more than he would ever be able to give her, and the sooner she realized it, the better it would be for her. Besides, he was headed for trouble on this hunt, more trouble than he had ever known before. All his logic faded as he caught sight of Cindy running across the road toward him, and his bony face, which usually looked so stern, relaxed into a grin.
Matty Johnston had brought Cindy with her, but dropped her off before parking her pickup in the field across from the docks. Matty was wearing a long yellow dress with flowers at her neck. She looked around the crowd, flushed with excitement. There must have been close to three hundred people milling around. There were even some strangers around: a camper from Louisiana, several carloads of people from Miami. They had brought cameras and folding tables and picnic lunches. It could have been a circus or a church outing, she thought.
A lot of the women were dressed up, and the bright colors, wonderful purples, pinks, blues, and reds, lit up the drab dock area. Matty had put on her yellow dress because she wanted Albert to remember her at her best. She hadn't been separated from him for more than two days since her mother died, five years ago. But also she wore it because this was as good a time as any. She'd bought the dress four years before, and it had lain in mothballs ever since. Even though she had dumped half a bottle of perfume on it, the dress still reeked of camphor.
Matty was finding the excitement catching. Even though she had spent all of the night alternatively yelling at and pleading with Albert not to go out, now she was glad he hadn't listened to her. The hunt had changed things, and though she didn't understand why, she was beginning to believe it was for the better. She knew what a lot of the other women meant when they said that the best thing about this alligator was what he did for them come night. Even old Albert, who usually was good for only one a week, had outdone himself.
On the docks, she could see Albert sitting with the other men, passing around bottles of bourbon and gin, drinking to the alligator, the swamps, their boats, themsel
ves, and anything else they could think of. They were bragging and swearing, bantering and shoving one another, clowning it up, feeling important because they knew they were being watched with envy by those not going. But what struck Matty most was that underneath all the yelling was another noise, a kind of buzzing. It seemed to intensify the excitement and make everything more colorful and funny and dreamlike. She understood instinctively that the buzzing was in her own head. It was fear.
Sam could hear the buzz, too, though he was doing his best to ignore it. He sat next to the skiff that he and Ben Ferguson had rented, watching the gathering crowd while second thoughts crowded in on him thicker than the mob on the dock. Already his muscles were aching from loading supplies, and the early-morning sun burned into his neck. He had no business going out on this hunt, and the others weren't much better off than he was. They were just a bunch of pharmacists, lawyers, loansharks, and kids; not one of them knew his ass from a hole in the ground when it came to the swamps. Sam could see that they were all just asking for trouble. The swamps weren't something rigged up by Disney for their amusement; the swamps were real. There were some places out there where no man had ever been, places only the animals knew.
The second thoughts Sam had been battling were starting to win when he saw Rye arrive at nine o'clock. Rye was dressed in an L. L. Bean safari shirt, open to the waist, and loose-fitting khaki pants that were so new, Sam could still see the creases where they had been folded. Rye's face was the color of a sunrise, all rosy from excitement and aftershave lotion. He squeezed through the crowd, shaking hands, slapping backs, and yelling challenges. He seemed to Sam to be a man who never doubted himself, never even wondered who the hell he was to do something; he just did it. Behind Rye, were his two stooges, Maurice and John, walking fast to keep up. They were carrying expensive rifles, and they were smiling too. Sam could imagine their suburban stone houses with circular driveways and their clench-jawed wives standing next to their yellow-haired kids. He envied their clean bathrooms and woodshops in the garage. No doubts and fears for them, he decided. Their wives weren't humping puss-faced delivery boys, that was for certain. He knew there was a secret to it. They weren't any smarter than he was. What was it that made them so sure and him so unsure?
But there was no longer time for thought. Rye's arrival was a signal to begin. The men who were going out began boarding their skiffs, and the crowd inched closer to the pier. The sounds of engines being tested, people laughing and shouting, grew louder and louder. The excitement touched Sam, and he could feel his heart pounding and the blood warm in his face. He felt himself being carried away, until he too began to believe that he was taking part in something very important, maybe the most important thing that had ever happened to anyone.
Sam climbed into the skiff and held it steady for Ben. It occurred to Sam that this would be his world for the next few days. Underneath him, he could feel the rhythmic churning of the water. The rich, acrid smell of swamp rot surrounded him, and he felt an incredible surge of energy.
For a moment he caught sight of Rye and Lee. Rye was looking out past the docks to a house at the edge of town. Sam followed his eyes and discovered the attic of Lee's house. In the window he could see a flash of white in the sun, then the pale, ghostly face of Lee's mother, Lizbeth, indistinct and blurred. It was very far away, and Sam wondered if Rye knew what he was looking at. He was sure he knew what Lee was looking at. Lee was watching Rye closely, and his eyes betrayed an intense anger. It only lasted a second, and afterward Sam wondered if he had really seen that look at all or if the noise of kids bawling, water churning, people shouting and laughing, the millions of sights and sounds and smells, the mottled colors vibrant in the morning sunlight, were distorting everything into a kind of madness.
Suddenly he heard a shout. He couldn't tell where it was coming from or who had made it, but there was a shrillness to the sound that was piercing and chilling like a winter wind. Sam heard the shout again, and realized it was the voice of an old man. He strained to hear what the man was yelling, but the individual words were lost; only the sound was discernible. Then he saw Luke pushing through the tight knot of people. He was still calling out. This time Sam could hear what he said. He yelled, "Don't go."
Luke climbed onto the dock and stood in the glaring sun, his eyes glistening milky-white like marbles, his frail skeletal body was as wrinkled and brown and tough as alligator hide. He seemed older and more fragile than ever before.
"Hey, old man, you coming along?" screamed Archie Marris. But no one laughed. There was something frightening about Luke, and a tension was beginning to spread around them.
Luke didn't say anything for almost a minute. Instead, he stood straight and stiff, his head slightly cocked, as if he were listening to something or someone. A few of the men continued to talk among themselves, but Sam felt an urgency to their voices, and when Luke raised his voice to speak, their whispers quickly melted into utter silence.
"Don't go," Luke said, "listen to me." His voice echoed in the quiet. Sam had never heard three hundred people be that quiet. "I've lived a long time. I know the swamps better than any of you. You don't stand a chance against that alligator. He's too old and too tough. Nature is on his side, not yours. Take my advice, stay here where you belong. Stop now while you can. Don't you see? I can feel it. That ain't no gator you're courting. It's death."
Without waiting to see what kind of reaction his words might have, Luke stepped off the pier and into the crowd.
Nobody moved. For the first time in hours, the sound of the swamps reasserted itself. It was like listening to the core of the earth. The insistent buzz of an insect, the rattling of dry sawgrass as a snake slipped along the ground, the splash of a heron dipping into the water to devour a minnow, sounds they had heard every day of their lives seemed unfamiliar and frightening.
All at once, a terrific roar boomed through the quiet. It sounded like the center was collapsing and the whole earth was telescoping. Sam grabbed the gunwales of the skiff instinctively; then, realizing that it was only the Saurian starting up, he laughed at himself.
Rye sat on the high platform of his airboat, watching the startled crowd, delighted at the reaction he had caused. He lifted a bottle and tilted it to the shore in a carefree salute. It was impossible to tell if he had even heard Luke's warning.
"To the alligator!" yelled Rye, and suddenly the sound of the swamps was drowned out by the roar of engines.
part two
Chapter 6
The men headed out into the swamps, past the rows of decaying summer houses and trailer parks, the weed-infested gardens with ragged banana plants, wild hibiscus, and poinsettias that were slowly being choked off by strangler figs. All along the shore, wooden docks disintegrated slowly into the water. Everything was on stilts, moss-covered, rotting from dampness; even the people seemed to be rotting away. It was an endless line of old men sitting on busted folding chairs, reading day-old newspapers, their white, hairy legs stuck into the water, their trousers rolled, and fleshy wives, wearing faded housedresses and rollers in their hair, hanging laundry out to dry.
Even out on the water, the men could discern a parade of smells: a pastiche of bacon and eggs, coffee, beer, rotting fish, dead field mice, dirty underarms. They could hear the sounds of breakfast dishes being washed up, dogs scratching, mixed in with the music of Johnny Cash, Merle Haggard, Perry Como, and the Lennon Sisters.
It was a string of decay, decomposition, disintegration, dissolution, breakup, corruption, and spoilage, a haven for mildew, mold, corrosion, erosion, and the ravages of time. The Everglades seemed like a cemetery for the South, a junkyard for Miami and all the other forward-looking modem cities of the Southland. It was the halfway station before the grave.
The Saurian led the way through the narrow channel. The skiffs followed behind, staying close enough to the airboat to feel they were all in the same party, but well out of its huge wake.
The Saurian was large for an airboat,
but that wasn't saying much. It sat only four men, and wasn't much bigger than three skiffs put together. Even though it was the most luxurious airboat Everglades had ever seen, it still looked like little more than a motorized oil rig. The platform, made of fiberglass, gently sloped upward at the bow and the stem, like a rocking chair. At the front of the platform was a huge box which housed the gears and steering pole. Just behind it were the seats, four of them, supported on a lattice of steel bars so that they were three feet above the platform. At the back, encased in a huge steel cage which covered the entire width of the boat and reached several feet higher than the seats, was the enormous airplane propeller that powered the boat. The airboat was purely functional. There was nothing graceful or pleasing about the way it looked. There wasn't an inch of wasted space, no concessions to grace or form, no decorations, no coverings that weren't necessary to keep out the dirt. It was a skeleton of a boat, a framework of bones and nerves and connective tissue without the skin.
As clumsy as an airboat looked, there was nothing better for taking the swamps. It skimmed over the surface; weeds, shallow water, even reasonably large logs meant nothing to it. And the seats were built so high that the sharp, five-foot-high sawgrass never got near the passengers.
Lee was at the helm. He had taken off his plaid cotton cowboy shirt and tied it around his waist, so he could throw it back on when they stopped onto a hummock. Even Lee, who was used to the swamp insects, wouldn't step ashore without the protection of a shirt and his heavy dungarees. Rye sat next to him. He hadn't taken his shirt off, but most of the buttons were open. Lee could see the coarse gray hairs among the mat of blond on his chest. Rye enjoyed the cool air rushing across his body. It knocked everything from his mind and relaxed his muscles like a good workout.
John and Maurice were sitting in the back, just in front of the propeller. Neither of them was enjoying himself. The seats were so high that Maurice felt that any moment he would fall off. He held tightly to his leather cushion, staring straight ahead. He didn't dare look down. John was trying to appear nonchalant, but his lips were pressed so tightly together that they were practically invisible.
