His trousers were soaked with seawater and his shirt soaked in sweat. Both clung to his skin like a clammy film of seaweed. They weighed him down, but he dared not remove anything for fear of the sun. His pace slowed dramatically and his gait became more erratic. His breathing became labored and noisy. The very act of seeing, of moving, of sensing his world, became a painful curse he’d renounce in an instant had he the energy to speak the words. Instead, he moved forward, trance-like, with only a small ray of hope that it would all end soon.
At last, in late afternoon, he came upon an inlet, and this gave him an excuse to rest. The inlet provided a half-mile wide estuary where creatures of the river and creatures of the sea came face to face, eyeing one another like beings from opposite worlds. Then there were the rare creatures like the manatee, caught between both worlds, not fully a part of either. If Josef had retained the ability to think clearly, he might have identified himself at that moment with those gentle outcasts, for he could not help but feel trapped between worlds, unable to return to Brooklyn without shame, yet seemingly unable to make his way through the rigors of this new environment.
There was a small skiff on shore that the postmaster had mentioned, with Property of the United States Postal Service and a small postal insignia painted on either side. With the little strength he had left, he pushed off and began to row across the inlet. Shortly, though, he dropped the oars and reclined in the boat, the mail sack falling to his side. The air was beginning to cool, and the gentle rocking made him drowsy. The day had grown silent, with only the soft slap of the water at the sides of his boat to send him off to sleep.
He drifted there in the estuary, in the space between two worlds, wholly unaware of a new predicament: it was high tide, and all around him, a feeding frenzy had begun. Dozens of alligators, who care nothing about whether a meal tastes salty or fresh, had moved up river to the inlet to feed on the convergence of fish. The gators snapped at the water, stuck their snouts up and swallowed whatever happened to fall across their razored jaws. The sea churned with blood, fish leapt in every direction. But none of this stirred Josef, whose head rested on the edge of the skiff, dangerously close to the snapping gators. Not even when gators knocked the boat and bit at it as they bit at everything else in their paths, not even when the silvery fish jumped into his boat to escape, then jumped back out to accept their fate—not even then did Josef stir from his much-deserved sleep.
Chapter 10
SOMETHING LANDED ON Josef’s chest, and he reached down to brush it off. A moment later, something bigger seemed to land there, and he grunted, still half-asleep, and brushed this one away, too. It came back again, though, heavier this time and thumping his chest as it landed. Now Josef jerked his head up off its wooden pillow and moved to squash the creature once and for all.
But when he opened his eyes he found he’d grabbed not a bug, but the wrist of a man. The man was young and dark and wore a knee-length skirt and colorful patchwork shirt. He stood half a step back from the boat and, bending forward, he clasped Josef’s wrist in reciprocation, shaking it up and down and smiling as if Josef had just been initiated into an exclusive club.
It was Josef’s first encounter with an Indian, and before he had time to think anything else, all the monstrous tales about violent, savage cannibals leapt into his thoughts, and he pushed himself up in the boat, knocking his head against a mangrove branch. As if to confirm Josef’s fears, the Indian wiped the smile off his own face and drew a knife from his belt. He held the knife to Josef’s face, twisting it back and forth between his thumb and forefinger. He still held Josef’s wrist with his other hand.
“What do you want?” said Josef, pulling the mail sack tightly to his side.
The Indian smiled again, seeing Josef was properly scared. He was a little taller than Josef and had pudgy cheeks and black hair parted in the middle. He let go of Josef’s wrist and, still standing back from the boat and careful not to touch the sides of it, he reached across with his knife hand and poked the sole of Josef’s right foot, which was still propped up on the boat bench.
Josef felt nothing but fear, since his foot was asleep. He tried to pull it in, at least get it off the bench, but to no avail.
The Indian prodded Josef’s toes again and then let out a laugh, pointing at Josef with his knife, throwing his head back and showing his big yellow teeth.
Finally, Josef’s leg began to make itself known, and he grabbed it in pain and pushed it to the floor of the boat. This sudden gesture startled the Indian, and he reached into the boat, still careful not to touch the edge, and yanked Josef out of it with surprising strength. For the first time, Josef realized he was onshore beside the inlet. He could not remember exactly how he’d gotten across it.
The Indian motioned with his knife and turned him toward a path through the mangrove swamp. Josef felt a little shove in that direction, but as he started forward, he noticed for the first time something odd on the Indian’s feet. He’d always thought of Indian men in loincloths and bare feet. But here was a man in a skirt whose feet fit snugly into a pair of black leather boots up to mid-calf. And there were rows and designs of pebbles and shells pasted all over them.
Josef didn’t have much time to think about this, though. With a hand on his shoulder, the Indian guided him down a twisting, low-ceilinged path. His legs and feet were stiff and aching, but he was glad to be in the shade.
They trudged through shallow swamp water and soon arrived at a small village on high ground surrounded on all sides by swamp. The path led directly between two rows of thatched huts, most without walls and held up by a single pole in the center. There were cooking fires burning and smoke rising up out of the mangroves.
Josef’s captor called to some of the other Indians in a language Josef couldn’t comprehend, and several young men came running to the path. They, too, wore leather boots, and when they approached Josef, they looked down at his bare feet and laughed. He couldn’t help feeling self-conscious. Why were his feet so funny to them? He tightened his grip on the postal sack; it felt now like a security blanket, a token of civilization among these savages.
People began to shout all over the camp, announcing the presence of the stranger. As they dashed out toward him from under their huts, Josef noticed their boots. It seemed that all of the men above puberty had fine-looking leather boots on their feet, some black, others brown, and all decorated with shells and stones, or else feathers. It was obvious that some did not fit their owners properly, that they’d not yet grown into them or had grown too big for them, so that many of them seemed to stumble over them as they walked, or else take small, gingerly steps with stalwart grimaces on their faces. The children were all barefoot, but some of the women wore boots, too, though not as elaborately decorated as the men’s. Even those barefoot members of the tribe could not contain their laughter at Josef’s feet, and Josef suddenly felt he’d exposed something private and shameful.
He was led into one of the walled huts and up to an elderly man sitting on a small stool and clothed in a bright, knee-length dress, silver jewelry, small animal skins dangling from his headwear and belt, and the most elaborately decorated boots of the tribe. Josef understood this to be the chief. His boots were so completely covered with shells and stones they looked rock stiff and impossible to walk in. Perhaps this explained why the chief did not leave his stool to greet Josef.
Other elders poured into the room, having gotten wind of Josef’s presence. They stood behind the chief, and Josef was separated from the group by a large bucket of water in the center of the room. Behind him were curious commoners, as many as could squeeze themselves into the room without crossing the invisible line that divided them from the elders. Those who could not get in the room stuck their heads through the doors and windows and jostled for a glimpse of the stranger.
The chief gave a sign and everyone but Josef immediately sat down on the dirt floor, the elders on woven rugs. Some words were spoken and several young women emerged fr
om the crowd carrying palm fronds. They sat between Josef and the bucket of Water and waved the fronds over the top of it, circulating cooler air inside the hut. Josef was startled at the simplicity and ingenuity of this air-cooling device, and wondered, strange as it might seem, if these Indians were also working toward rebuilding Paradise. They seemed to have long ago recognized the problem Josef had made note of only yesterday, and they’d already developed this simple technique for solving it. Josef wondered how this could be implemented on a grander scale. Perhaps he’d found a place for these people in the New Paradise. A thousand of them at once could be sent just offshore loaded up with big palm fronds that they’d fan vigorously over the ocean, thereby creating a cool ocean breeze for those on land. A masterful plan. Not only would the air be permanently cooled, but all those floating rafts would serve as a barrier reef to break up the bigger Atlantic waves. Between the shore and the fan-rafts there’d be nothing but glassy green lagoon.
The chief eyed Josef carefully. Then he signaled for a young brave to sit between him and Josef on the equatorial line marked by the bucket.
“Español?” asked the brave.
Josef shook his head.
After speaking with the chief, another young brave was brought in to replace the first.
“English?” he asked.
Josef shook his head proudly. “American,” he said.
A third interpreter was brought forth out of the crowd.
“Yank,” he said.
Josef nodded.
The chief looked at Josef and spoke in a musical, vowel-laden tongue.
The interpreter listened, then turned to Josef.
“Why do you disgrace your people?” he said, speaking in an accent no worse than Josef’s. “Have they cast you out?”
“I don’t understand,” said Josef.
“Your feet. They are as bare as a child’s or an unmarried woman’s. It is shameful to look at.”
The chief turned his head away, refusing to look at Josef for a moment. Then a woman behind him brought forth a blanket and covered Josef’s feet.
Now the chief spoke again, and the interpreter did his work.
“Your swollen face and your bare feet show us that your people have scorned you. Yet whatever crime you have committed, they have not felt you worthy of a proper execution. And so neither do we. You are doomed to shame yourself as you walk the land, for we will not provide you even with sandals. Leave our sight.”
Josef was pulled back by the armpits.
“Wait!” said the interpreter, at the chief’s command. “Leave your sack. You must pay us something for bringing your disgrace to our village.”
Josef grasped the strap of the mail sack with both hands. “I cannot,” he said.
Some strong braves behind him yanked it out of his hands and threw it across the bucket to the chief. He inspected it carefully. When he turned it over, he saw the postal insignia and dropped the sack in front of him, gasping.
The elders crowded around, leaning over the chief and looking down at the sack. There were assenting small gasps, echoing the chief’s.
Even the interpreter looked over at the bag and swallowed deeply. “You are government,” he said. “Why do you keep this a secret?”
“It is no secret,” said Josef. “I am a United States Postal Carrier.”
The chief spoke. “Take your sack,” said the interpreter. “We may not touch it. We have been told by the white man. His gods forbid us to touch anything where the Great Eagle has left its mark.”
Dozens of eyes watched as Josef stepped over and picked up his mail sack, then returned to his spot. The chief looked at Josef with fear and utter amazement. He conferred with the other elders for a moment, and a heated conversation broke out among them.
Finally, the chief addressed Josef again.
“Tell us for true,” said the interpreter. “Are you a real white man?”
“I am,” said Josef.
“We have heard that Indians who touch the mark of the Great Eagle may turn white forever. We suspect you are one of the braves lost in the great storm of last year. We suspect you saved yourself by clinging to the boat of the Great Eagle, but now you are doomed to be a white man.”
Josef remembered the young brave’s reluctance to touch any part of the Postal Service boat. “No,” he said. “I am a white man from Brooklyn. I don’t know your people or customs.”
“Then how do you explain your uncovered feet?” At this, a woman reached over and covered Josef’s feet again, for the blanket had fallen away.
“We think the white man discovered your true nature and sent you away from their village without shoes. We know that the white man thinks our people walk without shoes, because we used to wear buckskin sandals, which the white man does not recognize as shoes. Perhaps this is why the white man thinks badly of us and wants to make war with us. But those days are over. We can no longer make war with the white man. We can only try to keep what’s left of our lands and our home. Many of our tribe have agreed to leave this land and live in the lands to the distant west, but our small group and perhaps some others have decided to remain, even if it means adapting to some of the white man’s ways. Not long after we cast ourselves out from the rest of the tribe, we came upon the wreckage of one of the white man’s boats. There were many crates cast up on the beach, and when we opened them we found the leather boots you see us wear today. We took this gift as a sign from our own gods that we were now to start wearing boots so the white man will respect us and our lands. Of course, we could not resist enriching their design with our own style. But you wear nothing. So you must have disgraced yourself among the white men.”
“No,” said Josef. “It’s because of one white man only that I do not wear shoes.” And suddenly inspired, he lost all his nervousness and told them the whole story of his childhood in Austria, of his coming to America, of his aunt and uncle and even his wife and their failed efforts to grow citrus in Figulus, and finally of his uncle’s death and the missing pair of loafers. “And so,” he concluded, “it is in honor of my deceased Uncle Mordy, who raised me as a son, that I have made this personal decision to walk my mail route barefoot.”
Josef waited while the interpreter paraphrased the entire tale for the chief. When it was over, the Indians broke out in great laughter.
It took a few minutes for the chief to regain his composure and address Josef again.
“We do not know if you are a red man or a white man, but we know now that you are a fool.”
Josef’s face turned a shade darker than any Indian’s. There was a brief silence and they all seemed to study him as a curiosity.
“You are all mixed up. You seek to do your fathers an honor. This is the way of our people; this is good. And yet you shame yourself in doing so, exposing your feet to laughter and the anger of the sun, who surely finds your gesture offensive. This is the way of white men, the way of fools. We think you do not know who you are.”
Josef had nothing to say in his defense. The elders conferred again.
The interpreter summed up the results of the conference. “By handing the chief the sack of the Great Eagle, you have exposed our tribe to dangers. The chief fears he might turn white. Or that the entire tribe will turn white. We must know your true nature so we can perform some precautionary rituals. The Great Eagle may have affected your head so that you no longer remember whether you are white or red. Yet you tell long stories about your white past. We question the truth of these stories. It may be that you know you were once one of us, and you are angered that you cannot return to the tribe of your blood, so you take out your anger on all red men—you seek to change us all into white. Our prophets have told us that one day the Great Eagle may swoop down from the skies, and as the tips of his wings touch us, one by one, we will all turn white, and our tribe and all of our history—our honor and our bravery, even our gods—will be forgotten forever. If you are the Great Eagle, we want you to have pity on us and tell us right now, so
that we may kiss our wives and hold our children one last time before our memories are wiped clean.”
A flash of guilt illumined Josef’s mind to the injustice of his previous thoughts. If the Indians were to wave their fronds and cool the inhabitants of Paradise, who would cool the Indians? He hadn’t thought of their well-being; he hadn’t thought of them as full-fledged humans. But now he understood something of their plight and wondered whether certain animals could be trained to float behind the Indians and wave palm fronds to cool them as they cooled the white men on shore. Mules came to mind. Dogs, perhaps. But they would have to be bred big to hold the branches in their jaws all day. He didn’t have time to think it through now.
“I swear that I’m no Great Eagle,” he said. “I mean you no harm. I wish only to make prompt delivery of this sack and fulfill my duty to my government and my people.”
Another short conference took place among the elders.
“Your words have the sound of truth, man of unknown color. Still, we must be certain because the consequences of a deception could mean the end of our tribe. We must detain you here and observe you to see what blood runs in your veins.”
Everyone stood again, and Josef was led through the throng of curious Indians, which split to give him a wide berth. Though all but the very youngest of them had seen white people before, they were strangely fascinated by Josef. His face was still frighteningly swollen from his debacle in the postmaster’s restaurant. And his hair was darker than most other white men’s hair, his skin not quite so pale; to many people in the tribe, here was visual evidence that he’d once been one of them.
They spoke amongst themselves, bringing up names of men who’d disappeared from their tribe, but whose bodies had never been recovered. They examined Josef’s face, trying to decide which of their tribe lay under that puffy mask. Some thought it was Yaha-Chatee, the man who was lost in the great storm. Others thought it was Tustenuggee, the man who had disappeared in the river, whom they thought had been eaten by alligators. Still another faction agreed it was Emathla, the young scout who couldn’t wait until he’d grown up to explore the swamp, who one day twenty years ago had toddled out of his mother’s hut and into the wilderness forever. Or so they’d thought.
The Legend of the Barefoot Mailman Page 10
