The Man Who Ivented Florida (20 page)

Joseph almost said something about the television he'd wanted to take from the rest home, but he didn't. Maybe the hippie wasn't really talking about movies. It was hard to tell.

Tomlinson said, "I saw the way this place used to be hundreds of years ago. Thousands—this is an old place. A million souls. More. All crowded in on this stretch of coast. The mound Mr. Gatrell's house is on. The other lower ones. Mounds all along the Gulf; a whole civilization of people; dugout canoes,- kids running naked on the beach; thatched temples that would hold a thousand people; and shamans wearing wild wooden masks to frighten away evil. All right here, man, right where we're sitting. I saw it!"

Joseph was interested, following along.

Tomlinson said, "Listen and you can still hear their voices. Let your mind go—hey, try it!—open up to the old sounds. They're still vibrating in the shells, man. That's what I tuned in to. I mean, the shells
resonate.
That's what you meant when you said you could still hear just fine, isn't it?"

Intent on listening, Joseph didn't answer. He could hear the mangroves creaking in the evening sea breeze, and he could hear a bubbling, cackling sound, probably Rigaberto's chickens. No, wait—most of them had been moved to the rich horse ranch. The artesian well, that's what the noise was. Bubbling right there beside him. The only voice Joseph heard was Tomlinson's.

"I've been doing some reading, too," Tomlinson said. "Researching human history, ethnology, that's my work, man. I'm a professional. I haven't had time to do any original research yet, but I put together a few things. Ran a search through Compuserve, scoped out the local library. Found some pretty good translations of letters written by Jesuit priests sent by Spain to convert the people who built these mounds. From back in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. They were a great people—big and strong, those mound builders. Great fishermen and divers. The Calusa. They never needed agriculture, yet they were a highly complex society that ruled most of the tribes on the Florida peninsula, exacting tribute. Ass kickers, that comes through in the data."

Joseph thought, Now he's starting to sound like my grandfather again. He moved as if to get up, saying, "I just come up here for a drink—"

"Right, man. The past, the future. All in this moment."

"—since Tuck was gone. He doesn't want me drinking from the spring no more. He keeps big jars of water in the icebox, afraid somebody might follow us and know where we're getting it. He'd be mad, he knew I come."

"For sure. Understand entirely. My lips are sealed." Tomlinson twisted an invisible key and tossed it away. "But the point here is, Doc was telling me something about you."

"Marion?"

"Uh-huh. He said you've got a thing about not being mistaken for a member of one of the Glades tribes. And I was just wondering—"

"Marion and me, we used to have nice times, back when he was
^a
boy. He didn't have to be talking all the time."

"Hah! The man says five words in a row, it's a speech. But about you, he mentioned this thing you've got; he said you may be related to the people who built these mounds."

Standing, feeling uneasy but not minding this hippie so much anymore—he seemed strange but nice—Joseph said, "My great-great-grandfather was Chekika." He shrugged.

"My God!" Tomlinson got to his feet, fingers working at his hair again. "I know that name. Even before I started researching, I knew that name. I don't know exactly why—hey, maybe I heard it in a vision? You think that could be? A karmic message?"

Joseph said, "I'm going to take Buster on back. Tuck doesn't want people up here." He was untying the horse's reins. Maybe the next thing the hippie would say was that he'd seen Chekika riding in a Cadillac, another death message. Joseph didn't want to stick around for that.

"The point is"—Tomlinson was following him down the mound as Joseph took his time, leading the horse in the darkness—"I may have a way for you to keep possession of this mound. Hell, maybe all the mounds. Your people built them, right?"

Joseph didn't reply. The way the hippie jumped around from subject to subject was making his head hurt.

"The U.S. government never had a treaty with the Calusa—see what I'm saying? They've taken the land illegally, and if we can prove you're the last living heir . . . these mounds are your birthright, that's what I'm saying."

Joseph said over his shoulder, "I don't have no birthright. I wasn't born in a hospital, so I don't got no papers at all."

"Birth . . . ah-h-h? Oh, you mean birth certificate! Doesn't matter, man. Hell, it's probably better you don't. I might be able to do it, prove you're a descendant. Don't you see? That's why all those souls were talking to me. And man"—Tomlinson was looking up—"those clouds look like they're on fire. It's all a sign!"

Joseph kept walking.

"You're probably wondering how we can do that. Prove it, I mean. Hell, hardly anyone else would know. But I do. That's my point: exactly why they chose me! That's why they showed me the way this coast used to be; invited me to meet the family, so to speak. The karmic bond. I'm going to have to contact an archaeologist who's worked in the area, then this old buddy of mine who's like the top dude in the field. Then I'll need some of your hair, Joseph. I hope we won't have to, but maybe a bone sample, too."

Joseph stopped, turned, looking at the hippie's dim shape beyond Buster's rump. "I need my bones! If you saw my grandfather in a Cadillac, he's lying!"

Tomlinson said, "Now, now. Just a little scraping, that's all. Won't hurt a bit." Then he said, "Have you ever heard of a thing called DNA testing?"

EIGHT

After
a month on the sailboat, Sally Carmel's little white and yellow cottage seemed huge, a clapboard and tin delight with enough room to dismantle her tough on-board schedule and replace it with a more luxurious routine that, along with maintenance, study, and gardening, allowed space for soapy baths, morning jogs, and, in the evening, dancing alone, barefooted on the oak-strip floors.

Sometimes at night, sitting in the living room with just a reading lamp on, her legs curled up and with Ansel, the white cat, vibrating on her lap, Geoff would slip into her mind, the heat and weight of him. Geoff, her ex-husband. The man sounds he made, the intensity of his presence, filling the house with him, him, him, so that there was hardly room for her.

Geoff was a spoiled ass. . . .

Still, it left a hollowness in the cottage—a hollowness in her, too. Not that she was still in love with him—well, maybe just a little—but losing a mate created a void that grew stronger in the lonely night hours and sucked at the foundations of the new life she told herself she was building.

You failed at marriage, and you'll probably fail at living alone, too. . . .

Which was the way she felt sometimes, like a failure, for her marriage was a task started but not completed. An indictment of her own judgment and maturity. Her intellect, too.

How could I have been so stupid! I knew what he was before I married him, but I wouldn't let myself admit it and I went ahead and did it, anyway.

All true. It was like being in a car that had lost its brakes, gaining speed, faster and faster, and she'd ridden it right into marriage and beyond, a crazy smile frozen on her face.

On the worst nights, she would think, And I knew what I was, too—so it was a failure from the start. I loved the idea of having a hand in the design of great buildings; could picture him asking my advice about form and fountains and balconies, depending on my eye for composition. And I liked the idea of the money. What girl who grew up poor wouldn't. . . ?

Feeling the chilly wave of depression move through her, letting the silence of the little cottage punish her. Sometimes it was intense, but it never lasted; came sneaking in at night, particularly just before her period. That's when her whole body seemed a bloom of raw nerve endings—her nipples sore, her mood cranky. The recriminations linked to her own body's cycle, like moon tides, flooded full then drawn dry. She could look out the window at a low tide, sea grass lying flat, the bay empty and exposed, and she could feel the draining of it in her own abdomen and breasts.

I've no more control of its effect on me than a damn oyster....

That wasn't true, she knew. Just something she felt sometimes. So at night, when the mood was on her, she'd put down her book, put aside the cat, and lose herself in work. Go to the darkroom she'd built and soup film or experiment with printing. Or she'd work around the cottage, cleaning and neatening and arranging. She'd bought some old cherry-wood shadow boxes at a yard sale and refinished them, then hung them in the living room and kitchen to display the collection of cream pitchers her mother had given her. She liked brass, too. Around the house, over the fireplace mantel and on the window seals, there were brass unicorns, horses, cats, and brass candle holders. She collected more than two dozen candle holders over the years, all holding long green candles, a color she favored; felt the green candles implied warmth even without being lighted. On the porch, there were woven baskets with arrangements of dried wildflowers, and in the kitchen there were shelves holding Ball canning jars and country crockery.

She'd completely redone the little cottage, gave it a whole new feel, a fresh identity, scrubbing and painting and rearranging to rid the place of its history of Geoff and failed marriage. Even so, he came stomping back some nights. Not him, really, but the feel of him, his presence. Which was depressing enough, but with that mood came the emotional need and body longing that refused her contentment and mocked her independence.

It must be so easy to be a man. Everything is either superficial or disposable....

That's the kind of bitterness that came over her sometimes, like the last few evenings, watching the new moon tilting westward above dusk's last light. Feeling it draw the water from her body, abrading the nerve endings. Damn it, she was tired of being alone in that cottage night after night. Not that she wanted a man—no way, not so soon. She just felt like doing something, going somewhere.

Which was the only reason she'd said yes to Tucker Gatrell. Old Mr. Tuck—she'd called him that as a girl. One of the fishermen who'd flirted with her mother—they all had, her mother was so handsome and strong-willed. Back then, he'd been just one more grinning face in the moving throng of adult faces, but now he was one of the last remnants of old times in Mango. Because Tucker had been a part of her childhood, there was added importance to his role in her life as an adult, so she rarely denied him anything he asked. Usually, it was breakfast. Sometimes dinner. Lately, though, the favors he'd asked had something to do with trying to stop the government from condemning much of old Mango to make a state park. Going to the library for him, getting copies of documents made. Like earlier that afternoon. He'd come sauntering up to the door in his jeans, cowboy hat in hands, saying, "Miz Sally, I got a big favor to ask. Has to do with that damn Peeping Tom nephew of mine. I want you to take him a bottle of the vitamin water, have him test it. I'd do it myself, only I got to go out in the boat."

Any other time, she would have said no. But now, with the dark mood threatening her, she agreed to go. It was something to do. Besides, the chance to see Marion Ford's uneasiness again appealed to a quirky, perverse streak in her. As a girl, Marion had made her uneasy often enough: the high school football star she'd tagged after. Once, when she was ten, she'd hidden in the shadows and watched him and a girl kissing in the old gray car he'd owned. It was one of the most exciting things she'd ever seen, but also one of the most hateful. Marion had always been so . . . mature, so neat—then to see him acting like such a fool.

She'd run off in tears.

It irritated her to think about that. Particularly now, driving her white Ford Bronco west on the Tamiami Trail, then north toward Sanibel Island, a Ball jar full of water beside her on the seat, headed for Ford's house.

*  *  *

Sally
Carmel had her routine and Ford had his. Every morning, he was up at 6:30; didn't need an alarm clock, just woke up automatically. On the rare day he would have slept through, the noise the fishing guides made would have awakened him, anyway. Starting their boats, yelling in to Mack how much fuel and how many baits he should mark them down for, loading ice and drinks while they talked business across the docks, enjoying the private time and the morning coolness before their clients arrived.

Marinas were noisy in the morning—nice boat sounds to hear from a cool bed.

First thing Ford did was fit his glasses on his face, pull on shorts, then go outside to check his main fish tank. Made sure everything had lived through the night—no small drama, because more than once he'd found a soupy mess of decomposing specimens, the filter fouled or the raw-water intake plugged. Because Ford awoke to the fear of that every morning, his first ten paces of each new day were shaded with mild dread.

Usually, though, the tank was working just fine. The pumps were pumping raw water in, spilling overflow out. The hundred-gallon upper reservoir with its subsand filter cleared the water, then sprayed it in a mist into the main tank, where sea squirts and tunicates continued to filter until the water was too clear to support the weight of a human eye. Ford could look right through to the bottom. Even at morning dusk, the water seemed a brighter world: small snappers, sea anemones, swaying blades of turtle grass, sea horses, horseshoe crabs, whelk shells, the whole small world alive. Ford could see them all in a glance. Then his attention would focus, and he would pick out his favorite specimens, allowing his eyes to linger: three tiny tarpon stacked beneath the exhaust of the upper reservoir, as motionless as pale bars of chromium. Immature snook, too, heads turned into the artificial current. The half dozen reef squid were the hardest to find, because their chromatophores allowed them to blend with the sand bottom. Ford enjoyed looking for them. It was part of his morning ritual, and he always took his time, allowing the dread to fade with each small discovery.