A Visible Darkness Read Free

rail line from island to island all the way to Key West.
    Some of this history I knew. Billy had been my lending library, passing on books about Florida’s past, Audubon guides when I stared dumbly at a species I didn’t know and maps to give me a larger idea of where I was. He rarely gave tutorials. But this felt different. My friend was a lawyer, he was building a case.
    “Flagler employed thousands of southern blacks, free men who left their birth homes in Georgia and Alabama to hack his trail down the coast. They were the ones who piled the sand and gravel for a roadbed and then laid the ties and rails to carry Flagler’s class to the sunshine.”
    “But better work than trying to scratch out the sand where they had been,” I offered.
    “Agreed,” said Billy. “They weren’t forced and they weren’t stupid. But Flagler was also a businessman. He knew that deadheading empty trains back north wasn’t profitable. So he encouraged and often subsidized farmers to grow citrus and winter vegetables on the land west of his tracks.”
    “So he could fill the empty trains going back north, and make a buck selling oranges in the winter,” I said.
    “Exactly. And once the rails were down, many of the black workers stayed and went to the fields to harvest that fruit and those winter vegetables.”
    For generations those families would be the muscled backbone for a thriving agricultural industry. It was not, we both knew, unlike the working core of North Philadelphia’s factories and machine shops that once built thriving neighborhoods there.
    “By the 1940s, stable communities were set west of Flagler’s tracks,” Billy went on. “And entrepreneurial women started small businesses, stores and restaurants that created an internal economy.”
    Billy’s command of the facts was always solid, his telling of the stories always eloquent, especially over the phone when he felt most comfortable. But deep into my fourth cup of coffee, I finally interrupted him.
    “Wonderful history, Billy. And I appreciate your constant efforts to educate me. But your point is?”
    He waited a few studied beats.
    “The matriarchs, the ones who were forward-thinking and looked to guide and care for their family’s future?” he said, hesitating, letting the leading question hang.
    “Yes?”
    “I think they are being killed.”
    I paddled for more than an hour, east and south toward the sea. The river water had turned a dull blue green and its banks changed from the low tangle of mangroves to sandy banks sprouting skinny pines. I was sweating heavily, but had perfected my strokes so that I could wipe the perspiration from my eyes with a swipe of my shoulder without breaking the rhythm. Since leaving the canopy the smell of brackish water had thickened and the east wind brought in the salt odor of the Atlantic. By the time I swung around the last bend and spotted the boat ramp at the ranger station, the morning sun was full, the dome of blue sky cloudless.
    I sprinted the last 300 yards, digging deep and long, straining muscle and lungs until the blood pounded in my ears, and then I coasted into the graveled edge of land. I sat with my elbows on my knees and waited until my heart tripped down and my breathing eased before I stepped out into ankle-deep water. I pulled the boat up into a worn patch of shaded grass and pine needles and unloaded.
    The dock was empty but for the new ranger’s Boston Whaler tied up at one end. Further down the river I could see a single fisherman in a bass boat working the edges of an outcropping of pine root. I shouldered my gym bag and walked up to the washrooms and showered in hot water for the first time in weeks. I shaved and then dressed in canvas pants, a short sleeved polo shirt and better Docksides. When I came out I stopped just outside the doors and glanced over to the ranger’s office. No one appeared, even though I knew the 24-hour shift man was on duty and had seen me arrive. As I walked back to