The Bucket Flower. Donald R. Wilson
one can take a steamer to Key West or a train to Tampa. Another way is to take a train inland to Kissimmee and then a riverboat south to Lake Okeechobee. From the lake southward the Everglades spreads all the way to Cape Sable. A man must walk with water up to his armpits and sawgrass higher than his reach for a distance of fifty miles. Once you’ve seen one part of it, you’ve seen it all.”
“How can I get to the cypress swamps?”
“The riverboats continue on through the lake and westward down the Caloosahatchee River, which has been dredged by Henry Disston. From there one has to hike twenty miles or so through pine forests before getting to the swamps. But those swamps are dangerous. They tell of bears, wild boars, alligators, panthers, millions of mosquitoes, and poisonous snakes. My engineers brought back a rumor that a swamp ape bigger than a man roams in those bogs. But even if no predatory animals existed, the swamp miasmas—the poisonous gases that rise from the stagnant waters—will kill a man.”
She happened to glance at Mrs. Flagler, who was staring at her—or more accurately, staring through her. The lady’s eyes were wide and wild.
“What about yellow fever and malaria?” asked Aunt Sarah.
Mr. Flagler nodded. “There have been outbreaks of yellow fever in past years, and malaria can be contracted in any tropical area.”
Each bit of discouraging information had made her spirits sink lower, but to turn around and go back meant defeat. Papa would be proven right if she returned to the oppressive life that awaited her in Back Bay. And there lurked the horrible Edward Cushing, waiting for her to accept his proposal of marriage backed by the insistence of both of her parents.
“I want to go,” she said.
Mr. Flagler shook his head and smiled condescendingly. “I’m sorry, but such a trip for two ladies would be unthinkable. I have failed to mention that the trains and riverboats are frequented by gamblers and ruffians, and the swamps are known to be hideouts for murderers and thieves.”
Aunt Sarah shook as if casting off a chill. “Oh, I refuse to go to a place like that! St. Augustine is rustic enough for me.”
She was relieved to hear her aunt’s reaction and said, “I’ll hire a guide or a Pinkerton detective, then.”
Aunt Sarah patted her on the knee. “We’ll talk about that when we return to the hotel.”
“If you are determined to go, I happen to know a botanist who lives in Fort Myers.” He turned to his wife. “What is his name, Ida?”
“The Duke of Marlborough,” Mrs. Flagler said, still staring at her. “My side of the family is related, you know.”
“Worthington. That’s it. Doctor Worthington. He’s an excellent man to give you information about the interior of south Florida. I will telegraph him.”
Her hopes began to rise slightly. “Thank you, Mr. Flagler. I’d appreciate that.”
“I can’t let Elizabeth go,” said Aunt Sarah. “I promised Walter to keep her under my wing.”
“Are you a descendant of Queen Elizabeth?” asked Mrs. Flagler.
“Perhaps I can get my son, Harry, to escort you to Fort Myers,” said Mr. Flagler, ignoring his wife. “It’s at least a three-day trip depending which route you take.” He described the three different routes in more detail, and the riverboat seemed to travel closest to where she wanted to be.
“Harry has gone back to New York, dear,” said Mrs. Flagler, returning to reality. “You know how he hates Florida.”
He scowled for the first time and said nothing.
Aunt Sarah rose to her feet. “Thank you, Mr. Flagler. We must be going. I know you’re a busy man. You’ve been most helpful in showing us how impossible travel through the Everglades would be.”
“Invest in Florida, Miss Sprague,” he said to Aunt Sarah as he stood. “The state is growing rapidly and is already becoming the nation’s vacation paradise.”
As they were escorted to the front door by Mr. Flagler, she expressed her appreciation and promised to take the trip to the Oklawaha River.
As the carriage carried them back to the hotel, Aunt Sarah prattled on about Mrs. Flagler’s gown and regal fantasies and Mr. Flagler’s commanding but cordial manner. It was evident that all possibilities of traveling through the Everglades had been dismissed.
Mrs. Flagler’s comment about meeting Papa with Mama last fall weighed as heavily on her head as one of the flat irons in Mrs. Faraday’s kitchen might have. She struggled to dismiss the remark as the chatter of an unstable woman. Mrs. Flagler’s stare had been frightening, and some of her comments wild. Surely the lady was mad. Aunt Sarah had overlooked the statement about Mama like a true lady should, and was determined to see no evil, speak no evil, and hear no evil. That Papa could have taken up with a loose woman seemed unthinkable. Proud, churchgoing Papa, who stood as stiff as a ramrod, was always proper at home, insisting upon the strictest decorum from his wife and daughter.
But then she recalled the summer day she had wandered from home in search of her father. She had been eleven or twelve and had walked all the way from Dartmouth Street, past the Commons, down State Street to Atlantic Avenue, expecting Papa to be pleasantly surprised by her appearance at his office. Although frightened to be alone on the city streets and eyed by strangers seeing a little girl without an escort, she pressed on. The saloons, drunken sailors, loud waterfront noises, and the smells from the fishing boats and the harbor itself kept her and Mama closer to home most of the time. The company’s outer office was empty. When she opened the door to Papa’s office that she and Mama had visited on rare occasions, she saw no one at first. Then a slight noise made her look behind Papa’s huge, mahogany desk where she saw him lying on top of a young woman.
On the way home in his carriage, Papa explained how he had tripped and fallen and how he and Miss Murchison, his secretary, had landed on the floor. He seemed much more concerned that Mama would be furious about their daughter having wandered so far from home, and insisted for her protection that her jaunt would be their little secret. Nothing more was ever said about her excursion to the waterfront, and she had put aside the incident until now.
She felt her face grow hot as the image of Papa on top of Miss Murchison eleven years ago came roaring back. Had her naïveté clouded her vision of Papa’s true nature? Her social life had been as innocent as Sunday school. The ladies and gentlemen she had associated with at college dances and parties had always followed strict rules of propriety. Well, Grace was different of course, but her friend had behaved acceptably in their group. Those who didn’t had been ostracized. One time Grace was nearly expelled for some undisclosed reason until the intervention by powerful connections her parents had at Wellesley. She was aware that not all men and women were as pure in thought and deed as her close group of friends. For Papa to be one of those other people had been impossible to accept—until now.
The Flaglers’ behavior was not too different from her own parents. Mr. Flagler boasted about his plans for the development of Florida, oblivious to Mrs. Flagler’s sitting there imagining that she was of royal lineage. Papa was absorbed by expanding his steamship line while Mama dreamed of the Sprague family being included in the higher circles of Bostonian society. Mama blamed the legends surrounding Grandfather Sprague, a rowdy sea captain, for holding them back. These stories, she claimed, were still whispered around the upper class.
Mr. Flagler’s description of the Everglades was depressing, and his none-too-subtle inferences about the inabilities of women hadn’t been lost on her. There had to be a way for her to get to the Big Cypress Swamp and the Fakahatchee River. Among the young gentlemen guests at the hotel there must be one willing to escort her to Fort Myers and beyond. A plan was starting to form.
Chapter
4
“Watch out for