Quinquagesimus Quartus Gradus

I’d been on Rabbit Skull Island not two days after the Hurricane of ’53 when I met the rest of my life aboard The Rebellion. Ma’d sent me down from Bourbon with the season’s harvest and a tied-together raft of old logs, saying, “Son, those good people’ll need food to fix if the Lord bid they rebuild shelter down in Darius.” I told her, “Ma, I’ll take this to those good people and make sure you and Pa get your money, but mark my words, this is the blessed voyage that turns me away from Bourbon for good.” With a hug and kiss, I was off with the cargo. And that was that.

Wasn’t longer than a moment after I had taken the copper from the merchant who’d purchased my last raft log than I laid my eyes upon her: The Rebellion. She was tall as a building and prettier than a banker’s retirement home. Wide, blue and white, glistening in the rising sun and proud in the water. Touched by vintage carpenter’s ornamentation we’d somehow lost by the time I was a lad. Two great, orange wheels plunged into the water from her stern, and sleek cannons lined her decks. Accidentally in love, I started for her, pushing and knocking my way through the crowd to get a closer look.

“Woah, partner,” a gruff voice had said. A heavy, friendly hand clamped my shoulder, “What’s the hurry?”

“Excuse me, sir. Forgive my intrusion; I didn’t mean nothing by it. I’m on my way to the boat,” he followed my gaze to The Rebellion.

“No trouble at all, lad, none at all. Say, I hear she’ll be moored ’til at least nightfall. Maybe then you can take a better look. Meantime, care to lend a hand?” His lips pressed into an earnest smile. The warmth in his voice led me to believe he was right—the boat would wait for me. And Ma’d have me whipped if I declined my labor to a fellow in Darius after the storm they’d had. I peeled my eyes away from the beauty of the steam ship.

“What’s the job, sir?”

——

The raccoon’s fluffy tail slipped between my fingers as my face mashed into the dirt. I rose fast to make chase. A board shook as the back of my head crashed it. 

“Dah! Guh!” I seethed. I scrambled out from under the deck boards, stumbled to my feet, and rushed to the other side of the house. Soon as I rounded the corner I leapt back, something smashing into my chest, and landed on my rear. The raccoon’s shrill squabbling filled my ear as he scratched and nipped at me. He was heavier on my ribs than I’d anticipated a little critter would be. I batted him with my forearm and he scurried right back under the darn deck again. “Daggum!”

“Aw, man! I’m sorry buddy, I missed him again!” A heavy, friendly hand hovered before me. I took it and Levi lifted me to my feet like I weighed as much as a newspaper. I fiddled with the leather greaves on my arms. Fresh scratches from the raccoon’s claws gave ‘em some character. “He’s a smart one, that raccoon there,” Levi continued. “Picked a new hole to jump out this time.”

“He’s one crafty son-of-a-gun, I’ll tell ya’ what!” Marty’s quivering voice agreed. She didn’t make a T sound too well, so words like crafty sounded more like “craffy,” and her Ss were replaced by shushes. Marty found herself to be my present employer, courtesy of Levi, the man who pulled me off the dock. Rubbing the back of my head, I was about starting to regret that event. Anyways, Marty was an old woman. An old, old woman. Her skin was tanned as brass and wrinkled as a worn flag in a windstorm, and I can only perfectly describe her as a well-weathered wind chime. “My grandnephew ran ‘em off last year—you hear me?” We turned, giving her our full attention. “But the storm ran ‘em back in under my deck again!” 

I already knew that detail. When I met her earlier in the morning, she had jumped right into a grand narrative about the deck, her grandnephew, and the critter that had lasted from midmorning to noon. I was an expert in Marty’s deck, unwelcome pets, and other things pertaining to Marty generally by the time she finished her tale. Once she was done, she shooed us off straight to evicting the little fella and repairing her deck grates, scolding us for standing around. While Levi had seemed amused by the situation, I had shaken off a headache as we began our hunt for the raccoon. Now, caked in mud and sporting a bump on the back of my head, the crafty son-of-a-gun had me wishing for another one of Marty’s soliloquies. God willing, I was about to have one.

“Yeah,” Levi responded to Marty, “Y’know if it weren’t for that storm, I don’t think he’d have been run in under your deck again.”

I squinted my eyes at Levi’s parroting of her statement ‘cause I reckoned it was rather rude. Yet the words were genuine, and I caught not the slightest hint of mockery. Neither, it seemed, did Marty.

“That’d be what I just said, young man,” she replied, mirroring his smile. “I’m glad your ears ain’t quit working. Now shoo on back to work, Mister Coulson.” She stepped inside. The screen door rattled behind her.

“How are we gonna nab him?” I asked, my voice sour with disappointment that Marty had no further word to share and we would have no reprieve from the hunt. “He’s got too many escape routes for the both of us to cover.”

“Mm,” Levi mused. “Well, you reckon he likes berries?”

I considered the question, having never before considered the diet of Darius-dwelling raccoons. “S’pose if he’s anything like the raccoons we’ve got in Bourbon he’s kind to berries.”

Levi raised a brow at me when I mentioned Bourbon. “I s’pose you’re right.” With that, he plucked a whiskey glass from the rail of the deck and made for the marshy wilderness behind Marty’s cabin. I took one more look below the dusty deck, into the darkness under the cabin, before turning and following him.

The marsh quickly swallowed up my legs, pouring mud into my boots. Levi didn’t mind. He waded through like a spirit in a cemetery. Not a drop of whiskey lifted out of his glass if he didn’t want it to. Meanwhile, I trudged from tree to tree, slipping and splashing up mud all the time. Many trees were felled in the storm, leaving ripped-up stumps jutting out of the muck like spears on an old battleground. Didn’t see any bushes. No bushes, no berries. I began to grumble. Apparently, a little too loudly.

“Quit your belly-aching! Come here, there’s a whole patch of berry bushes just ahead,” Levi chimed. He was right. Just ahead, on a dusty hill, sat a clump of sun-soaked berry bushes. I couldn’t believe I’d missed it. I hurried to the edge of the hill, meeting Levi there. He whistled. “These are some mighty fine, mighty plump berries.”

I took a blackberry in my hand. It was heavy. Rolling it gently, I plucked it off of the branch. Purple stain trickled down the crevices of my fingers. “Oh, that raccoon isn’t going to be able to resist these!”

“No, sir!” Levi clapped. “Now, where’s the basket?”

“The—what?”

“Well, didn’t you bring a basket?”

My face turned beet red. I squeezed the blackberry in my hand, squishing it through my fingers.

“Ah, shucks! No problem, no problem… let me think,” Levi downed the remainder of his whiskey. “Mm! Here, we’ll put some blackberries in my glass. You got any cloth?”

“Just my shirt. We could—”

“Nope, not the shirt. Marty’d be on my case about staining a nice young man’s good shirt.” A moment of silence passed as he loaded his glass with berries. “Can you breath through your nose?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Well alright then. We’ll load up on berries. Just don’t bite ‘em.” He promptly snagged a berry off a bush and placed it into his mouth.

——

Back in Marty’s yard, I fell to my knees and spat out a mouthful of berries. I turned and spit out my purplish-red saliva. Levi kept his mouth shut until he made it to a stump in the yard, whereupon he placed each one by hand, stacking them into a neat offering plate for the raccoon. When his mouth was empty he took the berries from his whiskey glass. It was filled up again with whiskey by the time I cared to get off my knees. I brought my berries over and added them, with less eloquence, to the stack. 

“Now we just wait for him to come out. Then we net him. Those berries are so good, he won’t be longer than five minutes I bet you,” Levi said, giddy with anticipation. Still feeling sour for being turned into a human marsupial, I ignored him, but I hoped he was right.

Three hours later the sky was turning orange. The berries hadn’t flinched. The raccoon hadn’t even poked out his nose from below the deck. We could hear him scampering around down there, chittering, as if mocking us with laughter.

“Daggum!” Levi finally burst.

“Yep,” I agreed.

It was Levi’s turn to grumble. He paced for a moment, then shook his head with vigor and bent down. The butt of his whiskey glass pushed up against the dust yard. He nestled it in. Still muttering, he took up his post once again, taking his end of the net in hand.

Not five minutes later that raccoon had come scampering out of his hole, marching right up to the whiskey glass, and taking not even a second look around before dunking his snout into the cup.

Levi and I lunged without a word. A puff of dust and a squeal later, the raccoon was bundled up in our net, hanging a foot off the air. He fought like the devil to scratch or bite his way out of the net, but it held true. My arms grew tired quickly, but I’d be daggummed before I set him down after what I’d gone through to snatch him.

“Marty!” Levi hollered. “We need the crate, dear!”

Marty stumbled out of the back door holding a wooden crate that must’ve weighed near as much as herself, plunking it down by the porch steps. Levi and I waddled over to it, dropping the raccoon in. I kept hold of my end of the net as Levi shut him in with the lid. We carefully pulled the net free, so he wasn’t all bound up and all. Except for being in the crate itself, of course. The raccoon screeched and scratched like a menace all along.

Now I noticed that Marty was all done up for bedtime, with a loose nightgown and coils in her hair. I took stock of my surroundings, realizing how dark it’d become. I shivered, not from the cold, but from a wave of anxiety. I didn’t have nowhere to go.

“I know I’m pushing it in age, boy, but I ain’t a ghost yet,” Marty said, referring to the expression on my face. “What’s the matter, sonny?”

“It’s nothing for your concern, Ma’am. Please, pardon me,” I smiled. “I’m just glad we caught the critter for you.”

“Yup. Well, now you’d better take him far off so he don’t come back. My grandnephew didn’t do half what he ought’ve last year in that department.”

“I’ll take good care of him, Marty, don’t you worry,” Levi promised with a gesture. “I reckon you’d better say goodbye.”

Marty’s mouth worked without producing a sound. She bent as far as her old bones would let her, grazing the top of the crate with her fingers. She began to talk to the raccoon, speaking to it like a beloved grandchild. Her farewell was so personal, I shifted in my shoes and began to think maybe I oughta step away. As I turned, I felt a tough hand on my shoulder. Levi whispered in my ear, “She’s a sentimental thing. She’s about done.”

“Behave yourself now, you rascal, and I hope I never see your face around here again!” She smacked the lid of the crate and rose. Levi helped her stand.

“Anything else we can do for you, Marty?” He asked.

“Get that feller out of here.” With that, she slammed her door shut, leaving the three of us alone on the deck.

“No point in dawdling,” Levi chirped after a moment. He knelt, grabbed the crate, and hoisted it onto his shoulder. Spinning on his heel, he clamped down the steps and was almost to the corner of the house before I even registered to follow.

We were a good long walk up the road from Darius, so I got to thinking. Really, I got to stressing. The stars were now waving hullo and the sky was rolling over into its violet blanket, and I still had nowhere to be. I was almost out of spending money and I’d checked out of my room on the island that morning. As we walked, I scouted out some spots in the marsh that might do for a little fire and a sleeping body. Felt strange to try to sleep so close to the road, though. And the stink of the marsh wasn’t negligible. It made me appreciate the scent of Bourbon, which was… heck, I guess I couldn’t describe it from memory. It was good, though. Real good. Not like the marsh.

“So here’s the thing.” It was Levi who broke the dusky silence first. “This raccoon’ll find its way back to Marty. Marty’s cooking is the best-scented thing in these parts for miles around. I know her grandnephew, and he’s a good kid. He wouldn’t have just let the critter go anywhere. He’d have done a swell job of taking him far.” I looked at Levi, studying his face as he talked, trying to figure out why he was telling me this. “I reckon the raccoon isn’t gonna stay away from old Marty. That is, unless he’s got someone keeping an eye on him.”

“Are you saying you’re gonna keep him?”

“No,” he laughed. “I’ve got too many responsibilities at the moment, as it were. But you have just shed yourself of all responsibility, except to yourself. Isn’t that right?”

“Me? Well, no, now that ain’t right, exactly. I’ve got…” I trailed off. He was right. I had sold the last of my parents’ supplies, promised my Ma I’d not return to her, and was anxious about a place for my own head, and my own head alone. He took my silent realization as a “yes.”

“Then, congratulations, you’ve got yourself a new best buddy.”

The raccoon hissed in the crate. I swallowed. Levi took a sip of his whiskey and laughed. 

We walked in silence for a long time. My body started to gnaw at me, tired from the day. My head hurt from when I’d smashed it on Marty’s deck. I still didn’t know where I’d end up, had nowhere to go, and now there’s a daggum raccoon I’m gonna be stuck with. Well, at least I can use the crate as a bit of a chair, I suppose.

The tighter streets of Rabbit Skull Island replaced the marshy trail without my realizing, I was so deep in my contemplations. Before long, The Rebellion—tall, proud, and well-lit compared to the cool dark waters behind it—came into glorious view.

“‘Course,” Levi started, “when I had my first raccoon, someone taught me how to tame him and train him and such. I s’pose it wouldn’t be right not to pass along the favor, eh?” He stopped walking where the dock met the dirt. “Well, the call’s yours. You can give me a break from this here crate and go on your way, or you can come aboard and meet the rest of my crew. What do you say?”