Authors: Mike Blakely
Summer of Pearls (10 page)
“Too bad Pop already printed the paper,” I said. “Now we won't be in it till next week.”
“He ought to print an extra for a fish like this,” Cecil said. “I wonder what all those people are doing at Esau's. Wait a minute. I know what they're doing. Look! They're hunting for pearls!” He laughed so hard that he had to quit paddling. “That's Captain Brigginshaw on the shore with his suitcase.”
Cecil was right. Everybody in town had seen Brigginshaw's half-page ad and read about the big pearl sale of the previous day. Half the population of Port Caddo had come to hunt up a fortune in Goose
Prairie Cove, where Billy had recently found his pearl. Nobody had found anything yet, but a few disenchanted wives had brought old specimens their husbands had given them years before. Brigginshaw was dealing for them in the shade of a big mulberry.
Prairie Cove, where Billy had recently found his pearl. Nobody had found anything yet, but a few disenchanted wives had brought old specimens their husbands had given them years before. Brigginshaw was dealing for them in the shade of a big mulberry.
“There's Billy standing beside that Brigginshaw fellow,” I said.
“Good,” Cecil replied. “He can pay us on the spot for this fish.”
When we got closer, we started hollering to attract attention. We paddled in among the pearl-waders and let them look over the edge of the boat at our fish. Esau met us at the bank with Billy and Captain Brigginshaw. They made us feel good, bragging on us for bringing in such a monster whisker fish. Pop was there too, taking notes on the pearl-hunt, and he promised he would write us up on the front page next week. When Billy said he would pay a penny a pound, as promised, Esau doubled the stakes.
“Might as well fry up some fish to feed these hungry pearl hunters,” he said.
Most of the pearlers had come out of the water to view our fish and hear our story. They took turns looking into the big cat's mouth, to see the smaller one lodged in its throat. I was bulging with pride. For the first time in my life, I was earning money and getting recognition for something besides being my parents' son. Even Billy was amazed at what I had done. I wondered what Carol Anne would think when she heard.
What had started out as a pearl-hunt was quickly turning into nothing more than a big fish fry. The novelty of opening mussels in search of riches wore off fast. Most of the men were content to stand around our huge opelousas cat and tell fish stories. As whiskey sales increased, Esau decided to buy every fish we had in the boat. And he hired us to skin and gut them.
A couple of men volunteered to carry our big fish up under a tree where we could hang it, whack it on the head to make sure it was dead, and go to work on it. We felt like local heroes as two dozen whiskey-sipping ex-pearl-hunters followed us up under the boughs of the shade tree. It was shaping up to be the most glorious day of my life.
Then it happened. A shout came from Goose Prairie Cove. At first, nobody paid any attention. Slowly, though, I realized that somebody was yelling his lungs out. I heard a body splashing madly through the water, and turned to see Everett Diehl floundering to dry ground, all wet and muddy.
“Pearl!” he hollered. “I found a pearl!”
I WAS ACCUSTOMED TO EVERETT DIEHL SPOILING MY FUN, BECAUSE HE
taught school at the Caddo Academy where I took my lessons. But school had been out for weeks now and he still wasn't satisfied. He was trying to upstage my catfish with a measly shell slug. As soon as he hollered “Pearl!” every man standing around the big ugly fish hanging in the tree turned and stampeded to the lakeshore to see what he had found.
taught school at the Caddo Academy where I took my lessons. But school had been out for weeks now and he still wasn't satisfied. He was trying to upstage my catfish with a measly shell slug. As soon as he hollered “Pearl!” every man standing around the big ugly fish hanging in the tree turned and stampeded to the lakeshore to see what he had found.
“I was just about to give up!” Diehl claimed as the crowd gathered around him. “I thought I'd open one more. I almost threw it back in before I saw the pearl stuck to the rim of the shell. Look!”
Captain Brigginshaw pushed through the crowd of men, his money case like a battering ram. He took one glance and said, “Button pearl. I'll give you seventy-five dollars for it.”
Diehl's enthusiasm wilted a little. “Seventy-five? But the paper said they were worth thousands.”
“Those were excellent specimens, and many of them.”
“Still ⦔ Diehl lamented. “Just seventy-five dollars ⦔
“No small wage for two hours of work,” the captain said, opening
his money case. “Seventy-five dollars, take it or leave it.”
his money case. “Seventy-five dollars, take it or leave it.”
As Diehl groused, Billy took the mussel shell from him to examine the pearl. “I'd take it,” he advised. “This pearl isn't worth fifty. Captain Brigginshaw sometimes inflates the prices in the early going to promote interest.”
The big pearl-buyer sighed and frowned at Billy for revealing his tactics. Diehl decided to sell immediately. When his soft, pale fingers closed around the seventy-five dollars, all the men in sightâexcept for Brigginshaw, Billy, and Esauâturned and ran into Goose Prairie Cove like boys. It was then that the Great Caddo Lake Pearl Rush truly began. My friends and I didn't get to take part in that first stampede. We had to gut and skin catfish.
The hunting went on fruitlessly until about sundown, when Allen Byers, the sawmill owner, came up with a hundred-dollar pearl. Brigginshaw's luck had held out. The pearl fever would carry over to the next day.
By the second day of the pearl rush, I had established a daily routine. At dawn, I rode in the skiff and opened the mussels we had gathered the day before, while Cecil and Adam paddled to our trotline.
After running the line, we took the fish we had caught to our holding tank on the old Packer place. Like Billy Treat, those catfish could hold their breath a long time. The Packer place was a mile from the lake, but the fish could survive out of water until we got them to the big cypress trough.
By that time in the morning, it was hot, so Cecil and Adam and I were happy to go splash around in the water. Port Caddo must have been almost abandoned that second day of the pearl rush. It seemed every man in town was looking for mussels in Goose Prairie Cove. Some ladies had come, too. They didn't wade in like the men did because it wasn't considered ladylike for them to get their clothes all wet and sticking to them, but some of them opened the shells the men brought to the shore.
Cecil and Adam and I threw the mussels we found into one of Esau's skiffs. We would open them that afternoon, on our evening run to the trotline. First, though, we ate some lunch we had brought from
home, and found some kind of useless way to occupy ourselves for a couple of hours along the lakeshore, or up in the woods.
home, and found some kind of useless way to occupy ourselves for a couple of hours along the lakeshore, or up in the woods.
By the time we shoved the skiff into Goose Prairie Cove that afternoon, Captain Brigginshaw had purchased three new pearls. As we were paddling away, someone came rowing into the cove, shouting. It was Junior Martin. He had found a two-hundred-dollar pearl somewhere on the North Shore. A new surge of excitement fluttered through the pathering of pearl-hunters.
“Where 'bouts did you find it, Junior?” somebody asked.
“The same old mussel beds I've been gittin' my trotline bait from for years. The best mussel beds on the North Shore.”
“Where's that?”
“None of your damn business!” he said with a big grin.
Two men vowed to follow him all over the lake all night long to trail him to his lode. He was a good-natured fellow and challenged them to do just that. Junior was a lake rat and knew how to hide out in the brakes and swamps.
When we left to run our line, spirits were running high at Goose Prairie Cove, and folks were talking about scouting new mussel beds all over the lake.
On the third day of the rush, a couple of farm wagons showed up near Esau's place. The news had spread into the hills and fields. The crops were in the ground and wouldn't require much cultivation, except after a rain. A farmer could leave a couple of his older sons to take care of the fields and bring the rest of the family to the lake to hunt pearls.
On the fourth day, Goose Prairie began to look like a camp meeting. More wagons and tents appeared. Trevor Brigginshaw bought five pearls that day. People waded, napped in the shade, drank whiskey at Esau's, cooked, talked, laughed, and played.
Billy walked over to the cove between dinner and supper, and found me and Cecil and Adam watching a wrestling match between two farm boys.
“Ben, we have a problem,” he said.
“We do?” Cecil asked.
“Esau can't keep fresh drinking water for all these pearl-hunters. I told him I'd talk to you men about it.” He was always calling us “men” when he was trying to get us to do something productive.
“What are we supposed to do about it?” I said.
“Yeah, what are we supposed to do? Make it rain?” Cecil added.
Billy ignored him and talked to me. “Esau will provide the boats and water kegs if you men will row across the lake to Ames Springs every day and bring back water. He'll buy it from you.”
Cecil ran to Esau's place and haggled over the price for a while before making the deal. Everybody in camp agreed to use lake water for washing, reserving the spring water for drinking and cooking. After we made our first water haul across the lake that day, we barely had time to run our trotline. My summer was getting busier than I had planned, but now I was making money off of spring water and catfish, and starting to think of things I would like to buy.
My pop's business was booming, too. He became Trevor Brigginshaw's most avid promoter. He was thinking more of Port Caddo than he was of the Australian, of course, but what was good for Brigginshaw was good for the town. International Gemstones continued to run a half-page ad in every issue, so pop went biweekly.
A regular pearl column appeared on the front page. Pop told where the best pearls had come from, what kind of mussels had yielded them, what they looked like, and what they sold for. By surveying pearl-hunters and analyzing the industry, he concluded that the average man would make a dollar a day in the pearl-hunt. But some lucky hunters would earn small fortunes.
Pop's editorials heralded the Caddo Lake pearl boom as the salvation for our town. Pearl money would replace the dying riverboat trade. He urged everyone in town to spread the news of the pearl rush. People would come from surrounding towns and farms. The stores would sell more goods, the inns would fill with weekend pearl-hunters. Everyone would benefit.
At his own expense, Pop printed fliers announcing a pearl rush of unprecedented magnitude on Caddo Lake, centered at our town. He
sent them to surrounding towns. Local business people began to spruce up for a pearl boom.
sent them to surrounding towns. Local business people began to spruce up for a pearl boom.
Summer was supposed to be a slack time for trade. The lake had gotten too low for steamers to ply. But something new had come to Port Caddo. A glimmer of hope. People started talking about making the town a “pearl resort.” Pop may have been a visionary, but he sure sold the town on his pearl vision.
The
Steam Whistle
carried regular stories of unusual pearl finds: A fellow came from Marshall and found a pearl in the first mussel he opened. A farmer found one lying loose on the shoreâprobably dropped accidentally by some careless mussel-opener. A camper gutted a fish and found a pearl in its stomach. A boy found a pearl caked in bird dung under a heron rookery..
Steam Whistle
carried regular stories of unusual pearl finds: A fellow came from Marshall and found a pearl in the first mussel he opened. A farmer found one lying loose on the shoreâprobably dropped accidentally by some careless mussel-opener. A camper gutted a fish and found a pearl in its stomach. A boy found a pearl caked in bird dung under a heron rookery..
Of course there were other news stories to report besides the pearl rush, and one article that caused a sensation around the middle of July dealt with the riverboat trade. After decades of work, the government snag boats were finally getting close to removing the Great Raft from the Red River.
I don't know if I've explained exactly why it took so long to get rid of the Great Raft. It was a huge tangle of driftwood, hundreds of years old, that fed itself constantly with trees washed down from upstream. At one time it blocked over a hundred miles of the Red River channel above Shreveport. It was a concern to Port Caddo, because to get into Caddo Lake, steamers had to skirt the edges of the Raft and find a bayou channel deep enough to navigate. The channels shifted constantly as they got choked with new drift logs.
The government contractors were now claiming, however, that the removal of the Raft and the clearing of a channel would make year- 'round steamboat traffic possible on Caddo Lake for the first time ever. It seemed that the U.S. Government wanted to keep our steamboat industry afloat, even promising to mark channels to help pilots navigate. Port Caddoans began to talk about a new era of prosperity and a sustainable economy, based on pearls and riverboats.
George Blank, the blacksmith, was one of the first to take advantage
of the new prosperity. He started building mussel rakes to sell to the pearl-hunters. He invented two models. One looked like an overgrown garden rake. The other resembled a huge pair of tongs, with two long . handles. Both were designed to be used from a boat to get at mussels in water too deep for wading. They sold as fast as he could make them, for a while.
of the new prosperity. He started building mussel rakes to sell to the pearl-hunters. He invented two models. One looked like an overgrown garden rake. The other resembled a huge pair of tongs, with two long . handles. Both were designed to be used from a boat to get at mussels in water too deep for wading. They sold as fast as he could make them, for a while.
Charlie Ashenback, the best boat-builder on the lake, started taking back-orders. I regarded Charlie as a sort of artist. His skiffs and bateaux were the most graceful things in the water. He used only the best red cypress, and his hands were living tools. He could saw exactly three-eighths of an inch off of a board without even measuring. The boats he built would glide over the water like greased ice. If a fellow had to row all over the lake to find a pearl, he wanted an Ashenback under him.
Trevor Brigginshaw had Ashenback build a rowboat especially designed to carry his great weight, his money satchel, and an oarsman. He hired a young black man named Giff Newton to row the boat for him, while Brigginshaw himself sat in the bow with one hand on his satchel and the other on his pistol, watching for pirates. They made the rounds among all the best pearling spots, black and white.
Colored folks were in on the pearl boom, too. They generally kept to themselves, and hunted mussels where they were harder to get at. Us white folks got all the best mussel beds to ourselves.
Blacks and whites didn't mix much, of course. Around Caddo Lake, the colored population was double that of white folks in those days. Some whites were scared the coloreds would take over if they got education and the vote, both of which they were supposed to have, but didn't. There was a lot of severe harassing of any black person who tried to horn in on what the whites considered theirs.
But nature didn't discriminate against black folks, and they found their share of pearls. In fact, Captain Brigginshaw probably bought as many pearls from black folks as from white. Pop was careful not to print too many stories in the
Steam Whistle.
about blacks finding a lot of pearls. He didn't want a bunch of high-handed nigger-haters attacking the black pearling camps and ruining the boom.
Steam Whistle.
about blacks finding a lot of pearls. He didn't want a bunch of high-handed nigger-haters attacking the black pearling camps and ruining the boom.
Anyway, about the only people in town who disapproved of the
pearl rush at first were the preachers. The Reverend Bartlett Towne almost threw a hissy fit when half his congregation failed to show up the first Sunday of the boom. They were all out pearl-hunting. On Sunday! He preached against the evils of mammon for two weeks running, until he realized that not enough of that evil mammon was winding up in his collection plate. The third Sunday, he held services outside of Esau's saloon and asked God to bring luck to all good Methodist pearl-hunters.
pearl rush at first were the preachers. The Reverend Bartlett Towne almost threw a hissy fit when half his congregation failed to show up the first Sunday of the boom. They were all out pearl-hunting. On Sunday! He preached against the evils of mammon for two weeks running, until he realized that not enough of that evil mammon was winding up in his collection plate. The third Sunday, he held services outside of Esau's saloon and asked God to bring luck to all good Methodist pearl-hunters.
And the luck came. Not just for the Methodists, but for all denominations. Most of the pearls found were just small things called seed pearls, or even smaller ones known as dust pearls. They sold for about twenty-five dollars an ounce, but it took a handful of them to make an ounce. Some people got in the habit of paying Esau with seed pearls for whiskey or drinking water. Cecil and Adam and I traded catfish for seed pearls sometimes. The seed and dust pearls enabled just about everybody to at least break even in the pearl-hunting business.
Several times a day, however, we would hear of something bigger than a seed pearl being found. Maybe it would be worth twenty-five dollars all by itself. Maybe it would fetch fifty, seventy-five, even a hundred. Those were tough times in the bayou country, and a hundred dollars could pay a pearl-hunter's expenses for the whole summer and still leave a profit.
Then there were the rare specimens everybody wanted to find: the pearls of fifteen grains or more, about the size of a garden pea, or bigger. Such a gem would sell for at least a hundred dollars. Edgar Burnett, who lived on the North Shore, found a metallic-green pearl that sold for five hundred. Wiley Jones, a woodchopper who came over from the Louisiana side of the lake, sold two matching egg-shaped pearls for three hundred apiece.
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