Carolina Skeletons

by David Stout

  “Any suggestions? Seriously?”

  “Pace yourself. Look at old clippings. Take a ride in the country. Give yourself a break from facing strangers. You’ll be more effective.”

  “Right.” And he knew she was.

  “And treat yourself to a decent meal.” She talked again in Spanish to someone else. “Listen, I gotta go. Take care.”

  “I love you.”

  “Me too …”

  “Doesn’t sound all that bad, does it? Living in some quiet place, having a garden …”

  “We’ll talk about it.”

  Click. She was gone.

  Willop drove to the local paper, an offset weekly, and explained that he was researching an article on life in the rural South of several decades ago. Would it be too much trouble to look through newspapers from 1944?

  “I picked 1944 because it was the height of the war, and I’m interested in seeing how the war dominated local life, if it did,” Willop said.

  “No trouble at all,” said a cheerful young man. Willop guessed that he doubled as a reporter and official greeter. Probably still has his ideals, Willop thought.

  The young man set aside his brown-bag lunch, went down a hall, and returned with several bound files, each about three feet by two feet.

  “Not too much dust on them,” the young man said. “We keep the storage room temperature-controlled and clean as we can. Take as long as you like. Sit at that table over there, why don’t you.”

  “Appreciate it,” Willop said.

  Back in time. The papers were well preserved, not crumbling and yellow, so that they felt more like last week’s papers than ones from more than forty years ago. In front of him now was a picture of a minister from Orangeburg, an earnest, slick-haired man in his late thirties, perhaps, who was taking a new assignment. Old man now, if he isn’t dead. Retired with grandchildren, probably, Willop thought. Women’s aid unit plans social … Emerson Wells, a long-time railroad worker, dies at the age of eighty-two … News for and about colored people: Negro soldier writes home to mother …

  And there it was: “Mill-Shanty Negro Held in Slaying of Girls.” Mill-shanty Negro. Willop almost laughed. He had known some crusty old newspaper editors in his time (some were just plain bigots), but he had never seen a headline quite like that. Wonder what a mill-shanty Negro looks like, he said to himself. Easy: He looks like that picture of Linus that I saw in the Corrections Department.

  “Colored Community Also Angered by Slayings …” Oh, yes, I bet they were, Willop thought. Especially those who didn’t want to be mill-shanty Negroes …

  “Early Trial Urged for Negro Accused in Slayings.” Not bad, that. Almost sensitive by Old South, old-law standards, Willop reflected.

  “Murdered Girls Laid to Rest … Stunned, Angry Community Shares Parents’ Grief.”

  Willop looked at the pictures of the girls—taken in school, probably—smiling in happy innocence. So different from the terrible pictures of the girls in death. Enough to break your heart, even after all these years, Willop thought.

  And through it all, life went on. Of course, Willop thought. What else?

  He remembered his own mother’s death, how the day of the funeral, and for many days after that, he had been astonished that, while he was aching with deep, deep grief, the rest of the world went on. Not only went on but—and this was surely true—acted like it didn’t care.

  “Wife of Judge Heads War Bond Affair … Hero Soldier to Speak.” There was a picture of the hero soldier, in fact, looking much more like a tough, back-country lout than a hero, or even a soldier. Wounded at Anzio, decorated … Well, good for you, hero soldier, Willop thought. Hope you had a nice life.

  “Court Names Counsel for Accused Negro.” So that’s what he looked like back then, Willop thought. There was a picture of Judah Brickstone. Hair brilliantined in place, prissy, smug smirk … Probably more at home doing—what? What the hell would a lawyer from around here do in those days? And why would he stay?

  “Negro Convicted in Slaying of Girls … Sentenced to Die.”

  And there was the sheriff, a bit on the plump side but a tough-looking hombre nonetheless, leading the desperate prisoner—how small he was! Willop thought when he saw the picture—to a car following the sentencing.

  If Brickstone did anything at the trial, they sure didn’t report it, Willop thought. But, to be fair, he had met reporters he wouldn’t trust to accurately report a grocery list. God knows who covered this thing back then.…

  “Many From Community Expected to Watch Justice Carried Out.” Oh, yes, Willop thought. And I wonder how many slept that night after a good hearty meal.…

  “Negro Goes to Chair for Slayings.”

  Well, there it was. Calm and without remorse, the account said. Holding a Bible the sheriff had given him. “Last Conversation Between Condemned and Sheriff Reported,” the headline said.

  “Linus, you know that you have only a few minutes to live, don’t you?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Well, are you guilty of the crime for which you were convicted?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Did any officer from the time you were arrested up until now take advantage of you, threaten you, or punish you in any way?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Was anyone else with you when this crime was committed? Linus, I asked you if anyone else was with you.”

  “No, Sheriff.”

  “Well, good-bye, Linus.”

  “Good-bye, Sheriff.”

  Driving away from the paper, Willop remembered Moira’s advice about not overloading himself. But, having read the account of the last moments of Linus Bragg, he thought the least he could do was push himself a bit more. He owed that much, and more, to his mother.

  Am I doing this right? he asked himself. Jesus, such a mix of science and hunch and—and aimless poking around. Or maybe not so aimless. God, who knew?

  He found Luke Reddy’s farm-equipment place easily enough, but Luke Reddy wasn’t there. An aging, tired-looking man in a gray work uniform explained: “People ain’t buyin’ much farm equipment these days. I’m just kind of keepin’ an eye on things. You can catch Luke over at the station, pretty certain.”

  “Where’s that?”

  When the man told him, Willop wasn’t surprised that it was the same station where he’d stopped to have a new fuse put in for the car light. Seemed like everybody was connected to everybody else.…

  “Fill it up,” Willop told the same easygoing man who had tended his car a few days earlier.

  “Hey, how’s it going? Light working okay?”

  “Fine. Luke Reddy here someplace?”

  The station owner smiled and nodded in the direction of four gray-haired, stubble-bearded men sitting on benches and hunched over a sawed-off oil drum. They were playing dominoes.

  Hands on his hips, hoping to look casual but feeling stiff, Willop approached them.

  “Luke Reddy?”

  “Right here.” The man who looked up at Willop had thick glasses that made his eyes look grotesquely large.

  “Maybe I could have a few minutes of your time.”

  “That’s the sad thing. I got more time than I know what to do with.” Luke Reddy chuckled at that, and one of the other men by the sawed-off barrel nodded and chuckled with him. The last man, the oldest of all, looked up, and Willop saw that he was the father of the station owner, the same old man who had given him the hard-stare treatment the other day.

  “How’s it going?” Willop asked him.

  The man nodded, ever so slightly, but gave Willop the hard-stare treatment once again.

  Fuck him, Willop thought.

  “Buy you coffee?” Willop said to Luke Reddy.

  “Naw, my treat. We got our own pot inside,” Reddy said.

  Willop followed him into an office smelling of grease and littered with batteries, fan belts, and hubcaps, some old and some new, and sat on the edge of a wooden desk.

  “Black is f
ine,” Willop said, taking the cup Reddy offered him. The coffee was strong and bitter.

  “How can I help ya?” Reddy asked.

  “Doing some research. Maybe for a writing project … On the way the South was back forty and more years ago—rural sections, I mean.…”

  Luke Reddy’s magnified eyes showed no guile.

  “Fact is,” Willop said, “I’m interested in that murder way back in 1944. The two little girls …”

  “Oh, sure! Killed by that little nigger.”

  “You found the bodies.”

  “Damned if you ain’t right! Now, how’d you know?”

  “I’ve been studying. Look, do you remember any question, anybody ever asking, whether the black boy might have been innocent?”

  “Shee-it!” Reddy waved his hand, more in patient amusement at Willop’s ignorance than in disgust. “Nigger admitted he did it. Sheriff caught him soon afterwards. Went over to them shacks, over by the mill, niggers used to live there, the ones that worked at the mill—”

  “I know that.”

  “—caught him in no time, got a confession real quick, sent him straight to the electric chair. Served him right, dirty little bastard.”

  “The sheriff …”

  “Hell of a man, the sheriff. Real good man. Straight and true.”

  “Not the kind to beat a confession out of anybody?”

  “Oh, hell no.” Reddy’s face showed astonishment at the suggestion. “Fact is, a lot of folks woulda soon strung the kid up right away. From a tree. With or without all his parts, if you know what I mean.”

  “I can guess. But not the sheriff?”

  “Told you. He wouldn’t allow it to happen. Hell of a man, the sheriff. He was the law here. And fair to everybody. White and colored both.”

  “The, uh, colored … A lot of them were pisséd off at the kid too, I guess?”

  “Oh, hell yes. Whites and colored got along fine, each minding his own business. Ones that worked at the mill—colored, I mean—had it good. Sure. Oh, hell. Everybody was shook up over that. Everybody …” Luke Reddy suddenly began to cough, a deep, racking cough.

  “You okay?” Willop asked.

  “Good as a man with one lung can be.” Reddy smiled, took out a soiled handkerchief, and wiped tears from around his eyes. “Gave ’em up too late,” he said. “The cigarettes.”

  “Must be rough …”

  “Damn right. Own damn fault, though. What the hell, I don’t worry none. Expect I got some time left.”

  “A good attitude.” Willop could not help but like him for his indomitable cheerfulness.

  “Used to think I had my share of troubles early, so’s I wouldn’t get any more,” Reddy said. “Took a Jap bullet when I was just a pup. My wife, she passed on, kinda unexpected. Years ago. Then this.” He pointed with his thumb toward his chest and coughed some more. “Get so’s I’m used to living with one lung, more or less, and my business dries up.…”

  “Rough …”

  “Ain’t the word for it. But what the hell. I’m just one of many. When it rains, it rains on everybody. But when it don’t rain …” Reddy smiled sadly and shrugged.

  “Some people around here wanted to hang the kid right away, you said.”

  “Oh, hell yes. See, there was talk, right after the bodies were found, that he’d … you know …”

  “But that wasn’t really true, was it? I mean, you found the bodies. The clothes were all in place.”

  “Yeah, that’s true, I guess. Well …” Reddy frowned.

  Press on this, Willop told himself. “That still bothers you? I mean, that talk?”

  “Yeah, well, thing is we didn’t know whether to believe the sheriff or—”

  “You said ‘we.’”

  “Yeah, well …” Reddy coughed again. “Sure, I was as worked up as everybody else. Hell, I saw ’em when they was pulled out of the water. Jesus …” Reddy shook his head.

  “But as terrible as it was, they weren’t molested. Right?”

  “Well, I guess not. Still, I don’t mind telling you, ain’t ashamed to admit it, some of us—”

  “You and who else?”

  “Well, several folks. You have to realize, the feelings back then.…”

  “If you can remember anyone in particular …”

  “Well, now, T. J. Campbell, for one. I remember him being quite outspoken, about how we ought to just take the nigger—”

  “Who the hell was he?”

  “Nephew of old Mr. Tyler, the man who owned the mill. All worked up, he was. T.J., that is.”

  “He good friends of the girls’ families, or what?”

  “No, no, no. Not really. Not good friends with anybody, particularly. Then or now.”

  “You mean he’s still around?”

  “T.J.? Oh, hell yes. Lives over that way.” Reddy pointed.

  “Excuse me, I don’t get it.” Willop’s coffee was cold, his backside was sore from sitting on the edge of the desk, and he was getting tired.

  “Get what?” Reddy’s magnified eyes were puzzled.

  “How this T.J. fits in. Keeps to himself, isn’t all that friendly with the families of the girls, then he’s one of the people making noises about a lynching. That’s what you said.”

  “Never really came into his own, T.J., if you know what I mean. Never really fit in anywhere. There was kind of the expectation he’d be pretty well set, what with his uncle owning the mill and all and him being a foreman, but it never happened.”

  “How come?”

  “Hard to say. Just never quite fit in, T.J. didn’t. Used to be talk about him and the colored women over by the mill … You know.” Reddy smiled slyly, and Willop shook off his disgust.

  “So he didn’t wind up rich or anything, when the mill was sold?”

  “Oh, hell.” Reddy chuckled and coughed. “If he is rich, he’s even dumber than I thought. Lives like a goddamn bum …”

  “So how come he was making lynch talk?”

  Reddy shrugged. “Maybe it made him feel important. Like he knew more than we did. Telling folks he’d heard the nigger boy had violated them girls. After they was dead, even …”

  “He ever say where he heard it?”

  “‘Damn long time ago. Seems like he said he’d heard from the sheriff’s deputy. Guy named Cody. He lived over that way, retired a long time ago—”

  “From Cody? T.J. said he got information from Cody? You’re sure?”

  “Hell, damn long time ago. You can ask old Cody himself, if you want.… I mean, T.J. might have been makin’ stuff up. He had a big mouth sometimes. Sheriff never liked him at all.”

  “How come?”

  “Sheriff, like I said, was a hell of a man. Good eye for people, mostly. Just plain didn’t like T.J. Sheriff, he liked animals. Dogs and horses. T.J., he was mean to dogs and horses, if you can imagine a man like that. I can’t, personally.…”

  “Sounds like a sweetheart.”

  “Not hardly.”

  “He married, this T.J.?”

  “No, not hardly.” Reddy paused to cough again, and Willop could not tell whether he had laughed, too.

  “Anything else you can tell me?” Willop was suddenly getting worn out, physically and mentally.

  “No, not hardly.”

  “So I won’t take up any more of your time.”

  Willop shook Luke Reddy’s old, tired hand.

  “Hope I helped you some,” Reddy said. “Come see me any time.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Just a terrible thing, what happened back then. Never saw anything worse in my life.”

  As he drove back to the motel, Willop stopped at a drugstore to buy some aspirin. God, his head was aching. Just too damn much stuff crammed into it, he thought.

  He swallowed two tablets right in the car, without water, and leaned back in the car seat, closing his eyes. Something was bothering him; something wasn’t quite right.

  Something he had seen in the old file, back in the sherif
f’s office?

  Something in the old newspapers?

  Something that Reddy had said?

  Damn, what the hell was it …?

  26

  Willop had the water as hot as he could stand it. Only his head was above the surface, and perspiration matted his hair and trickled down his face into the tub. The strange thing was that, even though he was almost immersed in wet heat, he could stand to have his arm out of the water only as long as it took to reach the tumbler of Scotch on the edge of the tub. A quick, hot gulp, put the glass down, then pull the arm back into the water. He shivered every time the arm was exposed.

  The hot bath had seemed like a good idea: Relax the body, sort out things in his mind, decide who to talk to next. What he hadn’t planned on was the mental videotape that started rolling through his head. Maybe it was triggered by seeing the pictures of the girls in death, or maybe he just liked to torture himself. Whatever.

  The funny thing was that he had not seen the event in real life, yet the videotape was always absolutely clear and in color when it played in his head.

  He saw his mother being stabbed to death.

  Too late to rewind the tape, too late to speed it up. Here it comes, Willop thought. Just don’t let it be in slow motion. There she is, smiling and waving, as she used to wave at him.

  And there came the man, the man his mother didn’t like anymore and had tried to stop seeing. He came up behind her, and there was the knife, horribly long, the kind butchers used, poised in the air. She was still smiling, her lips curved up in a smile. Then, in an instant, her mouth curved down, her eyes rolling back in her head as the blade found her heart. He saw his mother falling to the sidewalk, the knife stuck in her, the man pulling it out (the blade red and wet!), the man bringing the knife down again and hacking, hacking through his mother’s coat until, at last, people pulled the man away.…

  There, the tape was done. Willop prayed as hard as he could that the tape of the other thing, the earlier thing that had happened to his mother, would not roll tonight. That, he would not be able to bear.

  Maybe Moira was right; he should get some more therapy.