A lawyer named Turley had once caught them in a compromising position during lunch at the office, and he made the awful mistake of telling others about it. He lost every case in Chancery Court for a year and couldn't buy a client. It took four years for Judge Atlee to get him disbarred.
"Hello, Ray," she said through the screen. "May I come in?"
"Sure," he said, and opened the door wider.
Ray and Claudia had never liked each other. He had always felt that she was getting the attention and affection that he and Forrest were not, and she viewed him as a threat as well. When it came to Judge Atlee, she viewed everyone as a threat.
She had few friends and even fewer admirers. She was rude and callous because she spent her life listening to trials. And she was arrogant because she whispered to the great man.
"I'm very sorry," she said.
"So am I."
As they walked by the study, Ray pulled the door closed and said, "Don't go in there." Claudia did not notice the intruder's footprints.
"Be nice to me, Ray," she said.
"Why?"
They went to the kitchen, where he put up some coffee and they sat across from each other. "Can I smoke?" she asked.
"I don't care," he said. Smoke till you choke, old gal. His father's black suits had always carried the acrid smell of her cigarettes. He'd allowed her to smoke in the car, in chambers, in his office, probably in bed. Everywhere but the courtroom.
The raspy breath, the gravelly voice, the countless wrinkles clustered around the eyes, ah, the joys of tobacco.
She'd been crying, which was not an insignificant event in her life. When he was clerking for his father one summer, Ray had had the misfortune of sitting through a gut-wrenching child abuse case. The testimony had been so sad and pitiful that everyone, including the Judge and all the lawyers, were moved to tears. The only dry eyes in the courtroom belonged to old stone-faced Claudia.
"I can't believe he's dead," she said, then blew a puff of smoke toward the ceiling.
"He's been dying for five years, Claudia. This is no surprise."
"It's still sad."
"It's very sad, but he was suffering at the end. Death was a blessing."
"He wouldn't let me come see him."
"We're not rehashing history, okay?"
The history, depending on which version you believed, had kept Clanton buzzing for almost two decades. A few years after Ray's mother died, Claudia divorced her husband for reasons that were never clear. One side of town believed the Judge had promised to marry her after her divorce. The other side of town believed the Judge, forever an Atlee, never intended to marry such a commoner as Claudia, and that she got a divorce because her husband caught her fooling around with yet another man. Years passed with the two enjoying the benefits of married life, except for the paperwork and actual cohabitation. She continued to press the Judge to get married, he continued to postpone things. Evidently, he was getting what he wanted.
Finally she put forth an ultimatum, which proved to be a bad strategy. Ultimatums did not impress Reuben Atlee. The year before he got booted from office, Claudia married a man nine years younger. The Judge promptly fired her, and the coffee shops and knitting clubs talked of nothing else. After a few rocky years, her younger man died. She was lonely, so was the Judge. But she had betrayed him by remarrying, and he never forgave her.
"Where's Forrest?" she asked.
"He should be here soon."
"How is he?"
"He's Forrest." <
"Do you want me to leave?"
"It's up to you."
"I'd rather talk to you, Ray. I need to talk to someone."
"Don't you have friends?"
"No. Reuben was my only friend."
He cringed when she called him Reuben. She stuck the cigarette between her gluey red lips, a pale red for mourning, not the bright red she was once known for. She was at least seventy, but wearing it well. Still straight and slim, and wearing a tight dress that no other seventy-year-old woman in Ford County would attempt. She had diamonds in her ears and one on her finger, though he couldn't tell if they were real. She was also wearing a pretty gold pendant and two gold bracelets.
She was an aging tart, but still an active volcano. He would ask Harry Rex whom she was seeing these days
He poured more coffee and said, "What would you like to talk about?"
"Reuben."
"My father is dead. I don't like history."
"Can't we be friends?"
"No. We've always despised each other. We're not going to kiss and hug now, over the casket. Why would we do that?"
"I'm an old woman, Ray."
"And I live in Virginia. We'll get through the funeral today, then we'll never see each other again. How's that?"
She lit another one and cried some more. Ray was thinking about the mess in the study, and what he would say to Forrest if he barged in now and saw the footprints and scattered boxes. And if Forrest saw Claudia sitting at the table, he might go for her neck.
Though they had no proof, Ray and Forrest had long suspected that the Judge had paid her more than the going rate for court reporters. Something extra, in exchange for the extras she was providing. It was not difficult holding a grudge.
"I want something to remember, that's all," she said.
"You want to remember me?"
"You are your father, Ray. I'm clinging here."
"Are you looking for money?"
"No."
"Are you broke?"
"I'm not set for life, no."
"There's nothing here for you."
"Do you have his will?"
"Yes, and your name is not mentioned."
She cried again, and Ray began a slow burn. She got the money twenty years ago when he was waiting tables and living on peanut butter and trying to survive another month of law school without getting evicted from his cheap apartment. She always had a new Cadillac when he and Forrest were driving wrecks. They were expected to live like impoverished gentry while she had the wardrobe and the jewelry.
"He always promised to take care of me," she said.
"He broke it off years ago, Claudia. Give it up."
"I can't. I loved him too much."
"It was sex and money, not love. I'd rather not talk about it."
"What's in the estate?"
"Nothing. He gave it all away."
"He what?"
"You heard me. You know how he loved to write checks. It got worse after you left the picture."
"What about his retirement?" She wasn't crying now, this was business. Her green eyes were dry and glowing.
"He cashed in the year after he left office. It was a terrible financial blunder, but he did it without my knowledge. He was mad and half-crazy. He took the money, lived on some of it, and gave the rest to the Boy Scouts, Girl Scouts, Lions Club, Sons of the Confederacy, Committee to Preserve Historic Battlefields, you name it.
If his father had been a crooked judge, something Ray was not willing to believe, then Claudia would know about the money. It was obvious she did not. Ray never suspected she knew, because if she had then the money would not have remained hidden in the study. Let her have a rip at three million bucks and everybody in the county would know about it. If she had a dollar, you were going to see it. As pitiful as she looked across the table, Ray suspected she had very few dollars.
"I thought your second husband had some money," he said, with a little too much cruelty.
"So did I," she said and managed a smile. Ray chuckled a bit. Then they both laughed, and the ice thawed dramatically. She had always been known for her bluntness.
"Never found it, huh?"
"Not a dime. He was this nice-looking guy, nine years younger, you know - "
"I remember it well. A regular scandal."
"He was fifty-one years old, a smooth talker, had a line about making money in oil. We drilled like crazy for four years and I came up with nothing."
Ray laugh
ed louder. He could not, at that moment, ever remember having a talk about sex and money with a seventy-year-old woman. He got the impression she had plenty of stories. Claudia's greatest hits. ^
"You're looking good, Claudia, you have time for another one."
"I'm tired, Ray. Old and tired. I'd have to train him and all. It's not worth it."
"What happened to number two?"
"He croaked with a heart attack and I didn't even find a thousand dollars," she said.
"The Judge left six."
"Is that all?" she asked in disbelief.
"No stocks, no bonds, nothing but an old house and six thousand dollars in the bank."
She lowered her eyes, shook her head, and believed everything Ray was saying. She had no clue about the cash.
"What will you do with the house?"
"Forrest wants to burn it and collect the insurance."
"Not a bad idea."
"We'll sell it."
There was noise on the porch, then a knock. Reverend Palmer was there to discuss the funeral service, which would begin in two hours. Claudia hugged Ray as they walked to her car. She hugged him again and said good-bye. "I'm sorry I wasn't nicer to you," she whispered as he opened her car door.
"Good-bye, Claudia. I'll see you at the church."
"He never forgave me, Ray."
"I forgive you."
"Do you really?"
"Yes. You're forgiven. We're friends now."
"Thank you so much." She hugged him a third time and started crying. He helped her into the car, always a Cadillac. Just before she turned the ignition, she said, "Did he ever forgive you, Ray?"
"I don't think so."
"I don't think so either."
"But it's not important now. Let's get him buried."
"He could be a mean old sumbitch, couldn't he?" she said, smiling through the tears.
Ray had to laugh. His dead father's seventy-year-old former lover had just called the great man a son of a bitch.
"Yes," he agreed. "He certainly could be."
CHAPTER 12
They rolled Judge Atlee down the center aisle in his fine oak casket and parked him at the altar in front of the pulpit where Reverend Palmer was waiting in a black robe. The casket was left unopened, much to the disappointment of the mourners, most of whom still clung to the ancient Southern ritual of viewing the deceased one last time in a strange effort to maximize the grief. "Hell no," Ray had said politely to Mr. Magargel when asked about opening things up. When the pieces were in place, Palmer slowly stretched out his arms, then lowered them, and the crowd sat.
In the front pew to his right was the family, the two sons. Ray wore his new suit and looked tired. Forrest wore jeans and a black suede jacket and looked remarkably sober. Behind them were Harry Rex and the other pallbearers, and behind them was a sad collection of ancient judges, not far from the casket themselves. In the front pew to his left were all sorts of dignitaries - politicians, an ex-governor, a couple of Mississippi Supreme Court justices. Clanton had never seen such power assembled at one time.
The sanctuary was packed, with folks standing along the walls under the stained-glass windows. The balcony above was full. One floor below, the auditorium had been wired for audio and more friends and admirers were down there.
Ray was impressed by the crowd. Forrest was already looking at his watch. He had arrived fifteen minutes earlier and got cursed by Harry Rex, not Ray. His new suit was dirty, he'd said, and besides Ellie had bought him the black suede jacket years ago and she thought it would do just fine for the occasion.
She, at three hundred pounds, would not leave the house, and for that Ray and Harry Rex were grateful. Somehow she'd kept him sober, but a crash was in the air. For a thousand reasons, Ray just wanted to get back to Virginia.
The reverend prayed, a short, eloquent message of thanks for the life of a great man. Then he introduced a youth choir that had won national honors at a music competition in New York. Judge Atlee had given them three thousand dollars for the trip, according to Palmer. They sang two songs Ray had never heard before, but they sang them beautifully.
The first eulogy - and there would be only two short ones per Ray's instructions - was delivered by an old man who barely made it to the pulpit, but once there startled the crowd with a rich and powerful voice. He'd been in law school with the Judge a hundred years ago. He told two humorless stories and the potent voice began to fade.
The reverend read some scripture and delivered words of comfort for the loss of a loved one, even an old one who had lived a full life.
The second eulogy was given by a young black man named Nakita Poole, something of a legend in Clanton. Poole came from a rough family south of town, and had it not been for a chemistry teacher at the high school he would have dropped out in the ninth grade and become another statistic. The Judge met him during an ugly family matter in court, and he took an interest in the kid. Poole had an amazing capacity for science and math. He finished first in his class, applied to the best colleges, and was accepted everywhere. The Judge wrote powerful letters of recommendation and pulled every string he could grab. Nakita picked Yale, and its financial package covered everything but spending money. For four years Judge Atlee wrote him every week, and in each letter there was a check for twenty-five dollars.
"I wasn't the only one getting the letters or the checks," he said to a silent crowd. "There were many of us."
Nakita was now a doctor and headed for Africa for two years of volunteer work. "I'm gonna miss those letters," he said, and every lady in the church was in tears.
The coroner, Thurber Foreman, was next. He'd been a fixture at funerals in Ford County for many years, and the Judge specifically wanted him to play his mandolin and sing "Just a Closer Walk with Thee." He sang it beautifully, and somehow managed to do so while weeping.
Forrest finally began wiping his eyes. Ray just stared at the casket, wondering where the cash came from. What had the old man done? What, exactly, did he think would happen to the money after he died?
When the reverend finished a very brief message, the pall-bearers rolled Judge Atlee out of the sanctuary. Mr. Magargel escorted Ray and Forrest down the aisle and down the front steps to a limo waiting behind the hearse. The crowd spilled out and went to their cars for the ride to the cemetery.
Like most small towns, Clanton loved a funeral procession. All traffic stopped. Those not driving in the procession were on the sidewalks, standing sadly and gazing at the hearse and the endless parade of cars behind it. Every part-time deputy was in uniform and blocking something, a street, an alley, parking spaces.
The hearse led them around the courthouse, where the flag was at half-mast and the county employees lined the front sidewalk and lowered their heads. The merchants around the square came out to bid farewell to Judge Atlee.
He was laid to rest in the Atlee plot, next to his long-forgotten wife and among the ancestors he so revered. He would be the last Atlee returned to the dust of Ford County, though no one knew it. And certainly no one cared. Ray would be cremated and his ashes scattered over the Blue Ridge Mountains. Forrest admitted he was closer to death than his older brother, but he had not nailed down his final details. The only thing for certain was that he would not be buried in Clanton. Ray was lobbying for cremation. Ellie liked the idea of a mausoleum. Forrest preferred not to dwell on the subject.
The mourners crowded under and around a crimson Magargel Funeral Home tent, which was much too small. It covered the grave and four rows of folding chairs. A thousand were needed.
Ray and Forrest sat with their knees almost touching the casket and listened as Reverend Palmer wrapped it all up. Sitting in a folding chair at the edge of his father's open grave, Ray found it odd the things he thought about. He wanted to go home. He missed his classroom and his students. He missed flying and the views of the Shenandoah Valley from five thousand feet. He was tired and irritable and did not want to spend the next two hours lingering in the c
emetery making small talk with people who remembered when he was born.
The wife of a Pentecostal preacher had the final words. She sang "Amazing Grace," and for five minutes time stood still. In a beautiful soprano, her voice echoed through the gentle hills of the cemetery, comforting the dead, giving hope to the living. Even the birds stopped flying.
An Army boy with a trumpet played "Taps," and everybody had a good cry. They folded the flag and handed it to Forrest, who was sobbing and sweating under the damned suede jacket. As the final notes faded into the woods, Harry Rex started bawling behind them. Ray leaned forward and touched the casket. He said a silent farewell, then rested with his elbows on his knees, his face in his hands.
The burial broke up quickly. It was time for lunch. Ray figured that if he just sat there and stared at the casket, then folks would leave him alone. Forrest flung a heavy arm across his shoulders, and together they looked as though they might stay until dark. Harry Rex regained his composure and assumed the role of family spokesman. Standing outside the tent, he thanked the dignitaries for coming, complimented Palmer on a fine service, praised the preacher's wife for such a beautiful rendition, told Claudia that she could not sit with the boys, that she needed to move along, and on and on. The gravediggers waited under a nearby tree, shovels in hand.
When everybody was gone, including Mr. Magargel and his crew, Harry Rex fell into the chair on the other side of Forrest and for a long time the three of them sat there, staring, not wanting to leave. The only sound was that of a backhoe somewhere in the distance, waiting. But Forrest and Ray didn't care. How often do you bury your father
And how important is time to a gravedigger?
"What a great funeral," Harry Rex finally said. He was an expert on such matters.
"He would've been proud," said Forrest.
"He loved a good funeral," Ray added. "Hated weddings though."
"I love weddings," said Harry Rex.
"Four or five?" asked Forrest.
The Summons Page 8
