Nana Trueluck waves her arm from the center of the rotunda like a wide receiver ready to receive a Hail Mary pass in the last seconds of the game. Her yellow hat and dress make her hard to miss. Paris runs toward her as the guards close in. Then Nana Trueluck takes the handoff at the same time Les Lester jumps to make the tackle.
When Les Lester hits the ground, his hair flies in one direction and his glass eye in another. Everyone gasps. Paris’ sneakers shriek as he dodges the twirling glass eye. He trips and lands with a thud at Les Lester’s feet. Inches away, the blue glass eye stares up at us.
The crowd gasps again as Les Lester scoops up his eye and returns it to its socket. Then he returns his Frankenstein hair to his shiny bald head. Paris stands, his arms up in victory. The crowd applauds as if the curtain has come down at the end of a hit play on Broadway, and Paris has given the performance of a lifetime. But the game isn’t over yet. My seventy-year-old grandmother circles the rotunda wearing the rebel flag like a southern shawl, singing as loud as she can her favorite Doris Day song:
Que sera, sera,
Whatever will be will be.
The future’s not ours to see.
Que sera, sera.
Chapter Twenty-One
Ida
Trouble closes in from every angle. I am surrounded by guards while several tourists take pictures. The flag is removed from my shoulders, and I am escorted to an office. Trudy and Vel are detained, too, and Les Lester has Paris by the arm.
Minutes before I took the flag from Paris, I had tears in my eyes. I felt useless, and I hated myself for being old and letting down the children. Then Paris ran through the rotunda with the flag soaring behind him, and it brought more tears to my eyes. Different tears. Happy tears. What a beautiful moment that was.
Trudy and her friends actually did the impossible. Then, it seemed, I was to play a part in it after all. An action was called for. An action taken for all grandmothers of every color in the name of justice and honor. We all hope for a moment when we meet our potential. This was clearly mine.
After having regrets for most of my life that I didn’t pursue a singing career, I sang as though my life depended on it, as though everyone’s life depended on it, my heart wide open. If only Ted Senior had been a witness to all this. He would have been so proud of me. Tears come to my eyes again. This time they are bittersweet.
But it seems now a price must be paid for that moment. Les Lester orders Wally to resume business as before. The flag is draped over his desk. It looks so innocent lying there. A lifeless piece of faded fabric instilled with meaning. Meanwhile, the four of us are left alone in the room with the blinking and the non-blinking eye staring straight at us—thankfully from its socket and not the floor. It is then that I notice a piece of lint stuck on the outside of the glass eye, picked up from the rotunda floor. I take off my glasses and wipe my eyes so that maybe Les Lester will take the hint and remove the fuzz stuck to his left eyeball. No luck. I cringe. Things like this make my teeth itch.
“What did you think would happen?” Les Lester says. “Did you think you would get away with it?”
“It was all my idea,” I say, wiping my eye again. “You should let the children go. They didn’t do a thing.”
“No, it was my idea,” Trudy says.
“No, I put them up to it.” Paris’ voice wobbles in and out of a southern accent. His eyes are dark and serious, as if Les Lester is the latest Sunbeam Bread truck to endanger Trudy.
Les Lester lets out something that sounds like a growl.
Am I really being detained? Until now, I have gone my entire adult life without even a speeding ticket.
“Let the children go,” I say again. “You can take me to jail if you want.” I can’t resist wiping my eye again, and then I wink. His good eye looks offended or perhaps intrigued. It is hard to see past the floor lint.
As the adult in the mix, I am clearly the one responsible. I imagine Abigail packing my bags as soon as she and Ted Junior get the call to come and bail me out of jail.
“Nancy, tell them it was my idea,” Trudy says to Vel.
Why did she call her Nancy? I wonder.
“I think you’re confused, Ida,” Vel says. “It was Martin’s idea.”
Martin must be Paris. Evidently, names have been changed to protect the innocent. Then who am I?
Trudy grits her teeth and glares at Vel, who shrugs her betrayal of Paris. In the meantime, Les Lester looks pleased thinking the whole thing was Paris’ idea. Perhaps putting him away is preferable to putting away two girls and a grandmother.
“Martin didn’t do anything wrong,” Trudy says. “I was the one who took down the flag. I took it down myself while Wally watched.”
The blinking eye narrows.
“Do you honestly think these children are the ones who thought this up?” I say.
Les Lester looks at Paris. “I doubt anyone would have done anything without the boy’s input.”
“For goodness sakes, he’s twelve years old,” I say.
“Enough of this,” he says. He asks my name.
“She’s Doris,” Trudy says, before I have time to answer. “Doris Day-vis.”
My partners in crime smile. Fake names are one thing, but how do we get out of this office?
Les Lester leaves the room to talk to Wally and the other guards. They take turns looking through the glass at us until he comes back.
“You can all leave except for Martin,” he says.
“No way.” Trudy stands next to her chair, one fist clinched.
“Let me handle it,” I say to her and look back at Les Lester.
“You have no right to detain this young man,” I say.
“Actually, we do,” Wally says. “Anyone who defiles the contents of the State House faces Federal prosecution.”
The alarm in Paris’ eyes causes me to stand, too.
“But what about me? I carried that flag, too.”
Both men ignore me.
“I’d like to telephone my son in Charleston,” I say. “He’ll tell you what a misunderstanding this is.”
“You can do that, Doris, once you leave the State House grounds.”
For a moment I wonder who he is talking to. This is hard enough without having to keep all the names straight.
“But I refuse to leave without, uh, Martin,” I say.
Another guard enters the room to escort the girls and me out. He towers over us.
“We can’t just leave him here,” Trudy says to me as we leave the room.
Paris sits straight in the chair as if he has no regrets. But I am worried about leaving him behind. Does the state of South Carolina prosecute children for running with a flag? Surely not.
Once we get outside it must be a hundred degrees. I miss the breeze from the coast, even if it is a hot breeze. Les Lester steps forward again.
“Look, I understand you want to help the boy, but it won’t do any good.” He sounds halfway sympathetic, and I am relieved to see the lint on his eyeball is finally gone.
“I want to telephone my son,” I say again. “Aren’t I allowed one telephone call?”
“You aren’t being arrested,” Les Lester says.
“What about Martin?” Trudy asks.
“The authorities are just going to ask him some questions,” he says.
“The authorities?” I ask.
Trudy and I exchange a look, and I am reminded of the night the cross was burned in the front yard. Vel is silent, her knuckles white from clutching her book. Les Lester tells us to go on home.
“Let’s go,” I say to Vel and Trudy.
“But we can’t leave Paris,” Trudy whispers to me.
“We won’t,” I say. “We’ll get help. We’ll figure this out.”
She doesn’t look like she believes me—and who can blame her after my earlier disappearing act?
Vel pulls Trudy out the door, but then Trudy runs back into the building. A guard grabs her arm and escorts her back outside.<
br />
“Stop it,” I say to the guard. “That’s my granddaughter you’re manhandling.”
He doesn’t let go.
“We have rights,” I say. “You’re violating our rights.”
The guard releases Trudy’s arm with a scoff.
“Who do you people think you are?” he asks.
“Patriots,” I say.
Trudy comes to my side. Vel looks frightened as well. We are in a dilemma even Nancy Drew can’t solve.
I tell the guards that we will be back, but I feel shaken, too. We leave the building and walk down the steps and regroup under one of the giant oaks on the grounds.
“Why didn’t you take up for Paris?” Trudy asks Vel.
“Because he’s the reason we did it,” she says.
“No, he’s not,” Trudy says to her.
“Are you telling me that if Paris hadn’t saved your life, we would have come to Columbia to take down that stupid flag?” she asks.
“That doesn’t mean you abandon your friend,” Trudy says.
Vel lowers her eyes as though she might have a point.
“We need to stay calm,” I say, exuding calmness, though that’s not what I feel at all. I clean my glasses hoping it will clear my thoughts.
Vel holds up a nickel.
“I don’t want to call my parents yet,” Trudy says.
“What are you waiting for?” Vel asks. “It can’t get much worse than this.”
They both look at me.
I don’t want to telephone Ted Junior, either. Nor do I want to give Abigail fuel for the fire.
There’s got to be a way to outsmart these nitwits, I say to myself.
We sit on a wooden bench underneath a giant magnolia tree. Metal stars are hammered into the outside of the building to mark where General Sherman’s cannons tried to destroy the place over a hundred years ago. This was one of the bits of information from Les Lester’s tour. At the top of the dome the American flag flies by itself. I point to it, and Trudy smiles.
“You wanted to take down that flag, and you did it. At least you can be proud of that,” I say.
As if the old guard planned it, the tiny window opens at the top of the dome, and the Confederate flag is reattached.
“So much for a rebellion,” Trudy says, her voice soft with our defeat.
“I hope that Wally guy gets stuck up there,” Vel says.
Trudy looks at Vel as though she is not yet ready to forgive her for selling out Paris.
“What do you think they’ll do to Paris?” Trudy asks me.
“I honestly don’t know,” I say.
“Well, I hope he doesn’t tell them his real name,” Vel says. “Wait. Can you get in trouble for using a fake name?”
“Surely not,” I say, still thinking.
“Maybe I should go get Paris’ Uncle Freddie,” Trudy says. “I got Paris into this mess and want to get him out.”
“Not yet,” I say. “We don’t want to get Freddie in trouble, too. We’ve got to come up with a plan to save Paris ourselves.”
“We?” Vel asks. “You can count me out, Nana Trueluck. I don’t want to end up in jail. My parents will kill me.”
Trudy aims her disappointment in my direction.
“Okay, kiddo, it looks like it’s up to us,” I say to her. I always thought she would be the one to do great things, but maybe it is not too late for me to have a chance at it. We need a rescue plan, but I am empty of thoughts. The urgent look on Trudy’s face doesn’t help.
Seconds later, a black sedan pulls up in front of the State House. Three men wearing dark sunglasses get out of the car with the letters FBI on their shirts.
“Uh, oh,” Trudy says.
“H-e-double-hockey-sticks,” Vel says, her words soft.
A hot flash confirms the trouble we are in. I fan myself. All this for running through the building with a flag draped behind you? What about me? I had my hands on that flag, too. When I think of Paris in a room surrounded by white men pushing their authority around, I get mad. Boiling mad. Charleston mad. And the whole problem of how to rescue him gets much more serious.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Trudy
“We must have really riled up the old guard if they called in the FBI,” I say to Nana Trueluck.
She looks worried.
I envision Paris serving time in a federal prison and feel like I might be sick.
A nearby church bell rings twelve times. We are running out of time. We are supposed to be back at the farmer’s market by one o’clock.
“Tell me what to do,” I say to Nana Trueluck, who has cleaned her glasses so many times they sparkle.
Meanwhile, Vel is useless. With every turn of the page, she gives me a look that says, I told you so.
“We need to distract the FBI,” Nana Trueluck says.
“How?” I say.
“That’s the big question,” she says.
“Maybe I should go back in and explain everything to them,” I say. “Tell them the whole story.”
Vel looks at me like I have just announced I am going back into a cage of hungry alligators dressed in a white poodle suit.
“Do you have a better idea?” I ask her.
She sighs and turns back to her book. If the Russians released the atomic bomb, she would grab a book and read while she waited to be obliterated.
“Wait,” Nana Trueluck says, “maybe we could trick them into letting Paris go.”
“How will you do that?” I ask, surprised by my grandmother’s willingness to take on the FBI.
She bites her bottom lip.
“Maybe we should telephone your father,” she says. “Maybe he can pull some strings.”
“That could take forever,” I say. “I can’t just sit here and do nothing. What if they take Paris somewhere, and we never see him again?”
“We won’t let that happen.” Nana Trueluck stands again.
“Trudy, would you be willing to go back inside and look around? Maybe see where they’re keeping him? See if there’s a back door, a way to get him out? If you can do that, I’ll come up with some kind of distraction.”
“Well, I’m not moving from this spot until you get back. If you come back,” Vel says to me.
“Velvet Ogilvie, you are a coward,” I say. She nods like she couldn’t agree more.
I am not feeling so brave myself, but I owe Paris a life-saving moment.
“Trudy, be careful,” Nana Trueluck says.
I say I will. Then I approach the building again. This time I circle around to one of the side doors. Two men stride up the walkway dressed in suits and ties. I duck behind the bushes to wait until they pass. One of them is complaining about his boss, a state senator. Then the complaining guy holds the door as the two of them go inside. I guess this must be an employee’s entrance since nobody else seems to be using it. Just inside the door is another guard who is reading a newspaper. He must not know what has been going on upstairs.
“I need to give my dad something he forgot at home,” I say to the guard, pointing at one of the men up ahead. To my surprise, he waves me on. I duck behind a pillar and then take the stairs to the rotunda.
People mill around, which makes it easier for me to go unnoticed. I find Les Lester’s office again, and the door is still closed. The glass door has blinds that are left open just enough to see three FBI agents standing over Paris, who looks tiny compared to the large white men. I should never have left him in that room, but it is not like I had a choice.
A family of redheads stands at the front entrance. Behind them, I see Nana Trueluck’s yellow hat sticking above the crowd, ready to rescue me if I need help. A new guard is there and doesn’t seem to know who Nana Trueluck is. He lets her inside, and she goes to a far wall and stands. I wonder what she has in mind as a distraction. In the next instant, she takes a deep breath and begins to sing another Doris Day hit. A crowd gathers. I never realized how nice her voice is. Even the guard turns to watch, his back to me now.
With the guard preoccupied, I sneak down the hallway to look for another way into Les Lester’s office. Just past the bathrooms I find another hallway that circles back around to the front. Like a cat burglar searching for jewels, I enter the empty office next to the one where Paris is held. Nana Trueluck hits the chorus, her voice echoing in the marble building. Chills crawl up my arms.
Through the open door I see the FBI men questioning Paris. He stares straight ahead, his legs jiggling as though warmed up and ready to run if given a chance. I wonder if he is acting or if he is as courageous as he seems. Only a few feet away, I am close enough to hear the agents talking. They ask Paris all sorts of questions. They want to know who put him up to this and what other people were involved. They use words like conspiracy, and they ask Paris again what his real name is. Paris keeps silent, which is probably the smartest thing he could do.
If only I could distract those FBI guys and Les Lester, then Paris could make a run for it. I glance at my watch. 12:30 P.M. Paris’ Uncle Freddie expects us back at the farmer’s market in thirty minutes and it is a ten-minute walk. We need to get Paris back to Charleston. Otherwise, I will have to tell sweet Miss Josie that I left her grandson in Columbia, all alone, in a roomful of FBI men.
In the background Nana Trueluck’s singing continues. She is doing her best to buy me time. I hide behind a desk that has a framed photograph of three dorky-looking kids with big ears that look just like Les Lester. Minus the glass eye and hair rug, of course. Huge filing cabinets line a whole wall. A large table, like Daddy has at City Hall, sits in the center of the room. At the far end is another door that leads to where they are keeping Paris.
People clap after Nana Trueluck finishes her song. Evidently Les Lester hasn’t figured out who is singing and walks down the hallway in my direction. I scoot under the desk and hold my breath. He enters the dark office and pulls two paper cups out of a cylinder by the water cooler. He aims his eye that blinks at the spigot.
Trueluck Summer Page 14
