Devil on My Heels

by Joyce McDonald

  “Why didn’t you go to the police, then?”

  “Because my dad caught me listening that night. He beat the crap out of me for spying on him and Travis. That’s what he called it, spying. He said if I ever told anybody what I heard, he’d have my hide tied to the back of his truck and dragged along Route Eighty-six. That’s why.”

  I don’t doubt Chase for a minute. I know what Jacob’s temper is like. I’ve seen it in action. One time, when Chase was in third grade, Jacob messed up Chase’s shoulder real bad. And even though everybody said it was an accident, including Chase himself, I know better. I was standing right there when Jacob caught us playing on the tractor and yanked Chase off the seat so hard, he dislocated his shoulder.

  Sweat trickles down my neck and face. It is suffocating under this tree. Huge orange-tasting waves are slamming against the inside of my stomach. I crawl out from under the tree just in time to throw up every last bit of the fried chicken I had for dinner.

  “Oh, God, Dove. You okay?” Chase crawls up behind me and puts his hand on my forehead. I shove him away.

  I can’t talk to him right now. All I want to do is get home. I stagger to my feet and take off running.

  “Hey! Dove! You okay? Come on back here. Dove! Come on. Don’t do this. Okay?”

  I am afraid Chase will try to come after me, but he doesn’t. After a while his voice trails off.

  I keep on running. I run like Gator did that day of the storm. I run like the devil is on my heels.

  16

  For a while I sit in an old wicker rocker on the back porch. I can’t bring myself to go in the house just yet. When I was little, Delia used to rock me in this same chair. Sometimes she would be reading and I’d climb into her lap. She would start reading out loud from wherever she was in her book. I remember this one August night—I must have been about seven—we were all about dying from the heat. Delia was sitting in the rocker, trying to read by the porch light. My dad was off somewhere, and Delia stayed late to baby-sit.

  I remember settling myself in her lap and listening to her read this story about a lady, Miss Emily, who poisons her fiancé and then keeps his body locked in her upstairs bedroom. Nobody ever finds out about it until she is dead and buried. Then the whole town—they’d been waiting like kids for Christmas to get a peek inside her house—finally goes inside and what they find is this skeleton in her bed.

  Well, I almost died when Delia got to that last page. I was only seven, for heaven’s sake.

  I remember that night being so hot and humid and our clothes so damp that it felt like Delia and I were stuck together. And I remember the sound of the moths bumping against the porch light, and Delia taking up her glass of iced tea and circling my sweaty face with it. I can still feel that wet chill sliding across my forehead and down my cheeks.

  Delia thought the story was funny. She said most folks usually had some kind of skeletons—meaning dark secrets— hidden someplace in their houses, and Miss Emily was more the rule than the exception. I didn’t think much about that at the time. But ever since, whenever I find out something upsetting about a person I thought I knew, Miss Emily and her skeleton come popping into my head.

  The moon is half hidden behind dark clouds now, and only a few streaks of light break through, cutting a glimmering path that reaches from heaven to the center of our groves. The scent of the Valencia blossoms hangs heavy in the still air. But it can’t replace the odor of rotten oranges. The smell is all over me.

  Not more than fifty yards away is the blackened shell of our old barn, the one my great-granddaddy Alderman built. In my mind I see that streak of lightning all over again. Hear the loud crack, louder than any gunshot, as the bolt hits the tip of the barn roof and skids down the side.

  Maybe it was a judgment on my dad, that bolt of lightning, for keeping what he knew about Gus’s murder to himself all these years.

  I sit there on the porch till the mosquitoes get so bad I can’t stand it another minute. Then I go inside. I tiptoe past Dad’s door. He is snoring softly.

  For a long while I sit at my desk, staring out the window. I can’t seem to get my mind wrapped around Travis’s killing Gus, and around the people who know about it but haven’t done anything. Like my dad. How could he live with such a horrible secret all these years? How could he let Travis Waite go on working for him? How he could go on acting like normal whenever he’s around Delia?

  And that makes me wonder what else I don’t know about my father.

  The worst part is that I don’t know how to make any of this right. There is no point in going to the police. Spudder and the others already know what happened. Or they know Travis’s version, anyway. And then there’s my promise to Chase not to say anything, which I wish to heaven I’d never made.

  A streak of orange appears above the trees in the east. It looks as if somebody is slowly lifting a huge dark shade to let in the light. Only I can’t bring myself to look at such a hopeful sight. I climb into bed without bothering to take off my dirty clothes and pull the covers up over my head.

  I am out the door, heading for the school bus stop at the bottom of our dirt driveway before Delia or Dad even knows I’m gone. I keep my back turned to the house. If I look around, I’m sure I’ll see Delia standing on the front porch, spatula in hand, trying to get my attention. She hates it when I miss breakfast. Sure enough, her voice echoes down to me. But there is almost a quarter mile between us. I pretend I don’t hear her calling.

  My eyes are practically swollen shut from crying half the night. I am wearing sunglasses. My plan is to wear them all day. I don’t talk to anybody on the bus that morning. Even though my sunglasses have set off a barrage of stupid jokes, like, “Who do you think you are, Audrey Hepburn?” “Maybe she thinks she’s incognito.” “Nah, she’s probably a spy for the Soviets.” Really dumb.

  I ignore them. I ignore everybody.

  I go late to homeroom so I don’t have to talk to Rayanne. She stares at me the whole time, trying to get my attention. But I don’t look her way. Mrs. Hatch asks me to please remove my glasses. I tell her I have special drops in my eyes that make them sensitive to light. She actually falls for this. I use the same excuse in Mr. Weaver’s geometry class, and again in Mrs. Myers’s history class. My plan is to skip lunch period so I don’t have to see Rayanne or Jinny or anyone else.

  The news going around the halls this morning is about a fire in Buford Radcliff’s basement last night. It happened not long after he got home from sweeping floors at the movie theater. Everybody in town knows Buford’s got so much junk in his basement he’s barely got walking space. He even keeps piles of old newspapers dating back to before World War II down there. So I more or less dismiss the idea of somebody intentionally trying to find his way into Buford’s basement for the sole purpose of setting fire to it, seeing as how I can’t imagine anyone in their right mind wanting to do that. More than likely, Buford accidentally set it himself. Fortunately the fire department got there before the flames made it up the basement stairs. So Buford has still got his house, just not as many newspapers as he used to have.

  Even though this fire, like all the others, was an accident, most of the kids are saying the pickers are behind it. A lot of their parents believe that too. They are scared out of their wits that there’s going to be some kind of uprising and everybody is going to get their roofs set on fire right over their heads some night while they’re sleeping. I can’t for the life of me figure out why some folks are so anxious to believe something so stupid.

  Chase hasn’t been around all morning. He probably overslept, considering how late he was out last night. I would have stayed home myself, except then I’d have to face my dad and Delia. And I’m not ready to do that.

  Right now I’ve got Chase all mixed up in my mind with Gus and Travis. Here, all this time, I thought I knew everything there was to know about Chase Tully. He’s done some bad things over the years, like stealing that model plane from Woolworth’s. But keeping a mur
der a secret? And then making me swear not to tell anybody? He brought me into this so he could ease his own conscience. I don’t doubt that for a minute.

  In English class I give Miss Poyer the eyedrops story. She looks up at me from the attendance book lying open on her desk. Her dark hair is piled loosely on top of her head. Renegade strands have escaped down her neck and the sides of her face. She’s wearing big gold hoop earrings.

  “Eyedrops?” She tips her head to the side. A slow smile eases across her face. She doesn’t buy my story, I can tell. But she doesn’t ask me to remove the sunglasses, either.

  We are studying the Beat poets, and this morning she is handing out copies of a book of poems by Lawrence Ferlinghetti. Miss Poyer is wearing a black skirt, black tights, and a dark purple blouse, which makes me wonder if maybe she is a Beat poet too. She doesn’t dress like any of the other teachers.

  We were supposed to read Howl by Allen Ginsberg, but all the parents got together and raised a ruckus. They said it was obscene. The next day the school board banned it. Naturally I can’t wait to get my hands on a copy. Miss Poyer says it’s brilliant. The jury is still out on Ferlinghetti’s book, A Coney Island of the Mind, which is why Miss Poyer is handing out copies to everybody in class this morning and telling us to read it by Monday. I don’t think any of the parents have had a chance to read it yet. Miss Poyer is going to try to out-maneuver them this time. I flip through the book during class. The school board is going to ban it all right. No question about it.

  I plan to read the whole thing this weekend, like she asked, because they’ll be in our classroom come Monday going up and down the aisles with an empty box asking us to deposit Ferlinghetti’s book in it. That’s what they did with Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World last year. That happened in Miss Poyer’s junior class. But everybody in the school heard about it. If she keeps this up, I doubt she’ll be teaching at Benevolence High much longer. That would be too bad. Miss Poyer is the best teacher I’ve ever had.

  I slip into the girls’ room during lunch period. I don’t stop by my locker, so I’m still carrying my geometry and history books and Ferlinghetti’s poems.

  Everyone is either in class or at lunch. I’m alone in the girls’ room. Or at least I thought I was until I hear muffled sniffling sounds coming from the end stall. The door is closed. I bend down and spot dirty saddle shoes. I know these shoes. A frayed blue loose-leaf binder lies on the floor next to them.

  I knock softly on the stall door. “Rosemary?”

  Sniff.

  “Are you okay?”

  No answer.

  “It’s Dove.”

  Two more sniffs. The sound of toilet paper being pulled from the roll. Snuffling snorts. Lots of nose blowing.

  “I’m fine,” she says. It comes out like half a sob.

  “That’s why you’re spending your lunch period in that stall, because you’re fine?” Considering my own reasons for being here, I don’t have any right to form an opinion on Rosemary’s hiding place of choice.

  I hear the sound of more toilet paper unwinding. More nose blowing.

  “Nobody else is out here,” I tell her. “It’s just me.”

  The stall door opens a few inches. Rosemary stands there with eyes that match mine. I wish I had another pair of sunglasses to loan her.

  “Willy and Earl?” I ask.

  She nods. “I can’t go to chem class looking like this,” she says. “Willy’s in that class.”

  I’ve had about as much of school as I can take for one day. My mind has been all tied up with what happened the night before. I don’t remember a single thing that went on in my classes this morning. This isn’t likely to change anytime soon. Certainly not in time for French class.

  “Let’s get out of here, okay?” I say.

  Rosemary wipes the wad of toilet paper across each puffy eye. “Leave? School, you mean?”

  I take off my sunglasses. Rosemary stares at my face for a few seconds, then says, “Okay.” She picks up her frayed binder.

  We have to move fast. The bell is going to ring in about five minutes. Slipping through the front door is definitely out. We would have to go by the main office. We decide on the side door near the gym. It leads to the parking lot. The plan is to hunker down and wind our way between cars, hoping no one will see us if they look out the classroom windows. On the other side of the parking lot are some woods. I have no idea what we will do when we get there. I haven’t thought that far ahead.

  By the time we make it to the woods, Rosemary is actually giggling. She’s enjoying this. It brings a little smile to my face too.

  “Now what?” She looks at me. Expectation and hope are beaming all over her face. I am her leader. Her savior. And suddenly I wish I’d never knocked on that bathroom stall door.

  “We can’t go anywhere public. Anybody who sees us will know we’re skipping school.”

  Rosemary agrees. She is still waiting for me to tell her what to do next. I stare down at the books in my arms. Ferlinghetti’s book is on top.

  “There’s an old cemetery on the other side of the woods. A cemetery for colored folks. I found it once, years ago when I was supposed to be running laps in gym,” I tell her. “It’s near a cypress swamp. Nobody will find us there.” No white people, anyway. But I don’t say this out loud.

  Rosemary follows me through the thick brush along a path that is almost fully overgrown. No one has come this way in a long time. I hear her slapping at mosquitoes behind me, but she doesn’t say anything. By the time we come to the open clearing, my stockings are in shreds and we are both covered with stinging sandspurs. I set my books on the ground by a headstone that looks as if it’s been stained with tobacco juice and unhook my stockings from my garter belt. I roll them down, kick off my flats, and pull off the ruined stockings.

  Rosemary seems amused by this. “I hate wearing those things,” she says, picking sandspurs from her socks. “Well now, will you look at that.” She points to a wooden cross not far from an old shed. A little teddy bear, made out of faded blue-checked gingham, rests against the cross.

  I look around. It is like this everywhere in the cemetery— little treasures left next to the tombstones: a chipped bowl filled with seashells, plastic pop beads looped over a headstone, a dirt-crusted Coke bottle stuffed with plastic geraniums. Photographs encased in glass rest against the base of some of the headstones. Some are even embedded right in the tombstone. Most of the headstones have names and dates. But a few of the really old stones have only initials carved on them. Some aren’t anything more than brown stones, no names, no initials. There don’t seem to be many epitaphs here.

  I come across the grave of a boy named Curtis B. Washington. 1920–1935. Curtis is my age. I sit down next to his grave and open Ferlinghetti. It is Friday, so it only seems natural to stick with my routine.

  Rosemary doesn’t even ask what I’m doing. She sits down across from me. I tell her about reading poems—mostly love poems—to dead boys in cemeteries. Rosemary smiles. “That’s real nice of you,” she says. She acts as if this is something folks do every day, like brushing their teeth or changing their underwear. I’m beginning to like Rosemary.

  I flip through the pages, sliding my index finger over the lines, waiting for it to find the word love. My finger stops its journey on poem number 25. Apparently Emily Dickinson isn’t the only poet who doesn’t bother with titles. “Okay,” I tell Rosemary. “Here’s one.”

  I read this poem about the heart gasping like “a foolish fish.” About halfway through I realize this isn’t a love poem. It’s about the heart in love, dying alone and unnoticed.

  When I’m finished, Rosemary shifts a few times and rearranges her crinolines and skirt. “Well, at least poor Curtis won’t feel like he’s missing out on anything.” She runs her fingers over the chiseled letters of Curtis B. Washington’s name. Then she asks to see the book I’m reading from. I hand it over to her. She flips through the pages.

  “Gator and me, we some
times meet at the Baptist cemetery,” she says. She doesn’t look up from the book. “We go for walks in the woods behind the church.”

  I don’t move a muscle. I don’t even blink. I’m thinking about how Rosemary just suddenly showed up at the Baptist cemetery that day I was reading epitaphs to Gator.

  “How’d you happen to meet him?” I ask. “I mean, you said your folks don’t live at the migrant camp.”

  Rosemary keeps flipping through the pages of my book. Finally she says, “At the Gulf station. First day we got here. Daddy stopped to fill up the truck. We had the trailer hitched up to it. I got out to use the bathroom—our trailer doesn’t have one—and sitting on the ground, leaning up against some old tires, was this colored boy. He was drawing something on a brown paper bag. He looked up at me when I walked by and he smiled. Well, I didn’t know what to think, a colored boy smiling at me that way. But he’s got a real friendly smile and such a nice face. Have you ever noticed that?”

  I don’t say anything. I’m still stuck back at the part where Rosemary told me she and Gator have been secretly meeting at the cemetery.

  She doesn’t seem to notice. She goes right on with her story. “So there I was, smiling right back without thinking.”

  Rosemary blushes. I pretend to be examining the pop beads looped over the headstone next to Curtis Washington’s. I’m working hard to shove any thoughts of Rosemary and Gator being anything more than friends right out of my head. Because it is too disturbing to think about.

  “Right about then our dog, Roose—that’s short for Roosevelt—he leaped out of the pickup window—he’d been sitting in the front seat with Daddy and my brother, Charlie—and just like that he took off like a bat out of hell,” Rosemary says. “Charlie hightailed it after him, but Roose was on a tearing streak. Guess he’d been cooped up in the truck too long.”

  Rosemary stretches her legs out in front of her. She crosses them at the ankles and leans back on her elbows.

  “Well, he spun himself in circles, all of us chasing and calling after him, dumb mutt, when suddenly he just stops. He’s panting and slobbering. And we’re calling to him to come on and get in the truck. But instead he walks over to Gator and licks him on the face, like they’re old friends who haven’t seen each other in years. Gator rubs him behind the ears, and Roose about tumbles into his lap, he’s so happy.