Mayhew was really upset; so was I. “When will those devils get theirs?” I muttered.
Russell looked up. “Funny you should ask.”
“What do you mean?”
“I found out through a contact that there’s going to be a KKK rally tomorrow, midnight.”
“Where’s it going to take place?”
“You remember the trestle at Barons Point, from when we were kids?” I nodded. “Well, if you walked across the trestle, you’d be coming in from the back of where they’ll rally. A few hundred yards down the track, there’s a short hill and a cliff on the left. Right in the middle, there is a way up the hill. It’s not very wide. Remember that? We’d climb up there and watch the trains go by.
“On the other side of the cliff, in that big opening, is where they’re going to do their thing. They’ll have the road in from the highway guarded so no one but Klansmen can get in. It’s private property, so I can’t demand entry as a cop, but we can cross the trestle and sneak up to the top and see the idiots in action. We’ll take some photos and see what we can do with them. I hate those bastards, but I can’t do anything about it. The Chief won’t let me.” He looked at Mayhew. “Mayhew, there’s no way you can go even if you wanted to. It will be bad enough if we’re caught. If you were there, it would be major trouble.”
“Don’t worry. I don’t want to go.”
* * *
The night of the rally, we dressed in black. I burned a cork and covered our faces with the black charcoal. Russell had his holstered gun on and a backpack, and we headed for the trestle. As we were crossing the trestle, we saw flickering light from a fire up ahead. We climbed quietly up the cliff and made our way the thirty feet to the side, facing the forming rally. We crawled to the edge on our bellies and watched. Klansmen were showing up and parking their cars in a huge half-moon in front of the fire and the cliff on which we hid. A cross had already been erected near the flames, and a rope was in a slot at the top, which draped across both the front and back. I thought it might have been to pull the cross up, but I was wrong.
There must have been thirty-five or forty people in white sheets and cone hats milling around—it was surreal. They gathered around the small fire. One of them began talking loudly. Russell leaned toward me. “That’s the Grand Wizard Ass. Boy, would I love to pop a bullet in his butt. Or better yet, his brainless head.”
The hooded creep screamed and ranted about white supremacy as his followers raised their staffs and shouted their approval. They shouted about death to niggers and their true role as slaves to the supreme white race.
I looked at Russell. “Are they for real? I don’t believe this.”
Russell said, “You haven’t seen anything yet.”
Two robed dunces ran to a pickup truck. They dropped the tailgate, each grabbed something that resembled an arm, and they returned to the gathering dragging a black mannequin. Everyone shouted, “Death! Death! Death! Death!”
They dragged it to the cross; one placed the hangman’s noose over the mannequin’s head, and the other pulled the rope dangling from the back of the cross. The mannequin was tugged up the cross. Several figures grabbed stones and began stoning the figure hanging there while everyone else grabbed partially burned sticks and timbers from the fire and tossed them beneath the cross, all the while chanting, “Death to niggers. White is life, black is death,” over and over as the fire grew stronger.
“This is sick,” I murmured as I took out my camera, focused, and snapped several photos. Some of them wore their masks and many did not. Russell recognized most of them. “This can’t be happening.”
He replied, “This is happening all over the south, and usually on the same evenings—they actually plan it that way.”
“Can there be so many evil people?”
He said nothing as I took more photos and the mannequin began to burn. Then, he tugged me down so the glow of the flames was out of sight. He said, “You ready to rain on their parade? I have a great surprise for them.”
“I’d love to. But if you want to shoot a few, I think we’ll need a machine gun.”
Russell ignored that and reached into his backpack. “Remember the little kids killed in the church bombing?”
“Yes.”
“Well, Klansman aren’t the only one’s able to get dynamite without a permit.” He pulled out a stick. “I’m going to make this a surprise party.”
All I could do was gape at Russell holding the dynamite like it was a trophy.
“Russell, I’d love to toss it in their circle of ignorance and blow every one of the bastards to hell, but it might be considered murder.” He gave me a look, and my eyes darted back to the burning mannequin.
“We aren’t going to kill anyone, but we’ll sure show them a thing or two about what they’ve done.”
He took out a primer with a long wick and jammed it in the stick. “This much fuse will give us about fifteen minutes. Have you seen enough?”
I put the camera in my coat pocket. “Far more than I wanted.”
As I gazed down at white-sheeted devils, I suddenly felt irrelevant. The simple fact that I was not alone in my revulsion of the display below me did not help, for my actions, and the actions of all those working so hard to bring about equality, became immaterial. The hate below me, and all across the South, was real. This single stick of explosive in Russell’s hand was as immaterial as we were irrelevant.
I put my hand on his arm. “It won’t do any good.”
Russell smiled. “Oh, but you’re wrong. It will make me feel really good. And hey, remember Exodus 21:24, an eye for an eye? Those poor children paid the price of hate from KKK dynamite. I’m just giving some dynamite back.”
Russell looked at his watch, lowered the fuse between us, and lit it. An inch or two down, the wick was covered with tinfoil to conceal the sparkle. He slid on his belly to the edge of the cliff and tossed it down the incline. It landed just behind a bush maybe forty feet from the nearest Klansman.
“This should blow enough gravel around to pepper a bunch of them and their cars, and their stupid sheets aren’t gonna be much help. Hopefully, this blows their dunce caps to kingdom come and maybe a few ear drums.”
We scooted down the way we climbed up and hurried across the trestle. When we reached the car, we leaned against the hood and looked back. Russell aimed his flashlight at his watch. “Twenty or thirty seconds.”
All of a sudden, we saw an intense flash light up the woods. “Holy…” Before I could get the next word out, a loud explosion echoed across the inlet, followed by frantic shouts that pierced the night.
Russell patted me on the back. “I needed that. Let’s go.”
“That blast was huge! You think we could have killed anyone?”
“No, but I hope to hell we hurt a few of them. When I make my rounds tomorrow I’ll check with the hospital to see if there was any emergency room business tonight, but I assure you, they won’t let on anything about getting their asses blown up.”
When I replayed the night to Mayhew later on, his hands flew to his face. “You really did that? Where’d Russell get the dynamite?”
“He’s a cop, he has his sources. I just wish I could have seen their dunce caps blown off their dumbass heads.”
“Damn, I’ll bet it scared the crap out of them.”
I looked at Mayhew. “Mayhew, don’t ever tell Moses. I didn’t do it, but I probably could have stopped Russell. I wanted them blown to bits. Moses would be upset with me.”
“Are you kidding? There’s no way I’d tell him. He’d have a heart attack on the spot. I just wish I could have been there.”
I shook my head, glad that my best friend had not seen what I had seen. “No, you don’t. Believe me.”
61
Julie
I ASKED RUSSELL if he knew anyone at the newspaper office I could talk to about the photos I took at the rally, but if I talked to someone, they would have to promise never to reveal my name. He said he did
, and he would set it up. He told me to give him the film, and whoever it was would develop it at the newspaper lab so no one knew where the photos came from.
I went to the restaurant Russell had established as our meeting place, and sat in the booth at the back, as he had directed. He told me the reporter would know me and would have the photos. I ordered a coffee and took out what I had written about that night to look it over. A few minutes later, a very pretty woman around my age came up to me.
“You’re Jory.” I nodded. “I’m Julie, Julie Stanton, reporter from the News Sentinel.”
I shook her hand as she sat down across from me. It was three in the afternoon and the restaurant was empty. When the server came, Julie asked for coffee, and we ordered hamburgers. Julie took an envelope from her purse and slid it across the table. “That must have been a really good camera. The photos turned out great. Sick, but great.”
“It was my dad’s Yashica-D.” I looked at the photos and felt like I was back in the woods, watching it happen. “Sons of…”
“I’ll say. You can read automobile plates and see faces. This will reveal some of the Klansmen.”
I handed her what I had written. “I wrote this up. I’ll be happy to tell you everything I saw, and you can change what’s there any way you wish. I just wanted to give you my thoughts.”
Our hamburgers came. She read it while we started to eat, and neither of us said anything for a long while. She shook her head slowly, nodded, and shook it again. Turning the page over, she said, “You are a good writer. This is handwritten, and you never changed a thing, did you?”
“What do you mean?”
“Goodness, I have to write and rewrite, and I’d wear my typewriter out trying to write like this. And you did it in the first draft. Where did you go to school?”
“I’m in college part-time, but I’m majoring in business. Not much writing there.”
“Where did you go to high school?”
I didn’t want to say. “You like what I wrote?”
“I hate it—it’s perfect. I would love to use it, but look. My boss won’t allow me to be associated with any article like this.”
“Shoot. I thought it could be printed.”
“Oh, it will get printed, with photos, but my boss won’t put me at risk. If I take credit for this article, what do you think these idiots will do, give me an award for literary achievement? They would more likely kidnap me and beat the crap out of me until I told them where I got these photos. He’s not about to let that happen.”
“Are you serious?”
“To them I’d be a nigger lover—no different than a colored woman.”
I shook my head. “Then forget it.”
Her smile was infectious, and her close-set green eyes pulled at me. I looked at my hamburger in fear of being obvious. “I just don’t want any possibility of you being hurt. It isn’t worth the risk.”
“How long will they keep burning crosses and Negro effigies if no one does anything?”
I looked at her and I imagined a petite, redheaded Barbie doll standing up to the KKK. “I hate this more than you can possibly know.”
She tilted her head. “And why is that?”
“Because…” I hesitated.
She waited.
“I was raised by the most wonderful black family in the world. And I have a black brother and sister who I love dearly.”
“You’re kidding?”
“No. The old man who raised me, Moses, I love him as much as I did my own father, who died when I was eleven. And I’ve had to deal with so much prejudice, sometimes I want to kill someone, especially those Klansmen.”
Julie’s hand went to her mouth. “I’m sorry…really sorry you lost your dad.”
“But I was lucky enough to get Moses.”
The waitress came over to see how we were doing. Julie looked up at her. “We need to run. Would you please wrap the rest of our burgers and get us a pair of Cokes to go?”
“Sure, sweetheart.”
“Come on.” Julie grabbed my hand. “Something I need to show you.”
Her car was outside. About ten minutes out of town, she turned down a gravel road onto a narrow lane and pulled up to a massive, old, two-story house. It sat among huge oak trees and a pond, and it had been boarded up some time ago. We got out of the car, went to the front of the house, and sat on the porch swing. She opened our burgers, and we swung back and forth like children as we ate.
“I love this old swing,” she said. “This was my grandparents’ farm. It once was a plantation. After they died, it became my mom and dad’s. My dad told me when my grandpa inherited it from his parents, it came with slaves, twelve of them. The first thing my grandpa did when the farm became his was assemble all the slaves in a barn, which stood over there.”
I looked to where she pointed and saw nothing but a line of rocks. “You mean the stone foundation?”
“Yes. The KKK burned it down because my grandpa gave the Negroes their freedom. When he brought them all into the barn, he told them he was putting together the freedom papers for every one of them. He said they could leave as free people, or, if they wished, they could stay on and work the farm, and he would pay them a fair wage based on the farm income, and they would be free.”
Chills covered the back of my neck.
“All but five stayed on, and in three weeks, three of them returned when one of the others was lynched and found hanging from a tree not twenty miles from here. We never knew what happened to the other one. The KKK got wind of their freedom and, late one night, set the barn on fire. Five burned to death. They’re buried in the little cemetery under that oak tree next to the pond, along with my family.’
“Oh, God. What happened to your parents?”
“Dad was as strong as an ox, but mom was frail. When Grandma died, he asked this wonderful colored woman, Fanny-Mae Washington, the daughter of one of the original slaves, to stay in the house to help Mom. I was raised by Fanny. Mom died about a year later, and Fanny took over the role of my mother. I think I spent half my life in her lap. I loved her as much as my own mom.”
“Julie...” I didn’t know what to say. I couldn’t have imagined she would have a story like this of her own.
She looked up at me. “I know how you feel, Jory. I wouldn’t be the person I am without Fanny. If only you could have heard her talk. She was the wisest woman with the poorest vocabulary.” She chuckled lightly. “I loved listening to her.”
“You should meet Moses. He is, like Fanny, so wise. He has the most wonderful voice. What happened to Fanny?”
Julie led me to the front door. She unlocked it and we went inside. There were a few pieces of dust-covered furniture, but not much else, and it had obviously been this way for many years. We walked to the back of the house, through the kitchen, and to a quaint little room with a bed, dresser, and rocking chair.
“Fanny died in this bed. I was sitting right there beside her, holding her hand. I cried and begged her not to die, but she just said, ‘Thank you, child, for lovin’ Fanny-Mae—I surely does love you.’ And she squeezed my hand and stopped breathing, right there.”
Tears blurred my vision.
* * *
Julie had quickly been overcome by the memories of the bedroom, so she took me through the many rooms of the house, and told me more stories about parties that had taken place in the home, how many different hiding places there were, and so much more. Eventually, we walked to the little cemetery under the oak tree and stood at the resting places of her parents and Fanny. I could see that she had recently placed flowers there. “I miss them so,” she said.
We walked to the pond and sat on the bench, looking out over the water. “This is such a beautiful place, Julie. Does it belong to you now?”
“Yes. When my dad got ill, he couldn’t take care of the farm. Things were hard, very hard those days. He sold off more than two hundred acres and paid off the house and ten acres. I moved back here to take care of him, but
I had to take him to a nursing home in town. I got an apartment and boarded up the house. He died several years ago. The house needs lots of work, and I can’t take care of such a big place by myself. One day, when I make enough, I’ll fix up the place and move back.”
“It’s such a neat home. It would be great to fix it up.”
She looked at me and smiled. “I’ve talked enough. Tell me about your dad and your other family.”
The swing moved back and forth for what seemed hours as I told her how Moses found me, and how quickly I fell in love with the four of them. When I told her about Moses getting ill, she grabbed my hand and didn’t let go until she heard how he had recovered. Finally, I said, “I think I’ve overdone it. But it sure was nice talking to someone who understands.”
“Jory,” she sighed, like she was scolding me. “How wonderful it was you found Moses.”
I smiled. “I do believe Moses found me.”
* * *
Two days later, the article hit the paper along with two photos.
I had told Julie about the dynamite. She was shocked and said how she wished she could have seen their faces. There was no mention in the article of the explosion or how the photos were acquired, but the Klan surely assumed the newspaper was responsible for both. The day after the article came out, bricks were thrown through the two, large, plate glass windows of the News Sentinel office. That evening, the front page of the paper showed a photo of the broken windows with the caption, “Sticks and stones will break our windows—but truth will always reign.”
The accompanying article was written by the owner and went on about how there was no coincidence between the broken windows and a scathing article and photos about the KKK. The article said all people were equal, and until the hate and bloodshed stop, the KKK would continue to be seen as the evil denigrates of today’s society. Any group of individuals who met clandestinely to breed hate and burn crosses and effigies, were truly less than human, a disease plaguing the country. He went on to say the time had come to bury the hatchet and allow all people the happiness and peace they deserved—all people. He vowed to continue his newspaper’s support of equal rights for every person, no matter how many windows were broken.
My Water Path Page 25