“I like working with my hands, and Army needed the help. Besides, the pay’s good and it helps with school.”
“School?”
“Tech, over in Cookeville.”
“What’re you studying?”
“Math. This year I’ll be a senior. I stayed in the marines a little while after the war, so I’m a little late with my studies. I’m going through on the GI Bill.”
Shenandoah shook her head and thought, Mechanic, ridge runner, math major. Jesus, what an interesting man!
Bobby turned to Shenandoah, leveled his gaze, and looked her in the eye. “Tell me about you, Shenandoah. How’d you get to be a big-city reporter? And why in the world did you come back to Round Rock?”
Shifting her weight on the concrete bench, she said, “My history isn’t very interesting. I was born and raised in Beulah Land. When the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, I was working in Nashville as a secretary. I wanted to be an aviator like Cornelia Fort. Actually, Cornelia was in the air at Pearl Harbor at the time of the attack and was scraped by a Japanese Zero. Anyway, she’s always been one of my heroines. So I took flying lessons and then joined the WASP. I spent the war flying B-24s and fighter planes. The army cancelled my contract near the end of the war, so I went to the University of Texas in Austin and received a BA in English. I worked my way through as a waitress. I’ve been working for the Memphis Express now for a little over two years. I’m a childhood friend of Dr. Kate’s, and I’m here to cover the trial. I also want to interview Buford Frampton for a book I’m writing on Boss Crump. That’s me in a nutshell.”
Bobby asked, “What’s a WASP?”
“It stands for Women Airforce Service Pilot. We freed up the men so that they could go into combat.”
“That’s right interesting, Shenandoah. I’ve never even heard of such a thing as a woman pilot. I thought they were all men.”
“Surely you’ve heard of Amelia Earhart.”
“Nope. I guess I’m sort of behind the times, so to speak. I can tell you one thing, though: I’ve never met a sober Coleman.”
“Ever since I got here that’s all I’ve heard. To tell you the truth, I’m sick of it.”
Bobby shrugged his shoulders and said, “I’m sorry. It’s not your fault you’re a Coleman.” Then he got up and walked toward the water with Shenandoah close behind. On the way, he scooped up several small stones. At the edge of the lake, he handed Shenandoah two and kept two for himself. He threw one of his and watched it skip across the water. “Two,” he said, turning to Shenandoah. She threw one of her stones. It skipped once and sank. Bobby threw his second one, and it bounced across the water three times. Smiling, he waited for Shenandoah’s second try. This time she put all her strength behind the throw but got only two skips. “You win,” she said. “Is that important to you, winning?”
“Why, Shenandoah, whatever gave you that idea?”
Bobby stood close to Shenandoah, and her heart pounded like a sixteen-year-old on her first date. Shenandoah took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “How well do you know Dr. Kate?”
“I wondered when you were going to get around to that.”
“Trudy Underwood told me she thinks Army and Kate are having an affair.”
“I’ve never believed that for a minute.”
“You have to admit it sounds a little suspicious.”
“I’m not going to gossip about someone I care about. Besides, all three of them were good friends. If you grew up with Kate and Army, you should know that.”
“You don’t think Kate had anything to do with Lillie’s death?”
Bobby glared at her. “That’s nuts.” Then glancing at the sun, he said, “I’ve got to get back to work or Army will have a hissy fit. Come on, girl, we need to get cracking.”
On the outskirts of Round Rock, just as they turned onto Main Street, Shenandoah saw the Dodge pickup pull out of a side street and fall in behind them.
She grabbed Bobby’s arm and said, “That’s it. Stop.”
Bobby frowned. “What’re you talking about?”
“The pickup that ran me off the road is right behind us.”
At that moment, the Dodge roared past the Ford and sped down the street. Within seconds it was out of sight.
“Did you see it?” Shenandoah asked.
“Yeah, but I’ve never seen it before.”
“Follow it.”
“I can’t. I’ve got to get ready for my run tonight. Army would kill me if I didn’t make that run.”
“Damn it, Bobby, I’ve got to find out who that pickup belongs to.”
“Go see Jasper Kingman. He’s the sheriff. You get the license plate?”
Shenandoah shook her head. “No. It’s covered with dirt. I can’t go to Jasper. It’s a long story.”
Bobby guided the Ford into the shop, killed the engine, and got out of the car. Shenandoah followed. He opened the hood, pulled out the oil dipstick, and checked the level as she stepped beside him.
Bobby looked up from under the hood and asked, “You sure you wouldn’t like to have supper with me? We could grab a burger at the Blue Dot down in Livingston tomorrow night.”
Shenandoah looked at him with raised eyebrows. “You asking me for a date again?”
“Yeah, I’d like to know you better. You’re a right interesting person and pretty as a picture. That’s a fact.”
Shenandoah said, “You seem like a nice enough fellow, Bobby, but I haven’t got time to date. I brought a lot of work with me from Memphis, and I’m writing an article about the trial.”
“How long does it take to eat? I mean, you have to eat.”
“We wouldn’t have a thing in common. What in the world would we talk about?”
“We’d think of something.”
“I just can’t. I’ve got too many responsibilities.”
“Come on, Shenandoah. Don’t be such a stick-in-the-mud.”
Shenandoah shook her head and said, “I’ll be here for a week or ten days, and then I’ll go back to Memphis. Why bother?”
Bobby had a hangdog expression on his face that gave Shenandoah a split second of guilt. Then he turned and stuck his head under the hood of the Ford.
Shenandoah walked slowly toward the door. She looked back over her shoulder once to see Bobby watching her and thought, He’s not a bad fellow, really. And he sure is easy on the eyes.
Chapter 5
Friday morning following one of Hattie Mae’s big breakfasts, Shenandoah made her usual pilgrimage to visit Dr. Kate. She found her in good spirits and was delighted to see that the tremor was less prominent. Her hair was pulled back with a headband, and she had on a fresh county-issued gray cotton dress.
“Morning, Shenandoah. I’ve been waiting for you.”
“You look great this morning. Anything special going on?”
“Your visits are a treat. When Jake’s here, he spends the whole time working on my defense.”
“How’s that going?”
“You’ll have to ask him. Our biggest problem is my lack of recall.”
“How long have you had these blackout spells?”
“You know the whole truth now. I’ve had lapses like that off and on for years. I sometimes wake up on the side of the road and have no idea how I got there. It’s frightening.”
Shenandoah took her hand and said, “How’re you doing with the tapering off?”
“I’ll be clean by Monday. It’s been the hardest thing I’ve ever done.”
“Do me a favor?”
“Anything.”
“Let me have the flask on Monday.”
“With pleasure. If I manage to stay out of prison, I’m going back to AA.”
Suddenly, her expression clouded, and tears streamed down her smooth cheeks. She wiped them away and said, “My God, I never thought I’d hear myself say those words again.”
Shenandoah looked into her friend’s royal blue eyes and felt immense sorrow. From Army’s description of her life as a country doc
tor, she thought she understood how Kate could have become addicted. In June, the medical reporter for the Express had written an article about new theories of alcoholism. Some scientists considered the problem a disease that might have a genetic origin. So, in Kate’s case, she’d been hit with a double whammy, as they said in the mountains of East Tennessee.
“You’re a strong woman. You’ll make it. I’ve been talking to a few people, and you have some staunch supporters, Hank Boldt being one of them. He told me about your run-in with my uncle Junior. Would you have shot him?”
“If I thought my life or Hank’s was in danger, yes, I would’ve shot Junior.”
“I wouldn’t have blamed you.”
“Your dad was Junior’s brother. Isn’t that right?”
“Yes. There were four brothers, Lester, Archibald, Gilbert, and Junior.”
Kate shook her head and sighed. “I remember when we were in the fifth grade and your father died.”
* * *
The year Kate turned twelve, wages at the Round Rock sawmill were fifty cents a day. The men worked twelve-hour shifts, the big blade rotating constantly day and night. At least once a month someone was injured: a broken arm, a missing finger, a deep laceration, or a severed limb.
Kate, her father, and her older sister Rebecca lived in a three-bedroom apartment over the Round Rock Medical Clinic. Kate spent her time after school and on Saturdays working in the clinic, performing clerical duties, and she accompanied her father on some of his house calls.
Late on a Wednesday afternoon, hearing a commotion in the clinic’s waiting room, Kate ran to see what was happening. She swung open the door to see two men dragging a stocky, muscular man between them. The man’s right arm had been cut off just above the elbow. He was pressing a towel, which was completely soaked in blood, against the stump. His face, twisted with pain, made Kate shudder.
She motioned for them to follow her to her father’s operating suite. Dr. Walter Marlow rushed into the room and yelled, “Get Nurse Little! Hurry!”
The nurse came immediately. She instructed the men to place the injured man on an examination table in the middle of the large room. While Dr. Walt washed his hands, Nurse Little went to one of the stainless steel cabinets and removed a surgical pack and a small metal can of chloroform.
Kate stood to one side and watched as the nurse poured the anesthetic onto a gauze-covered wire mask that she placed over the man’s nose and mouth. As soon as the man lost consciousness, Dr. Walt removed the towel, cleaned the wound, tied off the blood vessels, and sutured muscle and loose skin over the stump of bone. One of the other men slumped to the floor, hitting his head on the side of a cabinet.
“Put your head between your legs, Coleman. Get the blood back to your brain,” Dr. Walt said.
Kate went to the sink and placed a surgical pad under the cold-water faucet. Then she held the cold compress to the man’s forehead.
Dr. Walt dressed the wound and, turning to the others, said, “When Archibald wakes up, you fellows take him home. Tell his wife to keep him in bed. I’ll be out tomorrow afternoon to check on him. Nurse Little will give you some morphine tablets.”
That night at the supper table Kate asked, “Is that man Shenandoah Coleman’s daddy?”
“Believe so.”
“He going to be okay?”
“Don’t know, Sugar. Hope so.”
“Me too.”
The next afternoon, Dr. Walt and Kate climbed into his Model A Ford coupe and drove the two miles to Beulah Land. Kate knew of the place, for she drove by there periodically with her father.
The doctor parked his car at the foot of the hill where the communal hand pump sat not three feet from the shoulder of the highway. A teenage boy pumped rusty, sulfur-laced water from the well into a galvanized bucket and stared at Kate. She followed her father up the hill to the shack that Archibald Coleman called home.
Several scantily clad and barefoot children stood to either side of the narrow pathway and watched the doctor and his daughter. It being late October, the ground was cold and covered with red and gold maple leaves. Dr. Marlow tapped on the door and then walked in when there was no answer. It was dark except for a lone kerosene lantern burning on a table in one corner. A second table, pushed against the far wall, held several dishes, a few jelly glasses, knives, forks, an iron skillet, a porcelain washbasin, and a pitcher. The rough wooden walls were bare.
Two side-by-side doors led to small sleeping areas. He walked into one where a dirty mattress lay on the floor. The injured man sat up when he saw the doctor and said, “Hurts like hell, Doc.”
Dr. Marlow kneeled beside the man and began to unravel the gauze from the stump. Kate stood in the doorway, wondering why Shenandoah wasn’t there.
Beads of perspiration formed on Mr. Coleman’s forehead, and he grimaced as the last of the gauze pulled free. Angry red streaks radiated up from the incision lines, and the wound gave off a sweet smell that made Kate want to retch.
The doctor took a thermometer from his black bag, placed it under the man’s tongue, and then listened to his chest with a stethoscope. When Dr. Walt removed the thermometer, it read 105 degrees. He shook his head. “This isn’t good, Archibald—infection in the stump and early pneumonia. Where’s your wife?”
“She’ll be here directly. She and the girl walked to town.”
At that moment, Shenandoah and her mother entered the room. The wife, tall like her husband, was thin and emaciated. Her dull brown hair hung loosely around her shoulders, and her dark eyes were the saddest Kate had ever seen. The woman’s hands had large calluses, and her fingernails were broken and dirty.
Shenandoah blushed when she saw Kate. “I’m sorry about your dad. I hope he gets better,” Kate told her.
Dr. Walt said, “Lucy, I need to talk to you and Archibald alone.” To his daughter, he said, “Kate, why don’t you and Shenandoah go out to the car and bring me that newspaper off the front seat?”
When they returned, Mrs. Coleman was crying. Two days later, Archibald Coleman died in his sleep.
The funeral at the Church of Christ was a simple affair. Gilbert, one of Mr. Coleman’s brothers, had made the coffin out of rough pine boards. At the gravesite in the paupers’ area of the city cemetery, Kate and her father watched as the pallbearers lowered the coffin into the cold ground. Stone-faced, Shenandoah stood by her mother and wouldn’t look at Kate.
* * *
“Being a Coleman is like climbing a mountain carrying a hundred-pound sack of potatoes on your back,” Shenandoah said. “Everyone I meet won’t let me forget where I came from.”
Kate frowned and said, “Your mom died when we were seniors, didn’t she?”
“Cancer of the ovary. They operated on her at Vanderbilt Hospital, but she only lived three months.” As Shenandoah remembered her mother’s death, a feeling of sadness swept over her. Her mother had done the best she could to provide for the two of them after her father’s demise. Kate’s mother had died in childbirth too, Shenandoah remembered, and Kate had been raised by her father. She’d always felt sorry for Kate, that she’d grown up not knowing her mother, never knowing all the things a girl learns from her mother.
“But, Kate, now we need to stay focused on the present,” she said quickly. “I also talked to Randall Moody, the mayor and poet laureate of Moodyville. Seems you saved his daughter’s life—and his wife’s.”
A smile formed on Kate’s face, and the worry lines on her forehead disappeared. “I guess I’ve done a few things right. I hope that counts for something.”
“You’ve done a lot of things right. Don’t be so hard on yourself. We all make mistakes.”
“And we pay for them the rest of our lives. Who else did you talk to?”
“Army. That didn’t go well. Threw me out of his office. Got really pissed off when I asked him why he’s a ridge runner.”
“His illegal business worries me sick. I’m afraid he’ll get killed on one of those hairpin curves betwee
n here and Cookeville. Did you meet Bobby?”
“Oh, yes, I met Bobby. Drives like a maniac.”
“You rode with him?”
“Just a trial run to Static. Scared the hell out of me.”
“I’m crazy about Bobby. He’s an incredible fellow when you get to know him. Sweet as he can be. I worry about him too. I’ve begged Army to keep Bobby out of his illegal activities, but he ignores me.”
“Bobby asked me to have a burger with him. I think he likes me. But that would be a disaster. I told him I couldn’t possibly do that.”
“He’s a really sweet man. You could do worse, Shenandoah.”
“I’m not interested in a relationship with someone from Round Rock. I never have been. All I ever wanted was to get out of this town. There was some boy from Celina who mooned after me when we were seniors. I’m sure he wanted to marry me. What was his name? I can’t remember for the life of me.”
“Ashley Crouch was his name. He had a sister named Lisbeth.”
“What happened to him?”
“He killed himself. Took a shotgun into a closet, placed the barrel under his chin, and pulled the trigger with his thumb.”
“Jesus. That’s terrible. Did he leave a note?”
“No.”
“Let’s change the subject. I can’t deal with that. Bobby and Army are in your corner.”
Kate smiled and said, “You’ve covered a lot of ground in a short time. What’s the score?”
“By my count you’re ahead by a slim margin. Some people who don’t seem to like you have had some bad experience where you’ve bested them in some way. The people who love you have good reason to. You’ve been a positive influence in their lives. Any suggestions on other people I should talk to?”
“No. You’re doing a good job.”
Shenandoah smiled and said, “Did I tell you I’m writing a book about the Crump political machine?”
“I don’t think so. That’s wonderful. How far along are you?”
“I’ve got the outline completed and I’ve done a number of interviews. While I’m here I plan to see Buford Frampton. You know him?”
“Everyone knows Buford.”
The Trial of Dr. Kate Page 9