“Well, come on, Lydia,” Uncle William said. “You know I can’t play this by myself.” He squatted down on the floor on one side of the table. I laughed and sat on the other side. We both said:
“Fairies high and fairies low,
Come this day, your powers bestow.
Bring peace and calm and music sure,
Tranquil words and melody pure.”
Then we started up playing and even Aunt Ethel Mae sung along. We told jokes and stories, and sung all evening. People coming in and out of the lobby would stop and listen. Some of them even joined in. The lady at the desk said the hotel should hire us for entertainment. After we went to our rooms, I told Aunt Ethel Mae I was going to use the desk in the lobby to work on some homework. I worked a few math problems so I didn’t feel like I lied to her, but then I commenced to write in this here notebook. I want to remember ever single thing that happened today.
I feel all tuckered out but safe and happy—not afeared about tomorrow like I thought I would be. I think I’ll get me a good night’s sleep, dreaming about seeing my mama again.
28
It’s about Mama’s new trial.
WEDNESDAY, MARCH 10, 1954
Today I woke up confident and rested and all ready to speak up for my mama. I sure wish it would have lasted. When I put on my new dress and lipstick and nylons, I felt all growed up and real strong. But later, it was like I had fell deep down into a dark, damp well of them old feelings.
Me and Uncle William and Aunt Ethel Mae ate breakfast at the hotel. Doc Smythson and Pastor John stayed with a friend of Doc’s last night. Mrs. Nowling stayed with her cousin. Mr. Hinkle stayed at his parents’ house. They live on a farm not too far from here. He planned to drive in early to the city to meet Miss Parker at her parents’ house for breakfast. We was all going to meet up at the courthouse at eight. The trial would start up at nine.
I had me some pancakes and orange juice. Aunt Ethel Mae just had toast and hot tea. She kept saying stuff like “I sure do wish we didn’t have to go through this today. I feel a headache coming on. I don’t know how you’re going to deal with all this, Lydia. A young’un shouldn’t ought to have to testify. I ain’t figured out how I’m going to make myself take that stand without passing out.”
Uncle William didn’t say nothing. He just kept his eyes on his breakfast of fried eggs, sausage, and biscuits, shoveling the food in his mouth. Sometimes I think Uncle William is deaf, but only when it comes to Aunt Ethel Mae.
The more Aunt Ethel Mae carried on, the more my pancakes started up tasting like rubber. My stomach felt like I was a-swallowing rocks. I finally gived up trying to eat.
Uncle William paid the bill, and then he drove us to the courthouse. We had to drive a piece to get surrounded by all them big buildings. Aunt Ethel Mae was still a-carrying on, but I think I caught Uncle William’s deafness to her.
I stared out the window of the car. Ohio is so flat. It’s like driving on one of them pancakes I had for breakfast. Gran used to say the sun comed up at your toenails in the morning and set back down on your toenails of an evening when we was in Ohio. It always makes me feel like I don’t have no clothes on, driving around up here—like anything bad could come up on me, and I wouldn’t have nowhere to hide. Today I wished I was in the mountains again, all safe.
Uncle William let me and Aunt Ethel Mae out in front of the courthouse while he went to park. As we walked inside the door, Aunt Ethel Mae said, “Here we go to face who knows what.”
My stomach knotted up tighter inside me.
Miss Parker and everbody else who was here to help my mama was squashed up in a circle at the other end of the big hallway outside the courtroom.
“Over here,” Miss Parker called to us, and waved her hand. “Lydia and Ethel Mae, you look beautiful.” Miss Parker touched my ponytail and then my shoulder as she smiled at me.
“Do you like my hat?” Aunt Ethel Mae said as she patted it real light. “I added the feathers to make it look like the hats them movie stars wear.” I caught myself afore I rolled my eyes like Uncle William always does.
“Uh, it’s lovely,” Miss Parker said. Then she hurry-up changed the subject. “Reverend Legg has asked if he could lead us in prayer, and I think that’s a wonderful idea.”
So we all held hands and bowed our heads. Pastor John said his prayer. I didn’t hear his words on account of praying my own prayer in my heart. Please, God. Please let my mama out of that jail. Please, God, please! I heard Pastor John say amen, and everbody else said amen real long and loud. Me, too.
Then Miss Parker spoke. “We’ll be going in soon, and I would like for all of you to sit as close as you can behind Sarah,” she said. “We want the jury to see that she has as much support as possible.”
“I wish I could sit aside her,” I said. I sure did hope she would say I could.
“Lydia, let’s sit a minute on this bench,” she said. She sent all the other folks on into the courtroom.
We sat down together. “I’ve thought a lot about this, Lydia,” Miss Parker told me. “And I’ve decided that you will not be in the courtroom until you need to testify.”
I felt tears crowding up my eyes. “Please, I want to be close to my mama.”
She sighed. “I know you do, Lydia, but the prosecuting attorney is going to do everything he can to make your mother look bad. There’s no reason for you to hear it.”
“But I done heard it in that other trial. I can handle it this time. I know it.”
She sighed again. “It’s not a matter of whether you can handle it, Lydia. It’s a matter of whether you should hear it. It’s going to be worse this time. Your mother’s other lawyer was incompetent. The prosecutor knows how skilled I am. He’s going to do everything he can to make sure your mother stays in jail.”
I looked at the ground. I didn’t feel all growed up anymore. I was a little kid again. “I’m the one that be incompetent,” I told her. “That’s what the judge said. You think so, too.”
“Lydia, look at me.” I still looked at the ground. “Look at me!” she said louder. She put her finger under my chin and lifted up my face.
I looked at her.
“You know that’s not true. You must trust me. It’s not just about your having to hear them do that to your mother. You need to think of your mother, too. How do you think she’s going to feel, knowing that you’re there hearing them say everything they can to make her look bad?”
I looked down at the ground again. “She would feel awful—real sad,” I said softly.
“That’s right. She doesn’t need to be thinking about what’s going on with you. She needs to be thinking about her defense.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t think about that.”
“It’s okay, Lydia. I know this is hard. I’ve arranged a room for you to stay in. It might be several hours before your turn to speak. It might even be tomorrow. I’ve left a few presents in the room so you’ll have something to do while you wait. Come on, I’ll show you where you’ll be.”
We walked down the hallway and she opened the door. I didn’t go in. “This is the same room,” I told her.
“You mean the same one where they took you during the last trial?”
I nodded.
“It’s different this time, Lydia. Last time, this room was filled with fear and despair. This time, let’s think of this room being filled with hope. Come see what I have for you.”
I followed her. Two packages sat on the table. They was wrapped up with paper covered in flowers and tied up with big pink bows.
“I need to go to the courtroom to be with your mother, Lydia. I know you’ll be fine. I’ll see you later,” Miss Parker said.
“Okay,” I told her.
I sat down and unwrapped the first gift. A red diary with a tiny key. The box also had a pencil that doesn’t need sharpening. You twist it and the lead comes down the point at the bottom. The package said it’s called a mechanical pencil. It also comed with a little box o
f lead strings to fill it up.
I opened up the diary. In blue ink, Miss Parker had wrote:
To Lydia,
The strongest young woman I know. May all the dreams you write in this diary come true.
Best wishes,
Julia Parker
I couldn’t figure out why she thought I was strong. Maybe she was just trying to be nice. I wrote today’s date at the top of the first page. That diary sure was fancier than the spiral notebook I been writing in. I could lock it and not worry about nobody reading it. I’d just have to figure out a safe place to keep the key.
Then I opened up the other package. Two books. Anne of Green Gables and Anne of the Island. I opened up Anne of Green Gables. In blue ink, Mr. Hinkle had wrote:
To Lydia,
I know you have read these books, but I also know Anne is your favorite character. Miss Parker and I thought you would appreciate personal copies. May Anne’s courage continue to inspire you.
Your teacher,
Mr. Hinkle
I felt the covers—smooth and velvety. Now I could always have Anne with me. The woody smell of them books remembered me of curling up on my bed in Paradise to read.
I turned to the first page of Anne’s first story and read about the most important day in her life. The day when she left all the bad behind, all the TRAGICAL, she called it, and started up all the good things with Matthew and Marilla.
I was thankful I had Anne to keep me company on my most important day. I sure hoped I could leave all the TRAGICAL behind. I joined Anne in her life so’s I could forget about what was going on in mine.
When I first sat down at the table, the clock in the room seemed loud, clicking by the minutes. But I was surprised when Miss Parker walked in to get me. I looked up at the clock and it was already eleven-thirty. I had read almost half of my book.
“Lydia,” she said, “you’re next to testify. I asked the judge if we could take a recess for lunch before you’re called to the stand. We need to be back at one. I thought you and I would go to lunch together. There’s a sandwich shop down the street.”
We walked to the shop and ordered hamburgers and French fries. Miss Parker asked for a cup of coffee, and I asked for a root beer. When the waitress handed us our drinks, I told Miss Parker about BJ putting raisins in the root beer back in Paradise. The two of us had a good laugh over that one. She told me about how when she was little, her brother asked her iffen she wanted half of his peanut butter sandwich. She said yes. When she took a bite, she bit off the head of a water bug he had stuffed inside. Us women decided that boys sure do weird things sometimes.
After we finished eating, we talked about what was going to happen next. She asked me iffen I recollected all the things she had taught me about trials afore Christmas. I told her yes.
Miss Parker already learned me all them big words that lawyers and judges use. She said that Mama is the defendant because she needs defending. BJ’s hospital is the plaintiff on account of them doctors complaining about Mama taking BJ out of the hospital.
Attorney is just a fancy word for lawyer. Miss Parker is the defense attorney because she defends Mama. The lawyer who tries to make Mama look guilty of doing something wrong is the prosecuting attorney. I told Miss Parker I thought he should be called the persecuting attorney. She said in Mama’s case, she agreed with me.
The jury is a group of people that listen real close to everthing that everbody says. When the lawyers finish up saying everthing they want to say, they go out to another room to decide iffen the defendant is guilty or not guilty of doing a bad thing. Iffen they say guilty, the judge decides what the punishment should be. Iffen they say not guilty, everbody gets to go home, including the defendant. I hope that’s what happens to my mama, that the jury figures out she’s not guilty, and we all get to go home to West Virginia.
When Miss Parker got done learning me all that lawyering stuff, she said I was just about ready to pass the bar—that’s a big test people take after they get all their book learning to prove they’s ready to be lawyers.
I also learned that swearing on the Bible in court means saying that you promise to God and everbody else that you ain’t going to lie. And as long as you don’t tell a lie, God will be right proud of you.
After I finished up reminding her of what she learned me, Miss Parker nodded. “Good. I’m glad you remember,” she said. “I’ve helped you understand the basics, but I want to tell you what the prosecuting attorney might ask you. He’ll want to know what your mother had you do to help get your brother out of the hospital. He’ll want to make the jury think that your mother forced you to do something that you shouldn’t have done. I can’t help you practice what to say. That should come straight from your heart. Keep your answers honest, short, and to the point. When he finishes, I’ll ask you some questions to give you a chance to explain more. Do you understand?”
I nodded.
“When I ask you questions, the prosecuting attorney might try to interrupt you and say that he objects to what you are saying or the questions I ask. Don’t worry about him. I’ll take care of any interruptions he tries to make. We’ll find a way for you to say everything you want to say about your mother and your brother. And if he starts asking you questions that I don’t think are appropriate, I will interrupt him with an objection. He’s tough, Lydia. But all you need to be concerned about is telling the truth.”
When we walked back to the courthouse, I thought about what I would say. I would tell what I done to help Mama get BJ out of the hospital. I would tell about how BJ cried when Gran died on account of her not having any kin with her. And I would say that I remembered Mama of that and begged her to bring BJ home. Then I would ask all them people how Mama and I could not bring him home to die with us iffen we loved him.
So I thought I was ready. But when I walked in that big room again with all them important people, it was like I was having a nightmare and was back in Mama’s first trial. I looked at the twelve empty seats at the side of the courtroom, waiting for the judge to call in twelve strangers that would look at me like I might be a criminal. I knowed from what Miss Parker told me that they was the jury. Them people was going to decide what happened to my mama. And by deciding what happened to my mama, they was going to decide what happened to me. All at once I felt dizzy and as jumpy as a grasshopper in a henhouse.
Then I saw them people in uniforms bring in my mama—in handcuffs. Her long hair had been cut short. Her beautiful hair was gone. The dress Miss Parker and me picked out for her was too big. She looked like a little girl playing dress-up in it. Mama walked to her seat without looking up from the floor. Didn’t she know I was in the room? Why didn’t she look for me? Did she know that Uncle William told me the truth about him and Helen? Was she too ashamed? Did she still love me?
The room started spinning and Uncle William had to catch me. He sat me down on a bench. Miss Parker runned over.
“Is Lydia all right?” Miss Parker asked my uncle. “Maybe we’re expecting too much of her.” She looked at me, her eyebrows arched up high, all worried-like. “Dr. Smythson is still outside with the pastor. I’ll go get him.”
“She’ll be fine,” Uncle William said. “You just go on and do the lawyering you need to do with Sarah. I’ll tend to Lydia.”
Miss Parker looked at Uncle William like she weren’t too sure whether to leave me, but then she went to Mama’s side.
Uncle William sat down beside me. I smelled bacca on him and knowed he had hisself a smoke after lunch. He didn’t look at me when he talked. “Lydia, this sure has been a hard road for you to travel, but you got good blood running through your veins. Never forget who you be.”
Then he went to talk to Doc Smythson and Pastor John and left me alone.
I recollected Mama saying them very same words to me. “Never forget who you be.” Them was the last words she said to me afore Doc Smythson took me away from Paradise.
Uncle William and Mama knowed that I ain’t who I tho
ught I was. It didn’t make no sense that they said that to me. What did Uncle William mean about good blood? But then I got to thinking that maybe they was saying I be more than who my mama and daddy be. That my blood runs deeper than that.
I recollected about how I felt when we drove to the courthouse—wishing I was back in the mountains. I figured something out. Them mountains is always and forever inside of me, making me who I be. My blood is like a river running through them mountains. As sure as I feel this here chair I’m sitting in right now, at the trial I felt them mountains filling up all the empty spaces inside me. Gran, Gramps, Mama, Daddy, BJ, Uncle William, Helen, and even Aunt Ethel Mae. The blood of them mountains flowed deep in all of us.
Gran always said our West Virginia mountains is like the bosom of the Almighty, keeping us protected and still in Him. That brought to mind one of them Bible verses Gran made me learn by heart. I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help. My help cometh from the Lord, the maker of Heaven and Earth.
And when I looked to them hills I always carry deep inside, I felt their strength. And I felt God, who made them hills, inside of me, too. Maybe the truth of who I really be had set me free after all.
I didn’t even notice Doc Smythson standing beside me. He knelt down and looked in my eyes. “How are you doing, Lydia?” he asked, all worried. “Let me feel your pulse.”
I held my arm out to him. “I feel better,” I told him.
He looked at his watch and counted the beats. “Nice and strong,” he said, and winked at me.
“All rise!” a man shouted. We all stood up while the judge walked in and sat down. The judge remembered me of a bulldog that belonged to our neighbor in Paradise. He had saggy jowls and his face was shaped like a rectangle. He looked like he might growl. I was mighty afeared of that bulldog at first, but after we got to know each other, he turned out to be a pretty good dog. I hoped this judge would turn out to be nicer than he looked, too.
The judge called in the jury. Then we all sat down after the judge took his seat.
Child of the Mountains Page 17