by Cynthia Webb
The sounds grew louder, then louder still, and then began to fade. There was a loud squeal of tires, and then the sound of an engine gunning. The buzzing grew louder again.
Someone was driving a loud, noisy vehicle up and down the lonely street outside the house. Sapphire dropped the edge of the curtain. “It’s a pick-up truck. Etta Mae, where’s Daddy’s gun?”
Chapter Fifteen
Now, you got to believe me when I tell you that guns make me very nervous. There was this sweet little dyke I met once, cocky and arrogant and boyish, with the most charming little tattoos on her wrists, her ankles, and one on that sweet place in the back of her neck, just visible under the wispy ends of her short silky hair. But the charm evaporated for me when she stood beside my bed, pulled off her black leather vest, and I saw the gun inked into her flesh, just over her heart.
Apparently, though, Sapphire and Etta Mae felt differently about the subject. When they came back down the hall, Sapphire was carrying a rifle.
The truck was still tearing up the road, back and forth in front of the house.
“I should just leave,” I offered.
“No, you’re not,” said Sapphire. “Not now. Not with them out there. Don’t worry, I have a plan. Just stay away from that window in the mean time.”
“Let’s move back to the kitchen table,” said Etta Mae. The tone was more of an order than a request. She softened it by saying, “I thought we could pass the time by playing Monopoly.”
I didn’t move. “Don’t you think we should call the police?” I asked, while Sapphire set up a Monopoly board. The two sisters were seated at the table, smoking fiercely.
Sapphire chuckled. “I already did. I called the sheriff’s wife. Says he’s out fox hunting. Says she’ll try to find him. I don’t want to talk to his deputies.” She took a long, graceful drag on her cigarette, then continued. “They’re all idiots and what I have to say, I have to say to the sheriff. Believe me, when he hears it, he’ll take care of those creeps out there.” She waved her cigarette towards the window. “Don’t get me wrong. We’ve got friends we can call—black and white—and if we called them, they’d be here before you could blink twice and spit. But I think we can settle this by ourselves.” She put down her cigarette and started counting out the money.
“I don’t mind trouble in the end, if that’s what it comes to. But I’m not dying to start any, if it doesn’t have to be that way.”
She gently dabbed out her cigarette in the ashtray and stood up. “I do believe we could use a drink, what do you say, ladies?” Without waiting for an answer, she headed back into the kitchen.
She came back with three cans of beer and three glasses. “Now, look here what I found. I keep these around for the man who does our lawn work. You know how a man who’s been working out in the heat appreciates a cold beer.”
Etta Mae said, “No need for tall tales, Sapphire. I have an intuition that Laurie won’t think any less of us if we own up to taking an occasional sip of beer now and then.”
I agreed that I would not think less of the sisters, and started right in on my can. They chose me banker, and the game commenced.
While we played, I talked. I told them everything. Why I had come, everything that had happened so far, every little detail I’d learned. I even told them about Forrest Miller, and how I’d run into him at the Klan rally, and then gotten some Klansmen pissed off, so that now I couldn’t tell who was chasing me or why. We kept playing, moving around our silly little silver-colored pieces, getting in and out of jail. Collecting two hundred dollars every time we passed Go. We were all listening to the truck outside, but we didn’t mention it. I did flinch once. The roaring sound got so loud that I thought the truck was going to bust right through the front wall. Etta Mae saw me, and reached over and patted my hand. “They’re just trying to scare us. That’s all.”
Sapphire looked up from where she was rearranging all the hotels she had on Boardwalk. “Well, they are succeeding in that,” she said drily.
“So what is it?” I finally demanded, unable to wonder any longer. “What is it that you know that they don’t want told? What is the deep dark secret? Do you know what really happened to your husband, Etta Mae?”
I thought I might have gone too far. She was clearly nervous, her eyes darted like hunted birds. She shook her head no, but didn’t say anything.
Instead, Sapphire answered. “I’ll tell you how much I’ve guessed. He got into trouble. He did something foolish and he got himself killed. If it were anyone but Elijah, I’d say it could be anything. Maybe some white man didn’t like the way he tipped his hat. But knowing what I do about Elijah, I always figured it was a woman.”
Etta Mae nodded, her eyes down. She was fiddling with her little metal top hat, turning it over and over in her hands.
Sapphire went on. “One thing worried me all these years, though. If he got involved with a white woman, or even if he just said something to a white woman, or even if somebody thought he might have said something, they would have lynched him in a big to-do. The whole purpose would be to make sure all the uppity niggers knew about it. A warning.” She spat out the words like they stung her mouth, then paused, lit another cigarette. “They murdered him all right, but quiet like. Just left his body in a river. Not hanging in a tree, no burning cross. So this is what I always figured. He did something that was so stupid they killed him for it, but whatever it was also reflected so shamefully on the white folks that they kept it quiet.”
In the silence after Sapphire’s question, I strained to hear sounds of a motor outside. Nothing. Maybe whoever it was had gone. Or maybe they had parked the truck and were sneaking around the house right now. Maybe they were going to murder us all.
Etta Mae spoke into the silence. She put down the top hat, and her voice was clear and firm. “It was a woman. A girl, really. A high school child. Not any older than you were, Sapphire, when he started messing with you. White girl. Her family had packed her off to a mental hospital once before, for whoring with the Mexican workers in her father’s orange groves. Just lay right down in the sand between a row of trees and took them all on, one after the other.
“So when her daddy caught wind of her and Elijah, he wanted the situation taken care of. But not advertised, with a burning cross, or Elijah’s body found hanging from a tree. In the end, they dumped his body in the river so the papers would say he drowned. The girl was so easy, you see.” Here she laughed, a hard, sharp humorless bark. “Any other girl or woman in town, they would of called it rape. But even Forrest Miller couldn’t have claimed that anyone, even a nigger boy, raped Billie Miller. Her name was Belinda, but everyone called her Billie. Not a soul would have believed she’d been raped.”
We sat in silence. When she’d said Forrest’s name, I had felt a shock go through me. Forrest had been involved in Elijah’s death. And so had Susan’s sister, Billie. The silver-framed picture of her at the Miller’s flashed into my head. I could hear Susan’s voice, across the years, saying, “That’s my sister. She’s away, where she can get special care. Momma goes to visit her.” And I had thought that it was one of those family embarrassments, that she was retarded or maybe just feeble-minded. So I hadn’t asked anymore. I hadn’t even wondered how Susan felt having a sister put away in a home somewhere. Finally I managed to ask, “What happened to her? What happened to Billie Miller?”
Etta Mae looked me straight in the eye. “Packed her right back to the looney bin. Tassahatchee Mental Institute. She’s probably there still.”
“The slut,” hissed Sapphire.
“Don’t blame her,” snapped Etta. “That poor child must have been out of her mind. I was surprised her father didn’t kill her, too. Old Elijah, though, he was strutting around his last few weeks. He must have thought he was something, slipping it to her like that. I bet he didn’t even see what was coming. More dick than brains. That child surely knew what was going to happen to her in the end. I think that must have been what she wanted.
I think she wanted to get away from her father’s house that bad.”
“How did you come to know so much about this girl?” asked Sapphire.
Etta’s face tightened, and she looked away. “I worked in the Miller house.”
Sapphire was shocked. ‘You cleaned house? Sweet Lord of Mercy, it’s a good thing Daddy died never knowing that. ‘I didn’t raise my girls to scrub white folks’ toilets,’ how many times did he say that?”
Quiet tears ran down Etta Mae’s face.
“I’m sorry,” said Sapphire, helpless sadness in her voice. “I’m sorry. I don’t mean to make you feel any worse.”
“I did what I had to,” said Etta Mae, ignoring the tears. “Men came calling for me before Elijah. Daddy didn’t think they were good enough for me. Men who worked with their hands. He’d raised his daughters for something better, that’s what he said. But for what? I had a college degree, but there weren’t any teaching jobs around here. He wouldn’t let me go North. What was I to do?
“And even Daddy was fooled by Elijah’s smooth ways and nice clothes at first. About the time Daddy was starting to see through him, Elijah talked me into running away to marry him. Problem was, Elijah underestimated Daddy. Didn’t dream he’d abandon me completely, refuse to send us a cent. Not even a wedding gift. So when Elijah couldn’t find any work ‘befitting his situation in the community,’ what was I to do? I took what work I could find to feed us both.”
We sat in the silence, thinking about that for awhile. Then Sapphire, said, gently, “Well, it’s good we are finally talking. Things are in the open now. In all these long years, I’ve never once been able to poke you in the side with my elbow and say, ‘My, wasn’t that Elijah a fine companion in the sack.’ For all his faults, he had that one fine quality. That was the best thing that ever happened to me, and, until now, we’ve never been able to share it.” She sat back in her chair, a smile on her face. Boy, did I like her just then.
“The best thing that ever happened to you! Why, Sapphire! He left you in trouble. He ruined your life.”
“It was worth it,” Sapphire insisted.
“A roll in the hay with Elijah was worth it! Come on, Sapphire, he just wasn’t that good. What he had in confidence, he lacked in technique. He may have been cocky, but that isn’t the same thing as being good with his cock!”
Sapphire’s smile faded. She sat up, grasped the edge of the table with both hands. “How would you know?”
“You don’t think Elijah is the only man I’ve ever had, do you, Sapphire?”
“What do you mean?” Sapphire asked sharply.
“You want me to say it right out loud, Sapphire? Okay, here goes. I’ve had others, and I’ve had better.” She spoke defiantly, proudly. This was something that she’d needed to say for a long time. But the moment she finished speaking, her resolve crumbled some and she collapsed a bit.
Sapphire was obviously flabbergasted. “What? You’ve kept this from me all these years, Etta Mae, acted and pretended and flat out lied that you were a respectable lady?”
I’d been just sitting there, enjoying the show for quite a while by then. I had the feeling that without an audience, without me there, they never would have been telling each other these things.
“Well, I don’t have to tell you, you know. Some things a lady keeps to herself,” said Etta with dignity.
“At least tell me this. Tell me you’re referring to things that happened a long time ago. That I can understand. When I succumbed, I was young and foolish, and I thought I was in love with Elijah. And then you were an awful young widow. I can understand you might have felt the need for a man’s company. Just tell me that you’re not running around with men behind my back at your age!”
Etta Mae’s smile then was a bit self-satisfied. “Let me just tell you that there’s something Wallace Henry appreciates more than a cold beer on a hot day. You don’t really think he does such a careful job pruning the shrubs because of the measly little amount you pay him every week, do you?”
Sapphire was speechless at first, then recovered just long enough to gasp, “You slut,” and collapsed back in her chair.
I felt that it was time for intervention. “Please, I think we have to get back to the subject here. It’s getting late and out there,” I pointed to the window, “are some people who don’t mean us well. We’re in this together and we’ve got to get organized here.”
I turned to Etta Mae. “It’s time to stop fooling around and tell me everything you know about Elijah’s death. Why you think it has something to do with those thugs driving up and down the street out there.”
To my surprise, she told me. “I could tell what was going on, even though Elijah probably thought he was doing a fine job of hiding it. Meanwhile, Billie was doing everything she could to make sure her folks knew. They were meeting in orange groves, down by the beach, out at Deadman’s Creek.
“If I knew what was going on, you can be sure that Forrest knew. He’d been watching Billie like a hawk ever since she got back from Tassahatchee the first time. Billie disappeared one afternoon. Elijah didn’t show up to pick me up from work that evening. Mrs. Miller, she gave me a ride home. Not all the way, mind you. A white lady didn’t drive her car alone down Piney Woods Road. After she dropped me off, I walked the mile or so home. I had gotten accustomed to Elijah’s unexplained absences, so I didn’t really miss him until I woke up the next morning and he was still not there. Well, that had happened before, too. I got a ride into town in the back of a truck full of grove workers. When I got to the Miller house, I knew right away. Knew that this was the day I’d been waiting for, been dreading, but had known was coming. I’d known that being Mrs. Miller’s colored help wasn’t the only misery I was destined for. That was only a kind of a hallway to hell, and I was fixing to be ushered into the main room.
“The exact truth of what had happened dawned on me in little bits, all day long. Mr. Miller was in Billie’s room. She was screaming and crying and carrying on. I was doing the breakfast dishes when Dr. Foster arrived. He went back to her bedroom, and pretty soon she got quiet. I guess he gave her some kind of shot. I remember wishing someone would give me a shot like that. Something to dull the pain. Felt I deserved that, at the very least.
“Groups of men came in and out of the house, off and on, all day. Mostly they just ignored me, of course. Like I was a piece of furniture. Sometimes, though, I caught someone looking at me, and the way they were looking told me I was right to be afraid. A lot of men. All day long. Some would go, some would come, some of them were just there. They spent a lot of time in Mr. Miller’s study. With the door shut.”
Here she stopped for a minute. When she continued, her voice was dreamy, like she had forgotten Sapphire and I were there and she was just talking to herself. “I hated that room most of all. Of all the rooms in that house, I hated it the most.
“It stunk of that nasty cigar Mr. Miller was always smoking, for one thing. And it looked ridiculous! The rest of the house was all light and Florida-looking, but he did up his ‘study’ like he was some lord in some English manor house. Dark paneled walls, mahogany desk, heavy leather couch and chairs. And bookshelves full of books. I hated him for those books more than anything else. No, that’s not true. I hated what he did to Billie, to his own daughter, more than anything. But anyway, he had rows and rows and rows of books. All with the same leather cover. He got them all from one of those companies. They sent him ‘guaranteed classics,’ one a month. He never read them. I’d bet good money on that. Never.” She snorted with derision. “I so missed having something, anything, to read. There wasn’t a single book in that shack Elijah took me to. I would have liked an indoor toilet. I would have liked hot running water. But I think I could have taken it better if we’d had some books.
“I knew better than to try to use the Port Mullet Public Library. Besides, it was a pitiful little thing.” She looked at Sapphire again. “I only saw it from the outside, but from the looks of it, there
weren’t as many books in that library as you and I kept in our bedrooms here at home. I couldn’t keep from hoping that you and Daddy would send me something to read.”
“I didn’t know,” said Sapphire softly. “I didn’t think.”
Etta Mae went on as if Sapphire hadn’t spoken. “I coveted those books. I did. And it wasn’t fair that he had them and never even looked at them, while I was aching for a chance to read them.”
“Couldn’t you have asked to borrow?” I broke in.
She shook her head slowly. “Of course not.” She thought it over, and then shook her head more vigorously. “No, I could not.”
“But you being trained as a teacher and all...”
She stopped shaking her head and looked at me, puzzled. “What makes you think they knew that?”
“Well, didn’t they?”
“Oh, Laurie.” She sighed, and waited, as if trying to decide if she had the energy to deal with my ignorance. “I was a good worker, and a good cook. That’s all they wanted to know about me. If they knew anymore, they probably wouldn’t have kept me.”
Sapphire was growing restless. “I’m gonna call the sheriff ’s wife again,” she said. “Tell him to get the word to those guys out there that they can end their little visit. I’ll let him know, in an oblique sort of way, that we haven’t told you a thing. That we don’t need some outside agitator looking into the water under the bridge, as it were. Then I’ll get him to promise safe passage for you.”
“How are you going to do that?” I asked, surprised.
“Won’t be hard,” she said. “I got a little something I’ve been saving for just the right occasion. Alice Parson, our cousin’s wife, she does the washing and the ironing for the sheriff ’s wife. She told me about some bright-pink lipstick she keeps encountering on the sheriff ’s uniform shirts. Well, I put two and two together, how the sheriff ’s young secretary overdoes it with her make-up, and how the sheriff’s cruiser is parked by the woods near that secretary’s house on a good number of the nights when her husband is out of town, and well… let’s just say I’ve got a feeling he will cooperate.”