Cottonwood Whispers

by Jennifer Erin Valent

  My hands gripped the edge of his desk so hard my knuckles paled, and Daddy reached over to peel one of them away. He tucked it inside both of his hands and sighed. “Reckon it’s fine with me, Jessilyn. Long as you run it by your momma and make sure she can spare you some days. I know she’s needed you to take on some of Gemma’s chores along with your own now that Gemma’s workin’.”

  “I’ll ask her, Daddy.” I put my free arm around him and laid my head on top of his. “You know, now that I’m workin’, I can help out around here with my pay.”

  “Jessilyn, it’s my place to make the money for this family, and I’m gonna do that. I don’t want you feelin’ a burden over this.”

  “Ain’t no reason I can’t help out around here. What else have I got to spend my money on that’s worth somethin’, anyhow?”

  “That ain’t the point. I got me responsibilities, and one of them is supportin’ this family. And that’s what I’m gonna do.”

  Worries were plentiful enough for us just then, so I decided to keep any arguments for another time. “Yes’r,” I murmured. “Guess I’d better go talk to Momma.”

  Daddy squeezed my hand between his two and then let me go. “You do that, baby. And don’t you worry about money. That’s in the Lord’s hands, and we got to trust in that.”

  I wasn’t much sure about that, but I didn’t say a word as I left him behind in the shed. I found Momma on the porch, fanning herself with a magnolia leaf.

  “Sounds like a right nice way to spend a summer, Jessilyn,” she said when I asked her. “I can get by just fine. Long as you can keep up with your regular chores.”

  So I made the trek down the road in the building morning heat, my steps instinctively slowing as I neared Miss Cleta’s house. Just the sight of the Colbys’ house next door got my heart racing. I put my head down and walked on, determined to keep my eyes from wandering anywhere I didn’t want them to.

  I found Miss Cleta fussing with some weeds in her front garden, and I immediately bent down to join her.

  “Land’s sake!” she muttered when she saw me. “Weeds are the doin’ of Satan, the way I see it. They just pop up and bother people for no reason other than to bother them.”

  “Let me get them for you, Miss Cleta. Momma and Daddy agreed on me workin’ for you, so I may as well start now.”

  She leaned back and smiled, the wrinkles beside her eyes deepening. “Well, that’s happy news around these parts, and no doubt I needed some. But I’ll work alongside of you while my back says it’s okay. I find it ain’t a bad job with you for company.” She took her gardening gloves off and handed them to me. “Here. I don’t want your pretty young hands gettin’ all dirty.”

  I held my hands out to her and said, “My hands ain’t pretty. Anyways, no reason why you should get your hands dirty but I shouldn’t.”

  “Well then, I’ll have to pick up a pair for you in town today. Ain’t no young lady should have dirty fingernails.”

  We worked side by side for quite some time without a shortage of chatter before she finally stood up slowly, listing a bit to the right before she steadied herself. “I declare,” she said, fanning herself with her hand. “Ain’t no good to gettin’ old, Miss Jessilyn. It’s gettin’ so I can’t even bend over no more without takin’ a spell.”

  I took the spade she carried in her hand. “I can be just as stubborn as you, Miss Cleta. I ain’t bein’ paid to watch you work, and since it’s botherin’ you to do it, I’ll do it myself. Seems to me you can set and talk with me just as easy as you can pull weeds and talk with me.”

  Miss Cleta took a seat on a nearby bench and wiped her forehead. “Well, I’m too old to argue,” she conceded with a smile.

  “You ain’t never too old to argue with nobody. You’ll be arguin’ till your dyin’ day.”

  Miss Cleta let out a hoot and shuffled into the house to get us some lemonade. I worked in the garden for the next hour, did a little ironing with Miss Cleta bending my ear all the while, and then we settled down for some dinner. After I’d had my fill of cold ham, potato salad—and a little sweet, of course—Miss Cleta announced that she wanted me to accompany her on some errands.

  “This is my goin’ into town day. Lionel Stokes is due to pick me up in his taxicab soon, and I could use some extra hands if you don’t mind comin’ along.”

  “No, ma’am. A little stroll through town today would do me good. Change of scenery, and all.”

  Miss Cleta looked me over and waved a hand at me. “You best go on home and change into somethin’ else. You’ve got dirt all over you, and a young lady ain’t got call to go into town all smudged up.”

  I looked down at my clothes and nodded my head in agreement. “S’pose so. I could use a little washin’.”

  “Well, you go on home and wash up, and Mr. Stokes and I will pick you up in about an hour.”

  I hurried home, though I knew it wouldn’t take me any time to get ready. Sure enough, I was finished in far less than an hour, so I sat on a porch rocker waiting for the taxi. When it arrived, I found Miss Cleta all dolled up and smelling like gardenias.

  “Good day, Miss Jessilyn,” Mr. Stokes said. “You look mighty fine this afternoon.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Stokes.”

  “Now, Lionel, you keep your eyes on the road and off the pretty girls,” Miss Cleta said. “I don’t want no accidents while I’m sittin’ back here.”

  “I always give the ladies respect, Miss Cleta. You know that. I got my eyes in my head for sure.”

  “See that you do.”

  Mr. Stokes took a quick look over his shoulder at me. “Ain’t seen much of Miss Gemma lately. She doin’ poorly or somethin’?”

  I cocked an eyebrow and leaned toward the front seat. “Ain’t you seen her at the colored church, Mr. Stokes?”

  “No, ma’am, I ain’t. Seems to me she ain’t been in some weeks. My missus was just sayin’ yesterday, ‘Ain’t seen Gemma Teague in a spell, don’t it seem?’ and I said I figured she was right.”

  I leaned back in the seat and wrapped my arms around my middle. Gemma had been claiming to go to church every Sunday morning, and now I knew she was lying to me, something I never would have expected from my Gemma.

  I could tell by her sideways glances that Miss Cleta could see I was worried, but she decorously held her tongue while we were in the taxi. It was once we were out on the sidewalk that she questioned me.

  “You and Gemma havin’ trouble?” she asked as she studied a hat in a store window.

  I pondered how much I might want to say to Miss Cleta. “Don’t know yet,” I replied. “Seems she’s keepin’ things from me. She ain’t never kept things from me before.”

  “She’s a grown woman now. Maybe she’s just tryin’ to figure some things out.”

  “If she’s a grown woman now, then she shouldn’t have as much to figure out, should she?”

  We walked along for a while longer before she spoke again. “You think Gemma’s been actin’ strange lately then?”

  “Yes’m.”

  She cleared her throat a little uncomfortably, something I didn’t see Miss Cleta do very often. “She’s been tellin’ you she’s goin’ to church on Sundays?”

  “Yes’m, she has. So now she’s been lyin’ to me, too.”

  “Well, I don’t want to be passin’ tales, but . . .”

  I stopped dead and looked pleadingly at her. “Oh, Miss Cleta, if you got news on Gemma, please tell me. She’s got me worried sick, and she won’t tell me nothin’. Nothin’ at all!”

  She leaned closer to me and said, “I seen her passin’ my house every Sunday mornin’. And you know she doesn’t have to go past my house to get to the colored church. She goes on up the road, carrying her purse like she always does on her way to work at the Hadleys’.”

  “Why would she go to work on a Sunday? She don’t work on weekends.”

  “Well now, that’s what I been thinkin’, and last time she went by, I called ‘yoo-hoo’ to her
, and she never turned to look my way one bit. She seemed to be thinkin’ too hard to notice me.” Miss Cleta brushed a drop of sweat from her powdered forehead. “I declare, she’s actin’ mighty strange these days, and she done got me worried.”

  “I know. She’s got me worried too. I told you, I’m all tied in knots.”

  She put a quieting hand on my back and nodded ahead of us. “Mrs. Packard’s comin’,” she said in a whisper. “Let her hear anythin’ and it’ll be all over town before you can blink twice.”

  True to her character, Mrs. Packard never issued us a greeting but started right in on a juicy tidbit the moment we met up with her.

  “Well, Cleta, what do you think of this nasty business?” she asked in a flustered tone.

  “Imogene, I ain’t got a speck of an idea what you’re talkin’ about,” Miss Cleta answered in exasperation. “As usual.”

  “I’m talkin’ about Elmer Poe, of course. That boy’s always been daft, don’t you know, and now he’s gone and gotten himself good and in a fix. Everyone in Calloway knew it would come to this someday.”

  Miss Cleta’s face creased into concern the minute Mr. Poe’s name came up, and she steadied herself against the side of a building. “Now, just what is everyone in this infernal town puttin’ blame on Elmer Poe for?”

  “For runnin’ down the poor Colby girl, of course. He’s always been a nuisance behind the wheel of his momma’s old jalopy, and now the sheriff’s gone and picked him up.”

  “Mr. Poe’s bein’ blamed?” I cried. “Mr. Poe would never have done that and just left her there. He’s got one of the kindest hearts I know.”

  “You don’t know a soul like you think you do sometimes, Jessilyn. You of all people ought to remember that.”

  “Well, I know Mr. Poe, and he would do no such thing.”

  “The girl’s right and you know it, Imogene,” Miss Cleta declared. “That boy’s as good as they come. He don’t even know how to keep a secret. Even if he hurt that girl by accident, he’d stop and care for her without pausin’ to think.”

  Mrs. Packard seemed offended that we didn’t sink our teeth into her news. “I don’t need to stand here and be insulted. I just thought you’d like to hear, Cleta, what’s been goin’ on in this town. After all, they found his car right busted up, and it seems a clear case despite what you’re thinkin’.”

  She skirted past us in a huff and left us to look at each other in bewilderment.

  “Mr. Poe couldn’t do nothin’ so cold, Miss Cleta,” I insisted.

  She took my arm to steady herself and began walking toward the center of town. “I know that, darlin’,” she said thoughtfully. “I know that as well as you do.”

  “Where are we goin’?” I asked as we passed by the pharmacy, where Miss Cleta had wanted to retrieve some things.

  “I’m headin’ over to that jailhouse and see what kind of nonsense is goin’ on in this town.”

  I accompanied her gladly, wanting nothing more than to go to Mr. Poe’s aid. He had always been so kind to me and my family, and I couldn’t bear the thought of him being in jail.

  “He must be frightened near to death,” I murmured. “Poor Mr. Poe.”

  The minute we walked into the jail, Miss Cleta hollered, “Charlie Clancy! Where’re you at?”

  Sheriff Clancy moseyed out of the back room. “I’m comin’, Miss Cleta. What’s got a bee in your bonnet?”

  I’d hated seeing Charlie Clancy take over when Sheriff Slater moved away, and I liked it even less now that he had Mr. Poe in his jailhouse. I didn’t trust him, and I worried even more for Mr. Poe because of it.

  “You got Elmer Poe in this here jail?” Miss Cleta demanded to know.

  The sheriff rubbed a hand over his tired face and sighed. “Yes’m, I do.” He held up his hand when Miss Cleta began to speak again. “Now, Miss Cleta, I know just what you’re gonna say, and I feel the same as you. I wouldn’t have thought Elmer Poe capable of maliciousness any more’n you, but we done found his car all beat up, and he travels over the pass near every day to go look in Mr. Kearns’s antique shop. There ain’t no other option in light of the evidence.”

  “You been a lawman for some years, Charlie. You always had cases where what you seen matched up with what was true? Your own cousin was a murderous Klansman, and you didn’t suspect a thing.”

  My stomach dropped when I heard her reference to Otis Tinker, and I swallowed hard in an attempt to push those thoughts away.

  “All right now, calm down,” Sheriff Clancy told Miss Cleta. “We’re lookin’ into things. If there’s another truth to find, we’ll find it.”

  “But now people’s minds are set on it bein’ Mr. Poe,” I argued. “I’ve seen enough of this town’s prejudice to know that once they make up their minds about somethin’, they ain’t gonna change it anytime soon. They’ll make a villain out of Mr. Poe.”

  “Jessilyn, I know you got a fondness for Elmer, but sometimes that fondness makes people a little blind to someone’s faults.”

  “Mr. Poe couldn’t have done such a thing. I know that sure and simple.”

  “I want to see him,” Miss Cleta demanded. “That poor man’s probably scared out of his wits, and two familiar faces would do him a world of good.”

  The sheriff stood there with his hands on his hips, staring at the both of us. He finally nodded slowly. “All right, Miss Cleta. You two can come on back if you like. Just don’t go slippin’ him no hacksaws or nothin’.”

  Miss Cleta smacked his arm with her pocketbook. “Get on back there with your smart tongue and take me to the boy.”

  It was a sad sight seeing Mr. Poe sitting in that jail cell. He had his arms wrapped around himself, his eyes red from tears. One of his feet was constantly tapping, and he was muttering things I couldn’t understand. But then, Mr. Poe was usually hard to understand.

  “Elmer,” Miss Cleta said quietly. “You all right there, honey?”

  Mr. Poe’s head shot up at the sound of Miss Cleta’s voice, and he jumped up and ran to us, shoving both hands through the bars.

  “There, there, now.” Miss Cleta gripped his hands and shushed him softly. “It’ll be all right, Elmer. The good Lord’s watchin’ out for you.”

  “Ah ain’t done nuthin’ wrong, Miss Cleta,” he said in his heavily accented way. “They’s sayin’ ah hurt a little girl, but ah ain’t done nuthin’ in muh life to hurt a little girl.”

  “I know that, Elmer. I know that well as I know my own name. Don’t you worry none. Truth always comes out. You’ll see.”

  “We’re just wonderin’ how your car got beat up and all, Mr. Poe,” Sheriff Clancy added. “Why don’t you tell Miss Cleta here how your momma’s automobile got so smashed up.”

  Mr. Poe started to get worked up again, and he looked desperately at me and then back at Miss Cleta. “Ah cain’t say what happened to muh momma’s automobile, Miss Cleta. Sure ’nough, ah cain’t. Ah ain’t even been out drivin’ of late.”

  “Now, Mr. Poe,” Sheriff Clancy said, “everybody in Calloway knows you head on over to the antique shop near every day. You sayin’ you ain’t been there lately? ’Cuz Mr. Kearns, he says he saw you in his shop that day the little Colby girl got hurt.”

  “Ah’s there,” Mr. Poe stammered. “Ah ain’t nevuh said ah weren’t there. Ah walked that day.”

  “That’s nearly five miles, Mr. Poe,” the sheriff exclaimed. “You tellin’ me you walked ten miles that day?”

  “Tain’t but three miles the short ways. If ah walk across fields’n things, it’s a shorter distance than takin’ roads.”

  “This boy can walk six miles easier’n most in this town,” Miss Cleta insisted. “He’s got more stamina than you or your deputies, Charlie, I can tell you that.” Miss Cleta shot a glance at Sheriff Clancy’s overlapping belly. “Seems you could use a little more walkin’ yourself.”

  “All right now, Miss Cleta,” the sheriff said after clearing his throat uncomfortably. “My need for exercise ain�
��t no evidence for court. What we need is proof that Mr. Poe weren’t drivin’ that day.”

  “Are we in America, Sheriff, or ain’t we?” Miss Cleta asked. “Seems to me what you need is proof that he did it, not that he didn’t do it.”

  “I already got proof that he did it, Miss Cleta. I got that automobile, and that’s evidence enough.”

  “But he said he wasn’t drivin’ it.”

  “But his word ain’t enough.”

  The two stood there, squared off, staring each other down while Mr. Poe stood in that cell rocking back and forth.

  I went over to him and placed a gentle hand on his arm. “It’ll be okay, Mr. Poe. Miss Cleta and I will help you. I’ll tell my daddy about it, and he’ll help too.”

  “That little girl,” Mr. Poe said to me, “she okay?”

  Truth was, I hadn’t heard any report since they’d taken Callie to the hospital, but I smiled wanly. “She’ll be fine, Mr. Poe. Don’t you worry none about that.”

  “She’s a nice little girl.”

  “Yes’r. She is. And she’ll be fine; don’t you worry none.”

  The three of us left Mr. Poe after Miss Cleta gave him one more bit of assurance that he’d soon be free.

  Once we were out in the front office, Miss Cleta lit into the sheriff again. “You know you got the wrong man, Charlie Clancy. Why ain’t you just doin’ what you know is right? You need to let that boy go.”

  Sheriff Clancy took off his hat and ran a hand through his mussed hair. “Miss Cleta, I got me a job to do. I gotta go on evidence, not on my gut.”

  “Well, you sure got enough gut to go on,” she scoffed. “That ought to be plenty of evidence.”

  “Givin’ me grief ain’t gonna change nothin’ for the better.”

  “You know, Elmer’s poor daddy will be spinnin’ in his grave. Judge Poe was a fine man of the law for some forty years before he passed, God rest his soul.”

  “I can’t release a suspect just because his daddy was a respected judge back in the day.”

  Miss Cleta started toward the door, and I followed. But she stopped stock-still before she reached it and turned to face the sheriff. “If any harm comes to that boy because of this,” she said with a shake in her voice, “it’ll be on your head, Charlie Clancy.”