The trees, p.10
The Trees, page 10
“Since when do you eat meat?” Gertrude asked.
“I figured, what’s the difference? I was probably only going to prolong my life for a few minutes at best. And also, how many cows would I be saving? In fact, when you think about it, since no one’s going to raise domestic cows for fun, and since they’re too stupid to exist in the wild, then I’m really helping to save the species from extinction.”
“That’s warped reasoning,” Gertrude said.
“But reasoning nonetheless.”
“There’s a place up ahead where we can eat,” Gertrude said. “It will give you an idea of where you are.”
“I think I can see where we are. I’ve been in the middle of fucking nowhere before and it looked just like this.” Damon looked at the rundown, roadside food shack as Gertrude skidded to a stop on the gravel. “Maybe I’m not hungry.”
“Shut up,” she said.
The sign read Bluegum’s. It was a cinderblock structure with no windows in the front. Smoke rose from a chimney. There were three other cars, nondescript like Gertrude’s.
“This is a restaurant?”
“Trust me.”
41
At MBI headquarters in Hattiesburg, Jim Davis and Ed Morgan sat at a conference table in a room with big windows. They looked down on the Confederate monument across the street next to the courthouse.
“Look at that piece of shit,” Jim said. “Looks like a big White dick.”
“Now that’s funny,” Ed said.
“You think so.”
“Stop making fun of White people,” the director of the agency said as he entered the room. His name was Lester Safer. He was born in Mississippi, educated in Washington, DC, and truly believed that Mississippi didn’t have to be Mississippi. With him was a tall woman with a serious demeanor. “Men, this is Special Agent Herberta Hind of the FBI. It seems ghosts are the business of the feds.”
Ed and Jim nodded hello.
“As far as I know the Bureau has no interest in ghosts,” Hind said. “We are, on the other hand, interested in possible hate crimes.” She looked at Ed and Jim. “Good morning, gentlemen. What can you tell me about Money, Mississippi?”
“Well, it’s chock-full of know-nothing peckerwoods stuck in the prewar nineteenth century and living proof that inbreeding does not lead to extinction,” Jim said. “No offense, chief.”
“I’ll take your word on that,” Safer said. “I do want to point out to you that I’m from the state of Mississippi and that I grew up with these know-nothing, pre–Civil War, inbred peckerwoods.”
“So, you don’t agree that they are stupid miscreants?” Hind asked.
“Oh no, I agree,” Safer said. “You know, it’s just that it’s okay if I say it since they’re sort of my people. And I guess I don’t agree completely.”
“What don’t you agree with?” Hind asked.
“The extinction part. They’re pretty much on the way out.”
“So, who killed whom?” she asked.
“I’m sure you’ve read the file,” Ed said. He paused. “I’m assuming you’ve read the file.”
“Yes,” Hind said.
“Then you know what we know,” Ed said. He tossed a glance toward Jim.
“The good folks of Money want to believe our dead Black man killed the two White men,” Jim said.
“What do you think?” Hind asked.
“I don’t know. He was holding their testicles in his fists. But I have no idea how they could have killed him while he was killing them.”
Ed put the cigarette that he never lit between his lips.
“Not twice anyway,” Jim said. “You ever hear of somebody dying twice? Anyplace but a Bond movie.”
Hind shook her head. “Report says that you brought the Black body back to Hattiesburg with you.”
“The people in Money couldn’t seem to keep up with him,” Ed said.
“So, you think somebody took his body?”
“Dead people don’t walk,” Jim said.
“Except for Jesus,” Safer said.
“Yeah, him, I guess,” Jim said. “Anyway, the body is downstairs with the medical examiner, if you’d care to join us.”
“Let’s go,” Hind said.
The Medical Examiner was a fifty-year-old British woman named Helvetica Quip. She had come to Mississippi with her Mississippian husband, who turned out to be a clumsy pyramid-scheme con artist. Ferris New, the husband, had skedaddled out of the state in the middle of the night before his arraignment. Helvetica Quip claimed no ill feelings toward the man and refused to play the victim, but said only that she was relieved that she had not taken the man’s last name. “Helvetica New,” she would say, “sounds like the name of a font. If I’m going to be named after a font, it’s going to be Oriya Sangam or something with some exotic flare.”
“Talk to us, Helvetica,” Jim said as they entered the examination lab.
“Guess what? The DNA turned up nothing because your sample was no good,” she said.
“How is that possible?” Ed said. “I did it by the book.”
“You didn’t do it wrong,” Helvetica said. “But there’s no blood in this guy. He’s full of a mixture of formaldehyde, glutaraldehyde, methanol, and some solvents I didn’t bother to identify.”
Jim, Ed, and Hind looked at her.
“Embalming fluid. This man was embalmed.”
They stood silently while this sank in.
“Okay, but are you saying there is no DNA to be had?” Jim said.
“I didn’t say that,” Helvetica said. “I had plenty of tissue to work with. And I got a hit. This man was in the database. He was arrested for carjacking and kidnapping twelve years ago in Illinois.”
“That doesn’t make any sense,” Ed said.
“It gets better,” Helvetica said. “He died in prison. The Big Muddy River Correctional Center, to be precise. How is unclear. But he was severely beaten about the face and head.” She paused. “And it gets better. Mr. Hemphill’s body—that was his name, Robert Hemphill—was, as we say, donated to science.”
“Donated to science?” Hind said.
“You know, medical school, some lab somewhere. I don’t know. That’s where I lose him. He was picked up by Ace Cadaver Supply of Chicago. That’s all.”
“So, it’s not the body of Emmett Till?” Ed asked.
They all looked at him.
“Somebody had to ask,” he said.
“It’s not Emmett Till,” Quip said.
42
The Doctor Reverend Cad Fondle was sitting in his living room with his wife, Fancel. Fancel was a big woman, big enough that she hardly ever moved from her corduroy recliner, which was stuck in recline. There was a half a meat lover’s pizza and two beers on the foldout tray between her recliner and her husband’s. They were watching television, switching back and forth between Fox News and professional wrestling.
“They’s right,” Fancel said. “That Obamacare don’t work worth a hill of puppy shit. We done bought in, causin’ we had to, and I ain’t lost nary a pound.”
Fondle took long pull on his beer. “Well, the country’s done with that experiment. Smart-ass uppity sumbitch. You know he thinks he’s better’n us.”
“That Hannity is cute,” Fancel said. “If I could get my hand anywhere near my vajayjay, I’d rub me one out just watchin’ him.”
“You can’t reach it, so shut up.”
“How did the cross burning go the other night?” Fancel asked.
“It’s called a lightin’, a cross lightin’. It ain’t right to burn a symbol of our Lawd Jesus H. Christ. I would think you knowed that by now.”
Fancel sighed. “What’s the H for?”
“What?”
“The H in Jesus H. Christ, what’s it for?” She picked some pepperoni from a crease in her house dress.
Fondle paused to regard her with his head cocked. “Why, it stands for, um, heaven, that’s right.”
“Jesus Heaven Christ? That don’t make good sense.”
“What would make sense to you?” Fondle asked.
“I don’t know,” she said. “Herschel, maybe.”
“Why?”
“It’s a nice name and it’s a name. Heaven ain’t no name.”
“It’s the name of a place, so it’s a name. In fact, the place is named after our Lord,” Fondle said, his eyes narrowed.
“Why ain’t the place just called Jesus or Jesusburg?”
“Shut up and eat.”
“Tell me about that boy,” Fancel said. “That Black boy what keeps showin’ up dead. How come he done that?”
“Could be he weren’t dead. Hell, I don’t know.”
“You know what they be sayin’,” she said.
“What’s that?”
“That he’s the ghost of that boy Robert Bryant and J. W. kilt all them years back. They say he come back to get revenge. I guess he got it.”
“Hush yo mouth, woman. Ain’t no such thing true.”
“How you explain it then?” Fancel pointed a fat finger at him. “And don’t you tell me to shut up. You got stuff coming to you.”
Fondle wanted to, started to tell her to shut up, but didn’t. Instead he grabbed his New Reader’s Bible from under his La-Z-Boy and opened it. He held it open there in his lap while he pointed at the wrestlers on the television screen. “Big Bob Burgess is goin’ kill that little nigger.”
43
Everyone in the Bluegum was Black except for the one waiter who came to Gertrude and Damon’s table. He was lean, tall, and wore a blue T-shirt that said Rescued by Jesus on the front. There were a few patrons, well-dressed young Black men and women. They did not look up or in any way regard the entrance of Gertrude and Damon. At a window in the back a cook slapped a bell, and a muscular man collected the plates.
“Hey, Gertrude,” the waiter said.
“Hi, Chester,” Gertrude said. “Chester Hobnobber, this is Damon Thruff. Damon, Chester.”
“Hey, man, how you doing?” Chester said.
“Very well, thank you. And you?” Damon asked.
“Good, man, good.” Chester looked to Gertrude. “So, what brings you down here? Got tired of the big city?”
“Big city?” Damon asked.
“He’s being funny,” Gertrude said. “He’s talking about Money. It is not a city. It’s a shithole where people have put some buildings.”
“What do you want to drink?” Chester asked.
“Bring me a Kool-Aid,” Gertrude said. “You should try it,” she said to Damon. “It’s great.”
“I don’t like the sound of that,” Damon said. “But, okay.”
“Be right back.” Chester walked away.
“What’s with the shirt?” Damon asked. “Jesus?”
“We’re in Mississippi, Damon.”
“How do you know him?” Damon asked.
“I know everybody in here,” she said. “This is a small world. What’s that Disney song? ‘It’s a small world after all,’” she sang.
Damon looked about the room and saw that everyone was looking at them. They were not so much smiling as nodding in a friendly way. It was then that he realized that there were more people present that he had previously noted.
“What going on here?” Damon asked.
“Nothing, just a restaurant. A restaurant with friendly people. Don’t you like restaurants with friendly people?”
“It strikes me that you are being cryptic. What are you trying to tell me? Are you trying to tell me something?”
“And just why would I be trying to tell you something?” She cocked her head like a puppy.
“See, that’s cryptic,” Damon said.
Gertrude laughed. “In due time, my brother.”
44
“Hold still, Charlene,” Daisy Milam said. “This here is a big one. I mean a big one. How you let them get like this?”
Charlene Bryant lay on her belly in front of the television. “You think that Nicole Kidman got any on her back? Look at her there. She looks so perfect, so tall, so White. And married to that singer.”
“She is tall,” Daisy said. “Triple J, you get down off that china cabinet right now. I swear he gonna break every dish in that thing. Hold still, I say.”
“Hot Mama Yeller,” Lulabelle said, “when Aunt Daisy is done squishin’ yo pimples, can we go home?”
“No, baby, we gonna eat pizza here.”
“Awwww,” the child said.
“It will be fun, Lulabelle. We got us a meat lover’s on the way with extra sausage,” Daisy said. “Come over here and look at this big one.”
Lulabelle stepped close. “Yuck.”
“It’s comin’,” Daisy said.
“Ewwwww,” the child said.
“There she goes!”
“Ouch!” Charlene screamed.
“That’s gross,” Lulabelle cried.
“It’s all over the place,” Daisy said. “Lulabelle, go get me a bunch of paper towels and wet one of ’em.”
“Daisy,” Charlene said, “did you ever get all that blood cleaned up? ’Cause I sure didn’t. That grout’s gonna be pink forever.”
“It’s in the cracks,” Daisy said. “I found something when I was cleaning up though.”
“Was it a little cross?”
“Why yes it was. How did you know?” Daisy asked.
“I found one too. And I know Wheat ain’t had no little cross.”
“You think that nigger left them crosses for us to find? You think maybe he was a Christian man?”
“Niggers usually is. I wonder why he left them crosses. You got yourn?” Charlene asked.
“Got it right here,” Daisy said. “I put it on a chain round my neck.”
“Looks just exactly like mine. I keep it in my little pocket here in my jeans. They’s pretty little crosses.”
Daisy nodded.
“Makes me feel good to rub mine through my jeans.”
“Here are the paper towels,” Lulabelle said.
“Took you long enough,” Charlene said.
“Now, let me clean up all this pus. That pizza gonna be here any minute.”
“Mama, Triple J is playing in the back room,” one of Daisy’s children reported, breathless.
“Lord, have mercy,” Daisy said. “That boy ain’t got sense enough to piss out of a boot with the directions wrote on the heel. Lulabelle, come over here and wipe that shit off your mama’s back.”
“Okay, Aunt Daisy. Hold still, Hot Mama Yeller,” the girl said.
45
Ed Morgan sat in the back of the black Cadillac Escalade. Herberta Hind drove, and Jim Davis sat in the passenger seat. They were cruising along the highway toward Money, past shacks sitting off the ground on squat brick pillars, past spent cornfields and sad-looking, rib-bare cows.
Jim rubbed his hand across the black dash. “Don’t you think this vehicle is a bit of a cliché?”
“I like it,” Ed said from the back. “I’m comfortable.”
“We use these because they are cliché,” Hind said. “We’re the FBI. We are walking clichés.”
“Do you like the agency?” Jim asked.
Hind tilted her head and looked at him. “I hate every last motherfucker there, White, Black, and Asian.”
“Don’t mince words,” Ed said.
“So, why stay?” Jim asked.
“Why are you in the, what do you call it, the MBI? That’s funny.”
“This is Mississippi,” Ed said. “Somebody Black had better watch these White folks down here. Because for a lot of these crazy folks, it’s still nineteen fifty.”
“Shit, eighteen fifty,” Jim said.
“Not just here,” Hind said.
Another couple of miles slipped by.
“Do you really think going to Money is going help this investigation?” Ed asked.
“Not really, but that’s how we investigate, isn’t it?” she said.
Jim grunted an agreement.
“Anyway, it’s worth seeing this place, these people,” Ed said. “I also think that we’re not done. For a minute I thought we were dealing with the ghost of Emmett Till. How crazy is that?”
“Maybe we are dealing with a ghost,” Hind said.
Jim gave her a sidelong glance. “Whatchu talking about, Willis?”
“Unless you think that the folks in Money are suffering shared hallucinations, that they really did have a dead guy disappear and reappear at another murder scene. And it doesn’t get better when we find out that body has been dead for years. The ghost theory is looking pretty good.”
“Either way it’s fucked up,” Jim said.
“Are you men from Mississippi?”
“Biloxi,” Ed said.
“New Orleans,” from Jim. “My mother was from Hattiesburg. You? Where are you from, Special Agent Hind?”
“Washington, DC,” she said. “Sixteenth and T, to be precise. Poor little Black girl grows up to be an FBI agent. Classic American story.”
“Why did you become a cop?” Jim asked.
“Why did you?” Hind asked.
Jim and Ed together, “So Whitey wouldn’t be the only one in the room with a gun.”
Hind fist-bumped Jim.
Hind adjusted her mirror. “Well, look here,” she said.
Ed glanced behind them. “A Mississippi Straight Pooper,” he said. “And, of course, he’s lighting us up.”
“Wanna have some fun?” Hind asked.
“Don’t get us shot, Special Agent Hind,” Ed said. “Remember this is the sovereign state of Mississippi.”
Hind pulled over onto the shoulder.
Jim sang, “I wish I was a Mississippi trooper, that is what I truly long to be / cause if I was a Mississippi trooper, I could shoot them niggers legally.”
“Catchy,” Hind said. “Are you kidding me?” She was looking into the mirror.
The tall trooper approaching them wore a wide-brimmed hat and mirrored glasses. He had plenty of swagger in his gait. His hand found and rested on his sidearm as he arrived at Hind’s window.
