Cry Me A River (15 page)

“You sure?”

“I know what I seen.”

“Why didn’t you tell the police?”

“They didn’t ask me.”

“Ain’t nobody talked to you?”

She shook her head. “And to my knowledge, they ain’t talked to Miss Mabel either.”

T
hrust inside of him, just beneath the surface, was a burning desire to cast his anxious eyes on his son’s truck. Suddenly, he was too excited to think. He wanted to believe. Irene had been so sure. She had seemed so positive. Yet there was in him a doubt that he knew could be alleviated only by seeing with his own eyes that which he found so difficult to believe. As he drove, he was hopeful, but not arrogant. This seemed too easy to be real; too good to be true.

At his in-laws’ house, he parked on the lawn close to the porch and pushed the door open, then waited. Where was the dog? He cast a cautious eye toward the house, and when he was satisfied that all was clear, he stepped to the ground and on tiptoes gingerly crossed the short distance to the porch and mounted the steps. The front door was open, and as he stepped onto the porch, he heard a mixture of voices mingling together in a low, somber rumble. He made his way next to the door and peeked inside. Through the screen door, he saw several people huddled together in the tiny living
room. Mr. Titus, his father-in-law, Miss Gertrude, his mother-in-law, and Pauline, his estranged wife, were sitting on the tiny sofa, and Reverend Jacobs was sitting in the large chair across from them. Suddenly, his muscles stiffened.

“They got company,” he mumbled.

What should he do? Maybe he ought to wait until their company left. He turned to leave, but the sound of Reverend Jacobs’s voice stopped him.

“There is something above all this,” he heard Reverend Jacobs say.

A strange feeling surged through him, and instantly, he knew they were discussing the dim plight of his condemned son. He looked at his watch. No, waiting would not work. The reverend was long winded, and waiting could take too long. There was nothing to do but interrupt them. He raised his right hand and brought it down against the frame of the rickety screen door. The door vibrated. A hush fell over the room, and then the lone sound of his father-in-law’s masculine voice rang out.

“Who is it?”

Tyrone didn’t answer; instead, he pulled the screen door open and stepped inside. Instantly, his father-in-law snapped to his feet.

“Thought I told you not to come back here?”

“Need to talk to Pauline,” Tyrone said.

“Git out my house,” the old man demanded.

“Titus!” Tyrone heard Miss Gertrude yell, shocked.

A quiet moment passed. Then Tyrone started toward Pauline, but Mr. Titus stepped in front of him and blocked his path. Tyrone paused, and in the dim light of the room, he could see deep into his father-in-law’s fiery red eyes; he could feel the warmth of his hot, stale breath.

“I mean it,” the old man said. “Git out.”

“Brother Jackson.” Reverend Jacobs snapped to his feet. He looked from one man to the other, confused.

“Not ‘til I see Pauline,” Tyrone said defiantly.

“Boy, if you don’t git out my house, you better.”

“It’s okay, Daddy.” Tyrone heard Pauline’s voice. It was soft, weak, lifeless. He looked toward her, but he could not see her. She was still sitting on the couch, and Mr. Titus was blocking his view.

“Let ‘em talk, Brother Jackson,” Reverend Jacobs said. “Let her hear what he got to say.”

Mr. Titus stepped aside, and Pauline slowly lifted her eyes to Tyrone.

“What you want?” she said.

She looked at him, and for the first time, he looked directly at her. The ordeal had taken its toll on her. Her too thin face had not only fallen, but her once smooth skin was filled with worry lines. Her beautiful brown eyes had dimmed. Now they were red and weary, and marred with crow’s feet.

“We need to talk,” Tyrone said.

“Too late for talking,” she told him.

“Pauline, can we go somewhere private?”

“Anything you got to say to her, you can say to us,” Mr. Titus said.

“This between me and my wife,” Tyrone said.

“Ain’t nothing you got to say, I want to hear,” Pauline said.

“Pauline, listen,” Tyrone pleaded.

“No,” she interrupted him. “You listen. You the cause of all this.”

“Me?” Tyrone said. “Pauline, you know better than that.”

“I tried to keep him from you,” she said. “It may have been wrong, but Lord knows I tried.”

“Pauline!”

“I tried to show him another way.”

“Pauline.”

“But I wasn’t strong enough.”

“Pauline.”

“You in his blood,” she said. “Good God Almighty. You in his blood.”

“Pauline, I need to ask you something.”

“Guess you satisfied now.”

“Pauline, I didn’t want this.”

“He was a good boy.”

“Pauline, where his truck?”

“Truck!” Mr. Titus yelled. “That’s what you after?”

“Pauline, I need to see his truck.”

“I know you ain’t crazy ‘nough to think we gone let you take that truck ‘way from here,” Titus said. “I know you ain’t that crazy, is you?”

“Pauline,” he called her name again, then knelt before her, but she didn’t acknowledge him.

“You asked your question,” Mr. Titus said. “Now gone.”

“Pauline, where the truck?” Tyrone said.

She started to cry, but she didn’t answer.

“Stop aggravating her,” Mr. Titus ordered.

“Pauline, it’s important,” Tyrone said. “Where the truck?”

“Maybe you ought to go,” Miss Gertrude said. “Come back some other time. Let her rest now.”

“Pauline, I ain’t asking for myself,” he said. “I’m asking for Marcus.”

She looked at him, and her lips began to tremble.

“I met a woman might can help him,” he said. “But I need to see the truck. Need to see what color it is.”

“What difference that make?” Mr. Titus mumbled.

Pauline opened her mouth to speak, but no words came.

“Pauline, please,” he begged. “Please, Pauline, please.”

“What woman?” Pauline asked.

“Don’t listen to him, honey,” Mr. Titus counseled. “Don’t listen to his foolishness.”

“She say she saw the whole thang.”

“Who?”

“She say the truck what picked that girl up was blue, not black.”

Pauline stared at him, wide-eyed.

“You know what that mean, don’t you?”

“He didn’t do it?” Pauline mumbled.

“That’s right,” Tyrone said. “He didn’t do it.”

“Git out,” he heard Mr. Titus say. “Titus, you reckon it could be so?” Miss Gertrude asked.

“Git out!” Titus said again.

“Not ‘til I see that truck,” Tyrone said.

“It’s in the pasture,” Pauline said. “It’s in the pasture. Way back in the woods next to that old shed.”

“Baby, don’t tie your hopes on this,” Mr. Titus said. “Don’t listen to him. He don’t know what he talking ‘bout.” He turned to Tyrone. “What the woman’s name?”

“Her name Irene.”

“Irene what?”

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t know?”

“I don’t know,” he repeated.

“Where she live?”

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t know?”

“Mr. Titus, you heard me.”

“How you know she telling the truth?”

“I just know.”

“Is you crazy coming ‘round here with this?”

“Maybe this can help him,” Tyrone said.

“Why you getting this child hopes up? Why?”

Tyrone looked at Pauline. She was trembling. He felt the need to say more.

“Pauline, I believe her,” he said. “She work for some white folks in a house across the street from the store. She was looking out the window when it happened. She seen the truck. She say it was blue, Pauline. She say it was blue, not black.”

“She seen Marcus?” Mr. Titus asked.

“No, sir.”

“She seen who was driving?”

“No, sir.”

“She say it wasn’t Marcus?”

“Say she couldn’t say one way or the other.”

“Why you come here with this?”

“She say the truck was blue.”

“They say it was black.”

“It’s a chance.”

“It’s her word against theirs.”

“It’s something.”

“She colored?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Why you come here with this?”

“I’m trying to help him.”

“You making things worse.”

There was silence.

“Where this woman been all this time?” Titus asked. “Why she ain’t said nothing ‘fo now?”

“She been right where I found her,” Tyrone said.

“Why she ain’t talked to the police?” Titus asked.

“ ‘Cause the police ain’t talked to her,” Tyrone told him.

“Maybe she ain’t seen what she say she seen,” Titus said.

“What reason she got to lie for?” Tyrone asked.

“Maybe it’s so, Titus,” Miss Gertrude said. “Maybe it’s so.”

“And maybe it ain’t,” Mr. Titus snapped.

“But, Titus,” Miss Gertrude said.

“But, Titus nothing,” Mr. Titus said. “Somebody got to look out for this child, Gertrude. You know what she facing in a few days. Ain’t no sense in that boy prancing in here getting her hopes up after all this time. Ain’t no sense at all.”

“I’m gone go look at that truck,” Tyrone said.

“Leave that truck alone,” Mr. Titus said.

“Let ‘im look at the truck, Brother Titus,” Reverend Jacobs said. “Ain’t gone hurt nothing to let ‘im look at it.”

“Reverend Jacobs, this a family matter.”

“Titus!” Miss Gertrude exclaimed.

“I’m gone look at that truck,” Tyrone said.

“Gertrude, get my gun.”

“I ain’t gone do no such thang.”

Titus wheeled and stared at her, hard.

“Woman, you sassing me?”

“Daddy, please,” Pauline said. “This ain’t helping nothing.”

Mr. Titus turned to his daughter and looked at her with consoling eyes.

“Honey, you getting your hopes up for nothing,” he said. “I know this hard on you. God knows I do. But you just got to trust me on this. You just got to trust your ole daddy.”

“Sometimes we do better to trust in the Lord,” Reverend Jacobs said. “After all, he knows best.”

Titus looked at Reverend Jacobs with hard, disdainful eyes.

“Go ‘n and look at the truck, son,” Miss Gertrude said. “Go ‘n and look at it if you want to.”

“Woman, you walking over me?” Mr. Titus asked.

“Just doing what I think best,” Miss Gertrude said.

“All right,” Mr. Titus said. “You gone see. All of you gone see.”

Tyrone turned to leave, then stopped.

“Somebody need to hold that dog,” he said.

“Dog ain’t gone bother you,” Mr. Titus grumbled.

Tyrone didn’t move. He looked at Miss Gertrude.

“Go ‘n,” she said. “Blue tied up.”

Tyrone started toward the door, then stopped a second time. He looked at Pauline. She was looking down at the floor, crying.

T
yrone turned and left the room. Outside, he saw the dull red sun hanging low in the early evening sky, and he could hear the faint drone of a tractor in one of the distant fields behind the house. He stepped from the porch and walked toward the pasture. Near the fence, a small herd of cows had gathered around the water trough. Careful not to disturb them, he walked along the dusty road until he found a clear space near the fence, a short distance hence. He paused, then gingerly mashed the middle strand of barbed wire down with his right hand, bent low, and stepped through. Inside the pasture, he walked across the open meadow toward the sparse woods with quick but careful steps. The lush green grass over which he traveled, though evenly cropped by grazing cattle, was sprinkled with what looked to him to be hundreds and hundreds of tiny mounds of fresh cow manure.

In the woods, he advanced over dry twigs and hanging vines until he found himself standing uncertainly before the truck, which was overgrown with weeds and
briars and covered with a thick coat of caked-on dirt. He stood still, staring. He wanted to advance, but fear checked him. Was it blue or was it black? From where he stood, he could not tell. Well, there was only one way to find out. He advanced slowly, pushing back weeds with his foot and turning his body sideways, ever careful to avoid being stuck by the sharp-pointed edges of the prickly thorns.

He stopped near the hood of the truck, then raised a steady finger and rubbed hard across the surface until he broke through the crust and saw glimmering beneath the dust, the painted surface of the truck. “Black,” he mumbled, half aloud. He wiped hard against the surface of the truck with the palm of his hand, then stepped back and stared, wide-eyed. “It’s definitely black.” He moved forward again and was examining the spot more closely when he heard someone behind him.

“See you found it.”

He whirled and saw Pauline standing at the edge of the woods.

“Found it just fine,” he said.

She inched closer, then stopped.

“Got anxious waiting,” she said. “Had to know something.”

He looked at her, then at the spot again.

“Well, it’s black,” he said. “No doubt about it.”

“Couldn’t remember,” she said. “Been so long since I seen it.”

He looked at her, then looked away. Now that they were alone, he felt uncomfortable.

“What it’s doing out here?”

“Papa put it out here after the trial.”

“Why?” Tyrone asked.

“Say he didn’t want me looking at it.”

Tyrone walked to the rear of the truck and bent the weeds back with his foot, then eased down to a squat.

“These the same tires always been on it?”

“Far as I know,” she said. “Why?”

“Truck Miss Irene saw had whitewalls,” he said. “This one don’t.”

He looked up at her, but she was staring off, dazed.

“After they give him death, I use to come out here by myself,” she mumbled. “Use to sat on that ole stump yonder.”

Tyrone looked at the stump, then back at her. He eased to his feet.

“How long this truck been out here?” he asked.

She looked at the truck, then stared off again.

“Use to could see ‘im,” she said. “Use to could see ‘im plain as day.”

“Pauline, honey, this important,” he said. “Anybody else been using this truck since Marcus been in prison?”