eyes for a moment of silence in tribute to Brazos Hartley.
I knew from experience that when Duck says a moment of silence, he means the full sixty seconds. Sixty seconds seems forever when you’re trying to think reverential thoughts about someone you’ve never known.
Eventually, he murmured a soft “Amen,” and there was a general rustling and throat-clearing.
“I’ll ask everyone but his immediate family to rise now and join in while Annie Sue Knott leads us in ‘Amazing Grace.’”
We’re all more or less musical, but Herman and Nadine’s Annie Sue has the best voice in the family and it rang out pure and sweet as she set the pitch and timing for the rest of us. The boys and their wives and children were right there with her by the third note—bass, alto, tenor, and soprano, our voices blended in the old familiar harmonies:
CHAPTER 18
TUESDAY MORNING (CONTINUED)
Most funerals are not totally somber and Braz’s was no exception.
After Duck Aldcroft escorted Tally, Arnold, and Val up to the house, his people quickly lowered the casket into the ground, filled all the dirt back in, mounded the excess, and covered the grave with the blanket of roses. They took away the chairs and the navy blue carpeting, and they left the matching navy blue tent discreetly lettered ALDCROFT FUNERAL HOME to shelter the grave and the flowers heaped there from sun and rain. As Daddy had promised, there were plenty of wreaths and sprays from the rest of the family and one as big as a tractor wheel that Ralph Ferlanski, the other carnival owner, must have sent. It was composed of large white spider mums, yellow daisies, and the biggest bronze mums I’d ever seen. Gold lettering on the burnt orange ribbons read FROM YOUR CARNIVAL FAMILY.
Family’s where you find it, isn’t it? And I was proud of mine today. They were everywhere, talking, making folks welcome, urging people to fix themselves a plate of fried chicken, sliced ham, meatloaf, chicken pastry, and vegetables of every kind. And what about another serving of cake, pie, or peach cobbler? They fetched ice and slices of lemon for tea, cream and sugar for coffee, fresh cups of water. They showed people where the bathroom was and made sure there were plenty of paper towels.
Kay, the girl who’d found Polly Viscardi’s body, was about the same age as Jane Ann and Jessica, and Candy and Eve weren’t much older. All five of them sat along the edge of the old board porch, swinging their legs while they ate, and my nieces were peppering them with questions about carnival life and listening to the answers with such uncritical interest that I could feel a definite easing of tension.
April swooped by and gave me a hug on her way to the front parlor where Andrew, A.K., and Ruth were trying to bridge the years with Tally. The rest of the family were tactfully giving them space so as not to overwhelm her with so many of us at once.
Arnold and their son Val had gone out to eat on the front porch with Daddy, Dwight, Stevie, Reese, and those of my brothers who live close enough to come. The rocking chairs and swings were as full as the plates the men were balancing on their knees, but several offered to get up and give me their seats. I told them to stay as they were and perched on the steps with a red plastic cup of iced tea to listen with the others as Arnold described their tentative plans for the farm.
“You going to become a farmer?” Haywood asked dubiously, making short work of a drumstick.
“Not like you people.” Arnold took a sip of tea and set the cup down on the floor beside his chair. “We were thinking about turning the place into a Halloween attraction. If it all works out, we could come in off the road next year or year after next at the latest. Become forty-milers. We’ve already got the haunted house and if we weren’t hauling it up and down the eastern seaboard, losing bits and pieces every time we jump, I think we could make it something really special. I’ve got a good mechanic working for me right now, and Val has some great ideas for pop-ups and illusions if we can only figure out all the wiring and lighting.”
We’d all been sneaking glances at Val, trying not to stare as we cataloged every feature of this new twig that had popped out on the family tree, and Arnold’s words gave us permission to look our fill. I knew that after he left with his parents this afternoon, my kin would be saying how he was built just like Reese at that age, how his hair was like the little twins’, his hands and feet as big as theirs, and
From his wheelchair on the other side of Haywood, Herman said, “I’m just a plain ol’ everyday electrician, but that sounds like the kind of thing Annie Sue’d love to mess with. You need to talk with her.”
“Yeah? The one who was singing down there? She knows electrical gimmicks?”
“When she was twelve,” I laughed, “she wired her mother’s electric stove so that every time Nadine turned on one of the back burners, the doorbell rang.”
“And remember the time she wired the toilet seat in y’all’s bathroom, Herman?” Haywood chuckled as he related another family legend for the newcomers’ amusement. “It played ‘Remember Me’ every time he lifted the seat so’s to remind him to put it back down when he was finished.”
Val laughed out loud and Arnold nodded. “Sounds like someone we could use, all right.”
For his parents’ sake, the teenager seemed to be making an effort to be friendly today, and he said, “Tell them about the corn maze, Dad.”
“Oh, yeah.” Tally’s husband borrowed a match from Daddy and lit a cigarette. “We thought we could put four or five acres into a really elaborate corn maze.”
“You mean that fancy-colored corn?” asked Robert, who was working on a ham biscuit. “They’s a pretty good market for Indian maize over in Cary and Apex.”
“That’s another possibility,” said Arnold, “but I was talking m-a-z-e, not m-a-i-z-e. I want to grow tall field corn and have paths all through it for people to get lost in. Pumpkins, too. Charge five bucks apiece to go through the
