Tomorrow River

“But how did he get…?” Blackie. After he took it off Lou in the storm that night, he must’ve gone up to the house and shown the watch to Papa, who told his big brother that he wasn’t the one who give it to Mama. They must’ve gone over to Elmer Haskall’s jewelry store to find out exactly who did. Mr. Haskall would’ve put on his half-glasses, and said, “You know, this timepiece looks a lot like the one that Sam Moody bought a while ago. Let me turn it over to be sure.” He would’ve seen the word Speranza that he’d inscribed on the back. “Yup, that’s the one I sold Sam,” is what Mr. Haskall would’ve said. “Told me he was buyin’ it as a gift for a dear friend.”

I feel horrible. I should’ve given Sam the watch back when he asked for it. How could I be so selfish? Even I have to admit that the overwhelming evidence makes him look guilty. But if you could have seen him look at Mama with such tenderness the way I did. It was not the way a man looks at a woman he’s wanting to kill. I’m familiar with that look. I’ve seen it on Papa’s face. “What does the sheriff say is Sam’s motive for killin’ my mother? I mean… why would he think that he’d want to do her harm?”

Curry says, “Your father told Sheriff Nash that he believes your mother’s murder was a crime of passion. He knew that Evie… your mother… was spending time at Sam’s place trying to help an alcoholic Negro get back on his feet. He insists that Sam misinterpreted your mother’s kindness. When she didn’t reciprocate his feelings, he murdered her in a drunken rage.”

“That’s not true,” E. J. shouts. “Sam hasn’t had a drink of hard liquor in over two years!”

I say, really worked up, too, “And Papa did not know that they were spending time together. He’s… he’s makin’ it sound like he was proud that Mama was doing Christian deeds of mercy. He never would have allowed her to go over to the Triple S. My father… I know I told you up at the hobo camp that he was so wonderful and the best father, but… he’s not what you think… he’s not what anybody… you don’t understand.”

“I understand more than you realize,” Curry says with a curious little smile. Is he ridiculing me?

“I’m sure I don’t know what you understand and what you don’t. But I can tell you this much-Sam did love Mama, but it wasn’t in that crime of passion way,” I say, even though doubt has popped into my mind again. They could have started out as friends and then on one of those Tuesday afternoons realized that they were feeling something stronger. I look over at homely E. J. Could I wake up one morning and feel about him the same way I do Bootie Young? Could Cupid be that careless? Aimlessly shooting arrows at people, not thinking who could get hurt? Maybe that is what happened between Mama and Sam. Their love of words turned into a love of each other. I have never seen a white woman and a high yellow Negro or any shade of Negro be in love. It was unusual enough that the two of them were friends. No, that’s not right. Mama had to know all along what I just found out. That Sam is my father’s half-brother. Family. She wouldn’t have allowed herself to fall in love with him no matter how many arrows she had sticking out of her heart.

“Sam and Mama are related. Did you know that, Curry?” I ask, trying to gain back some of his respect. For once in this conversation maybe I can tell him something.

“I know that Sam is your half-uncle, Shen.”

“You do not.” I wish I’d never come into this dumb shop. I should’ve gone straight back home to Woody with her egg salad sandwich.

“What about the sheriff?” E. J. asks. I thought all this was going over his head, but he’s keeping right up. “Does he believe what His Honor is tellin’ him?”

“Of course, he does. I know Sam likes him and all. You seem pretty chummy with him as well,” I tell Curry’s surprised face. “But you two don’t know… the sheriff is so crooked you can’t tell from his tracks if he’s comin’ or goin’. My father gave him a big check for his Be-Handy-Vote-Andy campaign.”

All of that said, the three of us just stand there looking at one another. Finally Curry breaks the ice. “We know that Sam didn’t hurt your mother, Shen, but you’ve got to admit it sure looks like he did.”

Suddenly, a wonderful feeling comes over me. The kind I get when I find my sister after chasing around all afternoon for her. It doesn’t matter what my father or the sheriff has to say. Woody knows what happened to our mother. Papa told me she does. I don’t know if she knows if somebody ended Mama’s life or if she just had a bad accident, but Woody definitely knows that it wasn’t Sam Moody who caused it. I might not be the best judge of people, but my sister is. If Sam had done something wrong to our mother, Woody would’ve let me know to keep away from him. She would’ve made a drawing with a skull- and-cross bones or a big red STOP sign over a picture of the Triple S if Sam wasn’t safe. I may not have been paying close enough attention to her drawings the way I should have, but I’m sure I would’ve noticed that one.

Feeling revived, I tell Curry, “Woody saw something the night Mama disappeared. I think she might’ve seen what happened to her. She’s an eyewitness.”

Curry nods. “I suspected as much.”

“You did?” I have begun to doubt him again. He could be making every single bit of this up. I don’t know why he would, but he could. Grown-ups are always perpetrating tricks on innocent children. “Why didn’t you just come out and tell us you were a cop?” I ask.

“That’s not how it works, Shen. If I’d told you that I was down here investigating your… what if you or E. J. had accidentally let that slip?”

I feel E. J. go stiff. He’s remembering what he shouted out to the sheriff in front of Slidell’s. I can see Curry’s point. Really. If I knew something secret I probably wouldn’t tell us neither.

I got a lot more questions for Curry, but when one of the mantel clocks at What Goes Around Comes Around starts striking, he tells us, “Tomorrow is going to be a big day for all concerned. I’ll give you a ride back to Lilyfield.”

Chapter Twenty-seven

The car doesn’t have air-conditioning so the windows are rolled down.

Curry is behind the wheel of Beezy’s old brown Pontiac. The one I drive to Hull’s Drive-In. I’m remembering the last time I was in this car, the seat pulled all the way up so I could reach the pedals. Besides musicals, Beezy goes ape for creature features. The last one we went to see was Invasion of the Body Snatchers, but I barely watched it. I spent most of the night looking over at Woody, thinking, maybe that’s what happened to her. She’s one of those pod people now. I couldn’t stand it. I leaned up close to Beezy and whispered, “Maybe that’s what’s wrong with Woody. Some aliens came up to the fort one night and changed her brain around.” Blind Beezy reached out for my hand in the dark. “Don’t be silly. Woody is still Woody. She’s just not workin’ real good right now. Spaceships… alien bein’s… that sort of thing only happens in these movies.”

Not according to Clive Minnow. When we drive past Stonewall Jackson Cemetery, I regret missing his burial ceremony. Not as much as I do about missing Mama’s, but there’s a twinge when I recall Clive’s foolish fears about catching leprosy and malaria, and how he would get so excited when he found something with his metal-detecting device that he’d do a Rumplestiltskin dance through the woods, and his furious picture taking while he was searching for UFOs, and how he’d upset the checkerboard if he was on the losing end-yes, even that I’m going to miss. That man might’ve been odd, but he was someone I could count on to be where he was supposed to be, doing exactly what he always did. That’s a rare quality these days.

E. J. and I are in the front seat of the car. E. J. doesn’t get to ride in cars very often and he keeps sticking his head out the window like a dog. I have draped Mama’s spaghetti-and-meatball-smelling scarf around my neck. I wish we could just drive and drive. I don’t want to have to think anymore about Sam or Mama or my father or any of this horridness. I want to be small again. A little girl heading home after a long day at the beach. Smelling of sunburn, not putting up a fuss when my mother picks me up in her arms and carries me out of the car, sets me down on our sailboat bed, crooning, “Tomorrow.”

“How’d ya come up with the name Curry?” E. J. asks. “It’s kinda different.”

Lieutenant Sardino smiles, flicks his signal up, and makes the turn on Kilmer Street. “Curry is my wife’s favorite food. She’s Indian.”

E. J. perks up. “No kiddin’!” He really likes Indian stuff. Whenever Clive Minnow found arrowheads in his woods