headstone. Upon each visit to the deceased, the survivor gets to see his or her name already carved and just waiting.

 'Daddy was fifty-six when Mother died,' Lee explained as she took Adam's hand and inched away from the grave. 'I wanted him to bury her in a plot where he could one day join her, but he refused. I guess he figured he still had a few years left, and he might remarry.'

 'You told me once that she didn't like Sam.'

 'I'm sure she loved him in a way, they were together for almost forty years. But they were never close. As I grew older I realized she didn't like to be around him. She confided in me at times. She was a simple country girl who married young, had babies, stayed home with them, and was expected to obey her husband. And this was not unusual for those times. I think she was a very frustrated woman.'

 'Maybe she didn't want Sam next to her for eternity.'

 'I thought about that. In fact, Eddie wanted them separated and buried at opposite ends of the cemetery.'

 'Good for Eddie.'

 'He wasn't joking either.'

 'How much did she know about Sam and the Klan?'

 'I have no idea. It was not something we discussed. I remember she was humiliated after his arrest. She even stayed with Eddie and you guys for a while because the reporters were bothering her.'

 'And she didn't attend any of his trials.'

 'No. He didn't want her to watch. She had a problem with high blood pressure, and Sam used that as an excuse to keep her away from it.'

 They turned and walked along a narrow lane through the old section of the cemetery. They held hands and looked at the passing tombstones. Lee pointed to a row of trees across the street on another hill. 'That's where the blacks are buried,' she said. 'Under those trees. It's a small cemetery.'

 'You're kidding? Even today?'

 'Sure, you know, keep 'em in their place. These people couldn't stand the idea of a Negro lying amongst their ancestors.'

 Adam shook his head in disbelief. They climbed the hill and rested under an oak. The rows of graves spread peacefully beneath them. The dome of the Ford County Courthouse glittered in the sun a few blocks away.

 'I played here as a little girl,' she said quietly. She pointed to her right, to the north. 'Every Fourth of July the city celebrates with a fireworks display, and the best seats in the house are here in the cemetery. There's a park down there, and that's where they shoot from. We'd load up our bikes and come to town to watch the parade and swim in the city pool and play with our friends. And right after dark, we'd all gather around here, in the midst of the dead, and sit on these tombstones to watch the fireworks. The men would stay by their trucks where the beer and whiskey were hidden, and the women would lie on quilts and tend to the babies. We would run and romp and ride bikes all over the place.'

 'Eddie?'

 'Of course. Eddie was just a normal little brother, pesky as hell sometimes, but very much a boy. I miss him, you know. I miss him very much. We weren't close for many years, but when I come back to this town I think of my little brother.'

 'I miss him too.'

 'He and I came here, to this very spot, the night he graduated from high school. I had been in Nashville for two years, and I came back because he wanted me to watch him graduate. We had a bottle of cheap wine, and I think it was his first drink. I'll never forget it. We sat here on Emil Jacob's tombstone and sipped wine until the bottle was empty.'

 'What year was it?'

 'Nineteen sixty-one, I think. He wanted to join the Army so he could leave Clanton and get away from Sam. I didn't want my little brother in the Army, and we discussed it until the sun came up.'

 'He was pretty confused?'

 'He was eighteen, probably as confused as most kids who've just finished high school. Eddie was terrified that if he stayed in Clanton something would happen to him, some mysterious genetic flaw would surface and he'd become another Sam. Another Cayhall with a hood. He was desperate to run from this place.'

 'But you ran as soon as you could.'

 'I know, but I was tougher than Eddie, at least at the age of eighteen. I couldn't see him leaving home so young. So we sipped wine and tried to get a handle on life.'

 'Did my father ever have a handle on life?'

 'I doubt it, Adam. We were both tormented by our father and his family's hatred. There are things I hope you never learn, stories that I pray remain untold. I guess I pushed them away, while Eddie couldn't.'

 She took his hand again and they strolled into the sunlight and down a dirt path toward the newer section of the cemetery. She stopped and pointed to a row of small headstones. 'Here are your great-grandparents, along with aunts, uncles, and other assorted Cayhalls.'

 Adam counted eight in all. He read the names and dates, and spoke aloud the poetry and Scriptures and farewells inscribed in granite.

 'There are lots more out in the country,' Lee said. 'Most of the Cayhalls originated around Karaway, fifteen miles from here. They were country people, and they're buried behind rural churches.'

 'Did you come here for these burials?'

 'A few. It's not a close family, Adam. Some of these people had been dead for years before I knew about it.'

 'Why wasn't your mother buried here?'

 'Because she didn't want to be. She knew she was about to die, and she picked the spot. She never considered herself a Cayhall. She was a Gates.'

 'Smart woman.'

 Lee pulled a handful of weeds from her grandmother's grave, and rubbed her fingers over the name of Lydia Newsome Cayhall, who died in 1961 at the age of seventy-two. 'I remember her well,' Lee said, kneeling on the grass. 'A fine, Christian woman. She'd roll over in her grave if she knew her third son was on death row.'

 'What about him?' Adam asked, pointing to Lydia's husband, Nathaniel Lucas Cayhall, who died in 1952 at the age of sixty-four. The fondness left Lee's face. 'A mean old man,' she said. 'I'm sure he'd be proud of Sam. Nat, as he was known, was killed at a funeral.'

 'A funeral?'

 'Yes. Traditionally, funerals were social occasions around here. They were preceded by long wakes with lots of visiting and eating. And drinking. Life was hard in the rural South, and often the funerals turned into drunken brawls. Nat was very violent, and he picked a fight with the wrong men just after a funeral service. They beat him to death with a stick of wood.'

 'Where was Sam?'

 'Right in the middle of it. He was beaten too, but survived. I was a little girl, and I remember Nat's funeral. Sam was in the hospital and couldn't attend.'

 'Did he get retribution?'

 'Of course.'

 'How?'

 'Nothing was ever proven, but several years later the two men who'd beaten Nat were released from prison. They surfaced briefly around here, then disappeared. One body was found months later next door in Milburn County. Beaten, of course. The other man was never found. The police questioned Sam and his brothers, but there was no proof.'

 'Do you think he did it?'

 'Sure he did. Nobody messed with the Cayhalls back then. They were known to be half-crazy and mean as hell.'

 They left the family gravesites and continued along the path. 'So, Adam, the question for us is, where do we bury Sam?'

 'I think we should bury him over there, with the blacks. That would serve him right.'

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