Chapter 4
August 8, 1959
"It's not fair!" Christi complained to her mother as they stood at the sink drying the dinner dishes. "Kelly's a whole year younger than I am and she already has a boyfriend. She doesn't even want to be over here. I can't believe it's Saturday night and she's sitting at home by herself just in case Cameron might decide to call her. Where does that leave me? It's not fair. Kelly always gets everything."
Helêne looked around their large, beautiful kitchen and sighed, "Some people might think that you have everything, ma cher. Besides, she just met him today. She's excited, but it won't last forever. You're her best friend. That lasts forever. Try to be happy for Kelly and be patient. Someday you'll have a boyfriend, too, and you might need Kelly's patience."
"I'll never have a boyfriend," Christi whispered loudly. "Never."
"Of course you will," her mother assured her. "Of course you will."
"No," Christi insisted. "I won't. I don't want one. Boys are nasty."
"Look at me, ma cher," the elegant Frenchwoman cooed, cradling her daughter's face in her hands and looking straight into her eyes. "You don't mean that."
"I do mean it!" Christi glared at her mother, thinking about 'the July 25th incident.' "You just don't know how nasty they can be."
For a moment, Helêne thought back to her life on the streets of Paris. Boys can be nasty, indeed, but Christi is too young to know that. Helêne felt her own shame, and looked away.
"Some boys are nasty, ma cher, but I'm sure that young Mister Cameron Coulter is not. You said that he's nice and smart and tall and funny and handsome. I'm sure that someday you'll have a boyfriend like that too."
"Like Daddy?" Christi asked defiantly.
Helêne glanced away momentarily before assuring her daughter, "Your Daddy is a very nice man. Everyone in Vicksburg likes him. We're fortunate that he takes such good care of us. Don't you forget that. You'll find a nice man who will take care of you, too, but there's no rush. Now, why don't you go call Kelly and be sweet to her?"
"She doesn't want me to call. She doesn't want the line to be busy in case Cameron calls her. It's just not fair. Kelly gets everything!"
Christi finished her part of the dish drying without another word, wondering why her father couldn't be like Kelly's. Mr. McCain would never do anything nasty with that nasty Mrs. Jander. Clayton McCain was the most nearly perfect man in Vicksburg, maybe in all of Mississippi. Why did he have to be Kelly's father and not hers?
Christi decided that if she ever got a boyfriend, he would have to be like Clayton McCain -- tall and handsome and smart and nice to everybody and always interested in what she had to say. She smiled to herself, thinking about his call to "the vivacious and oh-so-popular Miss Christina Boudreaux." Clayton McCain would never, ever let her down as her own father had already done.
With that thought, Christi walked disconsolately through the den, past her disappointing father dozing in his big leather recliner. She slowly dragged her feet up the grand staircase to her exquisitely decorated bedroom. She didn't turn on the lamps, but got ready for bed in the dark, then lay there alone, staring at the ceiling, thinking about "the incident."
It had been exactly two weeks and the images of it still tormented her night and day. The nighttime was worse. She tried to stay awake, to avoid dreaming about it, but a fitful sleep came, bringing the torment that she had come to hate and fear. When the phone beside her bed rang early the next morning, Christi felt as if she had just fallen asleep.
"Christi, wake up," Kelly whispered loudly into the phone. "I have to tell you something very serious and important. Are you awake?"
"Mmm-hmm, I'm awake," Christi mumbled. "Did Cameron call you?"
"This is not about Cameron," Kelly continued solemnly. "But, no, he didn't call."
There was a long pause on the line.
"Then what is it?" Christi asked, sitting up in her bed, disturbed by the tone of Kelly's voice.
There was another long silence.
"When I got home from church this morning, my Daddy was not at home."
"No!" Christi exclaimed, thinking instantly of Mrs. Jander.
Kelly was silent again.
"Is he home yet?" Christi asked, hating Mrs. Jander and her red hair and her tacky clothes.
Kelly sighed, "No."
"Do you know where he is?" Christi questioned, with a sick knot forming in her stomach. "Do you want me to help you look for him?" she offered, recalling Mrs. Jander's address.
"I know where he is," Kelly whispered.
Christi felt guilty. On top of everything else, Kelly was a better friend than Christi could ever be. Kelly was going to tell her a secret about Clayton McCain and Mrs. Jander. Christi felt her hand getting sweaty on the phone. She didn't want to hear it, but she waited for the words she was dreading. The silence was deafening and interminable.
"My daddy," Kelly paused, and a chill went over Christi, "went to the hospital early this morning. Old Man Everett took him."
"Oh, no," Christi gasped, but there was relief in her voice. "What happened?"
"He had a heart attack," Kelly said softly. "I don't know if a heart attack hurts or not. Do you think it hurts, Christi? I mean, we can't usually feel our hearts, you know."
"I don't know anything about heart attacks," Christi mumbled, realizing that she was lying. She knew that you could die from a heart attack and that they did hurt, but she didn't want to worry her friend. She tried to sound cheerful as she said, "I'm sure he'll be okay, though."
There was another great long silence. Fear clutched Christi's throat. She tried to swallow and nearly choked.
"He will be okay, Kelly," she affirmed. "He has to be okay."
"He's not going to be okay, Christi. He'll never be okay. He'll never come home again."
"What are you saying, Kelly? Tell me straight out how bad it is."
Again, the silence. A longer silence.
"He's dead," Kelly whispered, as though her heart would break.
"NO!" Christi shrieked into the phone. "NO! He can't be dead!"
"My daddy is dead, Christi," Kelly responded quietly. "Maybe you could come over before everyone else gets here."
"Oh, Kelly, I'm so sorry! Oh, my God! What are you going to do?"
"Maybe you could get your mother to come over and talk to my mother," Kelly asked plaintively. She paused a long time before adding, "I think there is something wrong with my mother. After the doctor called to tell her that Daddy was dead, she told me not to tell anybody."
"Then, maybe it isn't true," Christi said hopefully. "Maybe your mother was upset and she got confused about what the doctor told her."
"He's dead, Christi. I called the hospital. Then I called the funeral home. They're going to pick up,…" Kelly paused a moment, "… his body."
"We'll be there in a few minutes," Christi promised. "We'll all be right there."
"Thanks," Kelly sighed. "I knew I could count on you."
Christi hung up the phone and let her head fall back on the pillow. She felt hot tears forming in her eyes and was crying softly by the time her mother came into the room.
"I heard you scream again, ma cher. Are you all right?" Helêne asked gently.
"Nuh, nuh, no, I'm not," Christi sobbed as her mother sat beside her on the bed. "Kelly called. Her fuh, fuh, father had a heart attack. He's dead."
"Mon Dieu!"
Helêne embraced her daughter and felt her own tears coming.
"Mon Dieu!" she cried, rocking her child back and forth. "Mon Dieu!"
* * *
Christi sat on the sofa in the McCain's front parlor and listened to the awkward whisperings of the classmates and neighborhood kids who had come to call on Kelly. Kelly herself was spending more time with the adults because her mother wouldn't come out of the bedroom to talk to anyone. Christi felt helpless, despondent, and alone. She didn't know what she should be doing, so she just sat and cried intermittently, and listened to the subdued buzz of conversations and the droning of the air conditioner.
It was nearly one-thirty. The dining room table was crowded with platters of food that people had brought already. It looked as if half of Vicksburg had decided to bring their Sunday lunch instead of eating it at home. Someone handed Christi a brownie on a napkin.
She stared at it and remembered how much Mr. McCain had liked brownies. I had always planned to make some brownies for him, but I never did. I never did. No, I never did, and now it's too late. Hot tears came to her eyes and brimmed over, spilling down her cheeks. She let them fall onto the brownie.
The room became stifling hot. The air conditioner was running constantly, but it was over a hundred degrees outside and there were too many people in the house, or coming and going and letting the front door stand open. Christi wanted to get up and shut it again, but she didn't have the energy. She felt too empty inside.
She glanced into the dining room and saw her father standing beside Kelly, talking quietly with some of Mr. McCain's friends. She supposed that her mother was still in the kitchen with the women and Nellie Mae. She wondered if Mrs. McCain would ever come out of the bedroom. Maybe she should go knock on the bedroom door and talk to her, but what would she say? Regina McCain was always nice to Christi, but they had never actually talked about anything. Maybe this was not a good time to start.
The group standing in the open doorway stepped back for another visitor, and Christi saw the new priest up close for the first time. There was a momentary lull in the conversations as the houseful of Baptists and Methodists and Presbyterians paused to scrutinize the Catholic cleric.
He was young, mid-to-late twenties, tall and athletic, with dark wavy hair. He looked around the room for a moment and then walked toward Kelly, who apparently had sensed his arrival and disengaged herself from the group in the dining room.
"I'm Father O'Connell," Christi heard him say gently, with a soft Irish accent. He took Kelly's hand in both of his. "Sean O'Connell. I came as soon as I could."
Christi watched as Kelly led the priest through the crowd and upstairs toward the master bedroom. She felt compelled to follow them, though she didn't know why. She waited a few minutes, put down the brownie that she had made soggy with her tears, and started up the stairway, hoping that no one would notice. Feeling guilty, she stood outside the master bedroom door and tried to hear the conversation.
It seemed that only the priest was talking. Christi was mesmerized by the sound of his voice, soft and lilting, gentle and reassuring. She sensed, as much as heard, what he was saying -- words about eternal life and rest in God. She tried to picture Clayton McCain in Heaven. She smiled, remembering his stories about picking cotton when he was a kid and wrestling alligators in Panama and fighting with bayonets in the Marine Corps. She could almost hear him singing the Marine Corps Hymn in his deep off-key voice:…
"If the Army or the Navy
ever gaze on Heaven's scenes,
They will find the streets are guarded by
The United States Marines."
* * *
Christi heard herself mournfully humming the Marine Corps Hymn like a dirge as she dressed for the funeral on Tuesday afternoon. It was the hottest day of the year, without a breath of air stirring or a cloud in the sky -- not a good day to wear black. Christi stood in front of her mirror and wished it were cold and rainy outside, to match her mood. She had cried so much she was exhausted. Suddenly it occurred to her that she hadn't seen Kelly cry at all.
Kelly had asked her to sit with the family during the service. It was the highest honor a friend could bestow, but Christi was too sad to feel at all proud as she took her place in the small room off to the side where the family could see but not be seen.
Christi sat beside the family niggers Nellie Mae and her daughter Prudence in the row behind Mrs. McCain and Kelly and Kelly's younger sister Mandy. Funerals and weddings were the only times that white people and colored people ever sat together, and so it was the first time that Christi ever sat beside Prudence. She realized that they were the same age and that Prudence seemed to be as upset as she was that Mr. McCain was dead. She vowed to go out back and talk to Prudence the next time she was at Kelly's house.
* * *
The procession to the cemetery was interminable. A couple of older cars overheated along the way and others stopped to pick up the stranded mourners. It was after three o'clock by the time everyone got situated at the graveside. The sun was unmerciful, even under the tents and the shade trees.
Christi felt sweat mingling with the tears running down her cheeks. She looked over at her best friend, sitting straight and silent in the white folding chair on the fake green grass carpet. Kelly didn't seem to be crying or sweating. She was just sitting there, staring at the open grave and the shiny casket suspended over it on belts.
The Baptist preacher prayed on and on. Then Father Sean O'Connell prayed on and on. The sun beat down, and Christi thought she was going to faint. She wondered how Father O'Connell could stand there in all those robes and not die from the heat. She thought about Clayton McCain being up in Heaven, watching all of them sweating around a box that held only his body while his soul was safe from the weather and from everything.
Then Christi began to wonder what would happen if her own father died. Would he go to Heaven? She panicked at the thought of her father and Mrs. Jander being together and dying and going straight to Hell.
She became aware of a lingering "Amen," followed by some uncomfortable shifting and coughing among the crowd. Then, in eerie silence, the casket was lowered slowly into the ground until it disappeared from her sight. She watched the funeral home attendant ceremonially scoop a shovel full of dirt and walk over to Mrs. McCain with it. He held the shovel out toward her and stood respectfully still. She looked up at him, with her big brown eyes so scared, and she shook her head from side to side. Other than that, she did not move.
There was another uncomfortable shifting of the crowd and a few more muffled coughs. Kelly stood up and took the weighty shovel from the man. Slowly, resolutely, steadily, she carried it across the carpet of fake green grass to the very edge of the open grave. She held the shovel over the gaping hole for the longest time. There was no shuffling of the crowd. No coughing. No breathing. There was nothing but the silence of stifling, still, summer air.
Finally, Kelly turned the shovel over. Dry dirt and rocks thundered onto the shiny new casket, and the rumbling echo of death was the only sound heard in Mississippi for the rest of that long, hot, August afternoon.
