Harvestman Lodge (54 page)

Eli asked, “Can he receive visitors?”

“I’m told that general visitation will be allowed this afternoon, though nurses are being encouraged to be militant in making sure poor Jimbo isn’t overwhelmed by visitors and forced to wear himself out talking when he should be resting. Initially visitation was allowed only for immediate family, and for us Brechts, Jimbo having been so much a part of our own family for so many decades now.” He paused. “What I would suggest is giving Jimbo a day or two. Perhaps he will rally some on his own. What appears likely now, though, is he’ll undergo surgery in the next few days … it’s risky at his age, but the doctors believe he is strong enough for it, and it could make a huge difference for him. It could add years to his life. I brought all of you in here so we could all be on the same page about Jimbo. And I want to ask those of you who pray to be sure to include him in your petitions to the Almighty. Jimbo means a lot to me, and to others here, too, and it is my sincere hope that he will pull through this and be back to the Jimbo we’ve known and loved. Does anyone have any questions?”

Lula Ann Jarvis raised her hand and was recognized. “I’ve been assigned the story in the bicentennial magazine about local black history and community. I talked a couple of days ago with Jimbo’s sister, Flora, who is sort of the unofficial historian of the black community here.”

“A fine woman,” Mr. Carl said, Keith nodding solemnly beside him.

“She told me she has heart trouble, too, and that she has been feeling the same kinds of sensations her mother described before she suffered a fatal heart attack. She actually said she expects to die soon. It was pretty morbid.”

Faces all around the conference table glanced at one another. David Brecht said, “Lula Ann, what is the purpose of sharing that rather depressing item just now?”

“Well … it seemed relevant. Her being Jimbo’s sister and all, and her having a bad heart, like he does.”

“Well, you’ve shared it. Let’s move on. Are there any questions about Jimbo’s situation? As opposed to comments about the health of his relatives?”

Lula Ann crossed her arms over her chest like a pouting little girl, and grunted a petulant “Ummp!”

ELI FOUND MELINDA IN her office at Hodgepodge, and when she opened the door to admit him, was sure she’d already heard the news. Her expression was troubled, her manner strangely uncomfortable.

“Who told you?” he asked.

“Told me what?”

“About Jimbo … you look upset, so I assumed somebody told you … ”

“Is something wrong with Jimbo? He’s not dead, is he? Tell me he’s not dead, Eli!”

“He’s not dead. No. But he had a heart attack and is in the hospital. No visitors until later today, and surgery pending in the next day or two. Mr. Carl advised the staff to wait a day or two before visiting, but that won’t fly, not for you and me. We can go see him later today.”

“Yes, we certainly … oh, no. Wait. I’ve got an interview this morning with the city manager about the July 4 town parade coming up. And an interview this afternoon with an old woman at the courthouse who has been the county executive’s assistant all the way back into the days the office was called county judge. She’s worked in the same position under four different men.”

“I … uh, would advise you find a different way to phrase that when you actually present the story.”

Melinda thought through what she’d just said and slapped the heel of her hand to her forehead. “Oh, wow … you’re so right! I’m glad you picked up on that … I might have actually gone on the air and said it that way. ‘Same position under four different men … ’”

“It’s a good thing to have a writer for a boyfriend, maybe, somebody who thinks about words and how they can be construed. Or misconstrued. My favorite journalism professor at UT always told us to read our copy with a dirty mind, because our readers certainly would. He had a whole collection of bad headlines: ‘Seeking to ease pain at the pump, Senate passes gas measure.’ You know, those kinds of things.”

“‘Same position under four different men,’ – I’d never live that one down.”

“No. Your coworkers would make sure of that. It would become part of your legacy.”

“Okay, now forget that. Tell me about Jimbo.”

Eli repeated what Mr. Carl had said, and even mentioned Lula Ann’s sideline commentary about his sister. Melinda, surprisingly, was interested in and saddened by what Lula Ann had said.

“Miss Flora has heart problems, too?” Melinda said. “I do hate to hear that. I’ve known her since I was a little girl. She did some housekeeping for my grandmother on Mom’s side. She still does housekeeping today, though she’s slowed down from age. She’s only two or three years younger than Jimbo.”

“Sounds like an interesting woman.”

“I adored her when I was little, and remember some of the stories she would tell about her own relatives and some of the earlier African-American people in the community. It gave me a better perspective than I would have had otherwise on the whole matter of growing up black in white America. She told me how her mother and even her old grandmother were expected to get off the sidewalk if a white person was coming their way. And about the names they’d be called if the white person didn’t think they’d hustled fast enough to clear the way. And when that kind of thing happened, their husbands and fathers and so on weren’t allowed to say a word in defense of their women. If they said anything at all, it was expected to be an apology to the white people they’d inconvenienced. Can you imagine it? Can you imagine growing up that way, and how that would make you feel about yourself and your value?”

“I can’t imagine it, no. Not really. All I can do is say how glad I am that things have changed as much as they have, and that I hope the change keeps going until the last of that race garbage is gone.”

“Amen, Eli.” She pointed a thumb back at herself. “This lady’s with you a hundred percent on that. Just don’t say too much along those lines to my father … unless you want to get him started on his rant against Martin Luther King and the Civil Rights movement.”

“I’ll remember that. You sure you can’t fit in a visit to Jimbo’s hospital room with me this afternoon?”

“Not until I’ve finished my interviews. The station has been pressuring me to start getting some pre-bicentennial features in so we can do some build-up to next year’s big celebration … and, I guess, so I can justify my paycheck and my private bureau office.”

Eli said, “How’s this: you do your interview and we meet back here at seven o’clock. We’ll go visit Jimbo together, then run down to the Cup and Saucer and have the blue plate dinner special. Or whatever you want. I’m buying.”

“Well, I’ll not likely to get a better offer than that.” She paused, wistful. “God, I hope Jimbo will be okay. And Miss Flora, too. I hate so much to see good people getting old.”

“It’s simply what happens to folks who refrain long enough from dying, Melinda.”

“Oh, how profound you are! What wisdom! What wit! How did I end up with such a stimulating boyfriend!”

“You’re just lucky, I guess. And if it’s stimulation you’re after, there are some things I can think of – ”

“Shut up! I mean it, Eli. You’re absolutely wearing me out with that stuff!”

“Wearing you out? My hope has been to wear you
down
, not out! To make you drop your barriers and standards and what the Brits would call your knickers. I’m not doing a very good job of it, though. You just keep holding out on me. But surely you’ll not hold out forever.”

“‘Hold out,’ you say. I’ll tell you about holding out. Eli, listen: there’s a family story that some early Buckinghams were besieged by Cherokee somewhere north of here, and holed up in a little frontier fort for nearly three weeks, nearly starved, before it was safe to come out. The point being that I come from a line of people who are very skilled at holding out.”

“Oh well. You can’t blame the Cherokee, or me, for trying to breach the defenses.”

“I’ve got to get ready for my interview, Eli. And don’t take that story about the early Buckinghams and the Cherokee too much to heart. Despite what I just said, it really isn’t relevant to me.”

A flicker of hope. “Meaning?”

“Meaning that a few years back, my parents revealed something to me they’d decided to wait until my eighteenth birthday to tell me. Something about my personal history and background. I’ve been planning to tell you, too, though I didn’t have in mind doing it in such an off-the-cuff way as this.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Just this: I’m not a born Buckingham. I’m adopted, Eli. I grew up in the Buckingham household and was raised from infancy like I was the natural child of Ben and Dot, and I always assumed I was. But the fact is I was adopted by them in Knoxville when Dad was in school there and I was a newborn. Then they brought me back with them to Tylerville, and I was raised as a Buckingham ever since. But I’m not a Buckingham by birth.”

Eli remembered things Ruby Wheeler had told him in that earlier hallway conversation about the Buckingham family. What Melinda was telling him now meshed perfectly with what Ruby had said.

“Wow. Did it bother you to learn your history wasn’t what you’d always thought it was?”

“We’ll talk about it later, Eli. This evening down at the Cup and Saucer, if we find a private enough corner.”

“Fine. Tell me just one thing, though: are you okay, overall, with being adopted?”

“I’m okay with it. Keep in mind, they told me the truth when I turned eighteen, so I’ve had time to get used to it. And anyway, I’m still me. I haven’t changed identities. I’m still Melinda.” She shrugged. “And now I know there’s a reason I don’t resemble the parents who raised me.”

“You’re full of surprises, young woman.”

“It’s life that’s full of surprises, Eli. Life. I’m just living mine and taking what comes, expected or otherwise. No different than you or anyone else.”

She kissed him and waved him toward the hallway door.

As he left her office, he turned back to her, “Hey Melinda, did the Rev come by with that Harvestman manual he promised us?”

“Not yet.”

“I guess he’ll show up later.”

“Probably so.”

Chapter Thirty-Three

REV. FEELY DID SHOW up, twenty minutes after Melinda had departed for the city manager’s office, video camera and notebook in her hand.

“Bad time to come in, Eli?”

“Not at all. I was just looking through Hadley King’s county history again, thinking magazine story thoughts.” He declined to mention that he’d also been thinking some about plot details for his
Farlow’s Trail
sequel, which he’d started but not yet gotten far into. His publisher was asking for a summary/outline so the cover art people could get a jump on things.

“Here’s the manual I promised,” Feely said, unceremoniously tossing an old and yellowed saddle-stitched publication down onto Eli’s desk. “And, my friend, speaking of the magazine, there’s a story I don’t think you’d want to miss if you want your magazine to have as full a look at possible at the positive side of our local heritage.”

“‘Positive side of our local heritage.’ You sound like Davy Carl. What are you talking about?”

“Something I should have thought to mention to you long before now. Come on. Grab your camera, and something to take notes on. I’m going to take you to meet the best man you’ll ever know in your life.”

Had that statement come from anyone but Feely, Eli probably would have discounted it. But this was Feely, so Eli promptly complied and was out the door in mere moments.

“Should I just follow you in my car?”

“Ride with me. I can fill you in a little on the way over.”

“Where are we going?”

“To the worst part of town.”

“Sounds fun.”

AT ONE TIME A HARDWARE business had operated on the lower level of the corner store building where Feely took Eli. Now the big plate-glass windows were hung around with heavy interior curtains. The painted words on the front window identified the place as the LOWER LIGHTS RESCUE MISSION AT TYLERVILLE.

“Why have I never noticed this place?” Eli asked as he and Feely crossed the street toward the building.

“Because it just blends in with its surroundings,” Feely said. “Dingy, run-down, cracks running down the brick wall, the awning sun-faded and drooping and full of holes. This place is as decrepit as most of the people it has served.” Feely paused and scanned the building’s face, top to bottom. “But God is in this place, Eli. I’ve seen what He does here.”

“You’re surprising me again, Rev. I’ve always associated rescue missions with the very conservative, old-time tent revival and sawdust trail side of religion. I perceived you as a little more, I don’t know … progressive? Non-fundamentalist?”

“I’m a surprising man, Eli. I say that because I’m constantly told it. People find me impossible to peg. I’m not one to sign up readily for any label except ‘disciple-in-development.’”

“Is this place as ‘glory hallelujah praise the Lord’ as it looks like it would be?” Eli was reading the big JESUS WELCOMES SINNERS AND SO DO WE line painted beneath the name of the mission.