IT WAS JUST after ten o’clock in the morning by the time I left the courthouse, but already it was as hot as the inside of an oven. The sky was a clear, deep blue, with not a cloud anywhere and no hint of a breeze. It was going to be one of those days when the sun could bake a person as crisp as a Christmas turkey.
Now what? Where should I go from here?
Women in summer dresses and hats, shopping bags over their arms, glided from store to store on the other side of the street. Little children frolicked in a small park, playing while their mothers or babysitters sat on benches in the shade. A postman trudged slowly down the sidewalk, dropping mail through slots and into boxes. Two pickup trucks sat in front of the hardware store while men in short-sleeved shirts and overalls chatted with each other. A kid pushed open the door to the diner.
That gave me an idea. It was early, but old men are like old women: they have nothing better to do than sit around and shoot the breeze. The only difference is that they don’t do it over tea at each other’s houses. Instead, they drive their wives to town to shop and do their errands while they sit and wait for them over a cup of coffee somewhere. I crossed the street.
Sure enough, three old men sat over mugs of coffee at a table near the counter. One of them was Mr. Standish. He glanced up when I came in—so did his companions—so I smiled and waved.
“Well, if it isn’t Cady Andrews.” Mr. Standish smiled as if he was glad to see me. “How did you make out yesterday?”
I approached the table and nodded pleasantly at all three men. “I was hoping I would run into you again.”
Mr. Standish beamed at me. “Is that so?”
“Actually, I’m hoping you can help me. I’ve been trying to find out about something that happened here back in the 1940s.”
The three men exchanged glances.
“Well, we were all here then,” Mr. Standish said. “Why don’t you sit down and tell us what you’re after, and we’ll see what we can do?” He got to his feet, clutching the back of his chair until he could straighten up. “Damned arthritis,” he muttered. He pulled out an empty chair for me, and I sat down. “This here is Lloyd Selig,” he said, nodding to the man on his left, a ruddy-faced, blue-eyed man with a paunch like Santa Claus’s. “And this is Marcus Drew.” Mr. Drew was one of those naturally thin men who are all skin and bone. His ears stuck out from the side of his head like the handles on a sugar bowl.
I shook hands all around while Mr. Standish beckoned to the waitress for another cup of coffee.
“Now, what do you need to know, young lady?” he asked.
“It’s about a murder.”
Mr. Selig and Mr. Drew frowned. Mr. Standish looked intrigued.
“This is about that fellow Jefferson whose grave you were looking for yesterday, isn’t it?” he asked.
I nodded. “Were you here when it happened, when Mr. Jefferson went on trial for murder?”
“Yup. We all were,” Mr. Standish said.
I felt a surge of excitement. Finally I had found someone who could tell me what had happened.
“What do you want to know about that for?” Mr. Selig asked. He was peering at me the way Miss Webster at the Home had inspected the little black pellets in the pantry the time we had a mouse infestation.
“I want to write about it.”
“You’re a reporter?” Mr. Drew’s eyes narrowed, and he regarded me with suspicion.
“Sort of. I work on the newspaper at school.”
“Oh. College student, are you?” The curl of Mr. Selig’s lip led me to believe that he did not hold college students in any higher regard than he did reporters. “Not one of those troublemakers we keep hearing about, I hope. Kids that have nothing better to do than make a mess in other people’s backyards.”
“No, sir. But I am interested in law, and I heard about this case.”
“Is that so? What did you hear?” Mr. Selig was definitely the least friendly of the group. Every word he spoke was heavily tinged with mistrust.
“Now, Lloyd, take it easy on the girl,” Mr. Standish said. “She’s young, and she’s not from around here.”
“Exactly,” Mr. Selig said. “All the more reason for her to keep her nose out of where it doesn’t belong.”
“There’s not much to tell,” Mr. Standish said, ignoring Mr. Selig. “Jefferson grew up around here—over in Freemount. There used to be a lot of little towns like that around here, settlements of runaway slaves who put down roots, or tried to, in these parts before the war.” It took me a few seconds to understand that he meant the Civil War. “More of them came up here after it was over. Tried to make a go of farming. The land is generally pretty good around here. But the plots were small, and after a while a lot of people moved on, especially when the war—the one against Hirohito and Hitler—came along. There were lots of jobs to be had making munitions, tanks, airplanes, you name it, and a lot of the colored folk left here to try their luck. Pretty soon the only people left were the old folks. They hung on as long as they could. Jefferson’s mother was one of them. She made up her mind to stay put until her son came back.”
“He went to work in a factory?” I asked.
“Nope. Signed up to fight the Germans. Joined the 761st Tank Battalion. They called themselves the Black Panthers because they’d be taking on the German panzer tanks. They were all colored fellas. The 761st saw action at Omaha Beach and the Battle of the Bulge. As I understand it, young Jefferson came home with a reputation as a war hero.”
“Or so he said,” Mr. Selig muttered.
“Also came back with a chip on his shoulder,” Mr. Drew said, clearly unimpressed. “Strutted around town in his uniform as bold as you please. Wouldn’t stand aside for a woman coming down the sidewalk. Acted like he thought the whole world should have changed just because he fought over there. Acted like he was the only one who’d gone off to war, even though plenty of us had sons who enlisted.”
“Young Jefferson had some strong opinions, that’s for sure,” Mr. Standish said. “He’d tell anyone who would listen—”
“And even those that wouldn’t,” Mr. Selig chimed in.
“—that any man who was good enough to risk his life for his country should be the equal of any other man, regardless of the color of his skin.” He smiled softly at Cady. “You’re young, and you’re not from around here, so maybe you won’t understand. But people in Orrenstown and in other towns in these parts had been doing things a certain way for generations. Change comes hard. The way Jefferson talked and behaved, well, it rubbed people the wrong way.”
“Is that what led to the murder? Did he get into a fight with someone?” I asked.
“In a manner of speaking.”
“He murdered his buddy, that fella he brought back with him,” Mr. Drew said.
“He and Jefferson met overseas, and to hear Jefferson tell it, he saved this fella’s life and they became fast friends,” Mr. Standish said.
“Those Frenchies opened their arms to colored entertainers,” Mr. Selig said disapprovingly. “Treated them all like something special.”
“He was French?” I asked.
“As French as the Eiffel Tower. Spoke with an accent.”
“And he sure did seem to like the Jefferson boy,” Mr. Drew said. “He stayed with Jefferson’s family over there in Freemount.” He shook his head, as if all these years later he still couldn’t believe it. “The two of them swanned around together. I heard they were thinking of starting some kind of business.”
“A garage,” Mr. Standish said. “Apparently, that fella—LaSalle was his name—was a good mechanic. Jefferson, he wanted to invest in a gas station on the highway. They were thinking his mother could run a little diner on the side, and LaSalle would take care of the car repairs.”
“Did someone object to the plan?” I said.
“Well now, I can’t say that everyone thought it was a crackerjack idea.” Mr. Drew drained his coffee and raised his cup to signal for a refill. “But I guess you could say that no one had much of a chance to do much objecting, because the next thing anyone knew, Jefferson killed LaSalle and hid the body to make it look like LaSalle lit out for home.”
“But you said they were friends. Why would Mr. Jefferson kill his friend?”
“Mister.” Mr. Selig shook his head in disgust.
Mr. Standish glanced at Mr. Drew, who was focused on the tabletop.
“Go ahead and tell her, Marcus,” Mr. Standish said. “It was a long time ago. It’s all water under the bridge now.”
Mr. Drew was silent for a moment. When he finally looked up, his eyes were hard. “I guess you could say I got into an argument with Jefferson. I was sick and tired of the way he was acting, like he was more important than anyone else. Like we owed him something. My boy John served over in Europe. Died there too, after winning himself a Purple Heart for saving six of his comrades. But I tell you what, if he’d come back with all the medals he earned pinned to his chest, he would never have strutted around like the cock of the walk. He was a good boy. Modest. So when Jefferson near ran me off the road one day, well, I stopped and called him out. I told him exactly what I thought of him and all his strutting. I put him in his place.”
I wondered what he meant but was afraid to ask. Mr. Drew was caught up in his memories, and they had obviously opened a hurt deep inside him.
“That LaSalle fellow, he was there too. But he didn’t say much. Guess he didn’t think it was any of his business. When they were finally leaving, I heard Jefferson tear a strip off LaSalle for not standing up for him. Next thing anyone knew, LaSalle was found floating in the river with his head bashed in.”
I looked at all three men in turn as I thought about this new information—not just the words these men had spoken but also the tautness or lack of it in their lips and the fire or ice in their eyes. I wondered where Mr. Drew kept his son’s Purple Heart. I also wondered if he ever wished his son had saved himself instead of those six other soldiers, other men’s sons.
“From what you told me, it sounds like a lot of people might have had something against Mr. Jefferson.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Mr. Selig demanded. “Are you saying you think someone else killed that fella, not Jefferson?”
“I’ve met at least one person who seems to think he didn’t do it,” I said.
All three men shook their heads, and all three opened their mouths to speak. But Mr. Standish and Mr. Drew deferred to Mr. Selig.
“He confessed.” Mr. Selig crowed the words as if he’d just won the biggest Bingo prize of the night.
“He did?” Then why had the boy at the cemetery given me the distinct impression that he believed Jefferson was innocent?
“He did indeed.” Mr. Selig leaned back and crossed his arms over his chest. He reminded me of Mr. Entwhistle, the inspector who had come to the Home twice a year to make sure everything was running according to regulations. He always stayed for dinner, and he loved nothing better than to lean back in his chair while his meal digested in his ample belly and tell all of us senior girls that we had better apply ourselves to household skills because, should we ever be so lucky as to attract a husband, he would be expecting someone who could keep a clean house and set a plentiful table. He’d made my stomach turn. If there was a Mrs. Entwhistle, I felt sorry for her.
Mr. Standish gave me a sympathetic smile. The other two glowered at me as if I’d gotten exactly what I deserved.
“The Jefferson boy got life for what he did. I guess he couldn’t take it,” Mr. Standish said. “He tried to escape. He got shot. That was the end of it.”
“What about Mr. LaSalle?” I asked. “Where is he buried?”
Mr. Standish looked at his two friends, not at me, when he answered. “I believe they shipped him back home.”