At the front door were two men in army uniforms. A moment later, they were seated in the den, facing the family on the sofa. Liza sat between Joel and Stella and held their hands. Stella was already in tears.
Captain Malone said solemnly, “I’m afraid I have some bad news, and I’m sorry. But Lieutenant Banning is now missing and presumed dead. We do not know for certain that he is dead, because his unit was unable to recover his body. But, given the circumstances, the men with him are reasonably certain that he is dead. I’m very sorry.”
Stella’s head fell in her mother’s lap. Liza grabbed both and squeezed them close. They gasped and cried and held each other tightly as the two officers stared at the floor. The men had not volunteered for this assignment, but they had their orders and were now making such dreadful visits almost every day throughout north Mississippi.
Liza gritted her teeth and asked, “What does ‘presumed dead’ mean, exactly?”
Captain Malone said, “It means we did not recover the body.”
“So there’s a chance he’s still alive?” Joel asked, wiping his cheeks.
“Yes, there is that chance, but I caution you that, under the circumstances, the men with Lieutenant Banning are reasonably certain that he was killed.”
“Can you tell us what happened?” Liza asked.
“We have some details, but not many, and I’m not sure how accurate our facts are, ma’am. Lieutenant Banning was captured when the Allied forces surrendered to the Japanese on the Philippines. It was last month on April 9 and 10. The men were being marched to a POW camp when he was injured and left behind, as were many men. He was then killed by the Japanese soldiers.”
At that moment it didn’t really matter how he died. The shock of the moment blurred the details. The horrible truth was that Pete Banning was gone and they would never see him again. Husband, father, patriarch, friend, boss, brother, neighbor, and leading citizen. There were so many who would share their pain. They wept for a long time, and when the officers had nothing else to say, they stood, offered their condolences once more, and left the house.
Liza wanted nothing more than to go to her bedroom, lock the door, get under the covers, and cry herself to sleep. But that would be indulgent and was not an option. She had two wonderful children who now needed her more than ever, and while she wanted to collapse into a puddle of tears, she instead stiffened her spine and took the first step.
“Joel, get in the truck and drive down to Florry’s. Bring her back here. Stop along the way and inform Nineva. Tell Jupe to get on a horse and spread the word among the Negroes.”
Word spread rapidly enough, and within an hour the front yard was filled with cars and trucks. Liza would have preferred to spend the first night in quiet mourning with just her kids and Florry, but things were not done that way in the rural South. Dexter and Jackie Bell arrived in the first wave and spent a few moments alone with the Bannings. He read some scripture and said a prayer. Liza explained that the family was not ready to confront a horde of well-meaning mourners, and they huddled in her bedroom while Dexter quietly asked folks to come back later. At ten o’clock, they were still arriving.
In Clanton, the gossip was of nothing else. At 8:00 a.m., Dexter opened the sanctuary of the Methodist church so those who knew Pete could stop by for a moment of prayer. In the early hours of the tragedy, much was made of the fact that he was missing and not officially dead. So there was hope, and the hope inspired his friends and neighbors to pray long and hard.
Later in the morning, Dexter and Jackie returned to the Banning home to sit with Liza and the children, who were still in no mood to greet the crowd. He quietly encouraged people to leave, and they did. They arrived in carloads and delivered cakes, pies, casseroles, food no one needed but there were traditions to follow. After a few soft words with Dexter, and once they realized they would not be allowed to hug and cry with Liza, they quietly left the house, returned to their cars, and drove away.
Liza made the decision that there would be no memorial service. There was a chance her husband was still alive, and she and her children would focus on that and ignore the bad news. Or, they would at least try to. As the days dragged on, Liza began seeing a few close friends, as did Joel and Stella. The shock gradually wore off, though the aching, numbing pain did not.
Routines developed to maintain normalcy. The family ate breakfast and supper together, often with Nineva sitting with them, a new wrinkle. Each weekday Dexter Bell arrived around ten for a short devotional — a verse or scripture, a comforting word, and a thoughtful prayer. Jackie came occasionally, but usually he was alone.
Two weeks after receiving the news, Florry took Joel and Stella to Memphis for a long weekend. Liza insisted they go in an effort to get away from the gloominess of their home, and to have a little fun. Florry had some eccentric friends in Memphis who could make anyone smile. She and the kids checked into the Peabody. Joel’s room was not far from where he was conceived, though he would never know it.
While they were away, Dexter Bell arrived each day for the morning devotion. He and Liza sat in the den and talked quietly. From the kitchen, Nineva listened to every word.
Some black-market paregoric worked, and Pete’s third round of dysentery improved but did not go away. His malaria lingered too. He could function with it, though at times the chills and fevers caused him to lie in the dirt and shake from head to toe. He hallucinated and thought he was back home.
He and Clay sat in the shade of the barracks and watched the parade of dead bodies being hauled to the cemetery across the road. By late April, twenty-five Americans were dying each day. By May, the number was fifty. By June, a hundred.
Death was everywhere. The living thought about dying because they saw the dead bodies, which were often piled haphazardly. They thought about dying because they too were facing death. They starved a little more each day and came closer to a collapse from which they would not recover. Diseases were running rampant and there was no way to stop them, and it was inevitable that one of a dozen would arrive any day now and bring a miserable death with it.
Pete watched men give up and die, and on several occasions he was tempted. All of them were hanging on by a thread anyway, and only those with an iron will to live managed to survive. Giving up was painless, while living meant waking up in the morning and facing another day in hell. Some were determined to cling to all hope and survive whatever the enemy threw at them, while others grew too weary from the suffering and closed their eyes.
Pete survived by thinking of his wife and kids, his farm, and his family’s long and rich history in Ford County. He recalled stories he had heard as a boy about old wars and battles and feuds, all colorful tales that had been handed down from one generation to the next. He thought about Liza and those wonderful days at the Peabody when they were spending nights together, something no well-respected couple would think of doing in the 1920s. He thought of her body and her constant desire for physical pleasure. He remembered hunting and fishing with Joel in the woods on their land and bringing home deer, turkeys, rabbits, bream, and crappie that they cleaned by the barn and gave to Nineva to cook for supper. He remembered Stella as a little girl with those beautiful eyes curled up on the sofa in her pajamas listening as her father read bedtime stories. He longed for the warmth of her soft skin. He wanted to be there when his children finished college and got married.