He wondered if Arlette was back to folding laundry, and looked into the church by one of the side exits. There she was, at the end of the aisle, her eyes focused on her work. The smell of ammonia and the cries of children almost sent Jason back to the camp, but Arlette looked up at that moment and saw him. She gave him a smile, though it was clearly an effort, and Jason stepped into the church, and put his telescope under the table where she was folding laundry.
“I’m sorry about your grandfather,” he said. “And the others.”
“Thank you.” Her eyes were puffy with weeping. “It was a surprise.”
“My mother died,” Jason said, “in the first quake.”
Arlette pressed her lips together, smoothed a child’s T-shirt on the table. “Daddy said you’d had a bad time.”
“Shall I help you with the folding?”
“If you like.”
He folded a pair of blue jeans, added it to the pile. Arlette picked another shirt from a plastic laundry basket, laid it out on the ironing board. Jason looked up at her, at the necklace and earrings she still wore, the strange contrast to her plaid shirt, blue jeans, and kerchief.
“Your dad’s been great,” he said. “I don’t know if I’d have made it without him.”
“He said the same about you.”
“He did?” Jason felt a rush of pleasure. “Sometimes he seemed to get pretty impatient with me.” Arlette nodded, her lips set in a private smile. “Yes,” she said. “He does that.” The voice on the loudspeaker rose to a chorus of “Amens,” and then there was a click and the sound died away. Arlette gave a sigh of relief.
“Sermon’s over?” Jason said.
Arlette leaned close to Jason, a conspiratorial glint in her eyes, and lowered her voice so that no one could overhear. “The mothers here convinced Brother Frankland that the loudspeakers had to be turned off for an hour in the mornings, and in the afternoons, so that the children could have their naps.” Jason leaned closer to join Arlette’s conspiracy, lowered his own voice. “So.” he said, “what’s it really like here?”
Arlette hesitated. “Well,” she said finally, “it’s Brother Frankland’s camp. Brother Frankland’s food. So we play by his rules.”
“And what are they, exactly?”
Arlette looked uncomfortable. “I’ve only been here for two days. I really shouldn’t judge, but I think he and the others are doing their best.”
Jason considered. “I suppose it beats being out in the wilderness in a boat,” he said. Arlette looked up at him, nodded. But her eyes, he saw, were troubled.
“Brought you some more clothes,” a voice intruded. Two more girls entered, both white, both in their mid-teens. They carried a plastic laundry hamper between the two of them, and set it next to Arlette. They looked at Jason, then at Arlette.
“Throw him back, girl,” one of them advised. “He’s too small.” Jason flushed. The girls, laughing, bounced back to their work. Arlette tried to conceal her smile.
“Well,” she said, turning to the pile of laundry, “looks like we’ve got our work cut out.”
TWENTY-SIX
At half past 6 o’clock in the morning it cleared up, and believing the danger over I left home, to see what injury my neighbours had sustained. A few minutes after my departure there was another shock, extremely violent—I hurried home as fast as I could, but the agitation of the earth was so great that it was with much difficulty I kept my balance—the motion of the earth was about twelve inches to and fro. I cannot give you an accurate description of this moment; the earth seemed convulsed—the houses shook very much—chimnies falling in every direction. —The loud hoarse roaring which attended the earthquake, together with the cries, screams, and yells of the people, seems still ringing in my ears.
The radio calls were confused. Officer in trouble. Shots fired. But it was David calling. Omar recognized his voice.
Omar spun the wheel of his cruiser and mashed the accelerator to the floor. Turned on the flashing lights as acceleration punched him back into his seat. There was a jar and a cry of metal as the car bottomed out on a partly-filled-in crevasse. Omar didn’t slow down.
In front of the A.M.E. campground he found a half-dozen vehicles with flashing lights, all casting long evening shadows across the highway. A big car, an old 1972 Oldsmobile with one primer-gray fender, had crossed the highway and was nose-down in the bar ditch. There were bullets stars in the windows. The driver’s door was open and a body lay by the door.
David stood nearby, his arms akimbo and his cap tipped forward over his eyes. There was a smile on his face. Omar saw him unharmed and felt his racing heart begin to ease.
A knot of deputies, some of them Omar’s specials in civilian clothes, stood around him in a knot. One skinny black man was seated on the asphalt at the rear of the car, his hands cuffed behind his back. Omar parked and almost vaulted from his car. He ran to his son.
“Are you all right?” Omar called.
David looked at him, his smile broadening. “I’m okay, Dad. Just shot a guy, is all.” He gave a little laugh.
“It’s martial law, right? It’s okay.”
Omar looked at the dead driver, saw a young black man, maybe twenty, with splashes of bright Technicolor blood all over him. Then he glanced at the camp, saw the wall of men, the hostile black faces, the stony eyes.
The smell of food floated on the air. The camp had been served their supper just before this happened, and Omar saw plates being carried by some of the onlookers, but nobody seemed to be eating. Reverend Morris stood among them, his face long, a brooding in his eyes. And for some reason the calm sorrow on Morris’s face seemed more frightening than fury on the dozens of faces that surrounded him. Omar looked at David again. David, standing easy, smiling among his friends, among the neighbors who’d known him since he was a boy.
“Okay,” he said. “We take pictures of the scene. Then bag the deceased and send him to Tree Simpson.” He took David’s arm, drew him aside. “And you tell me what happened.” And then we work out what to tell everyone else, he thought to himself.
An amateur cop, son of the King Kleagle of Louisiana, had just killed some black kid. Omar knew that there would be consequences to a story like that, whether David was justified or not, whether there was martial law or not.
In fact, he couldn’t think of any good consequences at all. Which was why it was important why David’s story had to cover all the bases, and why everyone else had to tell the same story as David. Omar was relieved when David’s story sounded okay. A couple bad boys had got stir-crazy in the camp, decided to go for a joy ride even though there was no place to go. Were in their car before anyone knew they’d got into the parking lot. And then ignored shouted orders to stop, until David drew his firearm and shot the driver.
“Everyone here saw the same thing? They’ll all back your story?”
David shrugged. “Sure. It’s what happened.”
Omar nodded. “Good,” he said. “Now what I want you to do is give me your pistol, then go to my office at the courthouse. We’ll do the paperwork.”
David looked at him in surprise. “I don’t get to keep my gun?”
“Not one that’s been used in a shooting, no. And you’re off-duty until Tree Simpson rules the shooting was justified.”