Alligator Bayou - Donna Jo Napoli [69]
“Yes.”
“Then go. Run away. Don’t tell me where. I don’t want to know. That way if the mob gets hold of me, I can’t tell them anything, no matter what they do.”
twenty-five
I run the road out of town, but as soon as Frank Raymond’s out of sight, I turn and race back. The shortest way to the slaughterhouse is to cut through town. I’m slick with sweat and panting hard and the only noise I hear is my own heartbeat. I’ve got to get there fast. I run in the center of the road. Others are running, too. But not as fast as me.
I can see it now. The slaughterhouse is lit up so bright, it looks as if it’s on fire. Outside, people stand in the grasses in little clumps of three or four. Whites with whites; Negroes with Negroes. Everyone’s talking. Children race through the crowd playing tag. More people are coming. The people I ran past on the road, they’re coming here.
If anyone recognizes me …I race for the woods, expecting to hear a shout, maybe even a shot. I dash behind a pine and cling. The bark cuts my cheek. People are coming in buggies, like to the tournament. Coming for a show, all right.
Sheriff Lucas! Get here fast!
I hunch over, run to the closest window, and press myself against the rear wall. I pull up on the window ledge and look in.
Giuseppe and Carlo are on their knees with their backs to me. Their hands are tied behind them. Men stand in front of them, arguing, everyone talking at once. White men. I can make out faces. John Wilson, Mr. Rogers, Fred Johnson, and others. And, Lord in Heaven, there’s Frank Raymond and Mr. Blander.
“All of them did it,” says Wilson in a booming voice.
For a second everyone’s quiet.
“This ain’t no court of law,” says Blander in a flat tone. “They’s procedures to follow. Facts to gather.”
“We done gathered the facts,” says Wilson.
“No, you didn’t.” Frank Raymond steps forward, but Blander catches him by the arm. Frank Raymond shakes him off. “They have a right to defend themselves.”
“You want a trial?” Rogers turns to Giuseppe. “Who killed Dr. Hodge?”
“No one!” shouts Frank Raymond. “He’s not dead! Dr. Hodge is alive!”
Giuseppe mumbles in Sicilian. I’m not sure he even understands the question.
“And you?” Rogers leans toward Carlo. “What you got to say for yourself?”
If Carlo speaks, I can’t hear it. He keeps jerking his right shoulder forward, pulling against the rope on his hands. And I know, I just know, he wants to make the sign of the cross.
“All right.” Rogers juts his chin toward Frank Raymond. “They got their trial.”
“Hodge isn’t dead!” says Frank Raymond. “We’ve got to wait for Sheriff Lucas.”
“No more trouble from y’all, Mr. Raymond,” growls Rogers.
“Father May isn’t here. They’re Catholic. They need a priest.”
“Catholics. They swarm all over New Orleans and Baton Rouge, but we keep clean of them here in Tallulah. That priest ain’t even American. He’s as bad as these dagoes.”
A man whose face I can’t see points a gun toward Frank Raymond and Blander.
“No more wasting time.” Johnson throws a rope over the crossbar where beef carcasses usually hang. The end is tied into a noose. He fits it over Giuseppe’s head!
I scream, “No!” But the sound’s cut off by a hand over my mouth and I’m rolling on the ground, kicking and biting, and two of them are on me at once.
“Stop it, dumbhead!”
I’m pinned, shaking and staring through the dusk at Rock and Charles.
“Get up.” Charles stands and pulls on my arm. “We got to run.”
“No.”
He drags me toward the woods, but I rip myself away and run for the window again when a cheer comes up from inside the slaughterhouse. Something’s happened.
I stop still. The whole world’s gone crazy.
“Calogero.” The voice is right beside me. “Come on!” Patricia takes my hand.
I don’t know what else to do. They pull me along into the woods. Ben is waiting there. We go deeper and I can’t hear anything anymore. It’s like we’re underwater.
I stop in a small clearing, heaving.
“Come on!” Patricia pulls