“Later. Once we’re safe.”
I gun the engine and blow past the vehicles and men of the Poker Club, back toward the mainland. Toward home. If Bienville is home. Before anything else, I need to do what I came back to Mississippi to do in the first place. Bury my father. Or in his case, scatter his ashes on the river.
Then we’ll see.
Chapter 56
Buck’s funeral is scheduled for three p.m. That worked out well, because Nadine and I slept twelve hours straight after getting home from the hunting camp. I wasn’t sure Mom coming to the cemetery was a great idea, given that my father’s funeral will be held in a couple of days, but she brushed away my concerns. She told me she’s always been grateful for what Buck did for me as a boy and doesn’t want his widow to have to bury her husband with only a handful of people to mourn him. That’s the closest Mom has ever come to acknowledging Buck being my surrogate father.
Nadine, too, fears that the funeral will be a bleak affair, given that the town virtually disowned Buck after his work threatened the paper mill. I feel a little more hopeful since learning that most of the newspaper staff is going; every warm body will make Quinn feel a little better. Mom is riding beside me in the Flex, while Nadine sits in the middle of the backseat, wearing a dark navy dress that’s quite a change from her usual jeans and T-shirts.
Two blocks from Cemetery Road, I recognize a couple of cars ahead of us. Hopefully they’re headed to the service. One is Dr. Jack Kirby’s, which lifts my heart. The other looks like it belongs to Byron Ellis, the coroner. Maybe we’ll have a decent showing after all, enough to pay modest tribute to all the good work Buck did for the people of this town.
As we drive through the cemetery gate, something tells me I might have misjudged the occasion. A young Boy Scout stands beside the asphalt lane, staring ahead with military bearing, his green ball cap held flat against the red kerchief on his chest as a sign of respect. I remember exactly what that uniform feels like, though in my day we wore the iconic Stetson campaign hat or a military-style garrison cap. Thirty yards down the lane, another Scout stands in the same rigid posture.
“My goodness,” says my mother, flattening her hand against her bosom. “What fine boys. What fine, thoughtful boys.”
As we drive deeper into the cemetery, we pass Scouts every thirty yards, all the way to the burial site, where a tent has been set up. As I make the final turn, I see forty or fifty cars parked along the lane beside the gravesite.
“Thank God,” I say softly.
“Look at the crowd down there,” my mother says. “What do you notice?”
I gaze down the lane at the knots of people, mostly adults moving among uniformed boys. “I don’t know. What?”
Nadine leans up between our seats. “It’s nearly all male. I’ll bet those men are Scouts, too. Men Buck mentored when they were boys.”
“Must be,” I say, feeling my throat tighten.
Mom squeezes my hand. “Good works never die. There’s your proof. You think those men give a damn about some paper mill?”
“Come on,” says Nadine, touching my shoulder. “Let’s go pay our respects to Buck.”
We walk down the asphalt lane and join the mourners. Through the bodies, I see Quinn Ferris moving from person to person, thanking each for coming. To my surprise, she’s smiling a lot of the time. When Quinn gets to me, I worry that she’ll ask me to say something over Buck’s grave, but she doesn’t. When I ask who is going to speak, she says no one. There will be no prayer, eulogy, or benediction, no Christian minister of any kind. But cryptically she adds that there will be a farewell ceremony of sorts.
“By the way,” she says. “I got a call from Arthur Pine this morning.”
“What did he want?”
“He said he had a check for me. An insurance policy I knew nothing about.”
“Huh. That’s weird.”
“I thought so, too. Because it was a big one.” She gives me a knowing look, then stands on tiptoe and kisses my cheek. “Thank you.”
After Quinn moves on, we choose a vantage point on some elevated ground across the lane, where we can see the faces of the mourners nearest the grave. Through the crowd I pick out an old-school campaign hat resting on Buck’s coffin lid. A fitting tribute to his lifelong avocation. A loud hum rises from the crowd, as people who haven’t seen each other for years greet friends and reminisce. But as a bank of clouds obscures the sun, they slowly fall silent. Soon not a sound can be heard from the mourners. Each is reliving moments he shared with Buck Ferris. It’s strange to hear no words spoken over the grave, no hymn or even pop tune sung with heartbreaking sincerity. As I wonder how this unusual gathering will end, a strange sound rolls over the ground, reverberating off the gravestones.
“What’s that?” Mom asks, looking around in confusion.
“A drum, I think.”
Half a minute later, a column of Indians wearing ceremonial shirts adorned with colorful ribbons marches over the hill behind the gravesite, a solemn file of men and women. It’s been three decades since I attended one of the powwows Buck managed at the Indian Village, but I still recognize members of at least half a dozen tribes. Some wear their black hair long, others short. And while many have the pure blood of the first Americans to walk this ground beside the river, others have intermarried with whites and look like working-class people from any Southern town.
“I bet this is the first time this cemetery’s seen a sendoff like this one,” I say softly.
“It’s not bagpipes playing ‘Amazing Grace,’” Mom observes. “But it sure inspires respect and reflection.”
As we watch in fascination, the Indians form a circle near the grave, the hide drum at the center, and eight of them begin striking it together. Then their voices rise in song.
Mom looks back at Nadine and me. “When Duncan and I first married, he came to the Episcopal church with me. We went to the adult Sunday school. The topic of discussion that day was whether or not Buddhists and Hindus could get into heaven. Can you imagine? That was the last time Duncan darkened the door of that church. I stopped going myself. Being with your father made me see the silliness of all that. The arrogance of it. Oh, Duncan would have loved this.”
I remember Dad sitting with me in the car yesterday, beside Adam’s statue, asking me to cast his ashes into the river. “I think you’re right.”
After the drum falls silent and the singing fades, a group of men lowers Buck’s simple wooden coffin into the grave, and the Indians begin covering it with earth. As the shovels work steadily, I notice Jet making her way through the crowd. She’s wearing a black dress and onyx earrings, and her height and dark skin make her easy to follow. I hadn’t realized she was here. Once I’m sure she’s moving toward me, I excuse myself and signal her to meet me at a tree that will give us some cover from the crowd, so as not to appear disrespectful.
“Are you by yourself?” I ask as she reaches the tree.
“Kevin’s home with Paul. Sally’s service is tomorrow. I think one funeral is enough for Kevin right now.”
“Sure.”
She hesitates, then gives me an unguarded look. “A lot happened last night. Some things need explaining. Could you meet me at the barn today? Four thirty?”
“The Weldon barn?”
She nods. “Too soon?”
“No, I can make that.”
Jet smiles with gratitude, but then her face darkens. “How’s Nadine doing?”
I’m not sure how honest to be about this. “She’s all right.”
She nods but says nothing further. “Four thirty, then.”
“Four thirty.”
We part without touching.