“Somebody sent me a picture of James Turner’s death notice in the Natchez paper. That’s when I realized he’d got killed in Vietnam nine months before Lincoln was even conceived.”
“Do you know who sent you that picture?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Who?”
“Cora Revels.”
“Like I said,” Rusty whispers in the stunned silence. “Fireworks.”
“The defendant’s sister?” Quentin asks.
“That’s right.”
“How do you know that?”
“She admitted it to me, two days later.”
“Cora Revels testified in this court that someone had sent you such a picture, but she didn’t know who.”
Jelks chuckles knowingly. “I’ll bet she did.”
“What did you do when you got the picture?”
“I questioned my wife.”
“Did you beat her?”
“I may have slapped her a time or two. I was pretty upset, as you might imagine.”
“What did she tell you?”
“First, some BS story about a one-night stand. I knew that was a lie. Viola never had a one-night stand in her life. Then she told me the Ku Klux Klan had raped her back in Mississippi. That I could believe. When I called down to Natchez to check, some people told me that rumor had gone around back in ’68. The numbers added up, so I bought that story.”
“When did you learn that Tom Cage was in fact Lincoln’s father?”
“Three months ago, when the story hit the national papers. After Viola died.”
Glancing to my right, I see my mother sitting as pale and motionless as a marble in the British Museum. Only her right hand, clenching Annie’s, gives any indication of life.
“Did you ever tell Lincoln that his birth had resulted from a Klan rape in Mississippi?” Quentin asks.
“Yes, sir. Seven months ago.”
“Why did you do that?”
“The boy disappointed me. I was upset. I wish I hadn’t done it now, but wishin’s no use. Wasn’t his fault, however he got born.”
Quentin rotates his chair toward the jury box but continues to address Jelks. “Let’s go back to Cora Revels for a moment. Please characterize the relationship between Cora and her sister, as you came to understand it after you joined the family.”
“Well . . . it wasn’t good.”
“How do you mean?”
“Cora was always jealous of Viola. Viola was the pretty one, the smart one, she could sing and dance like somebody on TV. Like Martha and the Vandellas. The Supremes. Cora was like Mary Wells to Viola’s Diana Ross. Only Viola was like Diana Ross with Mary Wells’s voice. She had it all, brother.”
Suddenly Jelks catches sight of Cora sitting in the row behind the prosecution table. She looks as though she’s trying to shrink beneath her seat.
“There you is, Cee. Ha. Don’t crouch down, baby. You still looking good!”
Judge Elder says, “Mr. Jelks, don’t speak unless you are first asked a question.”
“Yes, sir, Judge.”
Quentin says, “How well did you come to know Cora during the thirty-five years you were married to her sister?”
“Well . . . about as good as a man can come to know a woman, if you know what I mean.”
A shocked murmur ripples through the crowd. Everyone is staring at Cora Revels.
“When Mae Ola was dying,” Jelks goes on, “—that’s Viola’s mama, Mrs. Mae Ola—Cora and me got a little closer than we should have. I ain’t proud of it. Just stating a fact. But a man’s got needs, and all Viola could think about during those weeks was taking care of her mama. She was bone tired every day. But Cora didn’t strain herself like that. Viola always did most of the work, ’cause she was a nurse, I reckon. But those two women were just different. Always was. And having this jealousy thing between them, Cora wanted to try me out, I guess. So I let her. I didn’t care what her reason was.”
So this is what Lincoln was referring to on the stand when he said his mother had lost a lot of sympathy for Junius Jelks after her mother died . . .
“You’re saying Cora slept with you out of a desire to hurt her sister?”
“Objection,” says Shad. “Is this soap opera leading to anything relevant?”
Judge Elder looks curiously at Shad. “When you were directing the soap opera, Mr. Johnson, you seemed quite content to hear this kind of lurid detail. Overruled.”
“Like I said,” Jelks intones, “being with me was one way of getting back at Viola for all those years of feeling second class. If Cora could take Viola’s man, then she could feel superior for just a little while.”
“Did Viola ever learn about this extramarital affair?”
“Uhh, I’m afraid so. The night before we were due to go back to Chicago, she caught us messin’ a little in the kitchen, and she saw the way it was. Then out of nowhere Cora busts out and says I’m leaving Viola for her, which was complete bullsh— nonsense. I wasn’t that kind of fool. But the upshot was, Cora and Viola didn’t speak to each other for a long time after that.”
“How long, Mr. Jelks?”
“Years.”
“How many years?”
“Eight or nine, I guess. Until Viola got the cancer.”
“And it was during this period that Cora sent you James Turner’s death notice?”
“That’s right. For a long time Cora felt real guilty about me, and Viola wouldn’t ever ease up on her. So eventually Cee got mad. She wanted to prove to me—and to Viola—that Viola wasn’t any better than she was. Hell, I knew Viola wasn’t perfect. But she was as perfect as any mortal woman I ever met, and better than I deserved.”
“Mr. Jelks, two days ago, right there in that chair you’re sitting in, Cora Revels painted a verbal picture of the time when her mother was dying. She described it as a period of special closeness between her and her sister. She said it was then that Viola had confided the secret of Lincoln’s paternity to her.”
“I don’t know about Viola telling Cee that. But I know that time wasn’t any ‘period of closeness.’ Cora spent every minute trying to find excuses to get away from the house to have sex with me.”
A hum of conversation rises, then dies. A rustle of cloth to my right makes me turn, and I can see that my mother deeply regrets allowing Annie to attend these proceedings. But if I know Annie, she won’t be leaving until court has adjourned for the day. Not without making a scene, anyway.
“The day we left town,” Jelks adds, “it would have taken an ice pick for Cora to get one word out of Viola.”
Quentin nods as though he expected this answer all along. “I see. Well, why didn’t Viola divorce you over this incident?”
“I’ve thought about that a lot. She said it was because she wanted Lincoln to have a stable family. But looking back, I think the real reason was she was afraid I’d get mad and tell Lincoln I wasn’t his father. That was her greatest fear, that he would find out the truth about himself.”
“But you yourself didn’t know who Lincoln’s real father was at that time, did you?”
“No. That’s right. But she knew I’d tip to it eventually.”