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Chapter Seven

Gen

“We’ll start today with something that might feel off-topic,” Gen announced to her Civil War class. “I like to draw connections between the past and present. Anyone heard the statement, ‘Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it’?”

Margaret’s hand was the only one that shot up. After glancing around, she lowered it quickly.

Gen wrote the names Nixon and Kennedy on the blackboard, then stepped aside. “So tell me, who watched the presidential debate last night?”

The rocky transition threw the girls off-balance. To Gen’s surprise, only a handful of the twenty-four students raised their hands.

“You don’t have any interest in the upcoming election?”

With a hint of pride, Lee-Anne Blakeney said, “Paxton House doesn’t have a TV, professor.”

The mention of the dorm Gen would have lived in if she’d accepted the housemother position all those years ago made her wince. She might still be trapped there, living with girls like Lee-Anne.

“Well, such an elegant dorm must have a radio,” Gen said. “And I reckon most of you have transistors. I’ve seen you listening to them on campus, twisting your way across the quad.”

The girls laughed. “The Twist” was the latest dance craze, so popular that even Gen and Fenton had tried it out in her backyard.

“You could have listened to the debate, at least. Really, girls, you need to show some interest in your future as well as in the past.” Disappointment coursed through her. Gen ran down her notes as she realized she needed to salvage the first part of her class plan. “For those of you who did tune in, who can guess why I’m bringing up this current event when we’re learning about a war that took place a hundred years ago?”

Susanna Carr, whose family lived next door to Gen, offered, “Because of Kennedy’s opening statement?”

“Good, Susanna. What did he say?”

Susanna was stumped trying to recall the actual words, and Margaret chimed in. “He talked about Lincoln and the election of 1860. Something about Negroes still not being free?”

“Very good, Margaret. I jotted it down because it was so completely relevant to what we’re studying today. And as an aside, I was forced to take a course in Gregg shorthand the summer I graduated from high school. My mother thought a girl having a career meant being a secretary.” Gen smiled at the absurdity, but she knew some of these girls likely agreed with her mother.

“Senator Kennedy said, and these are his words, ‘In the election of 1860, Abraham Lincoln said the question was whether this nation could exist half slave and half free. In the election of 1960, the question is whether the world will exist half slave or half free, whether it will move in the direction of freedom, in the direction of the road that we are taking, or whether it will move in the direction of slavery.’”

Lee-Anne’s hand shot up. “But there’s no slavery anymore.”

“A fair point. But Kennedy went on to talk about Negroes not enjoying their full constitutional rights, how white children have a fairer shake in the country than black children, and he gave some startling statistics. For example, he noted that a Negro child has about one-half as much chance to get through high school as a white child.”

“Is that really true, professor?” Susanna asked, when Gen called on her.

Gen started. “About high school? Yes, it is.”

“But couldn’t there be other reasons they don’t make it through?” the girl added. “Like, maybe they don’t try as hard?”

“Or maybe school’s too hard for them?” Lee-Anne said.

Gen set down her notes. These two girls, peas in a pod, were prime examples of students she wanted to shake until she loosened their narrow beliefs about race. Yet, with their well-connected families, she couldn’t afford to alienate them.

“There is a legacy of slavery that we carry with us today. Negroes may no longer be literally enslaved, but the legacy means they don’t enjoy the same advantages in things like housing, jobs, and schooling. That is what Senator Kennedy was getting at with his statistics, and that is what I want you to remember as we learn about the Civil War and especially Reconstruction.”

Her firm pronouncement silenced them, and then they all opened their textbooks as instructed. Gen wondered how long it would take for Susanna or Lee-Anne to let the class lesson slip to their parents or to Henry Thoms.

✥ ✥ ✥

That week, Gen got a couple of hang-up calls at home—no one on the other end, just a dial tone. A likely prank, or someone who wanted to talk to her but couldn’t bring themselves to once they’d dialed. She’d hung up on Carolyn’s new number several times, so she was well aware the trick wasn’t limited to children.

After her supper, Fenton phoned, asking to stop by. It didn’t sound like he had a casual chat in mind. He explained his lack of sleep since the police had brought him in, his nagging fear that they’d show up at Timmons Hall for him or his belongings, as they had for Mark.

Then he arrived at the real reason for wanting to visit. The provost’s office had summoned him for a meeting the following day, with no specific subject mentioned.

Gen gulped. Provost Lowndes Ramsey, just a rung below the president of the college in power, had been in his job only a year. She’d shaken his manicured hand at a welcome reception. As faculty members listened to his greeting, Fenton had remarked on the provost’s trim build. “I wouldn’t turn him out of bed,” he’d whispered to Gen.

All that seemed ages ago now. Gen couldn’t deny Fenton the company he needed, even though she’d just cracked the spine on The Burden of Southern History and wanted to spend the evening alone with it.

Fenton appeared at her doorstep in a wrinkled button-down shirt that looked like he’d dragged it from the laundry basket. Always so fastidious about his appearance, his dishevelment stood out. His mouth sagged in a way she hadn’t noticed before.

“You look terrible,” she couldn’t help saying as she ushered him in.

“Thanks, hon.”

She splashed Jim Beam into his glass without asking if he wanted it.

“Say, you didn’t call and hang up on me, did you? About an hour before we actually talked?”

Fenton frowned, making the lines in his face more pronounced. “Why would I do that?”

“Sorry, of course you wouldn’t. Probably a neighborhood kid.”

Her friend belted back his drink while still standing up. Gen poured him another and watched as he polished that off, too. Fenton liked his bourbon, but he usually savored a glass or two over the course of a visit. As he placed the empty glass on Gen’s liquor cabinet, his hand trembled.

“Have you had supper?” she asked.

“I had a stale donut from the diner. Does that count?”

Gen smiled and led him to the kitchen by the sleeve. She flicked on the overhead as moonlight spilled through the window facing the Carrs’ house.

“I already ate but let me fix you something real fast.”

Aside from the barbecue recipe she served on special occasions, Gen had never bothered to learn to cook. When she was growing up, she resisted her mother’s attempts to teach her daughters about “meals to please a man.” Since leaving home, her most likely quick meals consisted of scrambled eggs or tuna fish salad. On weekends, she might attempt a recipe from Betty Crocker that she could eat all week, a casserole or spaghetti.

“How’s leftover meat loaf sound?”

“Divine. Don’t fuss, though. I’ll eat it cold.”

With its congealed tomato sauce, the meat loaf she plated for him looked unappetizing, but Fenton worked his way through it bite by bite.

“That was delicious. I didn’t know I was hungry.”

She’d brought the bottle of bourbon to the table, too, and he helped himself to a third round while she continued to nurse her first.

“I might regret eating, though,” he added. “My stomach’s not in the best state these days. Worried I have an ulcer again.”

“You might let up on the booze.”

Fenton let the third shot stand in his glass. He reached into his pants pocket and withdrew a piece of folded paper. He smoothed it open, showing a check for five hundred dollars with no name in the Pay to the Order of line.

Gen stared at the amount. “Hey, my meat loaf’s good, but it’s on the house.”

He didn’t crack a smile. “I want you to hold onto this,” he instructed. “That’s how much Mark said his bail came to. I don’t want to be caught having to scrounge around and beg people for the money. I also don’t want anybody having to write the check and implicate themselves. Especially not you.”

Gen’s pulse picked up speed. “Fenton, you’re not going to jail.” The statement rang hollow, said mostly to convince herself.

“I’d rather not pretend,” he said. “If they arrest me, I’ll need you to bring this to the station.”

“But what if—” She restrained her thought: What if the provost fires you? Won’t you need this?

As if reading her mind, Fenton said, “I have more put by.” He motioned toward the check. “I cashed in some railroad stock my granddad left me. I was saving it for a rainy day, but it’s starting to look pretty cloudy.”

The bourbon burned its way down her throat. They finished their drinks at the same time, and she glanced over the stove at the yellow Bakelite clock that read 8:34.

She wondered how he had gotten himself to this point. Fenton hadn’t divulged anything about the police interview, and she hadn’t prodded him, as if not knowing the details could make it all go away. Yet here he was, asking her to make bail for him if necessary, and she deserved information.

She poured herself a second shot, shorter than the first. Drinking emboldened her, though she sometimes regretted what came out of her mouth. “So what happened, Fen? Did Mark give the police your name?”

“Don’t know.” His finger traced a mark on the cotton tablecloth, a phantom stain that hadn’t come out in the wash.

“Didn’t you ask?” She didn’t mean it as a verbal slap, but it sounded that way, even to her.

“I was so flustered, hon, I was just trying to get it all over with. The police chief is a cool number, I’ll tell you that. The way those two looked at me—” He shivered at the memory.

“Well, if Mark didn’t give them your name, how would they have landed on you? Surely, just being a bachelor isn’t enough, and you say you’re always safe, that you don’t do . . . what Mark did.”

Her disapproval came through; she couldn’t hide it. She honestly didn’t understand the attraction of such a private matter like sex happening in a park or a public restroom. When Fenton didn’t respond, she added, “Or were you not telling me the truth?”

Pain clouded Fenton’s face. She knew he thought of her not just as a friend, but as a big sister figure. In light moments, he called her “Sissy” as a joke.

“I don’t lie to you,” he said slowly. “I may have . . . forgotten an incident with Mark. One time when I wasn’t quite as safe. Mark may have written about it. In a diary the police have.”

Gen’s spine straightened. “Tell me this wasn’t on campus.”

His eyes welled up and spilled over, a stream of tears that distorted his face. In her experience, men didn’t cry. Fenton had wept in front of her once before, several years back when his grandfather died, but that had been much more restrained and polite, a few drops he could wipe away with his pocket hanky. Then, she had patted his back in comfort. Now, she restrained the urge to smack him, keeping her hands securely on her glass and saying nothing.

A few minutes ticked by rhythmically. When Fenton’s crying subsided, she asked, “What happens next?”

He blew his nose, and the trumpeting echoed off the walls. “I should look for a lawyer. Lord, I can’t believe I just said that. You know anyone besides Darrell?”

“Just Frank Johnson at the NAACP.” Negro lawyers didn’t defend white men in their part of the country—or likely anywhere. “I could ask him about white lawyers.”

She thought for a few more moments, then continued, “How about men you know in Richmond? Could you ask around?”

Fenton scowled. “I need to keep my distance from those fellas,” he said. “They’re not going to want to see me anyway. Some of them have wives and families.”

They faced each other in silence as the second hand of the clock ticked and ticked. The weight of her uselessness sat heavily on Gen’s chest. “I’ve been no help,” she said finally.

“You let me come over. You gave me meatloaf and bourbon. You are the best friend I have.”

Guilt filled her to bursting. She was a terrible friend, judgmental and unkind.

“Do you want to stay over?” she offered, and he jumped at the chance. He had slept over before, when their evenings went late or he’d drunk too much. He claimed the sofa bed in her office was comfy, and in fact he was the only one who had ever used it.

Gen had tested the sofa bed at the store, picturing her parents visiting, maybe during the fall when the trees produced a breathtaking canopy of colors in the surrounding mountains. But she never invited them and they never broached the topic—a sort of mutual agreement of silence.

The next morning, Gen heard Fenton padding around in the kitchen. Her nightstand clock read only 6:20. Soon the aroma of coffee hit her nostrils, and she threw on her bathrobe.

Fenton was already fully dressed, his shirt even more wrinkled, as if he’d slept in it. “I’ll be out of your hair in a jiff. Don’t want to get you in trouble with the nosy neighbors.”

At the front door, Gen donned a big-sister face, concerned but smiling, to buck him up. “I’ll be thinking of you today. Let me know what happens?”

His old Dodge didn’t start right away; the cold engine took several tries to turn over. She hoped Mrs. Carr wasn’t up, that the racket didn’t attract her attention.