Date: Mon, 30 Mar 2009 08:09:06 -0400
From: John Ellison <paradegi@sympatico.ca>
Subject: The Landing - Chapter 8

This story contains situations and scenes of graphic sex between consenting
males. All legal disclaimers apply. If this topic offends you, do not read
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Copyright 2009 by John Ellison

Additional works publish in Nifty in the Military Category:

The Phantom of Aurora
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Aurora Tapestry
The Knights of Aurora
Aurora Crusade

The "Aurora" books are a series and should be read in sequence.

A Sailor's Tale

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The Landing

Chapter Eight


	The fiasco at the Consolidated Schools and the antics of the Smiths
were fodder for the gossips for weeks. The biddies gathered in clutches to
shake their heads, sip tea and nibble on shrimp sandwiches. The good old
boys gathered downtown, sipped their "coffee" - no doubt the product of one
of Daddy Smith's stills, and laughed their asses off. Stubby Richmond, whom
everyone rightly assumed had been in on the scheme from the get go, smiled
around his store-bought teeth. He had embarrassed the county officials, had
succeeded in keeping the school white, and demonstrated the base, feral
nature of Negroes.
	In other words, life returned to what passed for normal.
	I heard the laughter and the coarse jokes, but paid them little
attention. I was much too involved now in other things. First there was
school.
	I liked Parker-Semmes. The instructors, most of whom had been hired
away from the Consolidated Schools, were familiar to me. The academic
program was first rate and, much to Damian Lee's delight, the "Day Boys"
could participate in the sports program. He was out on the playing fields
every day after class, and while I was happy to see him happy, his football
playing played havoc with our sex lives. The big goof was usually too
tired, and too bruised after being pummeled and pounded on the gridiron!
	I think Damian Lee enjoyed the physical contact, the nudity in the
showers after practice, the coarse humor and homoerotic badinage and
reveled in the ability to be able to savor the firm, hard muscles that he
could feel without fear.
	While I missed our once nightly sessions, sex was not something I
missed at all. There was Sinjin, who was always "up" for a session, which
usually happened whenever he came around to do our homework. These sessions
were infrequent, however, as he was deeply involved not only with Jack
Mather, but also Miles Carroll. They were a threesome and according to
Sinjin managed to find every out-of-the way hidey hole in sight.
	I was occasionally involved with Pendleton Izard. We would meet
once or twice a week in the library and then retire to his room in Parker
Hall, the Senior Cadets' barracks. Miles and Jack were rarely there, as
both were involved in sports, or off somewhere with Sinjin, so we had
privacy and as we kept the noise down, no one suspected that we were
studying not calculus, but comparative anatomy.
	I visited Tony Ravelli at least once a week, always with the excuse
that I was tutoring him. Sex with Tony was pleasant, but hardly fulfilling
for me. For Tony sex was just a means to get off. He would not return any
favors. He liked having his dick sucked, and was one of those guys who
stayed hard after they came, so much so that he usually got off twice. Once
drained, as it were, he would roll away, breathing heavily, and thank me
for what I had done to him.
	Knowing that Tony would never do anything back, I accepted the
situation. There was really no point in doing otherwise. He was a straight
boy, at least in his own mind, and that was that.
	Not that I was desperate, or anywhere near desperation. John and
Thomas Pegram were always available, as were Tristan and Damian Conyngham,
and from time to time we would meet, usually down at the swimming
hole. Charlie Pegram I saw from time to time, but as he was now a Senior
Cadet at the Citadel, and a member of the South Carolina Guard, his visits
were few and far between.
	We also saw little of Philip Charles who, like his fellow
classmate, Charlie, was deeply involved in his military training. The war
in Vietnam was an inferno of death and destruction, and more and more young
men were being called up. Both Philip Charles and Charlie had signed papers
and upon graduation they were slated Basic Officer Training, Charlie
assigned to Camp Lejeune, and Philip Charles to Fort Bragg, and from there
to Vietnam.
	In a way the war brought prosperity to the Landing, in the form of
more and more soldiers being trained out at Camp Stephen Weed. Being
soldiers, and knowing what Fate had in store for them, they flocked to
town, flush with cash on paydays, looking for booze and women. Overbridge
underwent a metamorphosis of sorts, with six new taverns and two new whore
houses springing up, mostly on the western edge of town, although
Peckinham's and Ethel's still did land office business. Miss Letty
MacDonald, knowing a good thing when she saw it, sent the tired old whores
she usually had staffing her house packing, and imported pros from New
Orleans.
	The shops and stores, not only in the white section of town but
also in Overbridge, were also busy. Papa Ravelli, despite his ingrained
prejudices against them, hired more colored waiters to cope with the influx
of army officers and their ladies (a small number of cottages having been
built for married officers) who dined almost nightly at the terrace
restaurant. Market Day was almost chaotic at times, as many of the soldiers
were farm boys, or came from small towns all over the country, and Market
Day reminded them of home, and they came in droves. Daddy Smith, with his
sons in the pokey, complained that he had to do everything himself, from
bottling the corn liquor to selling it.
	Mr. Beidermeyer, who wasn't complaining at all, seeing as many of
the soldiers shopped in his department store, buying touristy souvenirs,
Hawaiian shirts (the gaudier the better), Bermuda shorts (plaids were "in")
and buck knives. Other popular items were pieces of jewelry fashioned from
Carolina gold (small deposits having been found at Ridgeway) and amethysts,
from Due West and Jonesboro, gifts for the girls left behind I
suppose. Mr. Beidermeyer did opine, however, that the new prosperity
wouldn't last, and advised anyone who would listen to him to, "Enjoy the
war; the peace will be terrible!"
	Few listened, and few saw what Mr. Beidermeyer saw, for along with
the prosperity, the war brought division, social and political, division so
intense that it divided families, and set father against son, and brother
against brother.
	We were of course, not unaware of what was going on in the
country. Thanks to television, and every other media form, we knew that a
vast, anti-war movement was at work. We had seen the horrible TV reports of
the carnage of the Tet Offensive, the heroic if useless defense of Khe San
by the Marines, and the protest marches that seemed to happen nightly in
all the northern cities. Driven by biased talking heads and written about
by equally biased newspaper reporters, the movement gained adherents, and
every liberal, left leaning Democrat jumped on the band wagon, from
Hollywood stars to once respected Senators and Congressmen.
	Most folk in town were not necessarily opposed to what was
happening. They were Southerners and believed in their military, believed
that it was an honor to serve, and answer Liberty's call. Still, there were
those in town who were passionately opposed to the war, Crazy Betsey van
Lews leading the charge. In Overbridge the anti-war movement was deeply
entrenched, the activists and rabble rousers claiming it was a "white man's
war and a black man's fight." This was a specious argument to anyone who
bothered to look at the statistics, and anyone who actually read the
Butcher's Bill when it was finally rendered. At the end of the day, of the
58,183 dead, 50,120 were white, and 7,264 were black. Of those casualties,
South Carolina counted 896 of her sons.
	While there were no demonstrations in town, and the anti-war
rhetoric was confined to the preachers, it was out there, and we all knew
it.
	Another divisive force was politics. The South had, since the War
Between the States, been a Democratic bastion. No self-respecting
Southerner would vote Republican if his life depended on it. The phrase,
"Yellow Dog Democrat" was apt and appropriate: you could put a yellow dog
on the ticket as the Democratic candidate for any office, and the thing
would be elected over any well qualified, respected Republican.
	Southerners take politics seriously, and no one was too
disappointed when Lyndon Johnson announced that he would not seek, and
would not accept, the Democratic nomination for re-election. Johnson was
not well-liked, nor respected. His Civil Rights legislation, his fumbling,
his "liberalism", and the firm opinion of many that he was a traitor to his
kith and kin (as a Texan, and a Southerner) put him beyond the Southern
pale. His speech declining re-election, which was too like that given by
the Archfiend and Arsonist, William Tecumseh Sherman when he declined to
even consider running for president, set more than one head to wagging
amongst Democratic Committee members. Johnson's goose was cooked in more
ways than one, and he knew it.
	Not that the other candidates were any better. Richard Nixon was a
slimy politico who dripped dishonesty and deceit. Hubert Humphrey
campaigned on continuing the Civil Rights movement with gusto, and when he
criticized Johnson for sending in the army during the riots in Detroit and
Washington after the assassination of Dr. King did not set well with the
Conservative South. Nixon promised to end the draft, and opposed
desegregation bussing. But he was a Republican!
	Then there was George Wallace, and his American Independent Party,
who wanted to bring back the old days of Jim Crow. He was popular in the
Deep South, notably Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana and
Arkansas. As far as South Carolina and the Landing were concerned, aside
from Stubby Richmond and Daddy Smith and his whelps, nobody wanted a return
to bigotry and racism.
	As for Eugene McCarthy, he was dismissed as a buffoon, and a waste
of space.
	The campaign was low-key for the most part, and few paid attention
to the politicos trying to drum up votes. Nobody on any of the tickets
appealed and frankly people were too concerned about making a living and
worrying about their sons in the military. The war had been kind, if that
is the proper word, to the Landing and the surrounding county. While there
were around eighty boys from the towns, and the county serving in Vietnam,
the Angel of Death had not spread his wings, and no body bags addressed to
the towns or counties were delivered to Charleston, and no chaplains had
come to make the fateful walk up to a rural porch.
	That all changed two days after the election when an Army captain
and the Rev. Henry McIndoo, Pastor of the Shining Spirit Evangelical Chapel
made the drive up the dusty lane to the neat, trim, farmhouse of Jonah
Martin. The only son of the house, Corporal Lonnie Ray Martin, had been
killed in action, his platoon ambushed outside of a nameless village in the
Iron Triangle.
	As word trickled through town, nobody cared about the Presidential
Election, nobody cared that Nixon was the President-elect, nobody cared
that a Republican would occupy the White House come January. One of us, one
of our own, was coming home in a flag-draped coffin. One of our own . . .

******

	Death had come to The Landing, and the people rallied. Lonnie Ray
had been a popular boy, and played football when in high school. He would
never have set the gridiron ablaze, but he was a good, solid tight end, who
pulled his weight. He was a typical Southern boy, a country boy, who worked
hard on his Daddy's farm, and still managed the time and energy to raise
hell with his buddies. He liked to hunt and fish, and wasn't ashamed to
ride one of his Daddy's mules into town on Market Day, or to help his
mother set up her stall.
	The Martins had farmed the same quarter section for over a hundred
years. They had managed to survive in good times and bad, and Mrs. Martin,
whom everyone called Mizz Hettie, saw nothing wrong in offering the best
baked goods for miles around at her small stall on Market Day. My father,
who enjoyed his food, delighted in her pies and cakes, and proclaimed that
the Martin farm produced the best damned fresh eggs he'd ever tasted. Mam
Berta, no mean cook herself, would never admit it publicly, agreed, and
every Market Day would speak privately to Mizz Hettie, who would put aside
fresh-baked cherry and apple pies for her.
	I did not know Lonnie Ray well. He was a high school senior when I
was still in junior high school. He was, however, a great friend to Damian
Lee. They played football together, and caroused together, and consoled
each other when the girl everyone said was a sure thing turned one of them
down. There was a close bond between them, although they were never
"close", if you catch my drift. Lonnie Ray had his faults, as we all do,
but he loved the ladies, and they loved him. He wasn't promiscuous, and he
never bragged or flaunted his conquests. He had no interest in anything but
straight, boring, so-called normal sex. His upbringing, his religion, and
his respect for his family would not allow him to be otherwise.
	Damian Lee was devastated, and locked himself in his room when we
heard the sad news. When he recovered (as much as he ever did) he left the
house and drove away. At first I thought, wrongly, that Damian Lee and
Lonnie Ray had been, to put it bluntly, fuck buddies. Not so. When he
returned I asked Damian Lee where he'd gone. At first he was close-lipped,
and merely said that there was another family in mourning. Intrigued, I
pestered him until he swore me to secrecy and told me that he been to visit
a girl in Carnes Crossroads, a small hamlet to the north of The Landing. I
thought he had a nerve, rushing off to see a girl when one of his best
friends was lying in a metal shipping container somewhere between Vietnam
and home.
	Damian Lee shook his head sadly. I had it all wrong. He'd been to
visit the girl who had recently given birth to a boy baby, a boy baby who
was the spittin' image of Lonnie Ray Martin when he was young. No one, not
even Lonnie Ray's parents, knew of the birth. The girl hadn't told Lonnie
Ray of the pregnancy, because he'd been on the brink of leaving for
Vietnam. She didn't want to worry him, or start a cat fight with his
parents. She was Roman Catholic, not Protestant Evangelical, and Lonnie
Ray's parents would never approve of her for having their son's child out
of wedlock. They would condemn her as a harlot, and Lonnie Ray did not need
the added stress.
	"Did she ever tell him?" I asked Damian Lee. "He had to know!"
	"She told him in a letter," Damian Lee answered flatly. "He
promised that when he got home they'd get married, and he didn't care what
his folks said."
	I remember shaking my head and murmuring, "Poor baby. Growin' up
without his daddy."
	"Not the first," replied Damian Lee, the tears filling his
eyes. "And not the last."

******

	The rituals of death in The Landing were more or less engraved in
stone. When someone died, he or she ended up at Mr. William van Lews
establishment. While his assistants worked preparing the deceased, the
family would show up, a bundle of clothing in their hands - burial suits or
dresses - and "arrangements" would be made, which included choosing a
coffin (although Mr. van Lews always called it a "casket", as if it was
something containing precious jewels), place of burial and mode of
transport. A day or two later the deceased would be on display, and
receiving visitors. Usually the coffin was open, except when the deceased
had died from a disfiguring illness or a catastrophic accident. On the
third day, there would be a church service, followed by burial.
	There were variables, of course. Country folk, being very
traditional in their religion and beliefs, rarely had their "loved one" on
display in one of Mr. van Lews' tastefully appointed parlors (always called
by him a Chapel of Rest) and many of the farm families had burial grounds
somewhere on their property. Here there lay generation after generation of
this or that family. Few took advantage of the verdant green lawns of
Magnolia Cemetery, and few would use a Chapel of Rest. Loved ones always
came home, and were laid out in the front parlor, and carried to their
final rest by male members of the family. Those who had the money and no
burial grounds, usually arranged for the last journey in a motorized
"coach", although the horse-drawn hearse and carriages were very popular.
	For some reason, the presence of children, unless they were related
to the deceased, was discouraged, which did not bother me at all. I had
been present at two funerals up to that time, and was stuffed into my
Sunday suit, and told to be quiet and show respect for the dead.
	With Lonnie Ray, I expected the same run of the mill, funeral. He
would be laid out at home. His mother and sisters would gather around him,
and his father, looking stoic but strong, would greet the stream of
visitors that would fill the house and yard. After viewing Lonnie Ray, and
offering condolences, with an occasional remark that he looked good, they
would move on. The women would gather in the kitchen, emerging to replenish
the dining room table with the food they all had brought. The men would
gather in the yard, where there was always booze, and after shaking their
heads and making regretful talk about how it was shame that one so young
had died, they would talk about the crops, the state of the market, and the
irresponsibility of the darkies after the riot in Overbridge.
	What I did not expect was the U.S. Army and the spontaneity of the
people.

******

	It is well known that the U.S. Army, all the services in fact,
never, if at all possible, left a man or woman killed in action
behind. They would be transported from the land of their death (in Lonnie
Ray's case from the Army mortuary facility in Saigon, where he'd been
identified and embalmed) to the land of their birth, always accompanied by
an Escort, to Dover AFB where there was a huge mortuary. Here they were
prepared for burial, dressed in a tailored, dress uniform and placed in a
coffin, usually highly polished wood, and flown if necessary to an airport
closest to their home town (unless they were being buried in Arlington), to
be met by the undertaker and family, and taken home.
	What I did not know at the time was that each branch of the Armed
Services had a detailed manual, outlining the honors to be accorded their
dead, from Generals down to recruits killed in training accidents. In
precise language was laid out who received what. Mr. van Lews had a
government manual detailing the honors Lonnie Ray was to receive. There
would be bearers, a firing party, and a bugler, all commanded by a
Sergeant, and the funeral party would be supplied from the soldiers at Camp
Stephen Weed. As Lonnie Ray's closet male relative, other than his father,
was a cousin, who was all of fourteen, the provision for bearers was a
welcome feature. There simply were not enough Martin men to carry him to
the burial ground, as was traditional.
	After the initial notification of Lonnie Ray's death, it was a
matter of waiting for him to be brought home. A week, then two weeks
passed, until finally word came that he would arrive at Charleston Airport
at 5:30 in the evening. Mr. van Lews polished his funeral coach, called for
an assistant, and drove off down Hampton Road to the Interstate, the
Martins following in a long, black Cadillac supplied by the funeral home,
as they did not have a car of their own; the rusty old pickup that they did
have was always on its last legs and nursed from death by the combined
efforts of Lonnie Ray and his father, and was not thought suitable.
	My father, as County Coroner, went to the funeral home, there to
wait and perform the last formality. He was required to "view" the remains
of anyone who had died a violent death, which he would do in the presence
of the Military Escort.
	My mother and Mam Berta began cooking up a storm, making cakes,
cookies, a shrimp Creole dish and loaves of bread. I was enlisted to help
load the back of the car with the food and then they were off. Mother
stopped at the florist shop downtown, and then she and Mam Berta joined
what looked like a convoy, heading out of town and southward, to the Martin
Farm.
	Led by the Finch Sisters, who had brought a turkey and a ham, and
finished with Atticus Sullivan, who brought enough barbecue to feed half
the county, the ladies set up the food on long, cloth-covered wooden
tables, commiserated with Mizz Hettie and her daughters and, after a
respectful period, went home.
	We all knew that Lonnie Ray was coming home, and this was when the
spontaneity of people came to the fore.
	The Finch sisters began it. Lonnie Ray was coming home in the dark,
and to their way of thinking that was not right so, candles in hand, they
gathered their cook, a wizened old black lady, and their maid, equally
wizened and older than God, and drove down to the Interstate off
ramp. There they parked, waiting. The old "Southern Telegraph" began to
work, word quietly being passed from neighbor to neighbor. The local
chapter of the VFW heard of what the Finch Sisters were doing, and showed
up en masse. There were veterans of every war since the First World War,
and Mr. Henry Dodson, who had won the Medal of Honor in the Argonne Forest,
left his sick bed to stand unsteadily, leaning on his son, who had won the
Navy Cross at Pearl Harbor.
	The Beidermeyers were next. Two of Mr. Beidermeyers nephews were
serving with the Colors, in Vietnam, and he dreaded that one day he would
receive a telephone call and the Rabbi would pay a visit.
	Papa Ravelli quietly closed the Inn's restaurant early and called
for his wife and sons to join him. He had no sons in the Army, but Tony was
getting older, and a year and a half away from registering for the draft.
	As the hours passed, the line of people began to grow, stretching
up Hampton Road and ending at the entry to Van Lews' Funeral Home.
	We all went, carrying candles in holders, my Mother and Mam Berta,
Mrs. Conyngham and her brood, Sinjin and his parents, the Pegrams and the
Cecils. Everyone remained silent, or spoke in quiet murmurs, and even the
critters that usually scampered in the fields and edges of the
highway. Sometime during this vigil I heard the growl of trucks: somehow
word at been sent to Camp Stephen Weed and a group of soldiers, black and
white and wearing their Class A uniforms, clambered down and formed up on
either side of the road. Later I heard the muted clatter of horse tackle
and the squeak of leather as a small group of mule-drawn wagons, passed
by. The farm folk, thinking of Lonnie Ray as much more "one of us", and not
a townie, would bring him home.
	As the night deepened the sea of flickering candlelight grew. The
cadets of Parker-Semmes appeared and lined the driveway of the funeral
home.
	The waiting crowd was quiet, the silence broken by whispered
prayers, and no one objected to the sisters from the convent school who
prayed the Rosary in soft murmurs.
	I stood with my mother and Mam Berta, who was weeping
quietly. Despite all their activism, and opposition to the war, her two
younger sons had received letters from the local Draft Board and she was
terrified that one day she might be waiting for one, or both of them to
come home in a metal box.
	The differences between the races was forgotten and forgiven for a
little while as small groups of blacks, led by their pastors, slowly joined
the waiting mourners.
	Around 10:00 a small voice said, "He's comin'" and pointed to the
off ramp from the Interstate. The crowd stirred and voices rippled along
the line of waiting people. The VFW flags were raised, as were the Colors
of the cadets. Old men straightened their forage caps, and stood taller. My
mother hugged me close and took Mam Berta's hand, both stifling sobs.
	As the cortege approached Mr. van Lews, seeing the flames of
candles and the dark silhouettes turned on the overhead light in the bed of
his hearse and revealed the flag-draped coffin. The sobbing grew louder as
the hearse drove slowly up Hampton Road. Hats were removed by the men folk,
save for the old veterans, who saluted.
	It was then that the spontaneity of the moment came in. I do not
know who started it, but slowly, quietly, as if we were all in a limitless
open-air church, the hymn rose from the voices of the crowd. I heard the
words, "Abide with me, fast falls the eventide . . ." taken up and rising
upward. Despite my firm conviction that I was no longer a little man, but a
MAN, I leaned against my mother and buried my head, weeping. Visions of
Philip Charles, who had signed a contract with the Army, might be coming
home in a flag draped coffin as early as next year.
	Damian Lee, whom I loved dearly, would graduate high school in the
coming June would, and if he were not accepted by the Citadel, or one of
the universities he had already applied to, would be called up. He had told
me that he was thinking of heading down to Charleston, to volunteer, rather
than wait for the letter from the Draft Board. He was, when all was said
and done, a Marigny, the scion of men who had never shirked their duty and
in his mind he would rather volunteer than be drafted.
	Slowly, slowly, the hearse passed by, turning into the driveway of
the funeral home. On the wide, open porch my father waited, dressed in his
best Savile Row suit, and wearing his medals. He too had a duty to perform,
a duty that he never spoke of for the remaining years of his life.

******

	The next morning, in bright sunshine, the people returned to line
the roadway. Once again they watched quietly as Lonnie Ray Martin was
carried home, this time in a polished, glistening, horse-drawn hearse,
drawn by four magnificent black horses. Following the hearse was a marching
unit of cadets from the military academy and a small platoon of cadets from
the Citadel. Flanking the hearse was the bearer party supplied by the Army,
six men and a sergeant. Behind the marchers came Mr. van Lews' carriages,
both carrying the female members of the family and drawn by pairs of black
and gray horses.
	Mr. Martin, alone, walked directly behind the horse-drawn
hearse. It did not matter that he would have to walk five miles. He was
bringing his son home.

******

	As the cortege wound its way toward the farm where Lonnie Ray had
been raised first one, then another, and then another vehicle joined
it. There were ancient Ford pickups, rusty and freshly washed, horse and
mule-drawn wagons, the Finch sisters' elderly Dodge, and my father's even
older and ancient Daimler, each filled with passengers determined that
Mr. Martin, and Lonnie Ray, would not be alone.

******

	At the Martin farm the cortege passed down the long, dusty drive
lined with live oaks. The horses snorted and shook their heads as they
passed the family burying grounds. During the night, Mr. Theophilus Monroe,
the town gardener, and his sons, had prepared the gravesite, the mound of
rich, red Carolina earth they had excavated covered with floral
arrangements and wreaths.
	There were more flowers filling the porch of the house, and the
front parlor, where Lonnie Ray would lie for a night and part of the next
day.
	The coffin was carried from the hearse by the Army bearers and
placed on the trestle bier. Here Lonnie Ray would lie as the neighbors, the
veterans, the town passed by. His coffin would not, could not be opened,
and a large photograph of him, a formal portrait taken at his recruit
graduation ceremony, rested on a small table at the head of the polished,
mahogany box.
	From the kitchen, and back yard, came the smells of cooking and
murmuring as food was prepared for the mourners. Long tables, usually seen
only on market day outside of Sully's Café, and now covered with crisp,
white linen tablecloths, groaned with food, from ducks and turkeys and
chickens to massive bowls of salads and pasta and platters and trays of
pastries and cakes. Mr. Sullivan, the owner of the café, and Papa and Mama
Ravelli supervised the setting of the tables and none of them would ever
mention their generosity, or present a bill. In the South, such things were
done quietly, without fuss, as was proper.

******

	Lonnie Ray's graveside service was dignified. The Army firing party
saluted him and a bugler sounded "Taps". The flag that covered his coffin
was folded into the traditional triangle and presented to his
mother. Filling the burying ground, and the surrounding fields, the people
gathered, dressed in their Sunday best, and no one minded that some of the
black frocks showed signs of hasty dying, or that some of the men wore
suits years out of fashion, and showing signs of wear.
	I stood to one side with Damian Lee, holding his hand tightly,
praying inside that I would never know the pain and anguish that the
Martins felt.

******

	After the funeral the people returned to the house, sequestering
the family so that they would not see Mr. Monroe and his boys filling in
the grave. Only Mr. Martin remained at the gravesite, watching as the
shovels of earth thudded against the lid of his son's coffin. He would
remain until the grave was filled and covered with flowers.

******

	Behind the house, after expressing their condolences and stopping
for a bite to eat, the people lingered briefly. Leaving the comforting side
of Damian Lee, I joined my friends, Sinjin, the Cecil boys, the Conynghams,
the Pegrams and the Ravellis. We were all dressed in stiffly starched white
shirts, black suits, ties and polished oxfords, having that morning been
bathed, buffed polished and combed to within an inch of our lives.
	Looking around I saw that everyone who could manage it was
present. I was a little surprised to see Daddy Smith and his wife, looking
presentable for the first time in years, standing with Stubby Richmond and
his son, Simmons. Philip Charles and Charlie Pegram stood with the small
group of Citadel cadets, chatting quietly with some of the Army boys who
had been part of the funeral party.
	Much to Sinjin's delight, Pendleton Izard, Jack Mather and Miles
Carroll, together with what looked like the entire cadet complement of
Parker-Semmes were in attendance. They were all dressed in their tight,
brass buttoned Confederate gray coats and starched white duck trousers and
I thought it fortunate that the day was cool.
	The more I looked the more I was impressed with the wonderful
turnout. Then I realized that one face was missing. Crazy Betsey was not in
evidence. In retrospect, given her politics and opposition to the war, I
suppose I should have understood her absence. She was sticking to her guns
and principles and attending the funeral of a young man killed in a war she
adamantly opposed would be hypocritical.
	Personally, Crazy Betsey's presence or absence was of little
import. I thought her a crazy old bitch and dismissed her from my mind. Not
so the town.
	Given the grief and situation, many thought that politics should
have been put aside. While many thought that Crazy Betsey was entitled to
her misguided opinions, others did not and with what amounted to the speed
of light she was ostracized. I do not know the details, but I did learn
that after the funeral she received threats, and much to her disgust,
Stubby Richmond arranged for a cross burning on her front lawn. Her
"creations", which dotted the front and side yards of her house, were
vandalized and smashed. The manager of the supermarket informed her that
she wasn't welcome, and asked her tartly to shop elsewhere.
	At first, Betsey persevered. She was a Southern woman and as
stubborn as a mule. However, the screws were applied and tightened when she
went to the town hall for her vendor's permit. Aside from the pittance she
received as her share of the van Lews funeral home profits, her main, if
only, source of income was the sale of her art work to the tourists on
Market Day. Much to her anger she was informed, smugly, by the Town Clerk,
who issued the permits for the booths on Market Day, that there was simply
no room for her and her application denied.
	People who had known and tolerated Crazy Betsey for years suddenly
crossed the street to avoid her. She was deliberately snubbed when she
appeared one afternoon, calling on Mrs. Pegram, being informed by the maid
hired for the occasion that Mrs. Pegram was not at home, although the sound
of women chattering and tea cups clinking was clearly audible to her. She
knew that the handwriting was on the wall. Not only was she not received,
she had been "sent to Coventry", an exile in the town where she had been
born and raised.
	Refusing to admit defeat, although she knew that it was a losing
battle. She tried to sell her work from her front yard, but the Town
Constable showed up and gave her a citation for operating an unlicensed
commercial enterprise in a residential district. Needless to say her
application for a license was denied by the Town Clerk.
	It took six months, but eventually Crazy Betsey gave up. She had no
choice, really, what with being ignored and snarled at whenever she
appeared in public. She grew tired of the name calling, of having her house
egged and paper bags of dog excrement set on fire on her front porch. The
final indignity, at least to her mind, was when Mr. Henry Conyngham,
Attorney at Law, representing Mr. William van Lews and the van Lews Funeral
Home, appeared and offered her a large sum to sell her share of the
business. With even her family, her kin, wanting her out of their lives,
she signed the papers, put her house up for sale, and called the Bekins
man.
	Crazy Betsey settled in Boston, Massachusetts, where she found
kindred spirits. She organized and attended anti-war rallies and parades,
volunteered in the Nixon re-election campaign, sat in at Civil Rights
protests and enjoyed a limited success in what passed as the "Artistic"
crowd. What she did after the war ended, and the troops came home, I do not
know. I only know that when she died many years later no one mourned her
passing, not even her kin, and had it not been for a small announcement in
the weekly newspaper, hardly anyone would have known that she was dead.

******

	Crazy Betsey's fate was in the future, though, and in the days and
weeks following Lonnie Ray's funeral I was too mired in grief and
disappointment to care about her. Charlie Pegram and I had talked, and I
was forced to confront my infatuation for him head on.