Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe (30 page)

"Were she and her colored man not over at her mother's house that evening, as has been suggested here earlier in the trial?"

"No, they were not."

Oh, shit
, thought Idgie.

Her lawyer persisted. "Are you saying, Reverend Scroggins, that she was lying as to her whereabouts on that evening?"

The reverend pursed his lips. "Well, sir, as a Christian, I couldn't say for sure if she was lying or not. I think it is a question of being mixed up about the dates." He then opened the Bible he had and turned to the back and began looking at a particular page. "It has been my habit through the years to write down all the dates of the activities of the church in my Bible, and while going through it the other evening, I show that the night of December thirteenth was the start of our church's yearly tent revival, down at the Baptist campgrounds. And Sister Threadgoode was there, along with her hired man, George Peavey, who was in charge of refreshments—just as he has been every year for the past twenty years."

The prosecuting attorney jumped up. "I object! This doesn't mean anything. The murder could have taken place anytime during the next couple of days."

Reverend Scroggins looked fiercely at him, then turned to the judge. "That's just it, Your Honor: Our revival always lasts for three days and three nights."     

The lawyer said, "And you're
sure
Miss Threadgoode was there?"

Reverend Scroggins seemed offended that anyone would doubt his word. "Of course she was." He addressed the jury. "Sister Threadgoode holds a perfect attendance record at all our church activities and is the lead singer in our church choir."

For the first time in her life, Idgie was speechless, dumb, mute, without a comeback. All these years the Dill Pickle Club had spent lying and telling tall tales, thinking they were so good at it, and in five minutes Scroggins had put them all to shame. He was so convincing, she almost believed him, herself.

"In fact, we think so much of Sister Threadgoode at our church, the entire congregation has come over in a bus to testify on her behalf." With which the doors of the courtroom opened and in filed the oddest lot that God had ever put together on this earth: Smokey Lonesome, Jimmy Knot-Head Harris, Splinter-Belly Al, Crackshot Sackett, Inky Pardue, BoWeevil Jake, Elmo Williams, Warthog Willy, and so on . . . all with fresh haircuts from Opal's Beauty Shop and wearing borrowed clothes . . . just a few of the many hoboes Idgie and Ruth had fed throughout the years and Smokey had been able to round up in time.

One by one, they took the stand and testified solidly, remembering in great detail the river revival that December, back in 1930. And last, but not least, came Sister Eva Bates, wearing a flowered hat and carrying a purse. She took the stand and almost broke the jury's heart as she recalled how Sister Threadgoode had leaned over to her during the first night of the revival meeting and had remarked how God had touched her heart that night, due to Reverend Scroggins's
inspired
preaching on the evils of whiskey and the lusts of the flesh.

The skinny little judge, with a neck like an arm, didn't even bother to ask the jury for a verdict. He banged his gavel and said to the prosecuting attorney, "Percy, it don't look to me like you've got a case at all. First of all, there ain't no body been found. Second, we've got sworn witnesses ain't nobody gonna dispute. What we got is a whole lot of nothing. I say this Frank Bennett got himself drunk and drove himself into the river and has long been ate up. We're gonna call this thing, here, accidental death. That's what we've got ourselves a case of."

He banged his gavel once more, saying, "Case dismissed."

Sipsey did a dance in the balcony, Grady let out a sigh of relief.

The judge, the Honorable Curtis Smoote, knew damn well that there had not been any three-day tent revival in the middle of December. And from where he was sitting, he had also seen that the preacher did not have a Bible between the covers of the book he had sworn on. He had seldom seen such a scrubbed-up lot of down and dirty characters. And besides, the judge's daughter had just died a couple of weeks ago, old before her time and living a dog's life on the outskirts of town, because of Frank Bennett; so he really didn't care who had killed the son of a bitch.

After it was all over, Reverend Scroggins came over and shook Idgie's hand. "I'll see you in church Sunday, Sister Threadgoode." He winked at her and left.

His son, Bobby, had heard about the trial and had called and told him about that time Idgie had gotten him out of jail. So Scroggins, the one she had bedeviled all these years, had come through for her.

Idgie was floored by the whole thing for quite a time. But, driving home, she did manage to say, "You know, I've been thinking. I don't know what's worse—going to jail or having to be nice to the preacher for the rest of my life."

OCTOBER 9, 1986

Evelyn had been in a hurry to get to the nursing home today. She had badgered Ed to drive faster all the way there. She stopped, as she always did, in Big Momma's room and offered her a honey-bun, but as usual, Big Momma declined, saying, "If I ate that I'd be sick as a dog. How you can eat that sticky, gooey stuff is beyond me."

Evelyn excused herself and rushed down the hall to the visitors' lounge.

Mrs. Threadgoode, who had on her bright green flowered dress today, greeted Evelyn with a cheery "Happy New Year!"

Evelyn sat down, concerned. "Honey, that's not till three months from now. We haven't had Christmas yet."

Mrs. Threadgoode laughed. "I know that, I just thought I'd move it up a bit. Have some fun. All these old people out here are so gloomy, moping around the place something awful."

Evelyn handed Mrs. Threadgoode her treat.

"Oh Evelyn, are these honey-buns?"

'They sure are. Remember I told you about them?"

"Well, don't they look good?" She held one up. "Why, they're just like a Dixie Cream Donut. Thank you, honey . . . have you ever had a Dixie Cream Donut? They're as light as a feather. I used to say to Cleo, I'd say, "Cleo, if you're going anywhere near the Dixie Cream Donut place, bring me and Albert home a dozen. Bring me six glazed and six jelly ones.' I like the ones that are twisted, too. You know, like a French braid. I forget what they're called . . ." Evelyn couldn't wait any longer.

"Mrs. Threadgoode, tell me what happened at the trial."

"You mean Idgie and Big George's trial?"

"That's right"

"Well, that was something, all right. We were all worried to death. We thought they never were coming home, but they finally got a not-guilty verdict. Cleo said that they proved beyond the shadow of a doubt where they had been at the time the murder was to have taken place, so they couldn't possibly have done it. He said the only reason that Idgie would have stood trial like that was to protect someone else."

Evelyn thought for a minute. "Who
else
would want to kill him?"

"Well, honey, it isn't a matter of who wanted to, but who would have. That's the question. Some say it could have been Smokey Lonesome. Some say it could have been Eva Bates and that gang out at the river—Lord knows it was a rough enough bunch, and those folks in the Dill Pickle Club stuck together . . . it's hard to say. And then, of course"—Mrs. Threadgoode paused—"there's Ruth, herself."

Evelyn was surprised. "Ruth? But where was Ruth the night of the murder? Surely someone knows."

Mrs. Threadgoode shook her head. "That's just it, honey. Nobody knows for sure. Idgie says that she and Ruth were over at the big house visiting Momma Threadgoode, who had been sick. And I believe her. But there are some who wonder. All I know is that Idgie would go to her grave willingly before she would let Ruth's name be involved with murder."

"Did they ever find out who did it?"

"No, they never did."

"Well, if Idgie and Big George didn't kill him, who do you think did it?"                   

"Well, that's the sixty-four-dollar question, isn't it?"

"Wouldn't you like to know?"

"Well sure I would, who wouldn't? It's one of the great mysteries of the world. But, honey, nobody's ever gonna know that one except the one that did it, and Frank Bennett. And you know what they say . . . dead men tell no tales."

JANUARY 23, 1969

Smokey Lonesome sat on the side of his iron bed at the mission, coughing through the first cigarette of the day.  After the café closed, Smokey had wandered around the country for a while.  Then he got a job as a short-order cook at the Streetcar Diner No, 1, in Birmingham, but his drinking got the best of him and he was fired.

Two weeks later, Brother Jimmy found him, passed out cold under the viaduct on 16
^th
Street, and brought him over to the mission.  He was too old to tramp anymore, his health was bad, and his teeth were almost all gone.  But Brother Jimmy and his wife cleaned him up and fed him and the Downtown Mission had been his home now, more or less, for the past fifteen years.

Brother Jimmy was a good man, having been drunk himself, once, but as he told it, he had made the long trip “from Jack Daniel’s to Jesus” and was determined to devote his life to helping other unfortunates.

He put Smokey in charge of the kitchen.  The food was mostly leftover frozen stuff that had been donated; fish sticks and mashed potatoes out of a box were the staple.  But there were no complaints.

When he wasn’t in the kitchen or drunk, Smokey would spend his day upstairs, drinking coffee and playing cards with the other men.  He had seen a lot happen at the mission. . . seen a man with one thumb meet up with his boy there, who he hadn’t seen since the day he was born.  Father and son both down on their luck, winding up in the same place at the same time.  He had seen men come through that had been rich doctors and lawyers and one man who had been a state senator for Maryland.

Smokey asked Jimmy what caused men like that to sink so low.  “I’d have to say that the main reason is that most of them have been disappointed in some way,” Jimmy said, “usually over a woman.  They had one and lost her, or never had the one they wanted . . . and so they get lost and wander around.  And, of course, old man whiskey plays a role.  But in all the years I’ve been seeing men come in and out, I’d say disappointment is number one on the list.”

Six months ago, Jimmy died and they were renovating downtown Birmingham and the rescue mission was to be torn down.  Smokey would have to be moving on soon.  Where to, he didn’t know as yet . . .

He walked down the stairs, and outside, it was a cold clear day and the sky was blue, so he decided to take a walk.

He walked by Gus’s hot dog joint and down around 16th Street, past the old terminal station and under the Rainbow Viaduct, down the railroad tracks until he found himself headed in the direction of Whistle Stop.

He had never been anything more than just a tomato-can vagabond, hobo, knight of the road, down-and-outer. A free spirit who had seen shooting stars from many a boxcar rolling through the night. His idea of how the country was doing had been determined by the size of the butts he picked up off the sidewalks. He had smelled fresh air from Alabama to Oregon. He had seen it all, done it all, belonged to no one. Just another bum, another drunk. But he, Smokey Jim Phillips, perpetually down on his luck, had loved only one woman, and he had been faithful to her all his life.

It was true he had slept around with a hunch of sorry women in sleazy hotels, in the woods, in railroad yards; but he could never love any of those. It had always been just the one woman.

He had loved her from the first moment he saw her standing there in the cafe, wearing that organdy dotted-swiss dress; and he had never stopped.

He had loved her when he'd been sick, puking In an alley behind some bar, or lying up half dead in some flophouse, surrounded by men with open sores having crazy alcoholic delusions, screaming und fighting imaginary insects or rats. He had loved her in those nights he'd been caught in a hard, cold winter rain with nothing but a thin hat and leather shoes, wet and hard us iron. Or that time he had landed at the veterans' hospital and lost a lung, or when the dog had torn off half his leg, or sitting in the Salvation Army in San Francisco that Christmas Eve, while strangers patted him on the back, giving him a dried-out turkey dinner and cigarettes.

He had loved her every night, lying in his bed at the mission, on the thin used mattress from some closed-down hospital, watching the green neon JESUS SAVES signs blink on and off, and listening to the sounds of the drunks downstairs, crashing bottles and yelling to come in out of the cold. All those bad times, he would just close his eyes and walk into the cafe again and see her standing there, smiling at him.

Scenes of her would occur . . . Ruth laughing at Idgie . . . standing at the counter, hugging Stump to her . . . pushing her hair off her forehead . . . Ruth looking concerned when he had hurt himself.

Smokey, don’t you think you ought to have another blanket tonight? It's gonna freeze, they say. Smokey, I wish you wouldn't take off like you do, we worry about you when you're gone . . .

He had never touched her, except to shake her hand. He had never held or kissed her, but he had been true to her alone. He would have killed for her. She was the kind of woman you could kill for; the thought of anything or anybody hurting her made him sick to his stomach.

He had stolen only one thing in his entire life.  The photograph of Ruth had been made the day the cafe opened. She was standing out in front, holding the baby and shielding her eyes from the sun with her other hand. That picture had traveled far and wide. In an envelope, pinned to the inside of his shirt, so he wouldn't lose it.

And even after she had died, she was still alive in his heart. She could never die for him. Funny. All those years, and she had never known. Idgie knew, but never said anything. She wasn't the kind to make you feel ashamed of loving, but she knew.

She had tried so hard to find him when Ruth had become ill, but he had been off somewhere, riding the rails. When he did come back, Idgie took him to the place. They each understood what the other was feeling. It was as if, from then on, the two of them mourned together. Not that they ever talked about it. The ones that hurt the most always say the least.