The headmistress at St. Agnes was sympathetic too, and told Stella she would be excused for the week. She was expected back the Sunday after Thanksgiving.
They stayed in the pink cottage and away from their house. Marietta roasted a turkey and prepared all the side dishes and pies, and they worked hard to get through the day in a grateful spirit. Florry was rallying and trying to enjoy the time with them.
Early Friday morning, Joel loaded Stella’s bags into the Pontiac, and they hugged their aunt good-bye. They stopped at Old Sycamore and had a tear. At their house, Stella hurried inside for a hug with Nineva; then they were off.
She had insisted on taking the train to D.C., but Joel would have none of it. She was quite fragile — weren’t they all? — and he did not want her sitting alone on a train for hour after hour. They needed the time together, so a road trip was in order. As they left the farm and turned onto the highway, Stella looked at her home and the fields around them. She hoped to never return.
And she never would.
Dead judges were replaced by the governor, who appointed interims until the next round of elections. Governor Fielding Wright, who had witnessed Pete’s execution two and a half years earlier, was flooded with the usual requests for patronage after the death of Chancellor Rumbold. One of Wright’s biggest supporters in north Mississippi was none other than Burch Dunlap, who was lobbying hard for a Tupelo sidekick named Jack Shenault. Dunlap had a plan to collect a quick, lucrative fee from the Banning case, and he needed Shenault on the bench.
In early December, while Joel was sweating through final exams at Ole Miss, Governor Wright appointed Shenault the interim chancellor to succeed Rumbold. John Wilbanks and most of the other lawyers disliked the choice, primarily because Shenault did not live in the district. He said he planned to move.
Wilbanks was pushing another candidate, but Wilbanks and Governor Wright had never been on the same team.
Out of respect for the family, Dunlap waited a month after Liza’s burial before swinging into action. He convinced Shenault to convene a meeting in Clanton with John Wilbanks and Joel Banning, who was home for the holiday break and had been appointed substitute trustee for his father’s estate. They met in the judge’s chamber behind the courtroom, a place Joel would always detest.
On the docket was Dunlap’s lawsuit seeking a judicial foreclosure of the land now held by Pete Banning’s estate, the last remaining salvo in the lengthy war over the property, and it was readily apparent that the new chancellor planned to move with haste.
By reputation, Shenault was an office practitioner and not a trial lawyer, and was generally well thought of. He was certainly prepared for the meeting, and John Wilbanks suspected he had been well rehearsed by Burch Dunlap.
According to His Honor, and Shenault even wore a black robe for the occasion, the scenario was straightforward. The hearing on the foreclosure would last only an hour or so, with both sides submitting documents and court orders, and perhaps a witness or two, but there was almost nothing disputed. He, Shenault, would most likely order a judicial sale of the property, which entailed an auction on the front steps of the courthouse. The highest bidder would take title, with the winning bid going straight to Jackie Bell, who held the judgment of $100,000. No one expected a bid that high, and any deficit would remain on the books as a lien against the property.
However, according to Mr. Dunlap, the plaintiff, Jackie Bell, was willing to accept a deed from the estate for the acreage, the house, and other assets in lieu of her claim.
Also, if Shenault ruled in favor of Jackie Bell, as he obviously planned to do, the Banning estate could appeal to the Mississippi Supreme Court, a delaying tactic that had been used before. Such an appeal would be fruitless, in his opinion.
Joel knew it too, as did John Wilbanks. They were at the end of the road. Additional delaying strategies would only postpone the inevitable, and drive up the attorneys’ fees.
With everyone in general agreement, Shenault allowed the lawyers thirty days to work out the details, and scheduled the next meeting on January 26, 1950.
In the spirit of the season, and with the promise of a brighter future, Jackie Bell and Errol McLeish were married in a small ceremony two days before Christmas. Her three children were dressed up and proud, and a few friends joined them in the small chapel behind an Episcopal church.
Her parents were not invited. They did not approve of the marriage, because they did not trust Errol McLeish and his motives. Her father had insisted that she consult with a lawyer before the marriage, but she refused. McLeish was far too involved with her lawsuits and her money and she was certainly being set up for financial disaster, according to her father.
And she was not attending church, which greatly disturbed her parents. She had tried to explain her crisis of faith, but they would not listen. One was either in church or not, and those on the outside faced damnation.
Jackie was thrilled with the plan to leave Rome and return to Clanton. She needed space from her parents, and more important, she was eager to assume ownership of the Banning home. She had been there many times and never dreamed it would one day belong to her. After a life in cramped parsonages and rentals, a life where every house was too small and too temporary, she, Jackie Bell, was about to own one of the finest homes in Ford County.
Chapter 48
On a freezing morning two days after Christmas, Joel was walking through the fields after a visit to Old Sycamore. Pellets began landing around him. It was sleeting and there was a good chance of snow by late afternoon. He hustled to the house and was about to suggest a road trip somewhere to the south when Aunt Florry announced that she had decided to spend a couple of months in New Orleans as the houseguest of Miss Twyla. She’d been hinting about leaving. She was depressed about everything — Liza’s death and her involvement in it, the cold weather, the dreary fields and landscapes, and, of course, the handing over of Pete’s land, which she had to cross to get to hers. There were dark clouds everywhere, and she just wanted to get away.
They left within an hour, as road conditions deteriorated, and barely made it south through Polk County before the sleet slacked off. By Jackson, the weather and roads were better.
Along the way, they covered many important topics. Joel planned to propose to Mary Ann later in the spring. He had bought an engagement ring in Memphis and was excited about giving it to her. He was determined to live in Biloxi and thought he had a job with a small law firm there. Nothing definite, but he was optimistic. They worried about Stella and her nagging depression. She was spending the holidays with friends in D.C. and could not force herself to come home. Wasn’t the whole family depressed? The most urgent matter was what to do with Florry’s land in the upcoming spring. Neither had the stomach to approach McLeish about a deal. Indeed, Florry wanted to be absent for the next few months to avoid the man. They finally decided that Joel would negotiate a lease with Doug Wilbanks, John’s cousin. He farmed thousands of acres in several counties and would not be intimidated by McLeish. They were not sure what would happen to the Negroes on the property, but those poor folks had always managed to survive. McLeish would need them as field hands. No one would starve.
And they couldn’t worry about everybody, could they? Their lives had changed dramatically since the killing, and there was no way to recapture the past. They had to take care of themselves. Florry admitted that for the past two years she had been talking about living for a spell in New Orleans with Miss Twyla, a dear old friend from the Memphis years. Twyla was older and getting lonelier, and her rambling town house in the Quarter had plenty of room.