The Last Ballad(108)

“Send Beal out here or we’ll need to see about coming inside,” Aderholt said.

“You’re going to need a search warrant,” the man said.

“To hell with a warrant,” Tom said. He stepped forward and reached for the door, but the man blocked his way. Tom grabbed the barrel of the man’s rifle.

“No, Tom,” Aderholt said. He reached for him, but the man pushed Tom, and he fell back and sprawled on the grass. “No!” Aderholt yelled again, but it was too late. Tom raised his pistol and fired one shot that caught the man in the stomach. He dropped his rifle and fell forward. He reached for the door frame, and caught himself before he hit the ground.

The shot echoed down the street. It was followed by the sound of the windows being broken from the inside with the barrels of shotguns and rifles. The wounded man managed to pick up his rifle and open the door. He disappeared inside the building.

“Now hold on,” Aderholt said, but his words were swallowed by a shotgun blast.

The windshield in one of the police cars exploded. Everyone scattered in different directions. Albert fell to his belly and crawled along the ground to where Tom was crouched behind a car. Albert reached out, and Tom handed him his pistol. Albert’s heart lifted. He’d never fired his weapon in the line of duty, and now he’d been given his chance.

Tom raised himself, leaned over the hood of the car, and fired at the building. Another blast from inside. Shot peppered the front fender and tore at the ground beneath the car. A tire hissed as air escaped.

“Goddamn!” Tom said. He laughed, looked at Albert, who sat leaning against the front fender. “We’re in it now.”

Albert peered over the hood. Rifle barrels protruded from the headquarters’ broken windows. He fired, emptied his weapon. There was another shotgun blast, and what felt like fire ripped into Albert’s arm. He fell back, felt blood soak through his sleeve.

“I’m hit,” he said. He opened his gun, fed rounds into the cylinder, closed it. He looked over the hood, fired again.

A few last gunshots from both sides. The sound of more sirens in the distance. A car’s engine fired nearby, then tires peeled off down the road. Footsteps as someone ran through the grass and then the gravel. Albert looked for Tom. He couldn’t find him. He crawled around to the front of the automobile. His fingers plumbed his arm for the wound. His flesh was numb. He could smell his own blood.

“I’m hit!” he said again.

He heard the sound of someone moving toward him on the other side of the car. He raised his pistol and took aim at the figure as it revealed itself.

“Hold!” Tom screamed. “Hold!”

He collapsed beside Albert, fell against the car, out of breath. Albert looked down, realized that Tom had dragged someone along with him. It was Aderholt.

“Chief’s hit,” Tom said. “They shot him in the back. I think it’s bad.”

Aderholt turned his face toward Albert. His skin was white against his black suit and tie. He coughed. Albert could see where blood had flooded Aderholt’s mouth.

“Why were you even here?” he asked. He coughed again. “Why?”





Chapter Twelve

Hampton Haywood





Saturday, June 8, 1929



A loud pop in the distant night caught Hampton’s attention. He opened his eyes and looked toward the window, waited to hear the sound again. The photograph of his mother and father still rested against the lamp.

Another pop, silence, then another. They were gunshots, volleys of them. He didn’t know what kind of guns he was hearing, didn’t know whether they were being fired in celebration or anger or defense. He thought of the picket Beal had planned. Hampton sat only a block from the mill, less than a half mile from the headquarters. He’d be able to hear shots from either location.

He sat up on the side of the bed. He considered going to the window and looking out, but something told him to remain seated. His first thought was that a mob had overrun the headquarters. He’d heard of the night back in April when vigilantes stormed the union’s first headquarters on Franklin Avenue while the National Guard stood by and let it happen.

Footsteps echoed from the street in front of the boardinghouse. Hampton reached for the lamp and extinguished it. Outside, the footsteps ran past the house and down the street. He listened until he couldn’t hear them anymore.

Sirens wailed up on Franklin. Hampton was certain that something had gone terribly wrong. He tried to decide what time it could be. Midnight? Perhaps later?

The floorboards gave way under his steps like piano keys. He opened his bedroom door, revealing the dark hall and the landing at the top of the stairs. He opened the door a little farther and peered past the doorjamb. He listened to the crystalline ring of the house’s silence. On the other side of the hall, a man named Stamp Dixon stood in the door to his own room in plaid boxer shorts and a white undershirt. Hampton had heard that Dixon worked as a bailer at Loray, one of the few jobs the mill offered Negroes. Hampton had never asked him directly, but it was clear that Dixon had no interest in either the union or a fancily dressed Negro from out of town.

The two men stood looking at one another across the hallway. In Dixon’s gaze Hampton felt every misgiving he’d feared about his trip south. The man’s face appeared stoic, but something in his eyes also portrayed disgust and disapproval. He stepped back into his dark room and closed the door quietly. Hampton listened as the lock clicked, listened to the springs give as Dixon returned to bed.