The Bernice L. McFadden Collection. Bernice L. McFadden
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men had done to that boy—things might have turned out different. But Eisenhower didn’t say one thing—which led some to believe that maybe he was okay with what J.W. and Roy had done to Emmett Till.
Two months after the men were acquitted of murder, the grand jury declined to indict them on kidnapping charges.
Double jeopardy is a term most people who lived here had not been familiar with before the Till murder, but it became one they would remember for the rest of their lives. In 1956, Bryant and Milam sold their story to Look Magazine, wherein Milam unabashedly admitted that he had killed Emmett Till and didn’t feel one iota of remorse.
A confession, printed in black-and-white in a national publication, and there wasn’t anything any court in the land could do about it. Milam and Bryant had been found innocent of murder and could not be trialed for the same crime twice.
Double jeopardy.
Hemmingway took her distraught daughter into her arms. “That’s man’s law, baby. Man’s law don’t outweigh God’s law. Don’t you worry, they’ll get theirs.”
And they did.
Even the most racist of Mississippians didn’t condone what Milam and Bryant had done to Emmett.
The brothers were ostracized by black and white alike. Friendless, stigmatized, and unable to make a living, the brothers closed the store and moved their families to Texas to start new lives.
They could run, but they could not hide. Their photos had been splashed on the front pages of every major newspaper in the country, so they couldn’t go anywhere without being recognized.
In Texas, white people pointed and blared, “Look at the child killers!”
So misery became as much a part of their lives as oxygen.
A decade later, Milam moved back to Mississippi and took a job as a machinist. He arrived at work on time, performed his duties, and at the end of the day returned home to his whiskey and cigars.
He contemplated suicide, but never had the guts to do it. At night he closed his eyes and prayed for death, but always woke up to a brand-new day.
When they found the cancer in his liver, he refused all treatment that was available to him. He thought that untreated, the end would come quick.
He thought wrong.
J.W. languished in excruciating pain for years.
When he died in 1980, the autopsy revealed that he had tumors in every major organ of his body.
In 1994, at the age of sixty-three, Roy Bryant died of complications from diabetes and liver cancer.
At the telling of this story, Carolyn Bryant was still alive, but not so well.
He was dark-skinned and charming. A twenty-five-year-old dreamer who loved to clown, play cards, and smoke cigars.
His name was Maximillian May, but because he had a passion for fishing, his family and friends had dubbed him Fish.
When he spotted Tass out in front of her house scattering dirt, bits of string, and flower petals with a straw broom, he stopped his car, climbed out, walked right over, and reintroduced himself.
“Tass Hilson, right? You remember me? Fish May?”
Tass looked at his hands and his eyes, and said, “Uhhuh, I remember you. How you been?”
The conversation started there and continued in the house after Hemmingway came out and asked if he would like to stay for a meal.
At the dining table, Fish explained that he was living in Detroit, working in the salt mines, but waiting on a job at the motor plant to come through.
“I ain’t gonna be there long though, gonna work for myself.”
“Oh yeah? Doing what?” Hemmingway asked as she scooped a second helping of mashed potatoes onto his plate.
“Real estate.”
“Real estate?”
“Yes, ma’am! Buying, selling, and building.”
Hemmingway glanced at Tass, who was thoughtfully studying the line of Fish’s jaw.
“Building? You know how to build a house?”
“Yes, ma’am! I’m a builder’s apprentice.”
“Apprentice? What’s that?”
“It’s like a student.”
“Oh. Ain’t that something,” Hemmingway crooned, and looked at Tass. “Don’t you think that’s something, Tass?”
“Yes, it is.”
After Fish left, Tass helped Hemmingway wash and dry the dinner plates.
“Well, he has certainly grown into a nice young man.”
“Uh-huh,” Tass mumbled.
“He seems to like you.”
“You think so?” Tass asked with an air of disinterest.
“Did you see how he was looking at you?”
“No.”
Hemmingway tossed the sponge into the sink and turned sober eyes on her daughter.
“He ain’t coming back, Tass.”
How many times had her mother said that to her? Too many to count. And each time Hemmingway uttered those words, Tass was reminded of how silly the statement was. Of course he wasn’t coming back. He had been dead and buried for two years by then.
Tass was only seventeen and still had a year of school left. Now, seventeen might seem too young for a mother to be pushing her daughter into the arms of an eligible bachelor, but in 1957, in rural Mississippi, with no prospects of ever going to college, but certainly the opportunity to become some white woman’s maid, the act was as common as cotton.
Tass reached for the sponge and squeezed it until it was free of every drop of water.
“I know that.”
“You gotta move on with your life, Tass.”
Tass dropped the sponge back into the sink. “I know, Mama, I know.”
Fish courted Tass with all he had. He sent letters, thin greeting cards painted with smiling cats holding bouquets of flowers, and boxes containing stuffed animals, perfume, and fashion magazines.
He drove from Detroit down to Mississippi twice in four months. On his second visit, Tass allowed him to kiss her, but the dizzying, drunken feeling she’d experienced when she’d kissed Emmett didn’t return. Disappointed, her heart began to slip back into hiding.
“He’s a fine catch,” Hemmingway pushed. “Not one man here in this town can hold a candle to him.”
“I know, Mama, I know.”
The letters and packages continued to come, and then one day a man from the telephone company knocked on their door and presented Hemmingway with a pink service order.
“I ain’t order no telephone,” Hemmingway said.
The white man pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and swabbed the perspiration from his forehead, and then snatched the slip of paper from Hemmingway’s hand. After scanning it, he said, “Maximillian May,” and shoved it back at her.
Hemmingway refused to accept the paper and folded her arms defiantly across her breasts. At that point she was so angry that she didn’t even recognize the name.
“He don’t live here!”
“Look, lady,