The List (6 page)

Although he had no brothers or sisters, Renny grew up as part of a larger family of Low Country relatives, and the modern twentieth-century notion of the nuclear family, isolated and distant from blood kin, was not his experience. To Renny, the concept of family also included links with other similar families from the same social strata in their geographic area. Among aristocratic Charleston families there was an unspoken understanding that, if possible, suitable unions of young men and women from the pool of established families should be pursued. That way the offspring would, like thoroughbred horses, bring out the best in the line of sire and dam. Renny himself was the progeny of such a union. His mother, although not as well off financially as his father, had roots wrapped around the bedrock of the pre–Revolutionary War settlement of South Carolina.

Renny reread the original agreement. Given his upbringing, he was comfortable with the purpose of the List and its references to honor and family security. It reminded him of a compact between European noblemen in the face of a common enemy.

The most recent entry in the ledger was a man named Bartholomew Maxwell. Checking back in time, Renny found that Maxwell's father, Stephen Franklin Maxwell, entered into membership in 1942. The List was like a necklace, each family a strand of beads connected at the beginning. Shutting the book, he took a sip of water and decided he wanted to learn more about his family before the meeting in Georgetown.

There was a Charleston phone book on top of the desk in the den. Turning to the
C
s, he found the entry for Gerald C. Caswell, his deceased uncle. Uncle Gerald had been dead for ten years, but Renny's Aunt Margaret continued to list her husband's name in the phone book. To her thinking, anyone she wanted to talk to would know that she was Mrs. Gerald C. Caswell. She answered on the third ring.

“Aunt Margaret, it's Renny. I'm here in Charleston for the weekend.”

“Good morning, Renny,” Aunt Margaret said in her high-pitched but congenial drawl. “Do you have time to come by and see me?”

“That's why I called. I had a meeting yesterday with Jefferson McClintock about my father's estate and decided to stay the weekend.”

“Good. Come at noon, and I'll fix you a bite to eat.”

“Thanks. See you then,” Renny responded with satisfaction. His aunt's “bite to eat” would be enough of the four major food groups to last him until the next day. Confident he would not starve to death in the foreseeable future, Renny carefully put the List back in the trunk and snapped the lock shut.

Aunt Margaret, his father's older sister by twelve years, had helped raise H. L. and always viewed him more as a son than a brother. When Renny was born, she transferred some of her maternal affection from H. L. to him. She had three children, all much older than Renny, and a number of grandchildren, two of whom, boys named James and Andrew, were contemporaries of Renny and his frequent playmates while growing up.

Aunt Margaret's home was close to Charleston's air force base, or more accurately, the air force base was close to her home. Long before jet engines, the Caswell family sold the U.S. government a sizable portion of the land needed for construction of the base. Although her house was not in the direct flight paths of incoming and outgoing aircraft, it was noisy on a busy day. Aunt Margaret had adapted to the airport sounds like people who lived beside the railroad tracks in a small town: After a while, the noise of a passing train became so common that it was nestled in a familiar slot of their consciousness without disturbing them. Renny pulled onto a long driveway and drove several hundred yards through rows of live oaks to the house. Not quite
Gone with the Wind
's Tara but still impressive, the white-columned house was built around 1900 and originally served as the main house on a large farm. Turning into the circular driveway, Renny parked directly in front of the house and opened the car door to a boisterous greeting from his aunt's two golden retrievers, Johnny and Jay. His aunt had watched
The Tonight Show
with Johnny Carson every night for years, and when Jay Leno took over for Carson, she transferred her loyalties to the new toastmaster. As a gift upon Renny's graduation from college, Aunt Margaret presented him with one of Johnny's offspring, a beautiful female named Brandy.

True to their namesakes, Johnny was older than Jay, and both loved to chase tennis balls. Jay dropped a slobbery yellow mass at Renny's feet and crouched low, ready to spring into action. Estimating he could make it to the door by the time the dogs returned, Renny threw the ball as far to the left of the house as he could and dashed up the porch steps as the dogs sped off.

Stoop-shouldered by her eighty years of life but still full of energy for her daily tasks, Aunt Margaret waited for him. “I wish I could throw the ball for them like that,” she said. “Do you want to wash your hands? Those tennis balls are soaking wet, although I'm sure you know a dog's mouth is cleaner than a human's.”

Not having scientific proof available to substantiate his aunt's hypothesis, Renny said, “I'll wash up.”

All the years watching
The Tonight Show
had not made Aunt Margaret cosmopolitan. The house was decorated much as it was when Uncle Gerald was a boy. The foyer opened to a large dining room on the right and a smaller living room to the left, with heart pine flooring throughout. A huge kitchen occupied most of the back of the house. In the 1930s, Gerald's father employed fifteen to twenty day men as field hands. The men were paid, in part, by an all-they-could-eat noonday dinner of fried chicken, mashed potatoes, green beans, creamed corn, beets, tomatoes, biscuits, fruit cobbler, and sweet tea. It took two women most of a morning to fry the chicken, fix the vegetables, and prepare the baked goods. For many of the men during the Depression, it was the only meal of the day.

Renny washed his hands in a large bathroom with two freestanding sinks. In earlier times, water to the house had been supplied by a private water tower constructed on the property. The Caswells had used two windmills to pump water from a well to the holding tank, and his aunt still used it to irrigate her flowers and a portion of the lawn close to the house. Renny remembered it as a frigid contrast to the summer heat. He and his cousins would use a hand pump to fill an old horse trough and lie in it on hot days.

His aunt had a bedroom downstairs and kept the upstairs closed except for frequent visits from children and grandchildren. Much of the furniture in the house was wood. She even had a long wood settee as a substitute for a sofa in the living room. It was a handsome piece, with a dip in the seat that made it surprisingly comfortable. Renny smelled dinner as he walked through the living room. This was not going to be a frozen meal for two popped out of the microwave. Aunt Margaret was a good cook who continued to prepare fancy holiday dinners for her children and grandchildren.

The long kitchen had a bank of windows facing the broad expanse of the backyard, a row of huge pin oaks, and the edge of the air base.

“Come out to the kitchen, Renny, we'll eat here.”

The combination of smells made Renny's mouth water. He hadn't eaten since the previous evening and he gratefully watched as his aunt prepared a plate with a medium to large portion of everything.

“Go ahead and get started, Renny,” she said as she set the food in front of him. “You look hungry.”

Renny didn't protest and began feasting like a field hand. “If Jay Leno knew about your cooking, he'd fly in for dinner,” he said after he had made a sizable dent in the food piled on his plate.

“Thank you,” she said. “How have you been doing?”

“OK, I guess.”

Aunt Margaret spread some butter on a homemade yeast roll. “It's hard to believe your father is gone. I miss him.”

“Me, too,” Renny said, trying to sound sincere.

“Yes, he used to come out every couple of weeks or so and eat with me.”

“Really? I didn't know that. How long had that been going on?”

“At least two years. We had some good talks.”

“Just the two of you?”

“Yes.” She nodded. “You know, he was getting softer as the years went by.”

“Um,” Renny grunted noncommittally.

“Oh, I know he was hard on you. It was just his way of wanting you to grow up strong.”

“I guess so.”

“Just a few months ago he told me he had been too demanding with you.”

“He did?” Renny put down his fork.

“He never told you?”

“No.”

“I'm not surprised. I told him to talk with you, but he was a proud man. He rarely opened the window into his soul.” Getting up, Aunt Margaret took some fresh rolls out of the oven. “Let one of these rolls float onto your plate,” she said more cheerfully.

Renny filled his stomach with Southern cooking at its best and wondered what his aunt would think about all he had learned about his father in the past twenty-four hours. She was a gracious, hospitable, Southern matron, focused on family activities, serving others, and preserving her little corner of the world. The idea of confederate gold and secret overseas bank accounts was not included in her framework. Perhaps that was why the founders of the List decided that succession pass to subsequent generations by the law of primogeniture, the exclusive right of the eldest son to inherit the estate of his father. Secrecy prevented the jealousy of those who received nothing, although Renny doubted Aunt Margaret would have cared.

Slowing down in order to make sure he had enough room for two servings of dessert, Renny swallowed a bite of chicken and broached the reason for his visit. “Aunt Margaret, I'm interested in learning about the Jacobson ancestors. My father once told me that you had documented a fairly detailed family tree. Do you have something you could show me about the male line back to the time of the Civil War?”

Visibly pleased with his request, she pushed away her plate. “My files are upstairs; I'll be back in a moment.” He heard the floor overhead creak under her footsteps. She returned a couple of minutes later with a manila folder.

“This contains what you want to know,” she said briskly, not stopping to ask him the reason for his sudden interest in genealogy. Moving her plate farther out of the way, she unfolded a large sheet of paper on the table at an angle so Renny could see it. “This is an overview of the family tree. The records used to compile this outline are upstairs. I prepared this sheet as a summary using what I learned and information collected by your great-aunt Aimee.

“At the top is the first known Jacobson to settle in South Carolina, John Worthington Jacobson, born approximately 1630 in Pelham, England, and died in 1679 in Charleston. He immigrated as an indentured servant in 1650. Freed after seven years, he worked for a shipping company, eventually becoming part owner. In 1659, he married Eliza Rea. They had three children.”

Renny was fascinated. The few bites of food on his plate grew cold as he listened to his aunt skillfully navigate the waters of the past.

Tracing his finger back and forth across the page in a miniature game of hopscotch, Renny found Jeremiah F. Jacobson, born 1835, died 1874. “Tell me about him.”

Aunt Margaret pursed her lips. “Well, J. F. Jacobson had a good start. As you see, he was born before the Civil War. He was a rice planter and worked with his father as a factor for other planters.”

“I wonder if he worked at the old P&M building downtown,” Renny interjected.

“Could have. He married at age twenty-two, and his first child, a son, Hiram T., was born on April 12, 1861, the day Confederate forces began the bombardment of Fort Sumter. It's my understanding that J. F. raised his own regiment and fought at Manassas and Fair Oaks. His term of enlistment ended before the war was over, and instead of continuing in uniform he returned to Charleston in early 1863. He was disillusioned with the Confederate cause and became convinced the South could not win the war long before more strident voices were willing to admit the possibility of defeat. The Jacobson family suffered financially during Reconstruction, but did better than most of their contemporaries. The Heywoods, descendants of a signer of the Declaration of Independence, worked as hands in a rice mill. The Jacobsons never had to sell their holdings or work for others.”

“My boss in Charlotte is named Heywood, but I don't know anything about his family.”

“If he wanted to find out, it shouldn't be too hard.”

“You said J. F. had a good start,” Renny commented. “It sounds like he did better than most toward the end as well.”

“Not really.” Aunt Margaret lowered her voice. “He died a hopeless alcoholic, killed in a fight over a high-stakes poker game.”

“Are you sure about that?” Renny could not imagine one of his relatives in such a scenario.

“I have a letter written by his widow to a cousin in Beaufort. It's all there.”

Renny pointed to Hiram Jacobson, the next name down the tree. “So, he was about thirteen when his father died?”

“That's right. Hiram was your great-grandfather. He was forced by his father's untimely death to assume responsibility for the family at an early age. Fortunately, he had help from an uncle and a man named LaRochette.”