Day 738: 5 Minute Freewrite: Monday - Prompt: no added sugar (and, The Posture of Innocence, day 7.5)

Continuing on in the "No Added Sugar" freewrite with The Posture of Innocence ... in day 7, new police commissioner Winfred Scott found out about the breaking of half the Soames case through the breaking of the great lie of Mrs. Lilith DeVille and rejoiced, for he sees in the exoneration of Tom Jnes his chance to save the Big Loft police department. Now, to really get caught up on why the department needs saving, you'll have to read back to Black, White, and RED All Over chapter 9 -- you can look that up here on Steemit through the search or catch the whole thing on Amazon, but, a quick summary is that the department had been rotten to the core, and had been truly rotten in dealing with Big Loft's Black citizens until it, too, was completely and utterly exposed!

(More immediately, you can get caught up on the The Posture of Innocence right here on Steemit -- here are the prologue, day 1, day 2, day 3, day 3.5, day 4, day 4.5, day 5, day 5.5, day 6, and day 7!)

Now, in day 7.5, we get to look again into Captain Lee's thoughts, this time on family legacy patterns in such situations as they relate to the history and future of the United States, along with their relationship to getting Lofton County, VA to accept a Black man's innocence (and the imminent arrest of Mrs. Lilith DeVille for her lies about said innocent Black man) ... and, off we go!

Privately, Captain Lee recalled the decision his cousin, Captain Hamilton of Tinyville, had made three months earlier to obey the Freedom of Information Act demand made by the Lofton County Free Voice, a decision that exposed the injustice his department (before his coming) had practiced for years against the town's Black citizens, a decision that had roots in the one good thing they had drawn from their most famous common ancestor's Confederate example. When proven wrong, and thoroughly beaten, surrender, and then survive to clean up -- that is what they each had learned from General Lee.

Captain Hamilton had followed his great-great-great-grandfather's wisdom, and Tinyville was at peace in the midst of the storm while he cleaned up -- and had he ever cleaned up in assistance to the Black men of Lofton County and Captain Lee during and after the Gilligan House Burning!

Commissioner Scott, who was also new, was getting to start out in an even better spot; the department would get to admit it was wrong at the same time it was showing it was cleaning up. And, that face of Captain Lee -- Big Loft, Virginia, and the whole South would swallow it all just as the United States had swallowed it all when General Lee, that regal old man, had walked into Appomattox and achieved a practical draw in the outcome of the Civil War … for the question of slavery, and of racial terrorism, and of the fair amounts of the White elite still attempting to use Black people solely as chattel, had never been settled. Forms had changed, and levels of the thing had eased – but it was not by any means done with.

Captain Lee, the nearest thing to a body double of his regal uncle, had deeply mixed feelings about being publicly used as such when it came to putting over news of the type that Tom Jones's exoneration would be. In his diet, he strictly limited his sugars, knowing that standard table sugar took vitamins and nutrients out of the body. Thus, in order to receive the maximum force of nutrients that he took in, they had to come in with no added sugar of that type. It was likewise Captain Lee's deep conviction that if the United States was going to survive and become both well and good for all its citizens, it was going to have to face the truth and swallow it down with no added sugar, and let the rough purging and expelling work have its free course.

Nonetheless, that rough work would not happen that day. Commissioner Scott had ordered his most regal-looking captain to do the press conference about the exoneration of Tom Jones for good reasons … it would take all of the face and voice of Lee to get that news to go down in Big Loft and Lofton County because the White citizenry felt so attacked by the Lofton County Free Voice and the aftermath of the Gilligan House Burning. Since General R.E. Lee had not been available for these kinds of jobs since 1870, Captain H.F. Lee would have to do.

“Captain?” said Lieutenant Anderson, and that recalled Captain Lee from his thoughts.

“So be it,” he said aloud. “Get yourself in your finest trim, Lieutenant Anderson. I am recalling your colleagues Lieutenants Longstreet, Jackson, Lightfoot, and Carter as well. If we must do this charade, then you all are going to get the public credit you deserve as well instead of having your careers hampered by the messes of this department. All of you are to come to the press conference, even if you are not granted a speaking role by the director of this little show.”

“At least the truth will be out after today about Mrs. DeVille and her lying ways,” said Lieutenant Anderson.

“And it would take my face to put that over credibly with those who have ardently wanted her story to be true, these 25 years,” Captain Lee said, shaking his head. “Best believe, Lieutenant: I will be glad to use my genetic advantages today. Tom Jones is saving our department – the least I can do, with this face, is to make the future not like the past for him and his family.”

And so, after 25 years, Tom Jones got his public exoneration from Captain Lee and a public apology on behalf of the department from Commissioner Scott. Captain Lee's face put it all over for the South (for that face had been putting things over for 154 years already), and as far as the White public was concerned, it was all right, even though that perjury charge would catch Mrs. DeVille in her old age. The face of Henry Fitzhugh Lee, and the allies he had carefully cultivated in Lofton County's jurisprudence, put that over with the district attorney.

Day 8 is up!