The play is over. Most of the actors are dead or gone, but the story lingers on, too haunting to forget, yet too frightening to remember. With an inner urgency, I feel compelled to relate this story to a sleeping giant, a confession to myself that innocence is not lost, by anyone. It is either stolen or given away. I gave mine away with eager reluctance. To gain it back would be a pearl of great value...I lived the life unfolded on these pages, as surely as I live and breathe today. In defiance of reality, I feel certain that more than one of the players of this drama, purportedly dead or otherwise disappeared, has neither died nor vanished but has chosen to withdraw into the woodwork of time, until called upon again, to take on another bit part.The story is fiction, but the plot is real, taken from the annals of Mississippi history, and spread out like an open-faced hot roast beef sandwich. It's all in there, layer by layer, with the messy gravy, sour pickles and crisp lettuce, wrapped up together in an unlikely union which is easier to digest a little bit at a time, rather than all at once, but which has more flavor and character taken as a whole, just like the life and times of these characters.