by Tina Whittle
“Yeah. But she didn’t tell me what she was going to do with it. You gotta believe me, I didn’t want to hurt anybody. Why do you think I want out now?”
Trey took his hand out of his pocket. Skip was thoughtless, not criminal. And he technically hadn’t broken the law. He hadn’t counterfeited bills or deeds or a driver’s license. He’d made “art.” What Hope has done with it, however, was a different story.
“Look, Skip, I don’t know what happened to Simmons, but I’m betting somebody killed him over that map and chucked his body in the channel. And I’m betting they’ll kill you too, if they think you need killing.”
“But I never…”
“You need to leave town. Tonight.”
Skip went pale. He looked at Trey, who nodded, and then back to me, every bit of cocky burned right out of him.
I put my hand on his shoulder. “Tell Nate you two need a long weekend. Then go someplace far away that you’ve never been before and stay there a while. And lay off the bartender. The last thing you want to be now is predictable.”
Skip nodded. He was quiet and serious, which was good, because that meant he was listening. I squeezed his shoulder. He was shaking underneath my hand.
That was also good.
***
Back in the hotel room, I explained things to Trey around a mouthful of toothpaste. “Guys like Skip clam up around cops. But talk to them like a thug? Works every time.”
“You seem to understand criminals.”
I spat in the sink. “Some of my best friends.”
Trey had taken a shower and changed into his pajama pants. He was two degrees from exhausted. I was tired too, but I still had work to do. I’d already perked a pot of coffee for what was looking like a long night.
I wiped my face with the towel. “I wish I could get my hands on that box. If it really is a forger’s kit, and Vincent DiSilva down in Florida really was a forger, then everybody’s having a hissy fit over a Bible that’s probably a piece of well-crafted fakery.”
“It does seem that way.”
“Which means I’m even more confused.” I pulled a plain white t-shirt over my head. “Thanks for helping me out today. I really appreciate it.”
“You’re welcome.” He leaned back against the wall, arms crossed, expression curious even if his eyes were flat and tired. “What are you doing tomorrow?”
“Tomorrow is the reenactment at Skidaway Island. I’m meeting Dee Lynn there.” I put a steadying hand on his shoulder. “And don’t panic when you hear this next part, but…I have a plan.”
Chapter Twenty-seven
I woke the next morning to the bubble and hiss of the coffee machine. I opened my eyes and blinked into the gray blur of dawn. Trey stood at the window. He wore workout clothes, his gym bag over one shoulder, his hair damp with sweat.
I pulled my head up from the desk, eyes sticky, mouth dry and thick. “What time is it?”
“Six-fifteen.” He turned to face me, a dark silhouette against the sheer curtains. “You didn’t come to bed last night.”
I forced myself to sit up slowly, stiffly. “I meant to. But then I had a little bit of a nervous breakdown.”
“I see.”
His desk was a mess. Pamphlets, printouts, garbled notes, everything I could find on the rise and fall and re-rise of the Ku Klux Klan. My cell phone lay on the floor next to the chair, along with two empty bottles of Jack from the mini bar.
I scrubbed at my eyes. “I remember calling Rico at some point and yammering at him for a while. Then I kinda fell apart. Then I fell asleep. Sorry. I’ll clean it up.”
“It’s okay.” He didn’t move from the window.
“I spent all night choking down this Klan shit. It’s evil, Trey, stupid and repulsive. I feel like I’m gonna throw up.”
He peered at the jumble of papers. “You already knew these things. You told me about them.”
“I knew the old stuff, yeah. But this is my first time getting acquainted with the new Klan, the one that’s operating here.”
“There’s more than one Klan?”
“There’s hundreds of Klans. But this is the big one—Ku Klux Klan Incorporated—and it’s trying to act like a squeaky clean social club.”
I got up and went to the coffee maker, stepping over a set of pamphlets I’d downloaded and printed, the ones the Klansman had been passing out at the Expo. They were professionally edited and slickly produced, featuring Gerard Dupree, self-styled Grand Wizard of the Southeastern Regional Knights of the Ku Klux Klan LLC. Sandy-haired and hatchet-nosed, smiling from the page, he looked more like a corporate CEO than the head of the Invisible Empire, or at least one head of that despicable hydra. In the old days, his identity would have been a secret to even most Klansman. Now he had a website, probably a Twitter account.
I poured a cup of coffee. “They say they’re not about hate. They say they’re advocates for the White Protestant Christians of America, that the violence of the past is tragic, of course, but past. It begins to seem almost reasonable, like maybe they’re deluded but harmless and that oh yeah, they do take care of the widows and orphans and occasionally pick up trash along the highway.” I dosed my coffee liberally with cream and sugar. “I don’t know what those men in gray died for, but it wasn’t so these idiots could have a gift shop with KKK tote bags.”
Trey watched me. He didn’t say anything. The city lay below us, cobblestones and tabby warmed by the dusty light of sunrise. It was easy to forget that we were in the twenty-first century, that we’d made any progress at all.
I went to the window and stood beside him. “Fifty years ago they’d have lynched me as a race traitor, right after I watched them hang Rico from a tree. But it’s all whitewashed now. Literally. Like it never happened.”
Trey still stood quietly. I took a sip of coffee, my hands trembling. Trey made it weaker than I usually did, but it would be a start. He was right—I knew all about the Klan. But I’d forgotten too, as deliberately as they had. I’d stowed this baggage down here in the pluff mud and made haste for Atlanta. The city too busy to hate, it called itself. Or remember.
“It all comes together,” I said. “My stuff, your stuff, the entire Civil War. It all flows down and gets lost in the end.”
Trey watched and listened. Any other man would have put a hand on my shoulder or pulled me into his arms. But Trey waited, as always, for me to make the first move. And maybe for the first time, I understood what a powerful gesture that was. I will always show up, he’d promised. Not save the day. Not make everything better. But he would always be there, for as long as I wanted him to.
So I put down the coffee and leaned against him. And he took my weight, all of it. He didn’t say anything for five minutes. But when I eventually buried my face in his chest, he put his arms around me and held me close.
“Do you still want to go through with your plan?” he said.
I nodded against his shirt.
“Do you still want me to come and help?”
I nodded again.
He exhaled. “Okay then. I’ll get dressed. You should too.”
And then—tentatively, tenderly—he patted my back. Without any prompting from me whatsoever.
***
Skidaway Island State Park felt like the very pivot between past and future. In the parking lot, the twenty-first century held sway—farm trucks with pull-behind trailers, motorcycles, muscle cars—but on the other side of the palmetto ridge, time blurred and dissolved. I could glimpse the reenactors’ camp through the morning mist, dozens of white A-frame tents and larger walled ones, all of them set up the previous night.
The public area teemed with activity. Spectators toted plastic coolers to the shade of the picnic pavilions. A few vendors stayed in character and manned tables filled with circa-1860 wares, but most of my fellow Expo participants reclined in the shade, lemonade and hot dogs in hand, fully grounded in contemporary America.
Emmy Simmons wasn’t among them, however. Nei
ther was her son, the Rock. The rest of his biker buddies were out in full force, clustered around their Harleys in the parking lot, shooting belligerent glares in my direction.
I ignored them and headed for the spectator area. The low breeze felt heavy and dense and ancient, stirred up from some prehistoric cave. Beyond the barrier rope, deep in those cool fronded depths, hundreds of men gathered, preparing for a battle. For those in the audience, however, it was bird song and crowd murmur.
Dee Lynn met me halfway. “I got a picnic blanket set up over yonder.” She frowned. “What’s that?”
She pointed at the document tube I carried. It was a professional-looking thing, like an architect might tote fancy papers in.
“You mean this?” I said. “It’s bait.”
Her hands went to her hips. “You’d better explain.”
I did. As I gave her the gist of things, Trey came to stand beside me. Every eye that wasn’t already on me swiveled our way. We made quite the pair—me the disreputable map seller and him…well, nobody really knew what he was, but he looked exotic and official, and that was good enough to get tongues wagging.
“Reynolds is checking in,” he said.
“So he decided to participate after all.”
“He did. I double-checked all his weaponry this morning. Everything was in working order.” Trey reconsidered his words. “Or nonworking order.”
“In other words, no real bullets, black powder only.”
“Yes.” He examined the field, the fog-shrouded stands of trees and the vast green meadow opening between. “I wish I could say the same for the rest of the reenactors.”
“You’re not happy about this.”
He shook his head. “In many ways, this will function like a real battle. And real battles are chaotic and unpredictable, with multiple failure points.”
Reynolds joined us from the check-in tent. Twin rows of gold buttons gleamed on the front of his dove-colored coat. Bright yellow piping accented his cuffs and neckline, complemented by a gold brocade sash, a feather projecting from the sweeping officer’s hat on his head. He even sported a sword, a slender presentation model in a leather scabbard festooned with flashing gilt.
He doffed the hat and bowed low in front of Dee Lynn. “M’lady,” he intoned, then snapped back to attention.
Dee Lynn gave him the up and down. “Who are you supposed to be?”
“I am my own creation, madam.”
I laughed. “With some flourishes borrowed from General Jeb Stuart perhaps.”
“Maybe a few. The gentleman had style.” He popped the hat back on his head, tilting it at a rakish angle. “I have received my orders and will be joining my regiment.”
He waggled a little index card at me—his instructions for the day’s action, delivered by the reenactment coordinator. How he was to fight, if he was to fall. The battle this day wasn’t a recreation of any actual moment in the War. Savannah’s defeat had been incremental and relatively bloodless. They’d lost the forts along the ocean early in the war, and had existed with Union battleships visible offshore for years. Today’s fight—with its charging cavalry, massed regiments, and hand-to-hand combat—was more educational demonstration than historic representation.
“Do you die today?” I said.
He tucked the index card in his boot. “That’s between me and my maker.” Then he spotted the container and moved in close. “Is that what I think it is?”
I nodded and dropped my voice. “But you can’t tell anybody. You can’t even look this direction. The FBI is on its way to pick it up, and they’re pretty sure they can figure out who killed the old man from it.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. Fancy CSI stuff. Way over my head.”
He looked left and right. “I thought the map was fake.”
“That doesn’t matter. They said it’s the evidence they need to put someone away.”
“Who?”
I put a finger to my lips. Reynolds nodded.
“The secret is safe with me, m’dear. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’d like to get into a martial frame of mind.”
We watched him saunter toward the sutler’s area, the part of the field reserved for sales. Several soldiers both blue and gray mingled there. Trey stood beside me, sizing up the scene.
“Do you think that was wise?” he said.
As we watched, Reynolds chatted up a sutler behind a table of games appropriate to the era—playing cards, chess, checkers. As they talked, the clerk’s eyes drifted our way, taking in the document tube.
“Oh yes,” I said. “That was the smartest thing I’ve done yet. Nothing spreads information like trying to keep it secret.”
“Are you sure this is necessary?”
“I’ve got a reputation to salvage and an ATF audit coming up. I’ve got to do something to bring this fiasco to an end, and quick.”
Trey didn’t look convinced. “So now what?”
“Now we see what happens.”
“That’s not a plan.”
“Sure it is.”
“No, it’s a…I’m not sure what it is, but it isn’t a plan.”
Across the field, a women in a hoop skirt eyed us and then averted her gaze. Behind her, two young boys walked a little closer to us than necessary, eyes on the document tube. They looked like central casting for Huck Finn, both dressed in beige cotton long shirts and trousers held up with suspenders, mock rifles on their shoulders.
I handed the tube to Dee Lynn. “My friend Kendrick will be at the main entrance in a patrol car. He’s officially on KKK watch, but he said to call if anybody made a grab for this. Trey will set up surveillance in the parking lot.”
She tucked the tube under her arm. “And where will you be?”
I pointed to the open green meadow between stands of trees. “Watching from over there.”
“But the reenactment will be coming through soon. The horses, foot soldiers, the whole crashing bunch of them.”
I shook my head. “I won’t be in the field. I’ll be behind the campground. It’s deserted now, so I’ll be out of the way of both the battle and the vendors. All you have to do is leave that tube unattended so that our guilty party can try to snatch it.”
Dee Lynn didn’t seem convinced. “Your friend Kendrick approved this plan?”
“He said it was worth a shot. It’s not something he can use in court, but it will give him a reason to take in a likely suspect. And he said that’s the big secret of police work—most cases get solved because one of the crooks spills the beans.”
Dee Lynn snorted. “That part makes sense. So what do we do now?”
“We take our positions and wait for the fireworks.”
***
Men. So many men. The womenfolk were shoved to the sidelines in war both real and pretend—only the smattering of females willing to cross-dress ever saw the battlefield. During the war, the elite gave cotillions and raised money for bandages, while the poor gutted hogs and scrubbed clothes and did without, every single night. Very little evidence documented their valor—there was no romance in survival, unlike its flamboyant second cousin, triumph.
But for now, the men occupied the deep recesses of Skidaway Island’s maritime forest, and I could slip among the tents and cast iron cooking pots unnoticed. I could still smell the remnants of breakfast—coffee perked in the fires, sausages on the griddles—and feel the heat coming from banked ashes. The morning fog had lifted somewhat, giving me a clearer view of the spectator area.
I saw Dee Lynn on her picnic blanket surrounded by the audience, the document tube at her side. The KKK was present now, weaving through the crowd, polite and smug in their clean white shirts. A woman joined them this morning—friendly, low-key, approachable. I remembered the photos from my night of research—the swinging corpses and the row of white robes, men’s dress shoes and women’s dainty heels peeking under the hems.
I stuffed down the anger and lifted my binoculars. Across the field, I got my first glimp
se of the cavalry through the foliage, already on their horses, massing at the far end of the theatre. They would fight on horseback today, carrying carbines and pistols, even though most actual units during the war fought as mounted infantry, arriving on horseback, then dismounting for hand-to-hand combat. I knew they’d come through first in today’s scenario—the better to avoid trampling the reenactors who’d pour onto the scene on foot.
I turned around and checked out the parking lot. I couldn’t see Kendrick and Trey, but I knew they were there, waiting.
A flash of movement in the officers’ tents caught my eye. As in actual wartime, these tents were set away from the enlisted men’s, and with only a few minutes before showtime, they should have been deserted.
But they weren’t.
I scanned the area, finally spotting the lurker. He was a small skinny guy, dressed in the simple trousers and white shirt of the civilian, the pants held up with suspenders, a dark gray slouch hat pulled low over his face. He skulked at the edges of the campground, hovering, waiting.
Beyond the trees, I heard the first noises of the coming armies—the bugle calls, the dull huzzah of a hundred voices. I crossed my fingers, hoping that nobody in the spectator area could see me, then jogged from the A-frames to the larger walled tents, which were tall enough to hide me from view.
I peeked around the corner. Nothing. The ivory cloth flapped in the breeze, row upon row of deserted squares.
Suddenly I heard a female voice behind me. “Hey, Tai. How’s tricks?”
I spun around. The mysterious stranger stood there, gun pulled. Not a he. A she. And not a stranger.
“Hope,” I said.
She raised the gun higher, a short-barreled revolver, and from the way she hoisted it, I knew she knew what she was doing. “Hands up. Don’t go for that phone, or anything else you might be packing. Unlike every other weapon out here, mine has real bullets in it. Nobody will notice you’re really shot until it’s too late.”
She pulled her hat off, and I gaped in astonishment. She’d dyed her hair to match mine and styled it in a tumble of curls. Her tresses were lighter, though, a honey blond.