He shook his head and started scratching at a spot with his fingernail. “I don’t think it’s dirt.” He looked straight at me. “I think it’s blood.”
I took a step back. “Blood?”
Mr Reynolds nodded solemnly. “A blood oath.”
I felt my stomach lurch. Because this is what had been niggling at my brain until I figured it out. And after I figured it out, I almost wished I hadn’t: How could Old Man Porter have known three days ahead of time that George Freeman was going to die…unless he was somehow involved in the murder?
Mr Reynolds answered the question even though I didn’t want to hear it. “I suspect your great-great-grandaddy wanted to get rid of George Freeman before the loan was paid off. That way, he could take their land back.” He stared at the map. “That explains the Fieri Facias. As far as the No Consideration, well, that means no money…” Mr Reynolds face turned pink, and he looked somewhere between hollering and puking. “I think that means he was willing to give Daniel Dunlop that little piece of land for free…if he would…you know…”
“If he would what?”
“Murder George Freeman.”
I heard my name a few times before Mr Reynolds shook my shoulder. “Red? I may need to use this as evidence. I’ve got to get to the truth.”
He took a small pad of paper and a pen out of his jacket pocket. “I’ll make a quick copy for my purposes, but I may need the original later, okay?”
He handed me back the map, but I wasn’t sure I even wanted to touch it.
“Take care of it, now,” he said, pushing it into my hand. “It may prove to be important.”
Mama called over that it was time to go. She got in on the driver’s side, saying, “Miss Georgia says she’ll talk with you tomorrow, Red, okay?”
Mr Reynolds cleared his throat. “Are you going to ask her about the date of death?”
I nodded. I couldn’t talk yet.
“We need to know that before we can be sure of what happened. Will you let me know what she says?”
I nodded again, or maybe it was a shiver.
In the car, my back pocket felt weird, like the map didn’t belong there. It was uncomfortable. Just like I felt.
“How’s Miss Georgia?” Beau asked.
Mama looked across the seat at him, then glanced at us in the back seat, swallowed hard, and said nothing. I saw her watery eyes, though, and how much she was blinking.
I finally found my voice. “Is she okay?”
Mama’s voice was shaking, like it was between angry and crying. “She’s ninety-three, you know. She’s very, very old.” She grabbed a Kleenex from the box on the dashboard and blew her nose.
Beau tugged his hair. “Miss Georgia sure did like how you painted her front porch, Red. She said she could see all the way to freedom.” He turned around in his seat to look at me. “What did she mean by that?”
“Freedom Church,” I said. Beau’s eyes grew wide, but I shook my head.
Mr Harrison’s 300 was parked in front of our house with him inside. He had the dome light on, looking at some papers. When he saw us, he started grinning like a fool.
Mama took J into his room to put him to bed. I stood in the kitchen, with Beau tugging his hair and me fuming, while Mr Harrison sat on the living-room sofa, still grinning.
He started talking before Mama even made it all the way in from the hallway. “I got you a big-time buyer, Betty.”
“Oh?” She sat down on the sofa.
“New. York. City.” He pronounced every word and paused after he said all three, like he was waiting for her to clap or something.
“Oh,” Mama finally said.
I could see Mr Harrison from the kitchen doorway, and he didn’t look too pleased that Mama sat there stony faced. I smirked at him even though he wasn’t looking at me.
“This fella wants to build himself a fine home and bring his rich city friends here to visit in the winter. Think of the money they’ll be spending in our community. You’d make your husband proud. It’s just what he would’ve wanted you to do.”
I froze long enough to hear Beau moan and say, “Careful, Red—” before I flew into the living room.
“We aren’t moving!”
Mr Harrison kind of chuckled and gave Mama a wink. “Well, it sure looks like a For Sale sign out front, son.”
I crossed my arms and set my jaw. “I’m not your son, and we’re not moving.”
Mr Harrison ignored me. “It’s a good deal of money, too,” he told Mama.
“We don’t care about money!” I yelled. “We care about doing what’s right!”
Mr Harrison let his head roll back and his ugly mouth open wide and nasty laughter come shooting out. I ran past Beau in the kitchen and out of the house, fearing I might shove something down that ugly mouth of Mr Harrison’s if I didn’t get out of there right away. I heard Beau calling after me but I was too full of hatred to stop.
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
What the Bible Said
The next day I went to see Miss Georgia, like I’d promised. Outside it was as dark and gloomy as I felt. And misty – if I hadn’t known how to get there so well, I could’ve gotten lost in the mist. The dampness made the dead leaves stink, and I felt like I was breathing rotten air.
When I got there, her son’s Plymouth Fury wasn’t in front. He must’ve already left. It was weird not seeing Miss Georgia on the porch, but smoke was coming out of the chimney, so I figured she must be inside.
The door was open a crack and I knocked.
“Come in, Red,” she called.
“How’d you know it was me?”
She turned in her wheelchair and smiled. “I may be old, but I ain’t all the way gone. Not yet.”
I slumped down in front of the fire.
“You lookin’ pretty glum.”
I told her about Mr Harrison and the buyer. “I don’t want to leave,” I said. “This is my home.”
“I hear you, Red. I hear you.”
It was exactly what Daddy used to say to me, and it sent a shiver through me. “Miss Georgia, I have to ask you about that grave marker.”
She coughed as she was trying to answer, and she kept on coughing.
I got a glass out of her strainer and filled it halfway. Good thing, because her hand was so shaky that a full glass would’ve spilled all over her. She drank some, and it seemed to stop her coughing. She handed the glass back to me and nodded at the fire like I was supposed to sit back down, so I did.
“You and Beau wanted to know exactly when my grandaddy died.”
“It had to be July first, not the seventh,” I said.
“Why do you say that?”
I didn’t say, Because if it was July first, then my great-great-grandaddy planned your grandaddy’s death. All I said was, “That’s what I heard.”
“Well, I think you heard wrong.”
I swallowed hard. “Why?”
“I thought about it, and I remember my daddy said the congregation had a party and a few days later they went to church, collected the rest of the money, and that Sunday night the church burned down.” Her voice was weak and shaky but she took a few raspy breaths and went on. “I’m pretty sure the party was on July fourth because my daddy talked about a special Independence Day celebration. They had a big celebration because they’d gained their financial independence, too. They’d be payin’ off their debt on the church. Then on Sunday, which was July seventh, they gave thanks, and on Monday they were goin’ to pay the debt and go to the courthouse to record the deed.”
My heart was pounding and my voice was so shaky, all I could do was repeat her last three words, “Record the deed?”
“That’s right. They were ready to pay Old Man Porter everythin’ they owed him. Then they’d own the church and the land, free and clear.” Miss Georgia smiled and her face looked at peace. “Free and clear.”
My face must’ve looked the exact opposite of peaceful. So Old Man Porter knew three days ahead of tim
e…three awful days when he knew George Freeman was going to be murdered. And did nothing to stop it. In fact, he planned the whole thing. Three days when Old Man Porter might’ve passed him in town and George Freeman might’ve lifted his hat and thanked him for loaning his congregation the money so they could build the church. The money they were about to pay back. What did Old Man Porter do? Say “you’re welcome”? Nod back at him? Smile? It made me sick to think of it. What kind of person does that to another person? A Porter.
“No,” I said out loud. “No, it couldn’t be.”
Miss Georgia said something, but I wasn’t even listening, until she put an old Farmers’ Almanac on my lap. It was from 1867. She opened it up to July and pointed at the days. The day of the month was the fourth and the day of the week was Thursday. And the seventh was a Sunday.
I was hoping against hope that something was wrong. There had to be an explanation. There just had to be. “What if people couldn’t remember exactly what the date was or wrote it down wrong by mistake?” I blurted out. “Miss Miller said that birth and death dates didn’t get recorded real well back then, so if folks didn’t have a place to keep those records, the dates could be wrong.”
“Well, she’s right about that.”
I breathed a sigh of relief.
“My folk had a place to record that information, though.”
“But the church burned down.”
“It wasn’t in the church.”
“Where was it?”
She pointed up at the shelf above the fireplace. “Bring down that Bible and we’ll solve this once and for all.”
I pulled the Bible out from underneath that black album with Emmett Till’s picture.
“Open up the back cover,” Miss Georgia said.
I stood in front of the fire. I should’ve been warm but I was shaking. Cradling the Bible in my left arm, I opened the back cover with my right, gripping onto it with hope. I looked at the names written carefully on the page in black ink. The first one read:
GEORGE FREEMAN, B. AUGUST 1829, D. JULY 7, 1867.
There it was. Written in the Bible. In black-and-white.
There was no getting around it.
It was us.
I felt the Bible slip out of my hands and hit the floor with a bang.
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
The Desk
I don’t even remember running, but the next thing I knew, I skidded to a stop in the gravel in front of the What-U-Want, gasping for air. Everything looked different. Nothing looked right, almost like it didn’t belong.
I knew one thing that didn’t belong. I ran to the shop and yanked open the door. For the first time, the shop smelled dirty and stale. I sprinted up to the office in the back, to Old Man Porter’s desk. I stared down at the sign I wrote, not that long ago. ON PAIN OF DEATH THIS DESK HAS TO BE MOVED! It was going to be moved, all right. I ran down the steps, grabbed an axe off the tool rack, and ran back up the stairs again.
The first chop cut the sign in half and the axe stuck in the desk I hit it so hard. I wrestled it free and hit the desk again. And again. Over and over. Pound, pound, pound. Until chips were flying as wildly as the swear words coming out of my mouth. Over and over. Bang. Heave. Bang. Heave. Bang. And I went for the legs of the desk and chopped them off one by one until the deformed wooden structure was tilted at an angle and I kept going at it because I wanted to lay the whole thing flat on the ground, like a coffin. Pound, pound, pound.
“Red!” Mama screamed. She was standing at the bottom of the steps, looking up at me, her eyes wide and both hands covering her mouth.
All the noise stopped, except for my panting. And I realized I was sweating. And I saw that I had wood chips all over me, bits of the chopped-up desk.
I looked at Mama and she was slowly taking her hands down from her mouth. “What are you doing?” she whispered.
“I’m getting rid of the desk!” My voice came out loud and screamy, especially compared to her whisper.
She shook her head a tiny bit, like it was too stiff to move very far. “Why?”
When I told her, her hands went back to covering her mouth and her eyes got wide again. That’s when I heard Beau moaning, and realized he was just a little way behind her, tugging on his hair.
“That’s bad. That’s real bad. Mr Porter, he said something bad had happened, but I didn’t know it was this bad.”
Mama let out a whimper, too.
“Did you know about that, Miz Porter?”
Mama shook her head. “All I knew was that we were somehow involved. I didn’t know…I thought maybe we didn’t try hard enough to stop Mr Dunlop…I never thought…Porters?” She looked at me like she couldn’t quite believe it. Water was collecting in her eyes, and her voice was a whisper again. “He just said he wanted to fix it. But how—”
“See, Mama?” My voice was shaking. “See why we can’t move?”
She put her hand against the wall below the office as if to balance herself.
Beau looked up at me. “What do you mean, Red?”
“Freedom Church was never on Dunlop land. Old Man Porter stole it from George Freeman and his congregation. We don’t even own all this land. We can’t sell until we find Freedom Church and give it back to Miss Georgia. Right, Mama?”
Her mouth was hanging open, but I saw her head do a definite nod. I felt like I’d finally gotten through to her before she turned around and walked like a robot out of the shop.
Beau watched her leave and then turned to me. “Red, are you okay?”
I shook my head, staring at the axe that was still in my hand.
“Did you apologize to Miss Georgia already?”
My head jerked over to Beau. “I – she doesn’t know yet.”
He tugged his hair. “Well, you’re going to tell her, right?”
“Yeah. Of course.”
He nodded. “I’m going to go apologize to her, too.”
“Why? You aren’t even a Porter.”
His shoulders sagged and I realized what I’d said.
“Beau, you should be happy right now that you’re not a Porter. It’s not your folk that – that did it.”
He looked up at me, his eyes shining in the shop lights. “It seems like everybody ought to say sorry for something as bad as that.”
My eyes flew around the shop. “This is a shameful place.” I raised the axe and gave the desk another blow. And another. And another one, until I was getting all worked up again.
“Why do you keep doing that?” Beau called up to me.
“Because I want to get rid of my great-great-grandaddy!”
“But that’s just a desk. That won’t get rid of him. He’s still your people.”
“I don’t want him to be my people!” I threw the axe to the ground and it tumbled down the stairs. “My people aren’t like that!”
Beau stood there, both hands tugging at his hair. He looked down at the axe lying at his feet, then up at me.
All the power went out of my voice. “My people aren’t supposed to be like that.” Not Porters. Not Frederick Stewart Porter. Not me. Except I realized something that made me shiver even though I was sweating. Old Man Porter had asked a Dunlop to do his dirty work for him, killing George Freeman, just like I’d asked Darrell Dunlop for help from his gang, and that ended up hurting Thomas. Maybe we weren’t all that different.
I couldn’t stand my name now – his name. Even my nickname was the same. Red. Because of my hair. I even looked like him! I couldn’t even stand my hair – his hair.
“Beau!”
He jerked at my loud voice. “What is it, Red?”
“I need to borrow your electric shaver!”
“Why?”
“Because Mama got rid of Daddy’s.”
Beau squinted up at me. “I don’t see no hair growing on your face.”
“I know. I’m shaving my head.”
“You – you want to be like that Kung Fu guy, too? I thought that was just J.”
&nbs
p; I kicked the desk. “I don’t want to have the same hair as Old Man Porter, so I’m going to shave it all off.”
“But, Red,” Beau said, tugging his hair, “it’s just gonna grow back again.”
“Then I’ll shave it again.”
“But it’ll grow back.”
“I’ll keep shaving it!”
Beau sighed. “All’s you can do is hide it for a while before it pops back out.”
“Fine! Then I’ll hide it!” I tugged on my hair, just like Beau, wanting to pull it all out.
“I don’t think it’s how you look what makes you different. I think it’s how you act.”
We stood in silence for a while until Beau spoke again. “The way I see it is you got a chance now to make the name Frederick Stewart Porter stand for something different.”
“How? It’s a pretty bad legacy.”
“I know it is. But you can do it.”
“How,” I said again, not as a question. I didn’t really expect an answer.
“Because you ain’t just that nasty old Frederick Stewart Porter’s great-great-grandson. You’s also your daddy’s son.”
CHAPTER FORTY
Confession
I hardly slept that night and by the time the sky was turning from dark to red, I’d about convinced myself that I shouldn’t go see Miss Georgia just yet. It’d be better for her if I could tell her I’d found the church when I told her the other news. But when I walked into the kitchen, Beau was already standing there, holding a plate of pancakes.
He looked at me with his puppy-dog eyes. “I made you your favourite breakfast, Red, because I know it’ll be tough going up to Miss Georgia’s this morning.”
I felt a gnawing in my stomach but it wasn’t hunger.
“I don’t know, Beau. I was thinking I might go look for—”
“I know it must be real hard,” he went on, like he hadn’t heard me, “but it sure is brave of you to go see her.”
I looked down at my sneakers.
“You want I should come with you?”
Seeing Red Page 22