A rattle of the ice, another sip, then, “Now, and in the near future, you will be well paid for your work and no one will begrudge it. As you’ve said, this mess was caused by Seth Hubbard, and he knew it was coming. So be it. However, I doubt the wisdom of you giving the impression you’re suddenly in the money. Ms. Lang moved her family to town, into the Sappington house, which as we know is nothing special and has gone unsold for a reason, but nonetheless it’s not in Lowtown. It’s on our side of the tracks. There’s been grumbling about this. It looks bad. A lot of folks think she’s already tapped into the money, and there is resentment. Now there’s talk that you have your eye on the Hocutt House. Don’t ask how I know; it’s a small town. Such a move at this time would get a lot of attention, and none of it favorable.”

Jake was speechless. As he gazed at the highest gable of the Hocutt House in the distance, he tried in vain to think of who told whom and how the word leaked. Willie Traynor swore him to secrecy because he, Willie, did not want to be pestered by other buyers. Harry Rex was a confidant of both Jake and Willie, and though he loved to spread gossip maliciously, he would never rat out inside information like this. “We’re only dreaming, Judge,” Jake managed to say. “It’s out of my range and I’m still tied up in litigation. But thanks.”

Thanks for meddling once again, Judge. Though, as Jake breathed deeply and let the anger pass, he admitted to himself that he and Carla had had the same conversation. Such a conspicuous purchase would naturally lead many to suspect Jake was moving up at the expense of a dead man.

“Has the topic of a settlement been broached?” the judge asked.

“Yes, briefly,” Jake answered quickly, eager to move away from real estate.

“And?”

“It went nowhere. In his letter to me, Seth Hubbard was explicit in his instructions. I believe his exact words were, ‘Fight them, Mr. Brigance, to the bitter end. We must prevail.’ That doesn’t leave much room for settlement negotiations.”

“But Seth Hubbard is dead. This lawsuit he created is not. What will you tell Lettie Lang when, and if, the jury rules against her and she gets nothing?”

“Lettie Lang is not my client. The estate is, and it’s my job to enforce the terms of the will that created the estate.”

Judge Atlee nodded as if he agreed, but he did not say so.

27

Charley Pardue’s arrival benefited from fortunate timing. Simeon was gone again. Had he been around the house on that late Saturday morning, he and Charley would have locked horns immediately, and the fight would have been nasty.

As it was, though, Charley knocked on the door of the old Sappington place and found a houseful of women and children. The kids were eating cereal out of boxes and watching television, while the women loitered around a dirty kitchen drinking coffee and talking in bathrobes and pajamas. Phedra answered the door and managed to get him situated in the living room, then ran to the kitchen and gushed, “Momma, there’s a man here to see you, and he’s soooo fine!”

“Who is he?”

“Charley Pardue and he says he thinks he’s a cousin.”

“Never heard of no Charley Pardue,” Lettie said, suddenly on the defensive.

“Well, he’s here and he’s really cute.”

“Is he worth talkin’ to?”

“Oh yes.”

The women scrambled upstairs and changed quickly. Phedra sneaked out the back door and eased around to the front. Yellow Cadillac, late model, spotless, with Illinois plates. Charley himself was just as presentable. Dark suit, white shirt, silk tie, a diamond tie clasp, and at least two small, tasteful diamonds on his fingers. No wedding band. A gold chain on his right wrist and a serious watch on his left. He exuded big-city slickness, and Phedra knew he was from Chicago before he got through the front door. She insisted on sitting with her mother when Lettie came back down to meet him. Portia and Clarice would join them later. Cypress stayed in the kitchen.

Charley began by dropping a few names, none of which meant much. He said he was from Chicago, where he worked as an entrepreneur, whatever that meant. He had a wide, easy grin, a glib manner, and his eyes twinkled when he laughed. The women warmed up considerably. In the past four months, many people had come to see Lettie. Many of them, like Charley, claimed blood kinship. Given the bareness of her family tree, it was easy to be cynical and to dismiss a lot of potential relatives. The truth was that Lettie had been unofficially adopted by Clyde and Cypress Tayber, after she had been abandoned more than once. She had no idea who her grandparents were. Portia had spent hours sifting through the sparse history of their ancestry, with little to show for her efforts. Charley rattled them when he said, “My maternal grandmother was a Rinds, and I think you are too, Lettie.”

He produced some paperwork, and they moved to a dining room table where they huddled over him. He unfolded a flowchart that, from a distance, more closely resembled a pile of scrub brush than a properly developed tree. Crooked lines ran in all directions, with notes wedged into the margins. Whatever it was, someone had spent hours trying to decipher it.

“My mother helped me with this,” Charley was saying. “Her mother was a Rinds.”

“Where did Pardue come from?” Portia asked.

“My dad’s side. They’re from Kansas City, settled in Chicago a long time ago. That’s where my parents met.” He was pointing at his chart with an ink pen. “It goes back to a man named Jeremiah Rinds, a slave who was born around 1841 near Holly Springs. He had five or six kids, one of whom was Solomon Rinds, and Solomon had at least six kids, one of whom was Marybelle Rinds, my grandmother. She gave birth to my mother, Effie Rinds, in 1920, who was born in this county. In 1930, Marybelle Rinds and her husband and some more Rinds took off for Chicago and never looked back.”

Portia said, “That’s the same year the property of Sylvester Rinds was transferred to the Hubbard family.” The others heard this but it meant little. Portia was not even sure of the connection; there were too many missing details.

“Don’t know about that,” Charley said. “But my mother remembers a cousin who she thinks was the only child of Sylvester Rinds. As best we can tell, this cousin was born around 1925. They lost touch after 1930 when the family scattered. But through the years there was the usual family gossip. This girl supposedly had a baby when she was real young, the daddy caught a train, and the family never knew what happened to the baby. My mother remembers her cousin’s name as Lois.”

“I’ve heard that my mother’s name was Lois,” Lettie said cautiously.

“Well, let’s look at your birth certificate,” Charley said, as if he had finally arrived at a critical moment.

“Never had one,” Lettie said. “I know I was born in Monroe County in 1941, but there’s no official certificate.”

“No listing of either parent,” Portia added. “We found this recently, down in Monroe County. The mother is listed as L. Rinds, age sixteen. The father is H. Johnson, but that’s the only mention of him.”

Charley was instantly deflated. He had worked so hard and traveled so far to prove his lineage with his newfound cousin, only to hit a dead end. How can you be alive with no birth certificate?