Sycamore Row

was not a bigot like most white people around here. We have eighty employees on this yard: half white, half black, all paid the same scale. I’ve heard all of his furniture factories and lumber yards work the same way. He wasn’t much for politics, but he despised the way black people have been treated in the South. He was just a fair man. I came to respect him a great deal.” Her voice cracked and she went for the tissue.
    Jake glanced at his watch and was surprised to see it was almost noon. He’d been there for two and a half hours. He said he had to go, but would return early the following week with a Mr. Quince Lundy, the new court-appointed administrator. On the way out, he spoke to Dewayne and got a pleasant good-bye from Kamila.
    As he drove back to Clanton, his mind spun with the possible scenarios that involved some thug posing as a big-firm Jackson lawyer and trying to intimidate potential witnesses; and doing so just days after the suicide and before the first court hearing. Whoever he was, he would never be seen again. More than likely, he worked for one of the lawyers representing Herschel or Ramona or their kids. Wade Lanier was Jake’s top suspect. He ran a ten-man litigation firm with a reputation for aggressive and creative tactics. Jake had spoken to a classmate who mixed it up often with the Lanier firm. The scouting report was impressive but also disheartening. When it came to ethics, the firm was notorious for breaking the rules, then running to the judge and pointing fingers at the other guys. “Don’t turn your back,” Jake’s friend had said.
    For three years, Jake had carried a gun to protect himself from Klansmen and other crazies. Now, he was beginning to wonder if he needed protection from the sharks swimming after the Hubbard fortune.

15
    Sleep was fleeting these nights as Lettie found herself yielding even more space to her family. Simeon had not left home in over a week, and he took up half the bed. Lettie shared the other half with her two grandchildren. Two nephews were sleeping on the floor.
    She awoke as the sun was rising. She was on her side, looking at her husband wrapped in a blanket and snoring off last night’s beer. Without moving, she watched him for a while as her thoughts drifted unpleasantly. He was getting fat and gray, and his paychecks were shrinking as the years clicked along. Hey big boy, time for a road trip, huh? Time to disappear as only you can do and give me a break around here for a month or two. You’re good for nothing but sex, but who can do that with grandkids in the room?
    Simeon, though, was not leaving. No one was leaving Lettie nowadays. She had to admit that his behavior had improved dramatically in the past couple of weeks, since, of course, Mr. Hubbard had passed and altered things. Simeon still drank every night, but not to excess, not like before. He was kind to Cypress, offering to run errands for her and refraining from his usual insulting manner. He was showing patience with the children. He had cooked twice on the grill and cleaned the kitchen, a first. Last Sunday, he went to church with the family. The most obvious change was his gentle and thoughtful nature when he was around his wife.
    He hadn’t hit her in several years, but when you’ve been beaten you never forget it. The bruises go away but the scars remain, deep, hidden, raw. You stay beaten. It takes a real coward to beat a woman.Eventually, he had said he was sorry. She said she forgave him, but she did not. In her book some sins cannot be forgiven, and beating your wife is one of them. She had made a vow that she was still determined to keep—one day she would walk away and be free. It might be ten years or twenty, but she would find the courage to leave his sorry ass.
    She was not sure if Mr. Hubbard had made a divorce more or less likely. On the one hand, it would be far more difficult to leave Simeon when he was fawning over her and following every command. On the other, the money would mean independence.
    Or would it? Would it mean a better life in a bigger house with nicer things and fewer worries and perhaps freedom from a husband she did not like? Surely these were possible. But would it also lead to a lifetime of running from family and friends and strangers, all with their hands out? Already, Lettie was feeling the urge to run. She had felt trapped for years in her boxlike house with too many people and not enough beds, too few square feet. Now, though, the