Sycamore Row

24

On the morning of Christmas Eve, Jake slept late, or as late as possible. With Carla dead to the world, he eased out of bed at seven, and without a sound went to the kitchen. He brewed coffee, scrambled eggs, and toasted muffins, and when he returned with breakfast in bed she grudgingly came to life. They were eating slowly and talking quietly, thoroughly enjoying a rare moment, when Hanna bounded into the room full of anticipation and chattering nonstop about Santa Claus. She wedged herself between her parents and helped herself to a muffin. Without prompting, she reviewed everything she’d put in her letter to the North Pole, and seemed genuinely concerned that she might be asking for too much. Both parents patiently disagreed. She was, after all, the only child and usually got what she wanted. Plus, there was a surprise that would overshadow all of her requests.

An hour later, Jake and Hanna left for the square while Carla stayed home to wrap packages. Roxy was off for the day, and Jake needed to retrieve a gift for his wife. The office was always the best hiding place. He expected to find no one there, but was not too surprised when he saw Lucien in the conference room, digging through a stack of old files. He looked as though he’d been there for hours, and, more important, he looked clean and sober. “We need to talk,” he said.

Hanna loved to rummage through her father’s big office, so Jake turned her loose upstairs and went to find coffee. Lucien had already consumed half a pot and seemed sufficiently wired. “You’re not gonna believe this,” he said as he closed the conference room door. Jake fell into a chair, stirred his coffee, and asked, “Can this wait until Monday?”

“No, shut up and listen. The great question here is, Why would a man do what Seth Hubbard did? Right? Make a last-minute will, crude and handwritten, cut out his family, and leave everything to a person who has no claim to any of his fortune? This is the question that haunts you now, and it will only get bigger until we find the answer.”

“Assuming there is an answer.”

“Yes. So to unravel this mystery, and to hopefully help you win this case, we have to answer that question.”

“And you’ve found it?”

“Not yet, but I’m on the trail.” Lucien waved at a pile of debris on the table-files, copies of old deeds, notes. “I have examined the land records of the two hundred acres Seth Hubbard owned in this county when he died. A lot of the records were destroyed when the courthouse burned after the second war, but I’ve been able to reconstruct much of what I’m looking for. I’ve dug through every deed book, all the way back to the early 1800s, and I’ve scoured every copy of the local newspapers from the day they started printing. I’ve also done a fair amount of genealogical research, into the Hubbard, Tayber, and Rinds families. As you know, it’s very difficult with these black folks. Lettie was raised by Cypress and Clyde Tayber, but she was never legally adopted. She didn’t know it until she was thirty years old, according to Portia. Portia also believes, as do I, that Lettie was really a Rinds, a family that no longer exists in Ford County.”

Jake took a sip of coffee and listened intently. Lucien propped up a large, hand-drawn map and began pointing. “This is the original Hubbard property, eighty acres, been in the family for a hundred years. Seth inherited it from his father, Cleon, who died thirty years ago. Cleon left a will giving everything to Seth, and Ancil was never mentioned. Next to it is another eighty-acre section, right here, at the bridge where they found Seth after he fell off his ladder. The other forty acres over here were purchased by Seth twenty years ago and are not important.” Lucien was tapping the second parcel upon which he had crudely drawn a creek, a bridge, and a hanging tree. “Here’s where it gets interesting. This second tract of eighty acres was purchased in 1930 by Cleon Hubbard. It was sold to him by Sylvester Rinds, or the wife of Sylvester Rinds. The land had been in the Rinds family for sixty years. What’s unusual about this is that Rinds was black, and it appears as though his father was the son of a freed slave who took possession of the eighty acres around 1870, during Reconstruction. It’s not clear how he managed to assume ownership, and I’m convinced we’ll never know. The records simply do not exist.”

“How did Cleon take ownership from Rinds?” Jake asked.

“By a simple quitclaim deed, signed by Esther Rinds, not by her husband.”

“Where was her husband?”

“Don’t know. I’m assuming he was either dead or gone because the land was in his name, not his wife’s. For her to be able to convey property, it would’ve been necessary for her to inherit the land. So, he was probably dead.”

“No record of his death?”

“None, yet, but I’m still digging. There’s more. There are no records of the Rinds family in Ford County after 1930. They disappeared and there’s not a single Rinds to be found today. I’ve checked phone books, voter registration records, tax rolls, you name it and I’ve been through it. Not a single Rinds anywhere. Pretty unusual.”

“So?”

“So, they vanished.”

“Maybe they all went to Chicago, like everybody else.”

“Perhaps. From Lettie’s deposition we learned that her mother was about sixteen when she was born, out of wedlock, and that she never knew her father. She says she was born near Caledonia, down in Monroe County. Her mother died a couple of years later-Lettie doesn’t remember her-and an aunt took her in. Then another aunt. Then she finally landed over in Alabama with the Tayber family. She took their last name and got on with life. You heard the rest of it in her deposition. She’s never had a birth certificate.”

“What’s the point here, Lucien?”

He opened another file and slid a copy of a single sheet of paper across the table. “A lot of Negro babies were born back then without birth certificates. They were born at home, with midwives and such, and nobody bothered with record keeping. But the health department in every county tried to at least record the births. That’s a copy from a page in the 1941 Register of Live Births. It shows one Letetia Delores Rinds being born on May 16 to a young woman named Lois Rinds, age sixteen, in Monroe County, Mississippi.”

“You went to Monroe County and dug this up?”

“I did, and I’m not finished. Looks like Lettie might be a Rinds.”

“But she said she doesn’t remember any of this, or at least she doesn’t remember anything before her childhood in Alabama.”

“Do you remember anything that happened before you were three years old?”

“Everything.”

“Then you’re a nutcase.”

“So, what if Lettie’s people came from Ford County?”

“Let’s assume they did, just for the hell of it. And let’s assume further that they once owned the same eighty acres that Cleon Hubbard took title to in 1930, the same that got handed down to Seth Hubbard. And the same he willed to Lettie. That closes the circle, doesn’t it?”

“Maybe, maybe not. There are still some huge gaps. You can’t assume that all black folks named Rinds in north Mississippi came from Ford County. That’s a stretch.”

“Granted. It’s only a theory, but we’re making progress.”

“We?”

“Portia and I. I’ve got her digging through her family tree. She’s been hounding Cypress for details, but she’s not too talkative. And, like most families, there’s a lot of crap back there that Portia wishes she’d never found.”

“For example?”

“Cypress and Clyde Tayber never married. They had six kids and lived together for forty years, but never tied the knot, legally anyway.”

“That was not that unusual. The common law protected them.”

“I know that. There’s a good chance that Cypress is not even blood kin. Portia thinks her mom might have been abandoned more than once before getting dumped on the Taybers’ front doorstep.”

“Does Lettie talk about it?”

“Not much, evidently. As you might guess, her family tree is not a pleasant subject.”

“Wouldn’t Lettie know if she was born a Rinds?”

“One would think so, but maybe not. She was thirty years old before Cypress told her the truth about being adopted; in fact, Cypress never met Lettie’s mother. Think about that, Jake. For the first thirty years of her life she assumed Cypress and Clyde were her biological parents and the other six kids were her brothers and sisters. Portia said she was upset when she finally learned the truth, but she’s never had any desire to dig into her past. The Taybers in Alabama are not even remotely related to the Rindses in Ford County, so I guess it’s possible Lettie doesn’t know where she came from.”

Jake thought about this for a few minutes as he sipped coffee slowly and tried to think of all the angles. He said, “Okay, let’s buy into your theory. Why, then, would Seth want to return the land to a Rinds?”

“My theory hasn’t gotten that far yet.”

“And why would he leave her everything-the eighty acres plus a helluva lot more-at the expense of his own family?”

“Still digging for that one.”

“I like it. Let’s keep digging.”

“This could be crucial, Jake, because it could prove motive. The big question is, Why? And if we can answer it, then you might just win at trial. Otherwise, you’re screwed.”

“That’s just your opinion, Lucien. As I recall, that was your general sentiment right before the Hailey trial.”

“The sooner you forget that trial, the sooner you’ll become a better lawyer.”

Jake smiled and stood. “Some things you can’t forget, Lucien. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to go shopping with my daughter. Merry Christmas to you.”

“Bah humbug.”

“Are you coming over for dinner?”

“Bah humbug.”

“That’s what I figured. See you Monday.”

Simeon Lang arrived home just after dark on Christmas Eve. He had been away for over two weeks, and his travels had taken him as far as Oregon, in an 18-wheeler packed with six tons of stolen appliances. He had a pocketful of cash, love in his heart, Christmas jingles on his tongue, and a nice bottle of bourbon hidden under the passenger’s seat. He was cold sober at the moment, and he was promising himself he would not let the booze disrupt the holidays. All in all, Simeon was in a cheerful mood, at least until he pulled to a stop in front of the old Sappington place. He counted seven cars parked haphazardly in the driveway and around the front lawn. Three he recognized; the others, he wasn’t so sure. He abruptly stopped “Jingle Bells” in mid-chorus and wanted to curse. All the lights were on in the house and it gave every impression of being filled with people.

One of the advantages of marrying Lettie was that her family lived far away, over in Alabama. She had no relatives in Ford County. On his side there were too many, and they caused trouble, but he took no flack from her people, at least not in the early years. He had secretly been delighted when she, at the age of thirty, learned that Cypress and Clyde Tayber were not her real parents and their six kids were not her siblings. This delight faded quickly, though, when Lettie carried on as if they were blood kin. Clyde died, the kids scattered, and Cypress needed a place to live. They took her in, temporarily, and five years later she was still there, bigger and needier than ever. The brothers and sisters were back, with their broods in tow and their hands out.

To be fair, there were some Langs in there too. A sister-in-law in particular had become a constant nuisance. She was out of work and needed a loan, preferably one accompanied by a verbal promise that could not be enforced. Simeon almost reached for the bottle, but he fought the urge and got out of his truck.

There were kids everywhere, a fire in the fireplace, and a kitchen full of women cooking and men tasting. Almost everyone was either happy to see him or good at pretending. Lettie smiled and they hugged. He had called the day before from Kansas and promised to be home in time for dinner. She pecked him on the cheek to see if he had been drinking, and when he passed that test she relaxed considerably. To her knowledge, there was not a drop of booze in the house, and she wanted desperately to keep it that way. In the den, Simeon hugged his kids-Portia, Phedra, Clarice, and Kirk, and his two grandchildren. From upstairs, a boom box was blasting “Rudolph” while three little boys pushed Cypress in her wheelchair up and down the hallway at a dangerous speed. Teenagers watched the television at full volume.

The old house almost shook with a chaotic energy, and after a few minutes Simeon was at peace again. The solitude of the open road had been dashed, but it was, after all, Christmas Eve, and he was surrounded by family. For sure, much of the love and warmth on display was being driven by greed and the desire to get closer to Lettie, but Simeon let it go. For a few hours anyway, just enjoy the moment.

If only Marvis could be there.

Lettie arranged two tables end to end in the dining room. The ladies then covered them with roasted turkeys, hams, sweet potatoes, half a dozen other vegetables and casseroles, and an impressive assortment of cakes and pies. It took a few minutes to gather everyone around the food, and when they were still Lettie offered a quick prayer of thanksgiving. But she had more to say. She unfolded a sheet of white notebook paper and said, “Please listen, this is from Marvis.”

At the sound of his name, all movements stopped, all heads dipped lower. They all had their own memories of the oldest child, and most of them were heartbreaking, unpleasant.

Lettie read, “Hello Mom and Dad, brothers and sisters, nieces and nephews, aunts and uncles, cousins and friends. I wish you the happiest holiday greetings and hope everyone has a Merry Christmas. I’m writing this from my cell, at night. From here I can catch a glimpse of the sky and tonight there is no moon but plenty of stars. One is really bright, I think it’s the North Star but I’m not sure. Anyway, right now I’m pretending it’s the star over Bethlehem, leading the wise men to the baby Jesus. Matthew, Chapter 2. I love you all. I wish I could be there. I’m so sorry for my mistakes and the misery I’ve caused to my family and friends. I’ll get out one day and when I’m free I’ll be there at Christmas and we’ll have a great time. Marvis.”

Her voice stayed strong but tears streamed down her cheeks. She wiped them, managed a smile, then said, “Let’s eat.”

Because it was a special occasion, Hanna insisted on sleeping with her parents. They read Christmas stories until well past ten, with at least two breaks every half hour so she could sprint to the den and make sure Santa had not somehow sneaked into the house. She chattered and wiggled with usual nervous anticipation until she inadvertently grew still. When Jake awoke at sunrise, she was wedged under her mother, both of them sound asleep. But with a gentle “I think Santa Claus has been here,” his girls sprang to life. Hanna dashed to the tree and squealed with amazement at the glorious loot Santa had left her. Jake made the coffee while Carla took photos. They opened gifts and laughed with Hanna as the wrappings and boxes piled up. What on earth was better than being a seven-year-old on Christmas morning? When the excitement began to wane, Jake stepped away and eased outside. In a small utility room next to the carport, he retrieved another package, a large square box wrapped in green paper with a large red bow. From inside, the puppy whimpered. It had been a long night, for both of them.

“Look what I found,” he announced as he sat the box on the floor next to Hanna.

“What is it, Daddy?” Hanna asked, immediately suspicious. From inside, the frazzled puppy made not a sound.

“Open it,” Carla said, and Hanna began ripping paper. Jake unfolded the top of the box, and Hanna looked inside. Sadie met her gaze with sad, tired eyes that seemed to say, “Get me outta here.”

They would pretend Sadie came from the North Pole; in fact, she came from the county’s rescue shelter, where, for $37, Jake bought her with all shots included and some future spaying thrown in. With hints of pedigree not even remotely possible, her handlers could not speculate on her size or temperament. One thought she had “a lot of terrier,” while another disagreed sharply and said, “There’s gotta be some schnauzer in there somewhere.” Her mother had been found dead in a ditch, and she and her five siblings had been rescued at the age of about one month.

Hanna lifted her gently, cradled her, cuddled her, squeezed her next to her chest, and of course the dog began licking her face. She looked at her parents in speechless amazement, her beautiful eyes moist, her voice unable to work.

Jake said, “Santa called her Sadie, but you can choose any name you want.”

Santa was a miracle worker, but at that moment all other gifts and toys he’d left behind were instantly forgotten. Hanna finally said, “Sadie’s perfect.”

Within an hour, the dog had taken over, as all three humans followed her around, making sure she got whatever she wanted.

The invitation to cocktails was a handwritten note from Willie Traynor. Six o’clock, the day after Christmas, at the Hocutt House. Holiday attire, whatever that meant. Carla insisted it meant a necktie at the least, and Jake eventually caved in. Initially, they went through the motions of pretending they did not want to go, when in reality there was absolutely nothing else to do on the day after Christmas. Well-done cocktail parties were rare in Clanton, and they suspected Willie, who grew up in Memphis amid money, might just know how to throw one. The biggest draw was the house. For years they had admired it from the street but had never managed to get inside.

“There’s a rumor he wants to sell it,” Jake said as they were discussing the invitation. He had not told his wife about the earlier conversation with Harry Rex, mainly because the price, whatever it happened to be, was far out of their range.

“That rumor has been around, hasn’t it?” she replied, and from that moment on began dreaming about the house.

“Yes, but Harry Rex says Willie is serious now. He never stays there.”

They were the first to arrive, fashionably late at ten minutes after, and Willie was all alone. His holiday attire included a red bow tie, black satin dinner jacket, and some modification of Scottish kilts. He was in his early forties, handsome with long hair and a graying beard, and perfectly charming, especially to Carla. Jake had to admit to some level of envy. Willie was only a few years older yet he had already made a million bucks. He was single, known to enjoy the ladies, and gave the impression of a man who’d been around the world.

He poured champagne into heavy, crystal flutes, offered a holiday toast, and after the first sip said with a smile, “I want to tell you something,” as if they were family and important news had arrived.

He went on, “I have decided to sell this house. I’ve owned it for sixteen years, and I love the place, but I’m simply not here enough. It needs real owners, people who will treasure it, preserve it, and keep it just like it is.” Another sip as Jake and Carla hung in midair. “And I’m not selling to just anyone. No realtor is involved. I’d like to avoid putting it on the market. I don’t want the town talking about it.”

Jake couldn’t suppress a chuckle at this. The town was already talking.

“Okay, okay, there are no secrets around here, but folks don’t have to know what we discuss. I would love for you two to have it. I actually saw your other house before it was destroyed, and I admire the way you restored it.”

“Cut the price and we’re in,” Jake said.

Willie looked at Carla’s soft brown eyes and said, “This place has your name written all over it.”

“How much?” Jake asked. His spine stiffened and he vowed not to flinch when the figure was revealed.

“Two fifty,” Willie said without hesitation. “I paid a hundred for it in 1972, then spent a hundred more fixing it up. Same house in midtown Memphis would push a million, but then that’s a long way off. At two fifty it’s a steal, but you can’t ignore the market. If I advertised it for half a million it would sit here until the weeds took over. Frankly, I’d just like to get my money back.”

Jake and Carla exchanged blank stares because there was nothing to say, not at that moment. Willie, ever the salesman, said, “Let’s look around. The others get here at six thirty.” He topped off their flutes and they headed for the front porch. Once the tour commenced, Jake knew there was no turning back.

According to Willie, the house was built around 1900 by Dr. Miles Hocutt, the town’s leading physician for decades. It was a classic Victorian, with two high-gabled roofs, a turret that ran up four levels, and wide covered porches that swept around the house on both sides.

The price was not outrageous, Jake had to admit. It was certainly out of his range, but it could have been much worse. Jake suspected Harry Rex had advised Willie to be reasonable, especially if he wanted the Brigances to own it. According to Harry Rex, one rumor had Willie making another bundle in the stock market, another had him losing badly in Memphis real estate, and yet another had him inheriting a fortune from his grandmother, BeBe. Who knew? The price, though, seemed to indicate a need for quick cash. Willie knew Jake and Carla needed a house. He knew they were bogged down in insurance litigation. He knew (probably through Harry Rex) that Jake was in line to collect a generous fee in the Hubbard matter. As Willie chatted nonstop and guided Carla across the beautifully stained heart-pine floors, through the modern kitchen, up the winding staircase, and all the way into the circular reading room on the fourth level of the turret, with a view of the church steeples just blocks away, Jake dutifully followed along, wondering how in the world they could possibly afford it, let alone furnish it.