“No problem,” I told her. “I’ll pick you up, we’ll drop Cal at Kate’s, and be at the library in plenty of time.”
Cal had already put Bandit in his crate with a new strip of rawhide and he slung his duffel bag into the backseat of my car and crawled in after it. The children were off from school until after New Year’s, but this morning was a final work day for the teachers, so Miss Emily was going to pick him up this afternoon and keep him overnight.
Barbara was looking at her watch and pacing back and forth when we got there, and she had the door open almost before I brought the car to a full stop.
“I really appreciate this,” she said, fastening her seat belt. “Today’s my last chance to try and talk the commissioners out of cutting county funds to the library.”
She greeted Cal, who responded shyly. Of my five sisters-in-law who live out here on the farm, she’s probably the one he knows least, but she made an effort and by the time we reached Kate’s, he was chatting normally. In response to one of her questions, he even confided that while he had enjoyed the Harry Potters, he really liked the Ender books better.
Because Barbara was in a fidget, I didn’t linger at Kate’s; just dropped a kiss on Cal’s head when Kate came to the door and told him I’d see him tomorrow morning, “but call if you need us, okay?”
“Okay,” he said cheerfully.
“You and Dwight have something on for tonight?” Barbara asked, as we headed for Dobbs.
I knew she was only making polite conversation, but it beat riding in silence.
“Just dinner,” I said. “It’s our anniversary.”
For some reason, that surprised her. “Has it really been a whole year?”
“Time flies when you’re having fun,” I said lightly.
She let that pass. “Cal seems like a bright little boy. A real reader, too.”
I told myself that she didn’t mean to sound insulting. “He takes after his grandmother,” I said. “Miss Emily loves books.”
“I know. Every time the bookmobile goes out to the school, it always takes a stack that she’s requested. She probably goes through three or four a week.”
“Guess I won’t try to give her books for Christmas, then. But maybe you can help me about Cal. I bought him
“
“Isn’t that too old for him?”
“Not really. Sounds as if he’s reading well above grade level.”
“I don’t mean that. I mean, won’t the issues of race and lynching go over his head?”
“You’d be surprised. He’s ten, right?”
“Nine and a half.”
“Third grade?”
I nodded.
“He rides a school bus, Deborah. He has to have heard the N-word and probably a lot of worse racist language besides.
“Okay,” I said. “I’ll add it to my shopping list. Thanks.”
The weather and the dazzling ice carried us for another mile or two, making me ever more conscious that this was about the longest one-on-one conversation Barbara and I had ever had. Lacking anything else, I said, “How’s Emma doing after yesterday?”
She sighed. “That was really hard for her. Hard for all the girls. To put on their uniforms and walk in together, and then out at the grave—? You didn’t go to the interment, did you?”
“No.”
“It was dreadful. Her parents had arranged for each girl to have a red and a yellow rosebud. They had to sing the West Colleton fight song and then lay their roses on her coffin. It was ghastly. Those girls can never again sing that song without thinking of Mallory. It really wasn’t fair of her dad to make them do that.”
“Not her mother?”
“She’s hurting, but it’s the dad who’s absolutely shattered and seems determined to wallow in his grief. I know that sounds callous, but really! To force everyone else to wallow, too? No. Maybe if they’d kept a tighter rein on her…”
“What do you mean?”
“The way she teased boys. It made me so angry.”
“Huh?”
“Lee. Didn’t he tell you?” Her surprised tone turned spiteful. “I thought the kids told you everything.”
“Oh, wait a minute. Didn’t he take her out once last spring?”
“Yes.
“What happened?”
