coming to get money, and once I had it in hand, I was going right back where I came from. In my short years I'd had some going round and about with varmints, and although I hadn't my rifle with me, I did have a pistol and my Arkansas toothpick. It was two-edged, razor-sharp, with a point like a needle. If a body so much as fell against that point, it would go in to the hilt, it was that sharp.
Amy Sulky set a good table. She seated me on her left and told folks I was a friend from Tennessee. The city folks at the table bowed, smiled, and said their howdy-dos.
There was a tall, straight woman with her hair parted down the middle who looked like she'd been weaned on a sour pickle, and there was a plump gentleman with muttonchop whiskers who gave me the merest nod and went back to serious eating.
Seemed to me he figured he'd paid for his board and was going to be sure he got his money's worth, and maybe his neighbor's, too. Opposite me sat a quiet, serious-looking man with a bald head and a pointed beard. He was neat, attractive, and friendly. He asked if I intended to stay in the city and I told him I was leaving as soon as I'd done what I came for.
One thing led to another and I told him about us seeing that item about property left to the 'youngest descendant of Kin Sackett.' I told him we'd found the notice in the Penny Advocate . It had come wrapped around some goods sold us by the pack peddler.
'That strikes me as odd, Mrs. Sulky,' he said, turning to her. 'The Advocate has but a small circulation here in Pennsylvania. I imagine few copies get beyond the borders of the state. It must have been sheer chance that Miss Sackett saw the item at all.'
He glanced at me. 'Have you inquired at the address?'
'No, sir, I have just come to town. We wrote to them and they said I must come to Philadelphia to establish my relationship.'
'Odd,' he said again. 'It is none of my business, of course, but the procedure seems peculiar. I know nothing of the legalities. Perhaps they were required to advertise for heirs, but if so, they used an unlikely method. No doubt they were surprised when they heard from you.'
The talk turned to other things, but he'd put a bee in my bonnet. I said nothing about being followed, as more than likely they would think it was my imagination, but more and more I was wondering if there mightn't be some crookedness afoot. If any money was coming to us, we wanted it and our family hadn't had any cash money to speak of for longer than I wished to remember.
It was a puzzler that we'd been left money by kinfolk of Kin Sackett, because Kin had been dead for nigh onto two hundred years. Kin was the first of our blood born on American soil. His pappy had been old Barnabas Sackett, who settled on Shooting Creek, in North Carolina. He and some of his ship's crew had done well, finding some gem sapphires east of where Barnabas settled.
Barnabas was killed by Injuns near what was called Crab Orchard, and Kin became the old man of the family. His younger brother Yance settled in the Clinch Mountains, where he raised a brood of wild boys who would fight at the drop of a hat and drop it themselves. Those boys grew up back at the forks of the creek and were raised on bear meat and sourwood honey, but now I was the youngest of Kin's line.
At breakfast Amy Sulky advised me to have a care. 'This town is full of sharpers trying to take money from honest folk.'
'I've no money for bait,' I said. 'When I pay you, and my fare on the stage, I'll have nothing left but eating money. The little I have was earned a-hunting.'
'Hunting?' The fat man stared at me.
'Yes, sir. My brothers went west, so if there was meat on the table it was up to me. We ate real good, but I shot so much I commenced selling to the butcher.'
'Powder and ball cost money!'
'Yes, sir, but I don't miss very often. Nor do I shoot unless my chances are good.'
'Even so, one does miss.'
'Yes, sir. I missed one time last August. Mistook a stub of a branch for a squirrel. That squirrel ducked from sight and I seen that stub of branch. I hit what I shot at, but it was no squirrel.'
'You mean to say you haven't missed a shot since last August?'
'You come from the mountains, Mrs. Sulky. You can tell him how folks are about wastin' powder an' shot. Pappy taught us to hit what we shot at. Mostly we do, and that includes Regal.'
'Ah, that Regal!' Amy Sulky said wistfully. 'Did he ever marry?'
'Not so's you'd notice. He says he will when the right girl comes along.'
When I started to leave the house, the man with the bald head was leaving too. 'Miss Sackett? I know nothing of your affairs, but be careful. Don't offer any information you don't have to, and above all, don't sign any papers.'
'Yes, sir, thank you, sir.'
The man with the newspaper was standing near a rig tied across the street. He was a thickset man wearing a gray hard hat and a houndstooth coat. If he was wishful of not being seen, he was a stupid man. I walked away up the street, and after a moment, he followed.
Chapter 2
James White had an office on a small avenue that ran into Broad Street. The nice gentleman with the bald head and beard had directed me. On this day I carried a knitting bag and I had some knitting in it. I also had my pistol. The Arkansas toothpick was in its usual place and ready to hand.
Womenfolks did not go armed in Philadelphia, Ma said, unless they carried a hatpin, but nobody needed hatpins with the poke bonnets everybody was wearing. I let mine sort of hang back on my neck by its ribbon because I could see better from the corners of my eyes, and I'd spent too much time in the woods to want my vision blocked to the sides.
There were handsome buildings to right and left, with marble steps. The streets were of brick. Passing by a building with a beautiful marble front to it and marble steps, all the marble with blue veins, I glimpsed some brass plates with the names of the occupants on them.
One I noticed in particular because it had a familiar sound.
CHANTRY & CHANTRY, LAWYERS
Seemed to me it was a name I'd heard at storytelling time back in the mountains. We'd set around with the fire crackling, sometimes popping corn or having a taffy pull, and there would be stories told.
Sure enough, I found James White's office on a side street. Opening the door, I entered and found it was a small room with a couple of hard chairs, a sofa, and a small desk with a young man settin' behind it. Yet just as I entered, the door across the room was closing and I caught a glimpse of a boot heel and some pants leg before the door closed. Looked like that man who followed me, but how he could have gotten ahead without me seeing him, I did not know. Maybe it was somebody else.
The young man behind the desk had rumpled hair and a sly look to him. He looked kind of unwashed and slept-in. He looked at me impudent-like and said, 'What's for you?'
'I would like to see Mr. White. Tell him Miss Sackett is here.'
He sat there for a minute like he had no idea of moving, and then he stood up. 'Sackett, is it? You that hillbilly girl?'
'If you will tell Mr. White that I am here ...'
'Little thing, ain't you?'
'I am as big as I need to be.'
He leered. 'Reckon that's so. Yes, sir! I reckon you're right, at that!'
'Mr. White, please.'
He turned lazily and went to the door, opened it, and said, 'Girl to see you. Name of Sackett.'
There was the sound of a chair moving and then the young man drew back and an older man, short and heavyset, pushed by him. His black hair was slicked down over a round skull. As he came through the door he was shrugging into a coat, and he wore a bushy mustache.
His wide smile revealed more teeth than I'd seen in a long time and he said, 'Miss Sackett? I am James White. Will you come in, please?'
He let me go past him and then he followed, waving me to a chair and sitting down behind his desk. 'Is this
