Morgan James - Promise McNeal 02 - Quiet Killing by Morgan James Read Free Book Online Page A

didn’t care a fig I was Melungeon. Didn’t never even want to talk about it. He shut my daddy up by giving me my own bank account. My get-away-money he called it. Said iffen I wasn’t happy with him, I could always take my money and go on back to East Tennessee.”
    An unusual arrangement for the 1940s, especially when most women didn’t even have their names on a bank account back then, much less have one of theirown. I wondered if the wisdom to leave a wife her independence had been passed down to my Daniel.
    “I read an article in the Our State magazine about the Melungeon heritage being traced by DNA evidence to the Portuguese. Right?”
    “That’s right. Us Melungeon always told we came from the Portuguese who settled here before the English. The English, they didn’t believe us. Or didn’t want to believe us, cause that meant we got here first. Though only Lord knows why that would even matter. But you know those old-time English—always had to hold themselves better than somebody. They put us in with the mixed blood of Cherokee, or Creek, and Africans for a long time. Then they said we was gypsies, and that wasn’t any better. Even in the 1920s, our men couldn’t vote. It’s only been in the last ten or so years that the truth of us being Portuguese was proved. I reckon that’s one reason that letter has stayed in my heart over the years. I felt sorry for little Reba and for Mr. Aiken Beauchamp. Course, seems like little Reba was raised as a daughter by the Sorleys. And that’s okay, too. I say family is who loves you and takes care of you, no matter what the blood is, or isn’t. Wouldn’t you say so, Miz Promise?”
    A bell jingled behind me and I turned to see a red, yellow and brown painted bird pop out from his house on the wall. “Coo-Coo, Coo-Coo, Coo-Coo,” he announced. Three o’clock. “Good heavens. I had no idea I’d stayed so long.” I rose from the table and took my cup to the sink. “I hope I haven’t kept you too long from your chores. And,” I added, “I hope little Missy will come out from her hiding place when she sees meleave. She must be getting cold playing outside for so long.”
    Mrs. Allen walked me to the door. “Mercy me, that little thing would run these hills till she froze if I didn’t talk her inside. You take that letter on with you. I expect it belongs with you.”
    As I backed my Subaru around and inched down the steep drive, I may have seen someone in my rear view mirror running from Mrs. Allen’s well house to the porch; or, it may have been only the slanted late afternoon sunlight. Turning right toward home, I realized I’d forgotten to ask Mrs. Allen about Lewis and Adeline Redmond. It seemed that I’d heard the Redmond name, though I couldn’t place where.

6
     
    A tall person wearing a black leather jacket—an image of the Roadrunner stitched in yellow and white on the back—leaned against my pasture fence. I say person because, from the back, the thick, wavy blond hair cascading onto the shoulders could have belonged to either Marilyn Monroe or a member of the flashy world of prime-time wrestling. I could hear Alfie barking from the house as I pulled my Subaru next to the kitchen porch and got out.
    “Can I help you?” I called, and unlocked the door to let Alfie out. The hound jumped up and planted large slobbery kisses on my cheek, before he ran for the person standing on “his” turf. I wasn’t sure if Alfie would greet the stranger with kisses or take a hunk out of his butt. My visitor turned toward me and braced himself against the fence for Alfie’s tackle. He was a guy, a skinny guy, whose narrow chest seemed lost inside his oversized bombardier’s jacket.
    “Sorry, he’s just excited. He won’t bite. At least I don’t think so.” I covered the space between us andgrasped Alfie’s new red collar. “Down Alfie. Be nice and sit. Sit boy.” Wonder of wonders, the dog sat.
    My visitor retreated a foot or so, and brushed