Chapter Nine

      On the way to the Claybourne plantation, Ted turned from the highway on to a straight patch of gravel that sliced through dizzying rows of young cotton plants. After a hundred yards he slowed the Chevy, caught up in the beauty of the green vista that seemed as vast as the sky that arched above, wondering what this must be like when the plants burst into cotton in the fall. In the distance, tiny figures moved between the rows, bobbing like dark corks as they edged forward, chopping out the weeds. In the overheated stillness he could hear the chunk, chunk, chunk of the hoes.

      At an ancient weeping willow, the gravel road curved gently into the shade of a tall stand of old oaks surrounding a stately plantation house. It didn’t look like Tara. Not a grand ante-bellum mansion that was built before Abraham Lincoln was practicing law. No, it was almost defiantly Victorian, a white soaring filigreed eminence that could be comfortably at home in Newport, Rhode Island, or on Beacon Hill in Boston. It spoke of old money, of an unquestioned sense of entitlement. Carpetbagger money? He’d have to ask. No great white columns like the ones David Selznick had arranged. Beautiful, expensive, comfortably inviting, but decidedly not Tara.

      Ted had to smile, feeling relieved. On the broad, deeply shaded veranda embracing the house, he saw the woman from the gas station. Dressed in a pale green linen shift, she rose awkwardly from a porch swing and came forward to greet him. Not Scarlett, but a smiling Willy Claybourne.

      “You found the Claybournes, and nobody chased you that I can see from here.” Her eyes elaborately searched the empty driveway.

      He grinned and nodded. “And none of the townsfolk have arrived yet to string me up.”

      “I heard you on the gravel. Come on in out of this heat. Welcome, Ted Mendelsohn!”

      “Mendelsohn’s too much to handle in this humidity. Brevity is all, my editor, Max, keeps telling me. Just Ted if it’s all right with you, Mrs. Claybourne.”

      Her smile was impish. “What’s good for the cat is good for the kitten. If you’re Ted, then I’m Willy. Em’s inside. Nobody’s ever called her Emily. And I want you to meet my husband.” She hesitated. “Lucas Claybourne. He’s more traditional than I am. He’ll likely call you Mr. Mendelsohn.”

      “And what do I call him?”

      She slipped her hand under his arm and opened the door. “You could call him lord of the manor.” She smiled wickedly. “But I wouldn’t if I were you. I think Mr. Claybourne will do nicely for now.”

      Together, they moved down a cool, wide entry hall past four large, idealized oils of antebellum harbors in New England. Facing the entry to the living room a single portrait held a silent, self-important vigil. The man, painted in his elder years, was dressed in a great cloak and standing on the deck of a three-masted vessel under full sail. Ted stopped before the portrait, bursting with questions. “And who is this? He looks like Cotton Mather!”

      “This gentleman is the very first Claybourne to reach the Delta,” Willy explained. “Henry Percival Claybourne, great-great-grandfather to my husband, Lucas, on his father’s side. Henry Percival was a very successful ship owner who made a fortune carrying supplies to the occupying Northern troops down here from his home port in Plymouth, Massachusetts.” Noting the astonished look on Ted’s face, she grinned. “One nation, indivisible, Ted! Everybody came from some place.”

      As they entered the living room, a large, heavyset man in his late twenties turned from his conversation with Emily. With his rumpled dark brown hair, soiled khakis, and muddy field boots, Lucas Claybourne looked like a slightly aging running guard from Ole Miss. He was deeply tanned from the Delta sun, a man who would be most at home outside, perhaps a little uncomfortable among the colorful chintz and floral draperies of Willy Claybourne’s living room. He stood up, frowning, from a couch. A Bermuda fireplace held great pots of flowering fuchsia. Hands in his pockets, he quietly regarded Willy and the journalist.

      “Luke, honey, come meet Mr. Mendelsohn.”

      Shake hands with the son of a bitch? Let Willy do it. His eyes remained still.

      “Lucas!” Her voice was cutting.

      Jesus, Willy! Just what the fuck is this Jew reporter doing in my house? What the hell do you want from me?

      He remained stonily silent but finally he nodded. “Lucas Claybourne, Mr. Mendelsohn.” He cleared his throat. “Wilson and Em were telling me about your meeting at Bobby Joe’s station.”

      Ted smiled. “Well, if Miss Kilbrew here hadn’t bailed me out with her brother, I think I’d still be there.”

      “Doesn’t surprise me.” His voice was deep and lazy. “Em’s been almost family with us for a long time. Real close.” The voice had a cool edge. “Anything her best friend Willy asks her to do, she usually obliges. Hard to turn down a friend. No matter what.”

      Mendelsohn nodded to Emily who stood stiffly by the fireplace. “When I went to pick up the wheel, Miss Kilbrew, I don’t think your brother was very happy about the whole thing. So I’m really obliged to you.”

      She nodded briefly, her fingers picking lint from her skirt. “BJ’s not my brother. He’s a half brother. We’re not a whole lot alike.” Abruptly she sat back down on the couch.

      “Mr. Mendelsohn needed someone to offer a little Christian charity, Luke, and that’s what Em got BJ to do.” Willy turned to Ted. “Em and I teach Sunday school together down at Shiloh Baptist, so I know about her good heart, Ted. But best I can remember about BJ from high school, nobody wrote ‘good heart’ in his yearbook!”

      Irritated, Luke broke in. “Who the hell’s business is it if BJ has a good heart? That what this journalist is tryin’ to find out?” His eyes narrowed. “Willy and Em were tellin’ me that’s what you are. That so?”

      Ted folded his arms. “I think of myself as a reporter, Mr. Claybourne. I think a journalist gets paid better.”

      “Why don’t you all sit down,” said Willy. “Mr. Mendelsohn works for Newsweek, Luke. They sent him