True Fires Read Online Free Page A

pig.”
    “Now, Lila.” DeLuth’s face splits suddenly into a grin, a boy’s Sorry-I-spilled-the-sugar-bowl grin, I-wasn’t-aimin’-at-the-mockingbird grin, Teacher-it-sure-as-heck-wudn’t-me sort of grin that doesn’t appear to soften Miss Lila one bit. “What’s all this about Leroy? He’s been the Judge’s tree man ’round here for—what? Eight, nine years?”
    “Well, he ain’t mine anymore!” Her eyes are sparking fire. “Not since I found the truckload of fertilizer I paid for was pure cane sugar for his moonshine operation in the back corner grove!”
    “You fired Leroy for makin’ a little ’shine?”
    “What? I shoulda called The Law?” she blazes, then catches sight of Daniel and ’Becca in the back. “What’re you doin’ here anyway?”
    “Investigatin’ a constituent complaint,” he tells her, and opens the car door for them to scramble out. Daniel and ’Becca move mutely to stand beside Pap. “Seems to me and Clive Cunningham that your new tree man is tryin’ to bleach the tar brush at Lake Esther Elementary.”
    Pap slides a protective palm onto Daniel’s shoulder. “What ye sayin’ about my younguns?”
    The Sheriff’s eyes aren’t the least bit friendly. “I’m sayin’ that Lake Esther Elementary is an all-white school, for all-white children. Appears to me, your two don’t belong.” His tone is a low growl.
    Against his shoulder, Daniel feels Pap’s clutch turn into a claw. He can see, close up, the anger rushing into his father’s face. “They’re as white as you are and of better stock!”
    “Lila,” the Sheriff says, soft, “look at that girl’s nose. I don’t like the shape of it one bit. And, the boy’s hair—ain’t as nappy as old Nate’s over there—but it’s kinked, ain’t it?”
    Pap’s claw is biting into Daniel’s shoulder now, his breath’s turned to a shallow pant, the fight muscles in his jaw have begun to twitch.
Pap’s gonna kill him, I know it,
Daniel thinks. Miss Lila shoots a flat hand out in front of Pap’s chest, gives him that woman’s look that says “just you wait a minute,” and turns back toward the Sheriff.
    “Kyle, what’s this all about? Hidin’ behind Clive Cunningham who, everybody knows, swells up like a tick over anyone he hasn’t known all his life. Wasn’t it just last month he accused a Fuller Brush man of being a Communist spy? Don’t you have anything better to do than bother a boy about his curly hair, embarrass a little girl over the shape of her nose?”
    “Gee, Lila,”—the Sheriff grins his I-ain’t-done-nothing-wrong grin again—“you been gone so long you forgot the difference between colored and white? This ain’t no meltin’-pot state. We got laws about such nonsense. And I’m here to enforce ’em.”
    “You sonofabitch,” she says quietly. “This is another one of your preelection stunts, isn’t it? Last time, it was the Communist labor organizers, I heard. Sheriff DeLuth had to put his big ol’ white hat on and ride their Red asses outta town. And, now, it’s desegregation, isn’t it? Find some kids with curly hair and call out the Sheriff to save our lily white souls! You’re barkin’ up the wrong tree, Kyle. This dog won’t hunt.”
    “On the contrary.” The Sheriff laughs, then says sweet as chess pie, “I think this dog’s done treed himself a couple muleottos who best stay the hell outta the white folks’ school.”
    Pap’s had enough. To everyone’s surprise, except Daniel’s, he flies past Miss Lila and pins the Sheriff backward against his car. His fingers, clutching either side of the Sheriff’s starched shirt collar, jerk the thick neck, the heavy head, eye to eye. “Name’s Dare, ye blamed fool!” His face, which had earlier turned the color of a cock’s comb, was now way past red, the bridge of his beak-shaped nose streaked with white. “Son of Samuel Franklin Dare, tenth generation down from Ananais Dare, brother t’ Virginia Dare, first white