The Cottoncrest Curse: A Novel

Chapter 91

297 Chapter 91 “I don’t know where he is. When I woke up, he was gone. I assumed he was at the train station.” Bucky sat in the chair, his wrapped foot propped up on a big pillow. “He wasn’t at the train station. And he didn’t come back to check with us,” the man said. He hadn’t given Bucky his name. He had just said he was from the Vigilance Committee. “Tee Ray must be onto somethin’, like a thousand of brick. It’s just a matter of time. He’s gonna find that Jew if it’s the last thing he does. He and I are gonna go home to Parteblanc a-glory. Ol’ Cottoncrest ain’t never gonna be the same after he and I get back.”    The passengers in the Jim Crow car said nothing when Jenny and Jake came through the door. It was not that they lacked anything to talk about. Jenny’s cloak was missing, and the woman’s clothing that Jake had worn was now gone. Jake’s nose was a bloody mess, his face was beginning to swell, and dark circles were beginning to form under his eyes. But the passengers averted their eyes. The white lawman was no longer around. Whatever had happened, they had seen nothing and knew nothing. Ignorance was the safest path. Jake had used the blanket he had folded as a shawl, as well as the blouse and skirt that Jenny had lent him, to try to wipe up the excess blood off the metal platform. Their other clothes had been tossed into the marsh. They took their seats as the train continued northward toward the 298 first stop, Hammond, still more than a half-hour away. Jenny rested her head on Jake’s shoulder, just like the night before. She was so tired. Jake put his arm out and held Jenny. He remembered holding Rebecca that one night. At the Colonel Judge’s request. Help me have an heir, the Colonel Judge had pleaded. An heir to save Cottoncrest. By doing what the Colonel Judge had wanted, it had destroyed everything . The Colonel Judge hadn’t known who Rebecca really was. And even after he found out, he still loved her, although that love tore him apart. Now there were only the children left. Children that the Colonel Judge couldn’t bring himself to love and couldn’t bring himself to abandon . But in death he had abandoned them anyway. ...