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“In a rin “They always said tall, skinny boys like you and round I’ll tell you so”

He wiped the broom handle on his shirt and put the broom back inside

We walked a few minutes in silence Then Abraham stopped, his face suddenly serious

“I could talk baseball and swing at soft peaches all day,” he said “But you and I have some other business”

“Yes, we do,” I said

“This is serious business, Mr Corbett Sad business My people are worse off now than they were the day Mr Lincoln signed the Emancipation”

Chapter 34

“WE DON’T HAVE TO GO far to find a lynching tree,” Abrahaet fro in the heat of the day I reckon we’d best take the hosses”

The two “hosses” Abraham led out from a rickety blacksmith shop were mules—in fact, they were mules that had hauled one too many plon one too many cotton rows But those skinny ani us, less than twenty minutes later, at a secluded swa

Unmistakably

A cool grotto tucked back in the woods away fro The dirt was packed hard as a stone floor fro the terrible spectacle

Abraha “And there’s your main attraction”

Even without his guidance, I would have recognized it as a lynching tree There was a thick, strong branch barely a dozen feet froround The low dip in the middle of the branch was rubbed free of its bark by the friction of ropes

I walked under the tree The hard ground was stained with dark blotches My stoht of what had happened in this unholy place

“So,” Abraham said “That would be the Klan”