The Third Life of Grange Copeland Read Online Free PDF Page A

yellowish-gray. His pale blue eyes struggled to convey kindness and largesse. Brownfield slid down from the truck knowing his face was the mask his father’s had been. Because this frightened him and because he did not know why he should have inherited this fear, he studiedly brushed imaginary dust from the shoulders of a worn black suit Shipley had given him.
    He had been shocked to see Shipley at the funeral, but soon guessed he had come hoping to catch Grange. Shipley did not take kindly to people running off owing him money, no matter that they had paid off whatever debts they might have owed many times over. Nobody had whispered a word against him while he stood looking down on the bloatedly sleeping mother and child. To most of the people at the funeral Shipley’s presence was a status symbol and an insult, though they were not used to thinking in those terms and would not have expressed such a mixed feeling. Shipley squeezed out a tear for the benefit of the other mourners, and Brownfield had chuckled bitterly to himself. The tear wasn’t necessary: pity was scarce at his mother’s funeral; most of the people there thought she had got what she deserved. Shipley’s crocodile tear was the only one shed.
    Brownfield himself had sat, limp and clammy, wishing he were a million miles away. His mother as she was in the last years got none of his love, none of his sympathy and hardly any of his thoughts. The idea that he might continue to live in her house aroused nothing but revulsion. He knew too that the minute he accepted money from Shipley he was done for. If he borrowed from Shipley, Shipley would make sure he never finished paying it back.
    “Don’t know but what we might can build you a new house,” said Shipley, thinking that with Brownfield’s muscles he could do a grown man’s work. Shipley believed with a mixture of awe and contempt that blacks developed earlier than whites, especially in the biceps. He thought too that as long as he had Brownfield there was a chance of getting Grange. Believing that Brownfield was choked up from grief and from his generous offer Shipley continued speaking to him on an encouraging plane.
    “After all, if you marry one of these little fillies on my place she’s going to want to smell some new wood. Why, I can’t stop by a house on the place without the womenfolks waylayin’ me; talking about me fixing up the house they already got or wanting me to build ’em a new one.”
    He fished about for sympathy, while Brownfield stood looking at the ground.
    “But the main thing is”—Shipley smiled kindly—“we want you to stay here with us. And we don’t hold it against you what your daddy done. We’ll just wipe that off the books.” He continued to smile but eyed Brownfield shrewdly from under his brows. “Of course, I believe you said you didn’t know which way he was headed?”
    “No, sir,” said Brownfield, from a great hollow distance.
    “Well,” said Shipley sadly, as if a great wrong were being done him but one which he would not allow to dissuade him from future acts of kindness, “you think about all we discussed. And take the day off and get yourself straightened out. I tell you this much, I think we going to work out fine; and I know my boys will be glad to have somebody they already know to work with them when they take over Shipley’s Farm and Bait.” He leaned out of the truck, the hand dangling from the end of his coat sleeve like a papery autumn leaf. “You and me will start out fresh,” he said, “and remember, the North ain’t all people say it is. Just remember that.”
    When Brownfield looked up, Shipley and his truck were gone. He was left in the familiar clearing. Scornfully, shaking the ice from his gut, he spat on Shipley’s ground. His mind raced headlong into the realm of his dream. The fear of Shipley that had tied his tongue disappeared as the urge to sample his new freedom grew. He would be his own boss. From the forlorn and