Circle of Fire (Mysteries through History) Read online

  “Mendy?” Mama called.

  “Here I am,” Mendy said, joining her parents and Li’l Ben on the porch. All she could think of was her and Daddy’s trip.

  “I don’t want you sneaking off this morning.”

  “I won’t go off nowhere, Mama,” Mendy said.

  Mama eyed her. “What you up to, Mendy? You ain’t gonna whoop and holler about staying home?”

  “No, ma’am,” Mendy said, catching the wink from her daddy.

  “Well, that’s a relief,” Mama sighed, her shoulders relaxing. “Just for that, I’ll give you a treat. I’ll let you go across the creek to play with the Hatfield girl real soon.”

  Mendy smiled back, but she was thinking to herself, What kind of doings is that? She didn’t like playing with Brenda Hatfield. All the girl knew how to play was some silly tea party. Was the whole summer going to be like this?

  Mendy’s daddy was going off now to do blacksmithing. He owned a plumbing business, but he still blacksmithed for folks all across Tennessee. He shod horses and mules, built and repaired traps, and fixed wagons. That’s why he was gone from home so much.

  “Be careful,” her mama said, waving to Daddy and throwing him a kiss as he pulled away in his 1954 Chevy truck. That truck was Daddy’s pride and joy. He had saved up his money to buy it, and he had painted the words Blacksmithing and Plumbing on the side. He had learned plumbing while he was in the army in World War II, before Mendy was even born. Mama often said he learned something else in the Army, too—something that could get him hurt in Tennessee. Mendy didn’t know exactly what that was, but she often wondered if learning something new could ever really hurt you.

  The minute the truck was out of sight, Mendy went inside with Mama and Li’l Ben. She ate a buttered biscuit. Then she gathered the eggs from the henhouse, swept up the front room, and polished the furniture to a shine. After all her chores were done, Mendy waited for just the right moment—when Mama was ironing and Li’l Ben was asking her a million questions. “Mama,” she said, “can I go out for a little while? I won’t go far, I promise.”

  “Yes, but don’t be doing nothing you ain’t got no business doing, you hear?” Mama said.

  Then and only then did Mendy slip away to meet Jeffrey.

  CHAPTER 2

  PEAS IN A POD

  Jeffrey and Mendy had grown up together, and until recently they were like two peas in a pod, as Grandma would say. Jeffrey lived on the next farm over. For years, Jeffrey and Mendy had fished together, hunted together, and roamed the surrounding forest together, hiding out in caves, burying secret treasures, and trying to tame wild animals.

  But since Christmas, everything had changed. Their parents had forbidden them to spend time together anymore. They’d said it was because Jeffrey was white and Mendy was colored. Well, Mendy thought, Jeffrey didn’t just turn white, did he? Mendy’s brothers and sisters could still play with their friends, so Mendy and Jeffrey didn’t plan on giving up their friendship either.

  She and Jeffrey had arranged to meet secretly today at the spring in the Thompsons’ woods—which was a good thing since Mama had told Mendy not to leave home this morning. Today was a very special meeting. Last Saturday Jeffrey had gone to the theater to see a new Zorro movie. Mendy had seen the first Zorro movie with her daddy, and she couldn’t wait to hear about this one.

  Of course, she’d have to deal with Jeffrey acting crazy, but that was okay as long as it didn’t last too long. Jeffrey thought he was Zorro—the real Zorro—even though they didn’t look the least bit alike. Jeffrey had blond hair, sky-blue eyes, and pale white skin, but Zorro looked like a colored man to Mendy.

  Mendy was also anxious to tell Jeffrey all about the cigar and lighter she’d found in the clearing. Maybe Jeffrey knew who had been coming to the clearing, she thought to herself. He’d better not have brought anyone there without her, though, that’s for sure.

  Mendy heard Jeffrey approaching through the brush before she spotted him. She whistled one of their new blue-jay signals to let him know exactly where she was waiting.

  Jeffrey zoomed up on his bike so fast the tires spun in the dirt, stirring up dust all around him. After ramming the bike smack into a tree, he jumped off and immediately began to swish his imaginary sword.

  “Take that and that, you villain,” he shouted, one arm thrust into the air, the other hand on his hip. He pranced around until he tripped and crashed over a ground vine.

  Mendy burst into laughter. “You’re such a knucklehead,” she said, pointing at him and giggling. “Your mask slipped around. You’re going to kill your fool self.”

  Jeffrey fumbled with the black cloth that covered his eyes. The two slits he’d made to see through were now in the back. “Oh, shut up, before I slash the Z sign of Zorro across your chest.”

  “I’d like to see you try,” Mendy said, balling up her fists and taking a fighting stance like her daddy had shown her.

  “Put your dukes down,” Jeffrey said, “or I won’t tell you about the movie.”

  That did it. Mendy lowered her fists, and they both sat down at the spring and dangled their feet in the cool mineral waters. Mendy listened intently as Jeffrey told her about a duel between Zorro and mean Capitan Monastario on the balcony of an inn, attempting to sound like each character in turn as he described the scene. He told Mendy every detail of The Sign of Zorro. When he’d finished, he said, “I’m getting me a black cape just like Zorro’s to go with my mask. And I’m going to ask your daddy to make me a real sword. My pa says your daddy’s the best blacksmith in these mountains.”

  Mendy was about to say she would get a mask, cape, and sword, too, when she heard a throat being cleared behind her. Mendy twisted around and looked up into Mama’s glaring face.

  “I’m going to whip you, Mendy Anna Thompson,” Mama said. “It ain’t safe for you two to be out here alone—together. Mendy, I’m going to tell your daddy about this as soon as he gets home. And your parents, Jeffrey,” she said, “are gonna get you too, boy.”

  “I’m sorry, Mrs. Thompson,” Jeffrey said, scrambling to his feet. “Please don’t tell my parents. Please. I’ll never even speak to her again if you just won’t tell.”

  Mendy couldn’t believe it. The traitor! They’d vowed the next time their parents said something, they would stick together and just tell them no—that they’d always be friends—forever. After all, they were blood sister and brother. Hadn’t they pricked their fingers in the woods, mixed their blood, and recited the oath of loyalty? Mendy felt sick inside.

  “Mama,” she pleaded. “Why? Why aren’t we safe? We ain’t bothering nobody. We ain’t doing nothing but sitting here on our own land.”

  “You’re old enough to be figuring it out, Mendy. Now let’s get going,” her mama said. Then she turned to Jeffrey. “You know better, boy. Now go on home. I won’t tell your folks this time. But don’t let me catch you two again.”

  “Bye, Mend,” Jeffrey whispered. He never called her Mendy.

  “Don’t ‘Mend’ me,” she shouted. “I don’t ever want to see you again, Jeffrey Whitehall. You ain’t nothing but a traitor.”

  Jeffrey hung his head. “I’m sorry, Mend, but my pa—if he finds out, I’ll be in big trouble. That’s what he said. Please. Don’t be mad at me.”

  “You just go on home now,” Mama said to Jeffrey. “I’m glad you’re finally understanding.”

  Mendy stormed away. She didn’t understand anything. How dare Jeffrey promise not to talk to her again? She’d dig up their treasures at the Taj Mahal cave and throw them in the stream. She wouldn’t even tell him about the cigar. Boys were nothing but lily-livered cowards.

  Mendy had to spend the rest of the morning practicing the piano until she thought her fingers would break. After lunch Mendy asked, “Mama, can I go to Aunt Sis Swain’s, since I don’t have anyone to play with anymore?”

  Sis Swain was the oldest woman around. Mama said that Aunt Sis had been born a slave. Nobody knew how old she was,
but Grandma said she was as old as dirt. She wasn’t Mendy’s real aunt and she wasn’t anybody’s real sister; people just called her either Sis Swain or Aunt Sis Swain. Sometimes, when Aunt Sis’s mind was right, she would answer Mendy’s questions as though Mendy wasn’t a child but a grownup. Mendy liked those times best.

  “I don’t want you hanging ’round Sis Swain all the time, Mendy,” Mama replied. “She’s getting touched with old age. Besides, she needs her rest.”

  “I promised Aunt Sis I’d come and help her pick blackberries, though, Mama.” At least that part was true.

  “Well, all right. But I’m warning you, Mendy, you better not be up to anything,” Mama said, raising her eyebrows. “Go on, then. While you’re at it, you might as well pick enough for us so I can make a pie.”

  Mendy said, “Thanks, Mama. Are you still going to tell Daddy about me and Jeffrey just sitting at the spring talking?”

  “Mendy, you are old enough to know that it’s not okay for—”

  “For what?” Mendy asked, sitting up straighter. Maybe her mama was about to explain. It seemed like everyone knew but her.

  “Never mind. You just stay away from Jeffrey. That boy is trouble with a capital T.”

  Mendy said okay, but deep in her heart it hurt that she and Jeffrey were no longer blood sister and brother.

  Mendy ran almost all the way to Aunt Sis’s house. She wanted to see Aunt Sis, but Mendy had another reason for going, too. Aunt Sis lived next to Jeb Connor’s forest. When Mendy visited the Taj Mahal, she always went to Aunt Sis’s first, so in case she got caught she’d have an alibi.

  Mendy picked a few wildflowers as she walked through the woods toward Aunt Sis’s house. The house was made of logs with cement between them, and it had a tin roof. Mendy jumped up on the porch in one leap, ignoring the four stone steps.

  “Mendy, come on in here, child,” Aunt Sis said, opening the door.

  Mendy stepped inside. The house had just two rooms. The kitchen and sitting room were all one room, and then there was another small room with a cot. Aunt Sis still had an outhouse instead of an indoor bathroom. Lots of people in the hollow and up on the mountain didn’t have running water or inside toilets yet. Aunt Sis lived what people called the “mountain way.” She didn’t like automobiles or telephones. She did have a small black-and-white television that one of her rich relatives up north had sent to her. But she couldn’t turn it on, since she had no electricity.

  “Here’s some flowers I picked for you, Aunt Sis,” Mendy said, smiling.

  “Child, you’s a sight for sore eyes,” Aunt Sis said, even though she’d just seen Mendy yesterday. “You the spitting image of your Great-Uncle Joe, girl. You got them long, tall mountain ways.”

  Mendy always felt proud when Aunt Sis compared her to Great-Uncle Joe. Great-Uncle Joe was a legend. Why, people said he could shoot a bird in a tree from a mountain away, and he could shoot coins right out of the air. They said he was the best trapper and hunter these mountains had ever seen. Mendy was sure he had loved the woods just as much as she did.

  Aunt Sis’s voice broke Mendy’s thought. “You stop that, now, Caleb,” she was saying, gazing toward the wood-stove with a faraway look in her eye. Mendy knew what the look meant—Aunt Sis had gotten lost in the past again.

  “Aunt Sis,” Mendy said gently to call her back.

  But Aunt Sis only frowned, still staring in the direction of the stove. “What you doing, Caleb?” she said. “Why you standing there like an old owl? You better quit speaking that African. You know Massa don’t ’low it.”

  “Who?” Mendy said, looking around the room, almost laughing that she’d said who just like an owl. But there was no one else, and Aunt Sis was staring at the air on the other side of the room.

  “Caleb, quit juking with that stove. Have you got ary sense at all? I can’t hardly abide peoples stoking no fire whilst I’m cooking.”

  “Aunt Sis, the woodstove ain’t on and ain’t nobody here but us,” Mendy said patiently, walking over and lifting the lid of the black iron woodstove. “See?”

  “Ahhh, yes,” Aunt Sis said, like she’d just sipped a cool drink of water. “Mendy. Mendy, it’s you, ain’t it?”

  “Yes, ma’am. It’s me. I came over to help you pick your blackberries today, remember?” Mendy smiled at Aunt Sis. She couldn’t understand why grownups made such a big deal of it when Aunt Sis got confused. If you just reminded her gentle-like, eventually she caught on that it was you.

  Mendy got Aunt Sis’s sunbonnet off the kitchen hook and helped her tie it on her head. She handed Aunt Sis a basket, took one herself, and then guided Aunt Sis out into the back field, where the blackberries grew so thick they looked like a black and green rug on a floor. Aunt Sis didn’t really pick anymore, but she still insisted on being in the patch. After Mendy had filled both baskets and turned her fingertips purple, she helped Aunt Sis back to the porch.

  Mendy settled Aunt Sis in a rocking chair on the porch and went inside. She dipped a cool drink of well water from the metal bucket in the kitchen and brought it out to her. “Here, Aunt Sis. You drink the water and sit a while. I’ll be back in a little bit and take you inside.” Mendy gave Aunt Sis’s wrinkled hand a little squeeze and headed off to the Taj Mahal.

  At the edge of Mr. Connor’s woods, Mendy paused. Was it possible that the trespasser was Jeb Connor himself? Well, even if it were, so what? He wouldn’t really kill no person like they say, Mendy told herself. Leastways not a little girl.

  Besides, she could outrun old man Connor any day. And she’d promised to pay Mr. Hare a visit.

  CHAPTER 3

  TRESPASSERS

  When Mendy arrived at the clearing, she stood very still and listened before stepping out into the open. She didn’t hear anything, but she could see that someone had been there again. The remains of a fire made a black circle in the middle of the clearing. Beer bottles and crushed cigarette butts and cigars lay all around.

  Mendy’s heart raced. “Come on, baby,” she said, picking up Mr. Hare, who was nibbling his favorite purple flowers. Now she knew there was more than one person trespassing in the Taj Mahal. She checked the branches of trees and bushes close by, looking for signs that this had been some kind of hunting party. This time of year, hunters could be after squirrels, groundhogs, coyotes, beavers, deer, or even black bears. But Mendy found no hunting traps or dog leavings, not even a dog track.

  Mendy felt heartbroken as she looked around the littered clearing. She stroked Mr. Hare as she thought. How dare people mess up the Taj Mahal like this? Whoever they were, they had no respect for the woods. Everyone knew you shouldn’t carelessly set a fire in the middle of thick forest in the summer. Maybe teenagers had done this. Mendy had heard that sometimes they sneaked off doing things they had no business doing. Yes. That must be it.

  Mendy squatted at the edge of the clearing. What could she do to stop them? She couldn’t tell Mama or Daddy, because then they’d know she’d been in Jeb Connor’s woods. It was up to her to handle the problem. Well, she would fix those kids if they came back.

  Mendy put Mr. Hare on the ground and began to search for the trespassers’ path. Like any good woodsman, she could read the telltale signs of broken twigs, torn leaves, footprints, and disturbed ground covering. By the footprints she found, Mendy judged there were four or five trespassers, all older boys or men.

  Mendy’s daddy had taught her a lot about tracking in the woods. And Grandma had told her about the honey traps her ancestor Great-Uncle Joe used to set. Mendy smiled grimly and set to work.

  She marched off to the cave where she and Jeffrey hid their treasures and left supplies for their adventures in the woods—canned food, utensils, army blankets, tools, old clothes, and the long, sharp bowie knife that Daddy had given her as a gift. Mendy put on overalls and tied string around the pants legs. Then she cut off a piece of mosquito netting and stuck it in her pocket along with a pair of thick work gloves. Last, she picked up a large empty buck
et.

  Mendy returned to the clearing. She quickly carved a makeshift shovel from a fallen tree branch with her bowie knife and dug a deep hole near the trespassers’ path. Then she set back out—but not before she ordered Mr. Hare back into the clearing. She never wanted him following her too far into the woods.

  The great thing about having your own forest is that you know where everything is, and in this case Mendy knew the exact hollow tree where the honeybees lived. Now the trick was removing the beehive and placing it in the bucket. Her grandma had taught her about the “bee calm” bushes that grew on the north side of the woods. Mendy gathered leaves from the bushes and dropped them into a rusty tin can along with dry pine straw. Then she hurried back to the beehive and lit the contents of the tin can with a match. Standing upwind, Mendy fanned the smoke until it swirled around the tree and calmed the bees.

  Mendy pulled the netting from her pocket and draped it over her head, tying a string around her neck to keep the netting in place. Then she slipped on her gloves. Mendy waited until all the buzzing stopped. Carefully she pulled out the honeycomb, making sure the queen was attached. A few bees buzzed softly near her head, but Mendy didn’t move or swat at them. She knew they were not in the mood to attack.

  Once the honeycomb was in the bucket, Mendy covered the top with mosquito netting, carried the bucket quickly to the hole she had dug, and set the honeycomb inside.

  Her trap was nearly finished. The only thing left was to find some bait to lure the trespassers to it. The bait had to be something valuable—something boys or men would notice right away. What?

  Mendy glanced at her bowie knife. Leaving it would mean she might never get it back. The knife meant a lot to her, but it was the only thing she could think of to use. Any boy worth his salt would recognize the hilt of a bowie knife. And he’d stop and pick it up, too.

  Mendy found a thick piece of wood and plunged the knife into it as hard as she could. Then she tried to pull the knife out, but it stuck fast. Perfect. She set the wood and the knife into the hole alongside the honeycomb, arranging the mosquito netting around it. Then she covered the hole with grass and leaves until only the hilt of the knife was sticking out. Now her trap was ready. She hoped that whoever came along would get curious about the knife, pull it out, and release the whole swarm of bees.