July Free Chapter - In The Kingdom of Men by Kim Barnes

7/31/2019 July Free Chapter - In The Kingdom of Men by Kim Barnes

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Copyright Kim Barnes 2012. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored

in a retrieval system, transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying,

recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher.
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HUTCHINSON

LONDON



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Published by Hutchinson 2012

2 4 6 8 10 9 7 5 3 1

Copyright Kim Barnes 2012Kim Barnes has asserted her right under the Copyright, Designs and

Patents Act 1988 to be identifed as the author o this work.

This is a work o fction. Names and characters are the product o the authors imagination

and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way o trade or

otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the

publishers prior consent in any orm o binding or cover other than

that in which it is published and without a similar condition,

including this condition, being imposed

on the subsequent purchaser.

First published in the United States in 2012 by Alred A. Knop, a division o Random House,

Inc., New York, and in Canada by Random House o Canada Limited, Toronto

First published in Great Britain in 2012 by

Hutchinson

Random House, 20 Vauxhall Bridge Road,

London SW1V 2SA

www.randomhouse.co.uk

Addresses or companies within The Random House Group Limited can be ound at: www.

randomhouse.co.uk/ofces.htm

The Random House Group Limited Reg. No. 954009

A CIP catalogue record or this book is available rom the British Library

ISBN9780091944216

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Our paper procurement policy can be ound at:

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Printed and bound by CPI Group (UK) Ltd, Croydon, CR0 4YY



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For my brave and beautiful mother,Claudette Barnes,

and with special thanks toColeen and Wayne Cook

because of you, this adventure



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We travel, some o us orever, to seek other states,other lives, other souls.

anas nin

Let me have all things, let me have nothing.wesley covenant prayer

This is one way to make a new world.wallace stegner



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January 1, 1970

Rome, Italy

Here is the frst thing you need to know about me: Im a bare-

oot girl rom red-dirt Oklahoma, and all the marble oors in theworld will never change that.

Here is the second thing: that young woman they pulled rom

the Arabian shore, her hair tangled with mangrovemy husband

didnt kill her, not the way they say he did.

There is so much, now, that you will want to know, that you

believe I will be able to tell you. I not, why even begin?

Because I cant stop thinking o her, not yet eighteen, per-ectly, immutably silent, just as they wanted her to be. It is the

dream o her ace shining up rom the sea like a watery moon that

still haunts me. Not even her mother will speak her name.

Because, among these Roman people whose language ows

like a river over rocks, my own name drops heavy as a stone, no

husband, no ather, no amily or tribe to tether me.

Because I dont know who I am anymore and have orgotten

who it was I meant to be.



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in the kingdom of men

Let me tell it rom the beginning, then, remember the truths

o my own story so that I might better bear witness to hers, trace

the threads to that place where our lives intertwinedone o us

birthed to iron-steeped clay, the other to allow sand, each o

us brought to this place by men born o oil.



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Chapter One

Inthebeginningthese three words my daily bread, recited at the

kitchen table in our shack in Shawnee, the Bible open in ront ome. Beore then, just as the Korean War was beginning, I remem-

ber my mother humming honky-tonk as she ried spuds or our

dinner, two-stepping to the table in an imaginary waltz. She was

the daughter o a Methodist circuit preacher who extolled separa-

tion rom the world, and his wie, who bowed her head in sub-

mission and held her tongue even as she secreted away the money

she made selling eggs, a penny at a time added to the sock hiddenbeneath the nest o her beloved Rhode Island Red, a hen so ferce

and prone to peck that my grandather gave it wide berth.

My mother loved to tell the story: how my grandmother

scraped and saved until she had enough or a train ticket back to

her amily in Pawhuska, then rose one morning, fxed her hus-

band a big pot o pork hocks and brown beansenough to last

him a weekmade bacon and extra biscuits so he wouldnt have

to go without breakast, ironed his handkerchies and starched his

shirts, then told him that one o the ladies o the church was



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having emale troubles and needed her care. My grandmother

walked out the door with a bundle o biscuits under one arm, her

inant daughter in the other, went straight to the train station,

didnt even leave a note. My grandather reused to divorce her,

would never orgive the way she had deceived him, but maybe he

should have knownthe way that women have always lied, risk-

ing their souls to save their sorry lives.

It was eighteen years later when my ather, two weeks hitch-

hiking Route 66 and still no job, came looking or work at the

Osage County Fair and frst laid eyes on my mothera rodeo

princess pitching cow chips or charity. He must have allen inlove with her right thenthe way she could clean up pretty as a

new nickel or muck down on her knees in manure, that sunshine

smile never breaking. She brought him home to meet her mother,

and I like to imagine that moment: the three o them at the table,

the late light warm through the window, and all o them laughing

at their good ortuneto have ound one another, to share the

sweet ruit o that pie.My parents were married that winter, and the next winter, I

was born. When my ather was drated, my mother and I moved

in with my grandmother to wait out the war. Two years later, the

ofcial rom the State Department arrived, telling how my ather

had died in the Home-by-Christmas Oensive, that the president

was sorry, as was the nation. My only memories o him reside in

the stories my mother told.And then, that summer I turned seven, the cancer came up

through my mothers bones like it had been biding its time, took

what smile was let, took her teeth and blanched her skin to parch-

ment. I would lie in our bed and cradle my dolly in a tea towel

while my mother wept and prayed that God would take her and

my grandmother oered another spoonul o laudanum. When,

fnally, God answered my mothers prayers, and then, only a ew

months later, my grandmother was elled by a blood clot that the



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10/38

7

doctor said had bubbled up rom her broken heart, I was ordered

into my grandathers custody.

He came to the city orphanage in his old Ford pickup, and I

watched rom the doorway as he approached, a lean man, sinewy

and straight, with a strong way o moving orward, like he was

orcing his way through water. Pinched elt hat, starched white

shirt, black tie and trousers only the seams o his brogans, caked

with mud, gave him away or the scabland armer he was when not

in the pulpit.

My nurse had dressed me in a modest blouse and jumper, but

I reused the hard shoes she oered and wore instead my moth-ers old riding boots, an extra sock stued in each toe. The frst

thing my grandather did was have me open my suitcase. My doll,

my mothers rhinestone tiara, her wedding ringall worldly, my

grandather said, the devils tricks and trinkets, and he let them

with the orphanage to pawn.

I wailed all the way to Shawnee, but my grandather didnt

speak a word. By the time we took the road south that led to theat edge o townthat marginal land where the poorest whites

and poorer blacks scraped out a livingI had cried mysel into a

snubbing stupor. He held my door, waited patiently as I climbed

down and stood acing the narrow two-room shack with its bro-

ken oundation and sagging roo, the outhouse in back a haphaz-

ard construction o split pine. I trailed him through the kitchen,

its walls papered with newsprint, pasted with our and water,stained dark with soot, and into the bedroom, where he placed my

suitcase on the horsehair mattress. He peered down at me, laid his

hand on top o my head. God will keep us, he said, pulled the

door shut, and let me alone.

From the rooms single window, I saw that he had changed

into his patched work clothes, and I watched as he hitched the

jenny mule, threw the reins over his shoulders, and returned to

the plot hed been plowing. What I ound in that house was lit-



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11/38


tle: tenpenny nails in the wall, hung with my grandathers good

hat and suit; a two-door cupboard that held Karo, our, sugar, a

salted ham hock; an oilcloth-covered table and two weak chairs;

a short-wicked kerosene lantern; a potbellied stove streaked with

creosote; the cot that my grandather had set in the kitchen and

covered with an old wool blanket so that I might have the bed.

I moved to the porch, ound the washbasin, the straight razor,

the leather strop, and a cropped piece o annel that he used or

a towel. I sat on the single-plank step and watched him chuck the

mule up one row and down another until he put the plow away,

came and stood in ront o me, wiping the sweat rom his brow.Wheres my dinner, sister? he asked gently. I hadnt thought

to eed him, didnt know how. He led me back to the cupboard,

showed me the cast-iron skillet, the knie, how to make red- eye

gravy with the ham drippings, our, and salt. Over the next week,

we would eat that ham right down to the bone, boil it or soup on

Saturday, crack it or marrow. I learned what it meant to be hun-

gry, learned that Sundays meant more ood and a healthy helpingo Gods word.

Because he now had a child to care or, my grandather let the

circuit, and he counted it as Gods goodwill that a small congre-

gation east o the city was in need o a pastor. The parishioners,

some white, most black, olded us in, and though I had no siblings,

they called me Sister Gin. I wasnt yet old enough to understand

what the townspeople might thinkthatpoorlittlewhitegirlandspent the Sabbath wedged in a hard oak pew between skin that ran

rom pale pink to sallow, dusky to dark. My grandathers dictates

were absolute, but in his eyes, all o Gods children, redandyel-

low, black and white, were bound by the same mortal sin, given the

same chance at redemption. I sat in ascinated horror, the sancti-

fed moaning around me, as I listened to my grandathers hellfre

sermons that oretold the woe o every unsaved soul. Blood to

the horses bridle, ames licking the eshthe punishment that



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12/38

9

would come my way i I didnt repent, but no matter how hard I

considered my deeds, I didnt yet know what sins to coness.

Ater the hymns had been sunghappyarethefaithfuldead!

the churchwomen prepared a ellowship meal at one shack or

another. Your color didnt matter when it came to who was served

and where, but whether you were male or emale did. The men

were ed where they sat, their wives fxing their plates beore their

own, wise to their husbands predilections: Brother Fink ate only

the chickens legs, thighs, and the tail he called the popes nose;

Brother Jackson required that his ood be layered a mound o

potatoes topped with meat and smothered with a generosity ogravy. The boys not old enough to be in the mens circle and the

girls too young or kitchen help were called in next, made to scrub

their aces, and put to the table. Only ater the men and the chil-

dren were served did the women eat: bread heels, chicken backs,

the wateriest remains o corn pudding. They ate with babies nurs-

ing at their breasts and whispered their hushed stories o hard

births and tumorous wombs, jumping up when called to bringanother biscuit or glass o sweet tea to the men, whose talk was o

dropping wheat prices, Nazi spies, and the local criminal element

that ran bootleg out o the bottoms and carried razor-sharp knives.

I sat quiet in whatever corner I could fnd, acting like I wasnt lis-

tening, but what I heard told me all that I needed to know: that

the world was allen, that my only hope lay in the grace and glory

o God, that Satan was waiting or me to alter at every turn, thathe might appear to me as the Angel o Light, deceive me with his

wicked tongue, and lead me to hell as his bride.

How many times did I rouse rom some nightmare, call out

or my mother to save me? I might have let the trappings o my

old lie behind, but my grie had packed up and moved right along

with me, shaped and weighted as though it had a lie o its own.

I woke one night so sure that the devil had ound me that I ran

to the cot in the kitchen, told my grandather that I could eel



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13/38


that grie lying right there beside me like a panting black dog. He

lit a candle, took a vial o oil rom the corner o the cupboard,

made the sign o the cross on my orehead, and pressed his palms

to my ears. Demon, by the authority given to me by the Lord

Jesus Christ, I command that you leave this child! He gripped my

head tighter, shook it like a gourd. In the name o the Father, the

Son, and the Holy Ghost, come out o her, I command you! He

drew his hands away so quickly that the suction nearly deaened

me. When I opened my eyes, I saw the tears pooling in the dark

shallows o his ace, his mouth arched as though that demon had

leaped right out o me and into him. I went back to my bed, nowcold, and wished I had never let it, had kept my hurt to mysel.

Silence was a lesson I learned wellhow to mute my body, my

voice, my heart.

That all, my frst day o school, my grandather rode me to

town on the mule because the pickup had broken down and no

amount o prayer would fx it. As we approached the playground,

I saw all the white children pointing and laughing until the prettyyoung teacher came out to scold them. I I hadnt understood

it beore, I knew it then: we were dierent, Iwas dierent, not

only a member o the Holy Roller church but an orphan rom the

south edge o town who lived where most whites wouldnt. I slid

rom the mules broad back, kept my head down, and ollowed the

teacher into the room, where she showed me my desk and placed

a picture book in my hands. You can read or a while, she saidkindly, and let me to lose mysel in the pages even as the other

students fled in and began reciting their numbers. From that point

on, books became my solace, my escape. I brought them home

rom the library, hid them rom the eyes o my grandather, who

believed that only the word o God had a place in his house, that

stories outside o the scripture might lead me astray.

I completed elementary, kept growing, went with the

junior high nurse to buy what my grandather called my

unmentionablessot-cupped brassieres, panties, sanitary belts



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14/38

11

and napkinsthen stood in my bedroom, conounded by the

hooks and straps, ashamed that my grandather would no lon-

ger meet my eyes when I came in rom the outhouse. From him,

I learned that I was the daughter o Eve, a danger to mysel, a

temptation to those around me. Couldnt wear pants, only skirts

that covered my knees. Couldnt wear makeup or jewelry to draw

the attention o men. Couldnt cut my hair, which was my veil

o modesty. Couldnt preach because Paul said so. Suer not

a woman. When revival came and the Spirit descended, the sis-

ters who were slain ell at on their backs, arms raised to heaven,

ecstatic in their possession, and I was the one whose charge it wasto hasten orward and cover their legs with the lap cloths that

they themselves had sewn so that their modesty might be main-

tained. What would it eel like, I wondered, to give mysel over so

completely, to all under such a spell? But not even the ear that

I would spend my eternal lie in hell brought the call that would

lead me to kneel at the altar, lay mysel at the eet o the Lord,

and the church people noticed. I learned to pretend the convic-tion I did not eel, to pray with my mouth open, my eyes closed,

my hands raised to heaven. I was savedcouldnt they see? Born

again. It was a lie I didnt realize I was living, a way to survive the

surly dictates o that thing called aith.

Who knows what gives rise to our sensibilities? Maybe it

was some seed o resistance sown in me by my grandmother that

allowed me to keep my soul to mysel. Maybe it was just the wayI wasturnedfunny, I heard them say. They didnt even bother to

hide their mouths. No matter the color o my skin, I was the kind

o girl they watched rom the corners o their eyes, the kind o

girl that brought them to predictionsheaded to ruin i I didnt

get my head straight, my heart right with God. I wasnt like them,

wasnt like anybody I knew.

It was the characters in books who spoke to me, reected

some secret part o mysel. When the librarian handed me ToKilla

Mockingbird, I read it straight through, then hid it beneath my bed.



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15/38


I lost it, I told the librarian. Ill work check-in and checkout

during recess to pay. She was satisfed, and so was I. It was a sin

that I was jealous o and wanted to keepthe worst sin o all.

Walking home rom school one aternoon, the September air

thick with gray aphids, AnneofGreenGables open in my hands, I

ound a girl asleep on her sack, cotton tuting her hair. Fall har-

vest meant more hours in the feld or the black children o South

Town, the seasons sun beating down, the long, long sack trailing

behind like an earthbound anchor. Maybe that was when I began

to understand that, no matter how dierent I was, my lie would

never be as hard as hers. I sat at the edge o the patch and watchedher or a long time, then tore away one page o the book and then

another, planting them in the soil beneath her bare eet as though

they might sprout like Jacks magic beanstalk and carry her alot,

as though I were eeding the girl her dreams.

When the librarian discovered the ruined book, she said that

two was too many and sent me home with a bill. That was the

frst time I lied outright to my grandather. Ignoring any lessons Imight have learned about alse accusation, I described in detail how

Tug Larson, the schoolyard bully, had knocked the novel rom my

hands. He grabbed me, I said, and pushed me down. I cried

and showed my grandather the bruises I had pinched on my arms

to convince him how wounded I was. He grew solemn, said he

would talk with the boy, but I insisted it would only make things

worse, that he was already being given detention, and shouldnt Iorgive? My grandather was placated, and I elt a surge o relie

and tingling possibility. I had transgressed, might coness and be

orgiven, but I had discovered something that intrigued me even

more: I could lie and not be struck dead in my shoes.

I remembered my grandmothers ways, used the last o our

our and lard to bake hal a batch o sugar cookies, told my grand-

ather I was taking them to Sister Woody, an elderly parishioner

who lived down the road, and he nodded his approval at my char-

ity. I elt like skipping as I made my way out the door. I had no



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16/38

13

destination, only a desire to be ree. I walked an easy two miles,

ate hal the cookies, ed the rest to the crows, turned around, and

came home happy with the news that Sister Woodys health was

improving.

I became braver, told bigger lies, and walked the armland

or hours or hid with my book in the neighbors barn. In gym

class, I let my body have its joy, leaping and sprinting ahead o my

classmates. When my teacher suggested I try out or girls basket-

ball, I orged a careul note home that said I was helping clean the

blackboards ater school. I made the team and or the frst time elt

part o something, like I might be someones riend, running upand down the hal-court and hollering back and orth like it was

a normal thing or a girl to do. I skipped the communal show-

ers, unable to imagine letting mysel be seen naked, let my knee-

length trunks and sleeveless top in my locker, and ran as ast as I

could, hoping to beat my grandather home. He would sit down

to the dinner I made him and never say a word about my wild hair,

my ruddy skin, and I believed I had ooled him until the eveninghe rode into town on the mule and appeared at practice still in his

arm clothes, pulled out the worn Bible, and flled the gymnasium

with his voice. The woman shall not wear that which pertaineth

unto a man, neither shall a man put on a womans garment: or

all that do so are an abomination unto the Lord thy God! He

clapped the good book closed, pointed me to the door, and I slunk

out, shamed not by my sin but by the looks o pity on the aces omy teammates. Once home, he sent me to my room and sat at the

oot o my bed, studying me with intense sadness, as though he

might see the workings o my deceitul soul. I cant let you burn

in hell, he said, and raised the leather strop. The ferceness o his

whipping came up through my bones, rattled like dry seeds in my

ears. Ater, he held me and cried. Maybe thats why I can orgive

him. He only meant to save me.

Why couldnt I just obey? Drinking, smoking, dancing, bowl-

ing, playing cards, going to movies, wading with the Butler boys



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17/38


down at the creekall sins. To question my grandathers rules

and the law o his God was mutiny, any plans to rebel an act o

treason. Yet even with the punishment I knew was coming, Id

slide open the sash Id waxed with parafn, drop to the ground,

and walk to Chesters Drug, where I would sit at the end o the

counter and watch the boys peacock, the girls preen while the

jukebox played Elvis, Roy Orbison, the Miracles.

The only one who paid me any mind those times was Juney

Clooney, a white girl too pretty or her own good, the church

ladies said, but I envied her grace, the way she tipped back her

soda, ponytail hanging down like a plumb bob. She would pourme a glass o her Nehi, something in her smile almost sad. Maybe

I was the only one who wasnt surprised when her place at the

counter came up empty, one o the ew who knew the truth o

what had happened between her and Baby Buckle.

Buckle was a childlike man, rolled esh at his neck, rounded

shoulders and sot hips, waist cinched by a wide leather belt and a

brass buckle the size o a saucer. He worked right there at Ches-ters Drug as a delivery boy. Chester and his wie always said that

Buckle showed up one Christmas Eve, abandoned as a baby on

their doorstep, cold as slab marble, but rumor held he was Ches-

ters son by Hazel Twig, a young mixed-race woman rom our

side o town who cleaned the store once a week until she up and

disappeared. Because that is what happened when girls got them-

selves in trouble. They were sent to the home or unwed mothersor simply sent away, anything to erase the amilys shame, absolve

the athers guilt.

It was Juneys twin brother, Jules, who came stumbling into

the store one day, his shotgun loaded, hollering that hed gone

home or lunch and ound Juney crying. She told him that Buckle

had come to make a delivery, caught her alone rying gizzards, and

dragged her into the pantry. I sat stone still as the other boys piled

into their pickups. They ound him beneath that big walnut tree at

Bowmans Corner, asleep with his pants at his ankles. They didnt



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18/38

15

stop to ask, just noosed him up with his own belt, buckle split-

ting his mouth like a bit. It wasnt but a ew days later that I came

in on Juneys mother, conessing to my grandather that it wasnt

Buckle who had raped her daughter but Juneys own daddy, who

told her to blame Buckle or hed kill her and her mother too. All

that Buckle did was pick the wrong tree to do his business behind.

But what good would it have done or me to tell, and who would

believe me? I had read the stories o courage and conviction, but

sometimes the truth seemed worse than the lie. I sat quiet at the

counter, kept my secrets to mysel.

What I remember o high school: not the ootball games anddances I wasnt allowed to attend, not overnights with the girl-

riends I didnt have, but the romances and mysteries that kept me

company. My grandather demanded rom me humility, modesty,

and temperance, but when I read LittleWomen,GonewiththeWind,

MurderontheOrientExpress, I entered into the realm o everything

knowable, anything possible, i only I were smart enough, pretty

enough, and brave.In my imagination, I had traveled to that place o dark-haired

princes and veiled sultanas, knew the thousand and one tales that

kept Scheherazade alive, dreamed that I might do the same, weave

a web o stories so enthralling that the man I loved would be

spared the agony o having to kill me, but i someone had told

me that I would soon be living in Arabia, I would have laughed.

And no matter the number o romances I read, I never dreamedthat someone like Mason McPhee would kiss memy long skirt,

those awul shoes, straw rom the henhouse tasseling my socks.

But Mason. Highest-scoring point guard, on ull-ride scholar-

ship to Oklahoma State, once and ormer prom king, the pride

o Shawnee! Homecoming, the frst parade o my lie, Mason an

honored guest riding high in a convertible Chevrolet, everyone

calling his name. Only our hometown astronaut, Gordo Cooper,

had a bigger crowd, and hed orbited the Earth in a spaceship.

I wore my best wool skirt, rolled it up just a little. I my grand-



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19/38


ather had seen me that way, hed have whipped me into next Sun-

day. I thought I might look like Rita Hayworth, auburn hair to

my waist, loose and undone, and maybe I did. Maybe thats what

Mason saw. Virginia! He cupped his hands like a megaphone.

Ginny Mae Mitchell! I was struck dumb, as though he were the

frst ever to call my name.

Heres the truth o it: watching him smile and wave rom that

car, I made the decision right then. When he asked me out or a

Coke, I thought, This is it, my one chance with a man like Mason

McPhee. I waited until my grandather was asleep and slid open

my window, not a creak or scratch to betray me.That Coke was the sweetest thing. I couldnt believe I was

there at the soda ountain with Mason, the other boys slapping

his shoulder. The girls looked at me like theyd never seen me

beore. Maybe because I didnt know what to say, Mason talked

and talked. About basketball, all the hours he had practiced in

back o his house, a bicycle rim bolted to a pine. How his share-

cropper ather would come in o the tractor, challenge him to agame o Horse, and they would play past dark, nine games, ten,

until Masons mother called that she was eeding their dinner to

the hogs. Mason always knew he would go to college and was

studying prelaw, meant to be the fnest public deender to come

out o Pottawatomie County, maybe even a judge. He was sure

that he could make a dierence. He railed against the war in Viet-

nam and segregation, told me about the marches and protests heattended. This world right here isnt real, he said, and tapped

the ca table. You, he said, resting his hand over mine, you

can never be what you ought to be until I am what I ought to be.

Weve got to think bigger, do bigger things, like the Reverend

King says.

I didnt know the words o amous men, only the verses o the

Bible I had been raised on, but I believed everything that Mason

told me, as though they were truths I had elt but never knew how



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July Free Chapter - In The Kingdom of Men by Kim Barnes

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