Wild Midnight by Maggie; Davis

it.” He started for the door. “I’ve got to go to the bank. I’ve got other things to worry about besides tenant farmer trash. And”—he threw Rachel a violent look—”goddamned Quakers.”  
    The door slammed thunderously behind him.  
    In the ensuing silence the lawyer sat back down again and regarded Rachel with his eyebrows lifted quizzically. Finally he said, “My apologies. He seems to feel rather strongly about this.”  
    “He wouldn’t even listen.” She was still trying to cope with Beau Tillson’s noisy exit. “He didn’t even sit down. He is a violent man,” Rachel said, almost vengefully glad to make a judgment. “He wouldn’t even listen to our offer.”  
    The lawyer sighed. “I think from now on it would be better if you let me handle Beau, see what I can do.” When Rachel looked up he continued, “I don’t know what got him started, but Beau’s got a full head of steam up. And he has got a point about not wanting to give away public access to the land he owns along the river. But he’ll simmer down.”  
    Rachel doubted it. As far as she was concerned Beaumont Tillson was dangerous. And violent. And nothing that had happened in this office had reassured her.  
    “We don’t have much time,” she reminded the lawyer. “We really must use the road, especially to bring the tractor in again to cultivate the tomato plants in a few weeks, when the weeds begin to appear.” She frowned. “It seems we’re a long way from even negotiating. And we are right, under the law. I have taken time to look it up, and there is no record that the road has been closed off for forty-eight hours every year to keep it private property.”  
    The lawyer looked at her oddly. “Mrs. Brinton, I hope you don’t mind my saying you are a very persistent young woman. It certainly rubs Beau Tillson the wrong way. We may go about things a little differently here in the South than, say, in Philadelphia. After you’ve been here awhile you’ll understand that at times we beat about the bush, let the dust settle, smooth things out, and talk a lot before we get back to the point.” He smiled. “Sometimes we don’t even get to the point, or so it seems to outsiders. We place a great deal of importance on letting things work themselves out. As for the matter at hand—I’m beginning to believe we might be running Beau Tillson to the wall a bit by insisting that he’s got to give in to what you people think you’ve a right to. Do you follow me?”  
    “I don’t see how,” Rachel replied.  
    He only smiled. “Until we get Beau out of that corner, he’s going to be harder to deal with than a sore-eyed bear. And just repeating that he doesn’t seem to know the law isn’t going to help matters either. I want your promise,” the lawyer said, getting up, “that you’ll let me handle this.”  
    Rachel stepped out into the lawyer’s parking lot to a warm gust of wind and a sudden, hard spring rain. She couldn’t help a little moan of dismay. She had dressed carefully for this meeting in her good tailored suit of fine moss-green wool and her one and only best pair of handmade calfskin pumps and matching handbag, but she had no umbrella. It seemed appropriate that the disastrous morning should end with this, a good soaking of her best clothes. She wore her hair tightly coiled on top of her head in its rather prim, braided coronet. At least the wet, she tried to console herself, couldn’t reduce her hair now to a banshee’s bush of wild red curls, as it usually did. It was already frizzing where it escaped in tendrils around her cheeks and the back of her neck.  
    With a sigh for the expensive leather purse she held over her head as a shield, Rachel started across the parking lot at a quick pace. She was so absorbed in hurrying, her head down, that she didn’t see the figure of a man until he stepped out from behind a battered jeep. She suppressed a yelp of sheer fright just in time.