Free A Matter of Souls by Denise Lewis Patrick Page B

Covington heard after that, before pain shut his eyes, was Sam’s booming command.
    â€œSay it to a nigger who’s standin’!”

    â€œYou’re a mighty lucky Colored man, Covie.”
    Covington’s eyelids were heavy, fighting his attempt to open them. He had to try several times, and finally he squinted into the brightness of midday.
    He realized, as he shifted his body and felt pain answer back, that he didn’t know just which midday it was. He had a dull ache on one side of his head, and there was some kind of binding around his ribs.
    Abe Worthy was sitting across from him.
    Was this a dream? Or a memory? Hadn’t he heard those words a long time ago?
    â€œI have to tell you, though … that wife of yours …”
    Covington tried to push up at the mention of Beesi, and all at once the screaming and crashing of that awful night washed over him, pressing him back down.
    â€œBeesi?” he croaked. Somehow, he couldn’t make his voice any louder.
    Abe Worthy leaned in and said in the same low tone, “She’s just fine. I’m supposed to watch you until she returns.”
    Covington thought he heard wrong. He raised his brows in question. Worthy was smiling, shaking his head and looking off as if there was another life going on in the air between himself and the window.
    â€œYour wife, Covington, saved your life. Oh, your friends came, and even a few of your sympathetic White customers were roused from their parlors. But they needn’t have worried. She got at least one good wallop in on young Dawson with that poker. She shed no blood and scared them witless—if that, indeed, is possible. But then, I understand, she had your friends bring you up here, and she herself went to fetch Doc Barton. Don’t try to move, now … I have strict orders from your nurse.”
    â€œHow long … have I …” Covington coughed, and his ribs hurt.
    â€œNo talking, Covington, nurse’s orders. Now, where was I? Ah, yes. I came into the story later that evening, when your wife bundled all your shoe lasts into a bedsheet and dragged them across town to my office, where she insisted that I lock them up in my safe. Then she informed me that I was to escort her, as soon as she ‘did her hair up respectable,’ to the sheriff’s office to file charges for, as she so eloquently put it, ‘outrageous damage to the business and body’ of her husband … you.”
    Covington was not exactly surprised; he was more proud, in a way he had never been before, of the choice he had made. Of the woman he had decided to build his life with. He carefully turned his head to Worthy, wanting to know more.
    â€œYes, well, after that pronouncement, Adebesi proceeded to describe all seven of the White men in question in such detail that the deputy had to look for extra paper to write it all down …”
    Covington forgot himself. “She told you her name?”
    Before Worthy could answer, there were brisk steps in the stairwell that carried across the floor of the sitting room. The bedroom door was abruptly thrown open, and there was Beesi.
    There was the sunlight smile that hurt Covington’s eyes and healed them.
    She took two steps in, and his heart began beating so fast Covington thought it might jump out of his chest.
    â€œThank you, Lawyer Worthy. Now Covie and me gonna be alone!”
    Worthy bowed as he obeyed Beesi, turning to wink at Covington.
    â€œI reckon I’ll see you some other time, Covington. Miss Adebesi, whenever I can be of service?”
    Beesi nodded curtly, and didn’t even see the lawyer out. She shut the door behind him and walked slowly to the bed.
    â€œHow you?” she asked. She touched his forehead. Covington shuddered.
    â€œCovie?”
    â€œFine. How are you?”
    â€œFair.”
    Covington grinned at her modesty. She lookedwonderful to him. He reached up and pinched the tip of her