Madewell Brown. Rick Collignon

been moving along without his noticing. How else could he explain this girl wandering into his life from nowhere?

      “You think it’s an accident you here?” he asked her. “Well, it ain’t. So let me just tell you a thing or two. I played ball with a man named Madewell Brown my whole damn life and never did I see the likes of him. You put a ball in that man’s hand and he’d turn bats into kindling and buckle a man’s knees so bad he looked the fool.” Obie leaned closer, spit bunched at the corners of his mouth. “He once threw a ball so damn hard that it tore through the webbing of Syville’s glove and broke the home plate umpire’s arm at the wrist. I played ball with him my whole life. Yes sir, I surely did.”

      It was getting dark and swarms of mosquitoes were clouding the air. Rachael could feel them lighting on the backs of her arms and legs. She let her stick drop, leaned over and brushed her hands along her legs. The old man was still talking, but he was staring off at the river like he’d forgotten she was even there.

      I’m not ever going to come back here, she thought. Then she spoke the words out loud. As she walked away, the old man called out at her.

      “You full of that Madewell Brown, little girl,” he said. “You be back. I know you be back.”

      Two days later, Rachael went back to see Obie Poole. And this time, she went alone.

      He was sitting in the same exact place as before, fanning his face with a piece of cardboard, his legs stretched out and crossed. Rachael wondered if he was living every day out on this rickety old porch. She watched him lean to one side and spit. Then he settled back in his chair.

      “I knew you’d be back,” he said.

      Off to one side of the old man, the door to the house hung wide open. Inside, Rachael could see a square of daylight coming in through a small window in the far wall. It made it seem as though there wasn’t anything in there except shadows. Just then the old man shifted in his chair and drew his legs up. The scraping sound of his shoes startled her.

      Obie let out a laugh and shook his head. “Where’s that sassy little girl who was here before?” he said.

      For a moment, the two of them looked at each other. Rachael was wearing clothes that were too big for her. Baggy pants and a soiled shirt that fell far below her waist. Hand-me-downs, Obie thought. Hand-me-downs from that South Cairo Home. Her hair was undone now and she looked somehow smaller and older than she had a few days before.

      “Hey,” he said, “where’s that girlfriend of yours? And that boy. The fat boy.”

      Rachael shrugged her shoulders. “They’re back home,” she said. “They didn’t like it here.”

      “I bet they didn’t,” Obie said, nodding. He wiped his mouth clean with the back of his arm and laid his head back against the wall. “So what?” he said. “You just come out here to get a good look at me?”

      Rachael took a step forward. “My mama ain’t ever going to come back for me,” she said, the words rushing out of her mouth. “She’s no better than her own mama was.”

      Obie let out a grunt. “Well,” he said, “you ain’t alone in that,” and then he moved his eyes past her. Dark, heavy clouds were building up far west of the river. He thought that later it would rain and the two of them might still be out here tossing words at each other. When he looked back at her, he could see that she had edged a little closer.

      “I know what you come for,” he said. He let his hands rest still on his legs and waited for her to say it.

      Rachael was so close to the porch now that she could have reached out and touched it. The old man was gazing down at her, his jaw moving back and forth. His hands were laid out flat, the knuckle joints swollen and raw. She let her fingers rest on the edge of the porch deck and peered through the slats.

      “Tell me,” she said. “Tell me about my grandfather.”