Sycamore Row - John Grisham

popped on a grill. A large man with an enormous belly held a spatula like a weapon
and talked to two men sitting on stools. There was little doubt as to who was Fat Benny.
A sign said, “Order Here.”
“What can I do for you?” the cook said with a friendly smile.
She gave him her best smile and said softly, “I’d like a hot dog, a Coke, and I’m
looking for Benny Rinds.”
“That’s me,” he said. “And you are?”
“My name is Portia Lang, from Clanton, but there’s a chance I might be a Rinds. I’m
not sure, but I’m looking for information.”
He nodded to a table. Ten minutes later he placed the hot dog and the Coke in front
of her, and sat across the table. “I’m working on the family tree,” she said, “and I’m
finding a lot of bad apples.”
Benny laughed and said, “You should’ve come here and asked me before you started.”
Without touching the hot dog, she told him about her mother, and her mother’s
mother. He had never heard of them. His people were from Noxubee and Lauderdale
Counties, more to the south than the north. He’d never known a Rinds from Ford
County, not a single one. As he talked, she ate rapidly, and she finished as soon as she
realized it was another dead end.
She thanked him and left. Driving home, she stopped at every small town and checked
the telephone directories. There were very few Rindses in this part of the world. Twenty
or so in Clay County. A dozen or so in Oktibbeha County, near the state university. She
had spoken by phone to a dozen in Lee County, in and around Tupelo.
She and Lucien had identified twenty-three members of the Rinds family who had
been living in Ford County in the years leading up to 1930, before they all vanished.
Eventually, they would find a descendant, an old relative who knew something and
might be willing to talk.