Summary

Pages 201 - 253

This section opens with two pickup trucks quietly pulling up to Whistle Stop Café. Wordlessly, both trucks empty and KKK Klansmen surround the café holding signs warning, “Beware of the invisible empire. The torch and the rope are hungry” (Page 203). Sheriff Grady, who is a local Klansman and is at the café says, “Them’s not our boys.” One of the Klansmen stares straight at Ruth, who’s holding the baby, and doesn’t look away even when Grady comes outside to speak with them. A few minutes later, Grady returns and the Klansmen leave. The chapter ends by hinting that Frank Bennett, Ruth’s ex-husband, comes back that night, alone. The next chapter is a newspaper clipping from the Valdosta Gazette with a headline screaming that a local man, Frank Bennett, has gone missing.

Three days later (December 18, 1930), Grady and...