A Time for Mercy

17

Tensions at the Coffee Shop were lessened considerably when the deputies found another breakfast spot. For years Marshall Prather, Mike Nesbit, and other assorted deputies would arrive early to eat biscuits and stir up the gossip, but not every morning. They had other favorite spots, and their shifts changed so their routines varied. Jake, though, had been there six mornings a week for years, and he had always enjoyed mixing it up with the deputies. But they were boycotting him now. When it became apparent that Jake had no plans to alter his ritual, they went elsewhere, which was fine with Jake. He did not enjoy the forced pleasantries, the strained looks, the feeling that things were not the same. They had lost a comrade, and Jake was now on the other side.

He tried to convince himself it went with the territory. He almost believed that one day not too far away the Gamble case would be behind them and he and Ozzie and his men would be pals again. But the rift bothered him greatly, and he could not shake it.

Dell kept him abreast of the latest rumblings. Without giving names, she would report that yesterday’s lunch crowd was all abuzz with the coming indictment and questions about when and where the trial might be. Or that after Jake left that morning a couple of farmers got pretty loud in their criticisms of Judge Noose and the system and Jake in particular. Or that three ladies she hadn’t seen in years sat by the window for an early lunch and talked quietly about Janet Kofer and her nervous breakdown. There was a palpable fear that Jake Brigance was about to pull another insanity stunt and “get the boy off.” And on it went. Dell heard everything, remembered everything, and relayed some of it to Jake when he stopped by late in the day and the café was empty. She was worried about him and his growing unpopularity.

The morning after the indictment, Jake arrived at six and joined the usual crowd of farmers, cops, some factory workers, mostly men who rose early and punched in. Jake was about the only white collar who was a regular and for this he was admired. He often dispensed free legal advice and commented on Supreme Court rulings and other oddities, and he laughed along with the crooked lawyer jokes.

Across the square at the Tea Shoppe, the white collars gathered later in the morning to discuss golf, national politics, and the stock market. At the Coffee Shop they talked about fishing, football, and local crime, what little there was of it.

After the “good mornings,” a friend said, “You seen this?” He held up a copy of The Ford County Times. It was published every Wednesday and had managed to catch the late-breaking story from Tuesday afternoon. A bold headline screamed: “GAMBLE INDICTED FOR CAPITAL MURDER.”

“Surprise, surprise,” Jake said. However, Lowell Dyer had called him last night to confirm the news.

Dell appeared with a coffeepot and filled his cup. “Good mornin’, sweetheart,” Jake said.

“Keep your hands to yourself,” she shot back, and scooted away. There were a dozen regulars in already, and by 6:15 the café would be packed.

Jake sipped his coffee, and reread the front-page story, and learned nothing new. The reporter, Dumas Lee, had called his office late yesterday afternoon fishing around for comments, but got none from Portia. Mr. Brigance, she explained, was in court.

“Your name is not mentioned,” Dell said. “Already checked.”

“Darn. I need the publicity.” Jake folded the newspaper and handed it back. Bill West, a foreman at the shoe factory, arrived and fell into his usual chair. They talked about the weather for five minutes as they waited on breakfast. It finally arrived and Jake asked Dell, “What took so long?”

“The chef’s lazy. You wanna discuss it with her?”

The chef was a large rowdy woman with a short temper and the habit of throwing spatulas. They kept her in the back for a reason.

As Jake was shaking Tabasco sauce on his grits, West said, “I almost got in a fight about you yesterday. Guy I work with said he’d heard that you were braggin’ about havin’ that boy out by his eighteenth birthday.”

“Did you punch him?”

“No. He’s quite a bit bigger.”

“He’s also quite stupid.”

“That’s exactly what I called him. I said that, first of all, Jake doesn’t go around poppin’ off like that, and, second, you wouldn’t try to game the system for a cop killer.”

“Thanks.”

“Would you?”

Jake spread strawberry jam on his wheat toast and took a bite. He chewed and said, “No. I wouldn’t. I’m still trying to get rid of the case.”

Bill said, “That’s what I keep hearin’ from you, Jake, but you’re still on the case, right?”

“Yes, afraid so.”

A crane operator named Vance walked by the table, stopped and stared at Jake. He pointed a finger and said loudly, “They’re gonna fry that boy’s ass, Jake, regardless of what you try to do.”

“Well good mornin’, Vance,” Jake said. Heads were turning in the direction of the noise. “How’s the family?”

Vance was a once-a-week guy and was fairly well known at the café. “Don’t get smart with me. You got no business in court with that boy.”

“That falls into the category of someone else’s business, Vance. You take care of yours. I’ll take care of mine.”

“A dead officer is everybody’s business, Jake. You pull a fast one and get him off on one of those ‘technicalities’ and there’ll be hell to pay around here.”

“Is that a threat?”

“No sir. It’s a promise.”

Dell walked in front of Vance and hissed, “Sit down or get out.”

He rumbled back to his table and for a few minutes the café was quieter. Bill West finally said, “I suppose you’re gettin’ a lot of that these days.”

Jake replied, “Oh yeah, but it’s just part of the job. Since when are lawyers admired by all?”

He loved the office at 7:00 a.m., before the day began and the phone started ringing, before Portia arrived at 8:00 with a list of things for him to do and questions to answer, before Lucien rolled in mid-morning and stomped upstairs with his cup of coffee to disrupt whatever Jake was doing.

He turned on the lights downstairs and checked each room, then went to the kitchen to brew the first pot. He went upstairs to his office and took off his jacket. In the middle of his desk was a two-page motion Portia had prepared the day before. It was a request by the defense to transfer Drew Gamble’s case to youth court, and when filed it would set off another round of nasty gossip.

The motion was a formality and Noose had already promised to deny it. But, as the defense lawyer of record, Jake had no choice. If the motion were granted, an impossibility, the murder charge would be tried before the youth court judge with no jury. When found guilty, Drew would be sent to a juvenile facility somewhere in the state and kept there until his eighteenth birthday, when the court surrendered jurisdiction. At that point, there was no procedural mechanism to allow the circuit court to assume jurisdiction. In other words, Drew would be allowed to go free. After less than two years behind bars. There was nothing fair about this law but Jake couldn’t change it. And it was precisely for this reason that Noose would keep the case.

Jake could not imagine the backlash if his client walked after serving such a short sentence, and frankly, he was not in favor of it. He knew, though, that Noose would protect him while at the same time protecting the integrity of the system.

Portia had attached a four-page brief that Jake read with admiration. As always, she was thorough and discussed a dozen prior cases involving minors, one reaching back to the 1950s. She argued persuasively that minors are not as mature as adults and do not possess the same decision-making skills, and so on. However, each case she cited had ended with the same result — the minor was kept in circuit court. Mississippi had a long history of putting minors on trial for serious crimes.

It was an admirable effort. Jake edited the motion and brief, and when Portia arrived they discussed the changes. At nine, he walked across the street and filed the paperwork. The assistant clerk accepted it without comment and Jake left without his customary flirting. Even the clerk’s office seemed a bit cooler these days.

Harry Rex could always find a reason to get out of town on business, away from the turmoil of his contentious divorce practice and away from his quarrelsome wife. He sneaked out the rear door of his office late in the afternoon and enjoyed the long, quiet drive to Jackson. He went to Hal & Mal’s, his favorite restaurant, took a table in a corner, ordered a beer, and began waiting. Ten minutes later he ordered another one.

During his law school days at Ole Miss, he had downed many beers with Doby Pittman, a wild man from the coast who had finished first in their class and chose the big-firm route in Jackson. He was now a partner in a fifty-lawyer group that did well representing insurance companies in major damage cases. Pittman was not involved with Smallwood but his firm was lead counsel. Another partner, Sean Gilder, had drawn the case.

A month earlier, over beers in the same restaurant, Pittman had whispered to his old drinking buddy that the railroad might approach Jake and discuss the possibility of a settlement. The case was frightening for both sides. Four people had been killed at a bad crossing poorly maintained by the railroad. There would be enormous sympathy for the Smallwoods. And Jake had impressed the defense with his aggressiveness and demands for a trial. He had shown no reluctance in ramming through discovery and running to Noose when he thought the defense was stalling. He and Harry Rex had hired two top railroad-crossing experts, plus an economist who would tell the jury that the four lost lives were worth millions. The railroad’s biggest fear, according to bar talk from Doby, was that Jake was hungry and craving another big courtroom win.

On the other hand, the defense was confident that it could whittle away at the sympathy and prove the obvious: that Taylor Smallwood had crashed into the fourteenth boxcar without touching his brakes.

Both sides could lose big, or win big. A settlement was the safest route for both.

Harry Rex damned sure wanted a settlement. Litigation was expensive, and he and Jake had borrowed, so far, $55,000 from Security Bank to finance the lawsuit. More expenses were likely. Neither lawyer on the plaintiff’s side had that kind of money lying around.

Of course, Pittman knew nothing about the loan. No one did, except for the banker and Carla Brigance. Harry Rex told his wife, his fourth one, nothing about his business.

Doby arrived thirty minutes late and didn’t apologize. Harry Rex wasn’t concerned with his tardiness. They drank a beer, ordered red beans and rice, and commented on the looks of some young ladies nearby. Then they got around to their jobs. Doby had never understood his friend’s desire to specialize in divorces in a podunk town like Clanton, and Harry Rex was repulsed by the grind and politics of a big firm in downtown Jackson. But both were fed up with the law and wanted out. Most of their lawyer friends felt the same way.

Their orders arrived and they were starving. After a few bites, Doby said, “Looks like your boy has got himself in a mess up there.”

Harry Rex knew it was coming and said, “He’ll be all right once he gets rid of the case.”

“That’s not what I hear.”

“Okay, Pitt, just go ahead and tell me what Walter Sullivan has relayed to you boys from the mean streets of Clanton. He probably calls down here every day with the latest courthouse gossip, half of which he makes up to begin with. He has never been a proven source for breaking news. I know far more and I’ll correct his mistakes.”

Doby laughed and shoveled in a chunk of andouille sausage. He wiped his mouth with a napkin and took a drink. “I don’t talk to him, you know? Not my case. So I don’t know much. What I hear comes from one of the paralegals working down the hall. Gilder keeps a lid on his files around the office.”

“Got it. So what’s the buzz?”

“That Brigance has got the town pretty upset because he’s going the insanity route. The boy’s already at Whitfield.”

“Not true. He’s at Whitfield, okay, but just for an initial evaluation. That’s all. Insanity might be an issue down the road, at trial, but Jake won’t be involved.”

“Well, he’s involved right now. Gilder and his gang are thinking that Jake might have trouble picking himself the right jury in the railroad case.”

“So the railroad’s backin’ off settlement?”

“Looks like it. And they’re in no hurry to go to trial. They’re going into a serious delay mode, hoping Brigance gets stuck with the kid. The murder trial could get ugly.”

“Delay? My gosh, I’ve never heard of such from a defense firm.”

“It’s one of our many specialties.”

“But here’s the problem, Pitt. Judge Noose controls his docket with an iron fist and right now he owes Jake a big one. If Jake wants a trial real soon, then it’s going to happen.”

Doby worked on his food for a moment, then washed it down. “Does Jake have a number?”

“Two million,” Harry Rex said with a mouthful and no hesitation.

Like a seasoned defense lawyer, Doby grimaced as if it were two billion. Both men ate in silence and thought about the numbers. The contract Harry Rex negotiated with the Smallwood relatives gave him one-third if the case was settled, and 40 percent if it went to trial. He and Jake had agreed to equally split the fee. Over beans and beers the math was easy. It would be the biggest settlement in the history of Ford County, and it was sorely needed by both lawyers for the plaintiffs. Harry Rex was not yet spending the money, but he was certainly dreaming of it. Everything Jake owned was mortgaged. Plus, there was the business of that bank loan for litigation expenses.

“How much insurance coverage?” Harry Rex asked with a smile.

Doby smiled back and said, “I can’t answer that. Plenty.”

“Figures. He’s gonna ask the jury for a lot more than two million.”

“But it’s Ford County, a place that’s never seen a million-dollar verdict.”

“There’s always the first time, Pitt. I’ll bet we can find twelve people who haven’t heard about the murder.”

Doby laughed and Harry Rex was forced to do the same. “Hell, Harry Rex, you can’t find two people who don’t know about it.”

“Maybe, but we’ll do our research. Noose’ll give us plenty of time to pick a jury.”

“I’m sure he will. Look, Harry Rex, I want you to get some big bucks, some of that dirty insurance money, okay? A nice settlement that’ll take the pressure off. But to do so, Brigance has got to get rid of that kid. Right now that case is a liability, at least in the minds of Sean Gilder and Walter Sullivan.”

“We’re working on it.”