Rainey’s voice becomes impatient.
“That’s just dumb.
You’re overreacting as usual! You make it sound as if she wants to become a preacher. Listen, I have to go.
Calm down, and she’ll be all right.”
Never have I heard her so patronizing. Her smugness is making me sick to my stomach.
“This is in confidence,” I warn her, “but I’m going to tell you what I told Sarah. Before you write him in as saint of the year, you need to know that the great Shane Norman is a suspect in his daughter’s murder case.”
There is stunned silence on the other end. Finally, her voice shrill, Rainey says, “I simply can’t believe that!”
It is my turn to laugh. I say savagely, “Why the hell not? You can believe God took one of Adam’s ribs and made a woman out of it; you can believe that after six days of making a world God needed a rest, so he called the next day Sunday. The trouble with people like you is that you think it’s perfectly wonderful to pick and choose your beliefs. If it makes you feel good, you can swallow a whole book. In the real world insensitive slobs like me don’t have that luxury. While you’ve got your eyes squinched shut reciting some prayer to give you more faith to believe what Norman tells you to, dumb clods like me have to consider the very real possibility that he shot dead his son-in-law. Maybe, though, I ought to just take his word that he didn’t do it. If I just pray hard enough, any disturbing thoughts I have about the man will go away.”
Rainey asks so quietly I can barely hear her, “Do you really have some evidence he might have done it?”
I bluster, “You know I can’t go into that, but tell me what I should do, Rainey. If there is enough evidence that Shane Norman killed Art Wallace, should I just sit on it, and let your beliefs guide me in this case? If he says he is innocent, do you think that ought to be the end of it? After all, he’s telling you to swallow the Bible whole. Shouldn’t his word that he didn’t kill his son-in-law be enough?”
She says weakly, “I just can’t believe he is capable of murdering anyone. You don’t know him. I know what your point is, but until I see some evidence, I just can’t accept he might have killed Art.”
I laugh triumphantly.
“Evidence! What do you want evidence for? There’s a ton of evidence the world wasn’t created in seven days, and you couldn’t care less about that. If Leigh goes to prison for the rest of her life for a crime her father committed, I guess that’s okay, because facts only matter when you want them to.”
“You’re not being fair,” Rainey says, her voice almost fading out.
“It’s not the same thing.”
Who is fair? Is anything or anybody fair?
“No, I guess you’re right,” I say sarcastically.
“Unless you can look it up in the Book of Genesis that Shane Norman killed Art Wallace, it could never have happened.”
Rainey says, her voice tremulous, “I have to go.”
With this, she hangs up, leaving me feeling almost gleeful. It’s about time she and Sarah learned they can’t have it both ways. They’ve both been so obnoxious it’s made me want to puke. Even if Norman’s got an alibi, they’ll never feel the same way about him again. Even if the son of a bitch didn’t have the guts to do it, he had murder in his heart. That’s got to be a sin in his book.
Shades of Jimmy Carter. These people drive me up the wall. The phone rings, and I pick it up, knowing it is Rainey. She’s decided she wasn’t in such a hurry after all. She’s too smart to stay in la-la land indefinitely.
“Hi!” I say, more cheerful than I’ve been all day.
“Gideon,” Chet says, his voice scratchy but full of life, “we’ve finally got something on Wallace that might lead somewhere. I’m down at my office with my investigator. Can you come down? I’m finally feeling a little better.”
“Sure,” I say, looking at my watch. I’ve had the feeling Bracken has been avoiding me. It’s about time I heard from him.
“I’ll be right there.”
I scribble a note for Sarah. For once this week she will be waiting up for me. Woogie, sensing I’m going out, thinks he may be getting a walk and begins to bark and jump up against my legs.
“You’re not going,” I explain.
“No!”
Frightened by my tone, he slinks away into the hall.
Though I am glad that Chet seems to be finally doing something on this case, I am disappointed he isn’t calling me to tell me about Norman’s alibi. Woogie turns and gives me a look that leaves no doubt he is pissed off at me. Lately, somebody’s always mad about something in this house.
Downtown is not a fun place after dark, and tonight is no exception. What little life there is gives me the creeps. I am no stranger to criminals, but the older I get, the more I like to see them sitting politely by me in a courtroom filled with cops. The shadowy figures walking the streets tonight are possibly candidates for future clients because there is absolutely nothing going on here after 6 p.m. that will find its way into the hands of a tax collector. The dream to revitalize the downtown center dies harder than the Terminator. As I drive down between the Layman and Adcock buildings on my way to chet’s office, I view the remains of the latest mall. A Wal-Mart would have to open up down here before real shoppers would come back downtown, and that is about as likely as Paul Simon doing a concert in my living room.
Bracken owns his own small one-story building near the courthouse, but with its barred windows, it looks more like a reconverted bunker from World War II than a law office. Dressed in jeans that fit him only slightly better than the jeans he was wearing the night I ate dinner at his place, he lets me in the heavy metal door, saying “Glad I caught you at home.”
I have been to his office once before, on the Sarver case. The law books in his library, overflowing before, seem to have multiplied. In fact, there is little in his office except books. Lawyers as famous and rich as Bracken usually cover their walls with crap that lets clients know how great they are. His walls are bare. Who will get his books? He probably pays more in updates and supplements than I make in a year. Many criminal lawyers, myself included, hate research. Judging by his library. Bracken must love it. I go to the law library at gunpoint.
“No problem,” I say as another man walks into the room. As little direction as Bracken has provided I would have driven to Memphis for this conversation.
“This is Daffy McSpadden, my investigator on the case,” Chet says, introducing me to a short, dumpy guy in his thirties with slightly crossed eyes. He is wearing a gray suit and striped tie and, except for his eyes, looks normal enough, until I notice his feet. He is wearing sandals. Though I get only a glance, I swear his toes are webbed. Surely not.
“How are you?” I ask, unable to call him Daffy. His hand feels like the skin of a reptile. This is one guy who didn’t get his job on his looks.
Instead of speaking, he nods, which makes me fear that he can emit only quacking sounds. I look uneasily at Chet. Maybe he is beginning to suffer dementia.
Daffy seems like a character out of a Batman movie.
Chet commands, “Daffy, tell him what you’ve run across.”
Daffy nods eagerly as we seat ourselves at a small conference table in the library. Speaking in a rapid monotone, he says, “Among Mr. Wallace’s other business interests, all legitimate so far as I’ve been able to tell, is evidence of a deal for pornographic videos produced in the Netherlands which probably went sour with a buyer in New York. Wallace found a distributor in San Francisco who later accused him of cheating on the price. The distributor, who reportedly has connections with some pretty tough customers, was obviously leaning on Wallace to come up with two hundred thousand dollars in cash to make things right. Wallace was acting as broker on the money transaction but apparently not an honest one.”
Art, you old sleazoid, I think. Yet a little extra profit on that kind of deal would be easy enough to conceal.