It had to be done, then. And he had to see it done. You never could tell which guard was a secret Knight sympathizer. If the man got loose, especially now with a war on… Pinkard supposed that was why Richmond had decided it didn't want to keep him around any more. If he ever escaped, the damnyankees could use him against the CSA. Or he could rally the black rebels, maybe even join them to white troublemakers. No wonder the Freedom Party didn't want to take the chance of letting him keep breathing, even in a place like Camp Dependable.
When Jeff walked out of the office compound and into the very different world of the camp itself, he wasn't surprised to have Mercer Scott come over to him within a couple of minutes. "What's up?" the guard chief asked.
He knew Pinkard had got a call from Richmond. He didn't even bother hiding that. But he didn't know, or didn't let on that he knew, what the call was about. Maybe he was sandbagging. Jeff didn't think so. He hoped not, anyway. He said, "Have Atkins and Moultrie and McDevitt bring Willy Knight here right away. Those three, nobody else. Anybody fucks this up, Mercer, it may cost me my ass, but I promise you you'll go down with me."
Again, Scott didn't bother pretending he didn't know what Jeff was talking about. He said, "You want to come along with me, see I don't talk to nobody else?"
"Yeah," Jeff said after a moment's thought. "I guess maybe I do. No offense, Mercer, but this here's important."
"Soon as you said it was about Willy, I reckoned it was," Mercer Scott answered. "His clock finally run out?"
Pinkard didn't answer that, not in so many words. "Let's just go get him, separate him off from the rest of the prisoners." He laughed. "One thing-he won't be hard to find." Except for the guards, Knight was still the only white man in the camp.
Braxton Atkins, Clem Moultrie, and Shank McDevitt were guards personally loyal to Pinkard. Mercer Scott had his own favorites, too. A guard chief would have been a damn fool not to. But Jeff was going to stand and fall with his people on this. Things still might go wrong, but they wouldn't go wrong because he hadn't done everything he could to make them go right.
All five white men carried submachine guns with big, heavy snail-drum magazines when they went after Willy Knight. If anybody tried to give them trouble, they could spray a lot of lead around before they went down. The Negroes in the camp had been taken in arms against the Confederate States. They knew what sort of weapons the guards had, and no doubt why. They also knew the men in uniform wouldn't hesitate to start shooting, not even a little bit. They gave them a wide berth.
Pinkard and his followers found Knight coming back from the latrine trenches. When the former Vice President realized they were heading his way, he straightened into a mocking parody of attention. "Well, gents, what can I do for you?"
"Got a message for you from Richmond," Pinkard answered stolidly. "It's waiting back at the compound."
"A message? What kind of message?" Hope warred with fear on Knight's scrawny, care-worn face. Did any part of him really imagine Jake Featherston would ever let him off the hook? Maybe so, or the hope wouldn't have been there.
"I don't know. A message. They wouldn't let me look at it." Pinkard lied without compunction. This had to go smoothly. The way to make sure that happened was to keep Knight soothed, keep him eager, till the very last instant.
And it worked. He believed because he wanted to believe, because he had to believe, because not believing meant giving up. "Well, lead me to it, by God," he said, more life in his voice than Jeff had heard there for years.
"No, Mr. Knight. You go first. You know the way," Pinkard said. That Mister sealed the deal. Knight hurried on ahead of the guards. Behind his back, Mercer Scott gave Jeff a look filled with reluctant respect. He brought his free hand up to touch the brim of his juice-squeezer hat, as if to say, You know what you're doing, all right.
Once Pinkard had Willy Knight away from the rest of the prisoners, he knew things would go the way he wanted them to. He nodded to his three loyalists. They all raised their weapons and shot Knight several times each. He died hopeful, and he died fast. There were worse ways to go out-plenty of them. The camp gave examples every day.
"Good job," Jeff told the guards. His ears still rang from the gunfire. "Take what's left here and get rid of it." They dragged Willy Knight's body away by the feet. That way, they didn't get their uniforms so dirty. The corpse left a trail of red behind it. Flies started settling on the blood and buzzed round the body.
"Well, there's one loose end taken care of," Scott said.
"I was thinking the same thing," Jeff answered. He was also thinking that another one had just shown up. Now the guard chief knew for sure who three of his chief backers were. He didn't see what he could have done about that, but he knew he would have to get some less obvious followers, too.
"Just complicated our lives, having him around," Mercer Scott added.
"You think I'm gonna tell you you're wrong, you're nuts," Jeff said. "Now I'm gonna go call the Attorney General back, tell him it's been taken care of." He didn't aim to wait for Ferdinand Koenig to telephone him again. He would have liked to call Koenig something worse than his formal title. He would have liked to, but he didn't, not where Scott could hear. The guard chief had his own channels back to Richmond. Giving him dirt to report was just plain stupid.
"I liked the way you handled that. Slick as hell," Scott said.
"Thanks," Pinkard said. Maybe good reports could go back to the capital, too. Maybe. He wouldn't have bet anything much above a dime on it.
He placed the call to Koenig's office. Hisses and pops and clicks on the telephone line said it was going through. Every once in a while, Jeff could hear operators talking to each other. They sounded like faraway ghosts. And then, also from some considerable distance but not quite from the Other Side, the Attorney General said, "Koenig here."
"Hello, sir. This is Pinkard. Wanted to let you know it's all done."
"Good. That's good," Koenig said. "You didn't waste any time, did you?"
"Didn't reckon I ought to," Jeff answered. "Never can tell what'll happen if you dick around on something like this."
"Well, you're right about that." The Attorney General paused. "You're sure about it?"
Jeff had expected that. He found himself nodding, even though Ferd Koenig was a thousand miles away. "Sir, I saw it with my own eyes. I made sure I did. Can't take chances on something so important."
"All right. I reckon you know why I have to make certain," Koenig said. Pinkard nodded again. That meant the Attorney General would also check with Mercer Scott, and maybe with some other people at Camp Dependable, too, people about whom neither Pinkard nor Scott knew anything. Jeff didn't know Koenig had people like that here, but he would have in the other man's shoes. The Attorney General went on, "I'll let the President know what a good job you did."
"I thank you kindly." Jeff meant that. "How do you want me to put it in the books, sir?, 'Shot while attempting to escape' or, 'natural causes'?"
", 'Natural causes,' " Koenig answered after a bare moment's hesitation. "His heart stopped, didn't it?"
"Sure as hell did."
"All right, then. Leave it at that. The less we stir up those waters, the better off everybody'll be," Ferdinand Koenig said.
Jeff found himself nodding one more time. "That's how it'll be, then." There were still more than a few people who liked Willy Knight. They mostly kept their mouths shut if they wanted to stay healthy, but they were out there. No point getting them all hot and bothered, not if you could help it. Natural causes could mean anything.