“Travis, look, I’m not keen on discussing this subject. I have some appointments. If you’d like to visit again, fine, just call ahead. And I welcome you back to our services this Sunday.” Keith wasn’t sure he meant that, but he sounded sincere.
From a pocket of his Windbreaker, Boyette removed a folded sheet of paper. “You ever hear of the case of Donté Drumm?” he asked as he handed the paper to Keith.
“No.”
“Black kid, small town in East Texas, convicted of murder in 1999. Said he killed a high school cheerleader, white girl, body’s never been found.”
Keith unfolded the sheet of paper. It was a copy of a brief article in the Topeka newspaper, dated Sunday, the day before. Keith read it quickly and looked at the mug shot of Donté Drumm. There was nothing remarkable about the story, just another routine execution in Texas involving another defendant claiming to be innocent. “The execution is set for this Thursday,” Keith said, looking up.
“I’ll tell you something, Pastor. They got the wrong guy. That kid had nothing to do with her murder.”
“And how do you know this?”
“There’s no evidence. Not one piece of evidence. The cops decided he did it, beat a confession out of him, and now they’re going to kill him. It’s wrong, Pastor. So wrong.”
“How do you know so much?”
Boyette leaned in closer, as if he might whisper something he’d never uttered before. Keith’s pulse was increasing by the second. No words came, though. Another long pause as the two men stared at each other.
“It says the body was never found,” Keith said. Make him talk.
“Right. They concocted this wild tale about the boy grabbing the girl, raping her, choking her, and then throwing her body off a bridge into the Red River. Total fabrication.”
“So you know where the body is?”
Boyette sat straight up and crossed his arms over his chest. He began to nod. The tic. Then another tic. They happened quicker when he was under pressure.
“Did you kill her, Travis?” Keith asked, stunned by his own question. Not five minutes earlier, he was making a mental list of all the church members he needed to visit in the hospitals. He was thinking of ways to ease Travis out of the building. Now they were dancing around a murder and a hidden body.
“I don’t know what to do,” Boyette said as another wave of pain hit hard. He bent over as if to throw up and then began pressing both palms against his head. “I’m dying, okay? I’ll be dead in a few months. Why should that kid have to die too? He didn’t do anything.” His eyes were wet, his face contorted.
Keith watched him as he trembled. He handed him a Kleenex and watched as Travis wiped his face. “The tumor is growing,” he said. “Each day it puts more pressure on the skull.”
“Do you have medications?”
“Some. They don’t work. I need to go.”
“I don’t think we’re finished.”
“Yes we are.”
“Where’s the body, Travis?”
“You don’t want to know.”
“Yes I do. Maybe we can stop the execution.”
Boyette laughed. “Oh, really? Fat chance in Texas.” He slowly stood and tapped his cane on the rug. “Thank you, Pastor.”
Keith did not stand. Instead, he watched Boyette shuffle quickly out of his office.
Dana was staring at the door, refusing a smile. She managed a weak “Good-bye” after he said “Thanks.” Then he was gone, back on the street without a coat and gloves, and she really didn’t care.
Her husband hadn’t moved. He was still slouched in his chair, dazed, staring blankly at a wall and holding the copy of the newspaper article. “You all right?” she asked. Keith handed her the article and she read it.
“I’m not connecting the dots here,” she said when she finished.
“Travis Boyette knows where the body is buried. He knows because he killed her.”
“Did he admit he killed her?”
“Almost. He says he has an inoperable brain tumor and will be dead in a few months. He says Donté Drumm had nothing to do with the murder. He strongly implied that he knows where the body is.”
Dana fell onto the sofa and sank amid the pillows and throws. “And you believe him?”
“He’s a career criminal, Dana, a con man. He’d rather lie than tell the truth. You can’t believe a word he says.”
“Do you believe him?”
“I think so.”
“How can you believe him? Why?”
“He’s suffering, Dana. And not just from the tumor. He knows something about the murder, and the body. He knows a lot, and he’s genuinely disturbed by the fact that an innocent man is facing an execution.”
For a man who spent much of his time listening to the delicate problems of others, and offering advice and counsel that they relied on, Keith had become a wise and astute observer. And he was seldom wrong. Dana was much quicker on the draw, much more likely to criticize and judge and be wrong about it. “So what are you thinking, Pastor?” she asked.
“Let’s take the next hour and do nothing but research. Let’s verify a few things: Is he really on parole? If so, who is his parole officer? Is he being treated at St. Francis? Does he have a brain tumor? If so, is it terminal?”
“It will be impossible to get his medical records without his consent.”
“Sure, but let’s see how much we can verify. Call Dr. Herzlich—was he in church yesterday?”
“Yes.”
“I thought so. Call him and fish around. He should be making rounds this morning at St. Francis. Call the parole board and see how far you can dig.”
“And what might you be doing while I’m burning up the phones?”
“I’ll go online, see what I can find about the murder, the trial, the defendant, everything that happened down there.”
They both stood, in a hurry now. Dana said, “And what if it’s all true, Keith? What if we convince ourselves that this creep is telling the truth?”
“Then we have to do something.”
“Such as?”
“I have no earthly idea.”
CHAPTER 2
Robbie Flak’s father purchased the old train station in downtown Slone in 1972, while Robbie was still in high school and just before the city was about to tear it down. Mr. Flak Sr. had made some money suing drilling companies and needed to spend a little of it. He and his partners renovated the station and reestablished themselves there, and for the next twenty years prospered nicely. They certainly weren’t rich, not by Texas standards anyway, but they were successful lawyers and the small firm was well regarded in town.
Then along came Robbie. He began working at the firm when he was a teenager, and it was soon evident to the other lawyers there that he was different. He showed little interest in profits but was consumed with social injustice. He urged his father to take on civil-rights cases, age- and sex-discrimination cases, unfair-housing cases, police-brutality cases, the type of work that can get one ostracized in a small southern town. Brilliant and brash, Robbie finished college up north, in three years, and sailed through law school at the University of Texas at Austin. He never interviewed for a job, never thought about working anywhere but the train station in downtown Slone. There were so many people there he wanted to sue, so many mistreated and downtrodden clients who needed him.
He and his father fought from day one. The other lawyers either retired or moved on. In 1990, at the age of thirty-five, Robbie sued the City of Tyler, Texas, for housing discrimination. The trial, in Tyler, lasted for a month, and at one point Robbie was forced to hire bodyguards when the death threats became too credible. When the jury returned a verdict for $90 million, Robbie Flak became a legend, a wealthy man, and an unrestrained radical lawyer now with the money to raise more hell than he could ever imagine. To get out of his way, his father retired to a golf course. Robbie’s first wife took a small cut and hurried back to St. Paul.