Logan gaped at the two older men. “You’re both certifiably insane.”
“Not at all.”
“Tomorrow is the next-to-last meeting in-chambers before we go to trial!”
“We have to determine,” Randall went on, pressing down hard on each word, “exactly how much Marcus knows.”
The senior partner spoke, “We realize this is a lot to ask.”
“What’s this we business? Who’s side are you on?”
“We’re all on the same side.” The senior partner patted his head of burnished silver, adding contentedly, “Randall Walker is offering to grant us a significant portion of the New Horizons corporate account. An account you would personally manage.”
Logan settled back in his chair. “All right. I’m listening.”
Randall said, “New Horizons’ relationship with Factory 101 is a critical part of their overall import business. One we would prefer not to have exposed to the light of an American courtroom. So we need you to hold back and see if Marcus Glenwood has managed to come up with the impossible.”
Logan mulled that over, then demanded, “So just how much trade do they do with these Chinese guys?”
On the ride back after the pig picking, Deacon sat up front because Austin insisted. A glance in the rearview mirror was enough to reveal the reason why: Austin spent the journey locked upon the view out the side window, eyes blind and face weary in the way of one whose sleep was stolen. The mood in the car remained thoughtful and quiet until Marcus turned back onto the state road and reentered familiar territory. Then Deacon eased himself about, until he was leaning against the door and able to watch Marcus and Charlie both. “Did you ever know Marcus’ granddaddy, Mr. Charlie?”
“No, can’t say I ever had the favor.”
“Old Mr. Horace was a fine man. Real fine. Helped build our church, in a manner of speaking.”
Marcus quickly glanced over. “What?”
“Those fields out between the cemetery and the rise, they once belonged to Mr. Horace. They were deeded to him in a settlement. Back when I was just starting out my days at the pulpit, lightning struck the old church. Least, that’s what we figured it was. Big storm passed late one night. Next morning we didn’t have nothing but ashes. That church was built by freed slaves with the first money they earned. Lots of wailing by their grandchildren and great-grandchildren the day after that storm. Didn’t have nothing left but a bell and four cornerstones. Lost it all.”
“Hard blow,” Charlie offered.
“Marcus’ granddaddy came by that very same day, deeded the land over to us. Said he had no use for bottom land, he wasn’t no farmer and never would be. Shame to let good tobacco land go to waste.”
“I never knew any of this,” Marcus said.
“We farmed that land and sold the crop and built the new church. Yes, Mr. Horace was a fine man. And my, but he could talk.” The memory caused Deacon to smile. “Talk the hind leg off a dead mule. Talk all day and all night.”
Charlie asked, “Marcus, your granddaddy was a tobacco auctioneer, do I recall that straight?”
“Until his stroke.” But Marcus was caught by the memory of an old man who, once settled by his wife into the corner rocker, neither moved nor spoke. Marcus’ grandfather had watched his growing-up years and never uttered a sound. For a born talker, it must have been an assignment in hell itself.
The car was silenced and sobered by passing the red-brick sign announcing the entrance to the New Horizons complex. One corner remained broken and scarred where Marcus had clipped it. A team was busy erecting a burnished copper shield on top of the brick, one bearing the star-and-rainbow logo and embossed with the world-famous command to GET IN GEAR. They took the downward-sloping curve through the forest, reentered the light where the road flattened and revealed the church. Marcus studied the surrounding fields with new interest. “Hard to believe all this started with them wanting to move the cemetery.”
Deacon shifted impatiently. “Wasn’t the cemetery and it didn’t start there.”
Marcus started to say how he was speaking of his own involvement. But he sensed something more than just casual conversation in Deacon’s tone. “What do you mean?”
The old man was long in responding. They were approaching Marcus’ street before he finally said, “Some things are harder to talk about than others. Dark spots you wish never happened, shadows you can’t never wash off.”
“You don’t have to tell me anything you don’t want to.”
He might as well not have spoken. “Cropping the tobacco we raised on the land your granddaddy gave us, the collections we gathered, it was enough to put up the walls and get in the windows. But we were short almost two thousand dollars. Winter was coming, and the man wouldn’t roof the building till he got paid. Back then it was Baker Mills on the hill behind our place, not New Horizons.”
“Old man Baker was a piece of work,” Charlie offered.
“Evil man,” Deacon muttered, his voice as tight as his gaze. “Carried the dark ’round with him. Grass died where he stepped.”
“I had him appear in my courtroom a couple of times,” Charlie went on. “Felt like ordering the bailiff to wash the place down with lye after he left.”
Marcus pulled up in front of his house, cut the motor, turned so he could study Deacon, who went on, “Old man Baker came by my house. Said how he’d give us the two thousand, and five hundred more for two stained-glass windows. But he wanted use of the church all winter, every Friday and Saturday night. I asked him what for. He gave me a grin I will carry with me to the grave and said, ‘Far as you’re concerned, it’s just a few friends looking for a place to have a good time.’ ”
“They were gambling,” Charlie suggested.
“That and more,” Deacon replied darkly. “A whole mess more.”
Charlie struck his knee with the flat of one hand. “I heard tales of their wild ways. Probably got run off someplace by the law, were looking for somewhere that wouldn’t get raided.”
“They fouled our church for a whole winter. Shot out both the stained-glass windows soon as we got them in. We didn’t ever replace them neither, not till we had money of our own.” Deacon breathed heavy, shook his head. “Come May and planting season I went by old man Baker’s house. Took the elders with me, couldn’t make that journey on my own. Told him we were starting a weekend Bible school, and he was gonna have to find some other place to meet. Old man Baker said maybe we’d find use for two thousand dollars more. No sir, I told him, the time for sinning was done. He gave me that same old death’s-head grin of his, and said how it’d be a shame to have to burn the place down again.”
The look Deacon gave Marcus was full of hard-earned knowledge. “Only one way to handle men like that. Got to stand up, stand strong, fight the good fight.”
TWENTY
Wednesday morning Marcus sat in one corner of Federal District Judge Gladys Nicols’ outer office. He was relegated to a straight-backed chair because the defense team, seven in number, had arrived ahead of him. They clustered around the sofa and side chairs in the far corner and raked him with angry glances. The only greeting he received was from Jim Bell, the retired patrolman on receptionist duty, who approached them every half hour to apologize for the judge’s being so late. They had been kept waiting almost two hours, but Marcus was too preoccupied to give either the defense team or the time much notice.
He sat and turned the pages of his dispositive motions, and pondered the mysteries the morning had revealed. Some of his questions were even about the trial.