A Time to Kill (13 page)

The women prepared lunch. The men ate quietly, then returned to the whiskey under the shade tree. The nigger’s hearing at 2:00 P.M. was mentioned, and they loaded up and drove to Clanton.

________

There was a Clanton before the killings, and there was a Clanton after the killings, and it would be months before the two resembled each other. One tragic, bloody event, the duration of which was less than fifteen seconds, transformed the quiet Southern town of eight thousand into a mecca for journalists, reporters, camera crews, photographers, some from neighboring towns, others from the national news organizations. Cameramen and TV reporters bumped into one another on the sidewalks around the square as they asked the man in the street for the hundredth time how he or she felt about the Hailey event and how he or she would vote if he or she was on the jury. There was no clear verdict from the man on the street. Television vans followed small, marked, imported television cars around the square and down the streets chasing leads, stories, and interviews. Ozzie was a favorite at first. He was interviewed a half dozen times the day after the shooting, then found other business and delegated the interviewing to Moss Junior, who enjoyed bantering with the press. He could answer twenty questions and not divulge one new detail. He also lied a lot, and the ignorant foreigners could not tell his lies from his truth.

“Sir, is there any evidence of additional gunmen?”

“Yes.”

“Really! Who?”

“We have evidence that the shootin’s were authorized and financed by an offshoot of the Black Panthers,” Moss Junior replied with a straight face.

Half the reporters would either stutter or stare blankly while the other half repeated what he said and scribbled furiously.

Bullard refused to leave his office or take calls. He called Jake again and begged him to waive the preliminary. Jake refused. Reporters waited in the lobby of Bullard’s office on the first floor of the courthouse, but he was safe with his vodka behind the locked door.

There was a request to film the funeral. The Cobb boys said yes, for a fee, but Mrs. Willard vetoed the proposal. The reporters waited outside the funeral home and filmed what they could. Then they followed the procession to the grave sites, and filmed the burials, and followed the mourners to Mrs. Cobb’s, where Freddie, the oldest, cursed them and made them leave.

The Coffee Shop on Wednesday was silent. The regulars, including Jake, eyed the strangers who had invaded their sanctuary. Most of them had beards, spoke with unusual accents, and did not order grits.

“Aren’t you Mr. Hailey’s attorney?” shouted one from across the room.

Jake worked on his toast and said nothing.

“Aren’t you? Sir?”

“What if I am?” shot Jake.

“Will he plead guilty?”

“I’m eating breakfast.”

“Will he?”

“No comment.”

“Why no comment?”

“No comment.”

“But why?”

“I don’t comment during breakfast. No comment.”

“May I talk to you later?”

“Yeah, make an appointment. I talk at sixty bucks an hour.”

The regulars hooted, but the strangers were undaunted.

Jake consented to an interview, without charge, with a Memphis paper Wednesday, then barricaded himself in the war room and prepared for the preliminary hearing. At noon he visited his famous client at the jail. Carl Lee was rested and relaxed. From his cell he could see the coming and going of the reporters in the parking lot.

“How’s jail?” Jake asked.

“Not that bad. Food’s good. I eat with Ozzie in his office.”

“You what!”

“Yep. Play cards too.”

“You’re kidding, Carl Lee.”

“Nope. Watch TV too. Saw you on the news last night. You looked real good. I’m gonna make you famous, Jake, ain’t I?”

Jake said nothing.

“When do I get on TV? I mean, I did the killin’ and you and Ozzie gettin’ famous for it.” The client was grinning—the lawyer was not.

“Today, in about an hour.”

“Yeah, I heard we’s goin’ to court. What for?”

“Preliminary hearing. It’s no big deal, at least it’s not supposed to be. This one will be different because of the cameras.”

“What do I say?”

“Nothing! You don’t say a word to anyone. Not to the judge, the prosecutor, the reporters, anyone. We just listen. We listen to the prosecutor and see what kind of case he’s got. They’re supposed to have an eyewitness, and he might testify. Ozzie will testify and tell the judge about the gun, the fingerprints, and Looney—”

“How’s Looney?”

“Don’t know. Worse than they thought.”

“Man, I feel bad ’bout shootin’ Looney. I didn’t even see the man.”

“Well, they’re going to charge you with aggravated assault for shooting Looney. Anyway, the preliminary is just a formality. Its purpose is to allow the judge to determine if there’s enough evidence to bind you over to the grand jury. Bullard always does that, so it’s just a formality.”

“Then why do it?”

“We could waive it,” replied Jake, thinking of all the cameras he would miss. “But I don’t like to. It’s a good chance to see what kind of case the State has.”

“Well, Jake, I’d say they gotta pretty good case, wouldn’t you?”

“I would think so. But let’s just listen. That’s the strategy of a preliminary hearing. Okay?”

“Sounds good to me. You talked to Gwen or Lester today?”

“No, I called them Monday night.”

“They were here yesterday in Ozzie’s office. Said they’d be in court today.”

“I think everyone will be in court today.”

Jake left. In the parking lot he brushed by some of the reporters who were awaiting Carl Lee’s departure from jail. He had no comments for them and no comments for the reporters waiting outside his office. He was too busy at the moment for questions, but he was very aware of the cameras. At one-thirty he went to the courthouse and hid in the law library on the third floor.

________

Ozzie and Moss Junior and the deputies watched the parking lot and quietly cursed the mob of reporters
and cameramen. It was one forty-five, time to transport the prisoner to court.

“Kinda reminds me of a buncha vultures waitin’ for a dead dog beside the highway,” Moss Junior observed as he gazed through the blinds.

“Rudest buncha folks I ever saw,” added Prather. “Won’t take no for an answer. They expect the whole town to cater to them.”

“And that’s only half of them—other half’s waitin’ at the courthouse.”

Ozzie hadn’t said much. One newspaper had criticized him for the shooting, implying the security around the courthouse was intentionally relaxed. He was tired of the press. Twice Wednesday he had ordered reporters out of the jail.

“I got an idea,” he said.

“What?” asked Moss Junior.

“Is Curtis Todd still in jail?”

“Yep. Gets out next week.”

“He sorta favors Carl Lee, don’t he?”

“Whatta you mean?”

“Well, I mean, he’s ’bout as black as Carl Lee, roughly the same height and weight, ain’t he?”

“Yeah, well, so what?” asked Prather.

Moss Junior grinned and looked at Ozzie, whose eyes never left the window. “Ozzie, you wouldn’t.”

“What?” asked Prather.

“Let’s go. Get Carl Lee and Curtis Todd,” Ozzie ordered. “Drive my car around back. Bring Todd here for some instructions.”

Ten minutes later the front door of the jail opened and a squad of deputies escorted the prisoner down the sidewalk. Two deputies walked in front, two behind, and one on each side of the man with the thick sunglasses and handcuffs, which were not fastened. As
they approached the reporters, the cameras clicked and rolled. The questions flew:

“Sir, will you plead guilty?”

“Sir, will you plead not guilty?”

“Sir, how will you plead?”

“Mr. Hailey, will you plead insanity?”

The prisoner smiled and continued the slow walk to the waiting patrol cars. The deputies smiled grimly and ignored the mob. The photographers scrambled about trying to get the perfect shot of the most famous vigilante in the country.

Suddenly, with the nation watching, with deputies all around him, with dozens of reporters recording his every move, the prisoner broke and ran. He jolted, jumped, twisted, and squirmed, running wildly across the parking lot, over a ditch, across the highway, into some trees and out of sight. The reporters shouted and broke ranks and several even chased him for a moment. Curiously, the deputies ran back to the jail and slammed the door, leaving the vultures roaming in circles of disarray. In the woods, the prisoner removed the handcuffs and walked home. Curtis Todd had just been paroled one week early.

Ozzie, Moss Junior, and Carl Lee quickly left through the rear of the jail and drove down a back street to the courthouse, where more deputies waited to escort him into the courthouse.

________

“How many niggers out there?” Bullard screamed at Mr. Pate.

“A ton.”

“Wonderful! A ton of niggers. I guess there’s a ton of rednecks too?”

“Quite a few.”

“Is the courtroom full?”

“Packed.”

“My God—it’s only a preliminary!” Bullard screamed. He finished a half pint of vodka as Mr. Pate handed him another one.

“Take it easy, Judge.”

“Brigance. It’s all his fault. He could waive this if he wanted to. I asked him to. Asked him twice. He knows I’ll send it to the grand jury. He knows that. All lawyers know that. But now I gotta make all the niggers mad because I won’t turn him loose, and I’ll make all the rednecks mad because I won’t execute him today in the courtroom. I’ll get Brigance for this. He’s playing for the cameras. I have to get reelected, but he doesn’t, does he?”

“No, Judge.”

“How many officers out there?”

“Plenty. Sheriff’s called in the reserves. You’re safe.”

“How about the press?”

“They’re lined up on the front rows.”

“No cameras!”

“No cameras.”

“Is Hailey here?”

“Yes, sir. He’s in the courtroom with Brigance. Everbody’s ready, just waitin’ on you.”

His Honor filled a Styrofoam cup with straight vodka. “Okay, let’s go.”

Just like in the old days before the sixties, the court room was neatly segregated with the blacks and whites separated by the center aisle. The officers stood solemnly in the aisle and around the walls of the courtroom. Of particular concern was an assemblage of slightly intoxicated whites sitting together in two rows near the front. A couple were recognized as
brothers or cousins of the late Billy Ray Cobb. They were watched closely. The two front rows, the one on the right in front of the blacks and the one on the left in front of the whites, were occupied by two dozen journalists of various sorts. Some took notes while some sketched the defendant, his lawyer, and now finally, the judge.

“They gonna make this nigger a hero,” mumbled one of the rednecks, loud enough for the reporters.

When Bullard assumed the bench, the deputies locked the rear door.

“Call your first witness,” he ordered in the direction of Rocky Childers.

“The State calls Sheriff Ozzie Walls.”

The sheriff was sworn and took the stand. He relaxed and began a long narrative describing the scene of the shooting, the bodies, the wounds, the gun, the fingerprints on the gun and the fingerprints of the defendant. Childers produced an affidavit signed by Officer Looney and witnessed by the sheriff and Moss Junior. It identified the gunman as Carl Lee. Ozzie verified Looney’s signature and read the affidavit into the record.

“Sheriff, do you know of any other eyewitness?” asked Childers with no enthusiasm.

“Yes, Murphy, the janitor.”

“What’s his first name?”

“Nobody knows. He’s just Murphy.”

“Okay. Have you talked to him?”

“No, but my investigator did.”

“Who is your investigator?”

“Officer Rady.”

Rady was sworn and seated in the witness chair. Mr. Pate fetched the judge another cup of ice water
from chambers. Jake took pages of notes. He would call no witnesses, and he chose not to cross-examine the sheriff. Occasionally, the State’s witnesses would get their lies confused in a preliminary, and Jake would ask a few questions on cross-examination to nail down, for the record, the discrepancies. Later at trial when the lying started again, Jake would produce the testimony from the preliminary to further confuse the liars. But not today.

“Sir, have you had an occasion to talk with Murphy?” Childers asked.

“Murphy who?”

“I don’t know—just Murphy, the janitor.”

“Oh him. Yes, sir.”

“Good. What did he say?”

“About what?”

Childers hung his head. Rady was new, and had not testified much. Ozzie thought this would be good practice.

“About the shooting! Tell us what he told you about the shooting.”

Jake stood. “Your Honor. I object. I know hearsay is admissible in a preliminary, but this Murphy fella is available. He works here in the courthouse. Why not let him testify?”

“Because he stutters,” replied Bullard.

“What!”

“He stutters. And I don’t want to hear him stutter for the next thirty minutes. Objection overruled. Continue, Mr. Childers.”

Jake sat in disbelief. Bullard snickered at Mr. Pate, who left for more ice water.

“Now, Mr. Rady, what did Murphy tell you about the shooting?”

“Well, he’s hard to understand because he was so
excited, and when he gets excited he stutters real bad. I mean he stutters anyway, but—”

“Just tell us what he said!” Bullard shouted.

“Okay. He said he saw a male black shoot the two white boys and the deputy.”

“Thank you,” said Childers. “Now where was he when this took place?”

“Who?”

“Murphy!”

“He was sittin’ on the stairs directly opposite the stairs where they got shot.”

“And he saw it all?”

“Said he did.”

“Has he identified the gunman?”

“Yes, we showed him photos of ten male blacks, and he identified the defendant, sittin’ over there.”

“Good. Thank you. Your Honor, we have nothing further.”