Chiefs (14 page)

Will Henry thought, as he pulled into a parking space reserved for court officials and the sheriff’s department, that the lack of money showed in the crowd. Clothes were clean but patched; the women looked longingly into the store windows, but most remained outside; there were too many children selling sandwiches and fruit and homemade preserves to an unbuying crowd; and the men stood about in groups, a vacant, stunned look about them, talking, but not laughing much. Since the War Between the States, as it was called in Georgia, these people had had little, and had perhaps not had much before that. Only the land. During the boom that had come with the Great War they had hoped for a future; they had worked harder and borrowed more for seed and equipment. Unused land had been cleared and planted in more of the single crop, cotton. The war ended, and with it the boom, and meanwhile, out of west Texas a plague of Biblical proportions began moving east at the rate of sixty miles a year.

They saw it coming. Deputations were sent who looked, came back, and said, yes, the boll weevil was destroying cotton, something must be done. But no one knew what to do. Some tried to diversify, buying dairy cattle or chickens, but there was no market for these products, no economic system to connect farmer and consumer. And so, even when the weevil crossed the Chattahoochee from Alabama, men were still planting cotton and hoping. Nobody but a farmer can understand what it means to clear land, plow, plant, then come to harvest and find nothing but dust in his hands and the note due at the bank.

Will Henry knew, as he picked his way through the crowd, exchanging a greeting here and there, that all that stood between many of these people and starvation was the fact that a prudent farm family could produce much of what it needed, keep a cow and a few chickens, grow vegetables and put them up for winter, pick berries and crab apples and make preserves, make clothes from flour sacks and mend them repeatedly. And there were quail, rabbit, squirrel, and ‘possum for the boys to shoot if enough preserves and sandwiches could be sold in town to buy ammunition. Will Henry thanked God it hadn’t come to that for his family.

He found Skeeter in his office, a place of oiled floors, cigar smoke, and spitoons; it was filled with bewildered people waiting for justice for their kin, wondering whether their husbands and sons would come home with them that night or go with Skeeter to the county camp, and how it had come to this. The two men went together into the high-ceilinged courtroom, with its hard benches and yellowing paint, and chatted idly up front as the milling throng filed in, blacks in the balcony, whites downstairs. Skeeter excused himself and left through a side door to find his prisoners, and Will Henry seated himself on a front bench and waited to be called. He was not kept waiting long.

A clerk bustled in, dumped a load of papers on his table, and yelled into the din, “Order in the court! The superior court of the fourth district of Georgia is now in session, Hizzoner Roy B. Hill presiding! All rise!”

All rose, and Judge Roy Hill strode to his bench and rapped twice. “Be seated. Call the first case.”

“The state of Georgia versus P. and R. O’Brien!”

A side door opened, and the O’Briens, accompanied by Skeeter Willis, entered, blinking in the sunlight which was streaming through the room’s large windows. They were directed to face the bench, where they were joined by their attorney, Pope Herring, a courthouse fixture for twenty years.

“Read the charge.”

“It is charged that on the first day of January, in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred and twenty, the defendants, P. O’Brien and R. O’Brien, did enter the premises of the Bank of Delano in Delano, in the county of Meriwether, in the state of Georgia, and did, by the use of force and with firearms, unlawfully take money in the sum of seven hundred and forty dollars and forty cents in violation of section five one five four of the penal code of Georgia!”

“How do the defendants plead?” asked the Judge, turning to Pope Herring.

Herring stepped forward and assumed an almost reverent tone. “Your Honor, the defendants both plead guilty to the charge as read, and, being unable to raise bail, request immediate sentencing. In sentencing I would ask the court to consider that these boys are from an honest farming family and that neither has ever been in serious trouble before. I would also point out that no one was injured in this incident and that very little damage to property occurred. When faced with arrest for their offense, the defendants readily surrendered and offered no resistance, and I submit that this incident occurred only because of a rare overindulgence on New Year’s Eve, the night before. The defendants beg consideration of these circumstances and the mercy of the court.”

The judge turned to the county attorney, Jesse Bulloch. “Does the state wish to comment before I sentence?”

Bulloch shuffled forward. “Yes, Your Honor. The Upson County Sheriff’s Office has advised me that the defendants have on three other occasions been arrested on drunk and disorderly charges and on one occasion have served thirty days in the Upson County jail on such charges.” Pope Herring shot an uncharacteristically sharp glance at the O’Briens, who blushed and looked guilty. Bulloch continued. “I would also point out that the car which they were driving and the weapons which they used in the bank robbery were stolen and that a warrant for their arrest in Upson County has been issued on charges arising from these thefts. The state cannot, therefore, join in a recommendation for clemency in this case.” He handed the judge a sheet of paper. “This is a true copy of their record of prior arrests and of the Upson County warrants.”

The judge read the sheet of paper, placed it on his desk, and directed his attention to the two boys, who stood with their hands cuffed behind him, staring at the floor. “The defendants will step forward.” The boys moved toward the bench and looked sheepishly up at the judge. “The court accepts the plea of guilty to the charge and accedes to the request for immediate sentencing. After consideration of the defense request for mercy and the statements as to the past conduct of the defendants by the county attorney, I sentence both defendants to twenty years at hard labor in the county prison camp. However, in consideration of the facts that no one was hurt, that no resistance was offered to arrest, and the absence of any prior felony conviction, I will suspend the last two years of the sentences, on condition of good behavior.” He rapped sharply with his gavel. “Next case.”

Skeeter led the bewildered boys out of the courtroom, followed by their attorney, and the clerk began to call the next case over a hum of conversation in the courtroom. The whole process had taken less than three minutes.

Will Henry sat, nearly as bewildered as the O’Briens. They would pay at least eighteen years of their lives for fifteen minutes of drunken foolishness. He left the courtroom and drove back to Delano, his journey to Greenville wasted. All the way back he dwelt on the contrast between the imprisonment of the O’Briens and the continuing freedom of the unknown boy’s murderer.

He is
my
murderer, Will Henry thought, and I am
his
pursuer. We belong to each other. I must find him, if it takes all of my life.

Chapter 18.

ABOUT THE TIME Will Henry left Greenville for the trip back to Delano, Hugh Holmes left Delano for Greenville. They passed each other in Warm Springs and exchanged waves. Holmes had business at the courthouse quite different from that of Will Henry. It was to be an important day for Holmes—a milestone day—and it was typical of Holmes that he had been preparing for it for the past ten years.

Holmes had, on settling in Delano, taken the trouble to learn how things were done, not just on the county level, but also on the state level. He had begun to perceive that there existed a complex pattern of relationships among the county bosses, a small number of large Atlanta law firms, small-town lawyers and newspaper editors, the railroads, and the Georgia Power Company. The law firms controlled the communications between the big-business community and the county bosses; the railroads were principal clients of many small-town lawyers, a group which dominated the state legislature; and the Georgia Power Company had become a major advertiser in many small-town newspapers, running large corporate advertising schedules and paying for their space in advance on yearly contracts, thus giving them a sympathetic ear among local editors.

The platform upon which this network of relationships rested was known as the County Unit System, established in the Reconstruction year of 1876 and designed to give the state’s rural counties domination over state elections. Each county was given two unit votes for each representative it had in the General Assenv bly; thus, the 8 most populous counties had six votes each, the 30 next-most populous counties had four, and the remaining 121 counties had two votes each. Holmes’s own senatorial district comprised the counties of Meriwether, Harris, and Talbot, also known as the Tri-Counties, which meant that if he could establish firm political control over those counties he could produce a county unit vote equal to that of, say, Fulton County, which included Atlanta, and enjoy commensurate political influence in the state. Only a handful of men could produce six county unit votes on demand, and Holmes meant to be one of them.

He would be aided in his quest by a condition he had helped bring about; indeed, Holmes had almost singlehandly invented the tri-county idea, although he was pleased to let people forget it. The three counties had lacked sufficient population for each to support a county fair, so Holmes, using the Delano Kiwanis Club as his instrument, had brought about the Tri-County Fair, held each fall in Delano, which brought farmers and townspeople from more than two dozen small communities to Delano to have their crops, animals, and recipes judged and to fritter away a dollar or two on unaccustomed paid entertainment. Holmes had also lent support to various athletic competitions among the schools of the three counties, which fostered a feeling of community and further nurtured the tri-county concept. It was this concept which might give him the political clout he needed at state level in order to further the economic, educational, and social well-being of Meriwether, Harris, and Talbot counties, which was his long-term personal goal. It was not entirely an altruistic goal, though Holmes was extremely civic minded; the Bank of Delano was the economic cornerstone of the area, and what was good for the Tri-Counties was good for the bank.

And so, as Holmes entered the chambers of Judge Roy B. Hill, he was ready to make his first visible move from being a merely influential man to being an overtly powerful one. He was joining a coalition of men which ran things in the Tri-Counties. It was typical of his way of doing things that he did not seek admission to this group until he was in a position to command it, and that he took pains to see that commanding it was unnecessary. It was also typical of Holmes that he was joining the coalition at the top.

Present for the initiation were the judge, the county attorney, Jesse Bulloch; the sheriffs of Meriwether and Talbot counties, Skeeter Willis and Tom Erenheim; the representatives of Meriwether and Harris counties, William (“Tiny”) Estes and Harold Whitworth, both lawyers; two newspaper editors, Harmon Everson of the
Delano Messenger
and Roz Hill, a cousin of the judge’s, of the
Meriwether Vindicator.
The occasion was the confirmation of the candidacy of Holmes for the office of state senator in the Democratic primary. Considering the constitution of the meeting, this was tantamount to the appointment of Holmes as the Democratic candidate, which was tantamount to election. The current holder of the office was absent, being otherwise engaged at a private hospital in Atlanta, which specialized in the conversion of drunken citizens into sober ones, but Holmes was able to produce his written regrets, along with a statement of disinclination to seek reelection. Holmes’s selection was unanimous, although at least two of the other men present had coveted the nomination for themselves.

As if to dispel any doubts about their harmony, Holmes quietly announced that a complete repaving of Highway 41 from the Talbot County line at Delano to the Coweta County line above Greenville would commence on the following Monday, to be completed by the end of the year. This announcement had the effect of producing respectful enthusiasm for his candidacy in quarters where there had been only regretful acquiescence, since no man or combination of men in the room had been able to achieve this coup in more than four years of assaults on the state highway department through every means at their collective disposal. When Holmes further stated that every mile of the repaving would be accomplished by professional contractors without the assistance of convict labor, respect turned to awe.

The judge recovered first. “Where, may I ask, will funds come from for this work?”

“From the governor’s contingency fund,” replied Holmes. “I’ve suggested that this project should be used as an experiment to demonstrate that a central state highway fund and competitive bids from contractors will produce cheaper, higher-quality road-building in the state. The old way of having each county responsible for its roads using chain gangs just isn’t sufficient any longer, now that we’re making such a rapid transition to the automobile. We need a proper state highway system, now, and I’ll be making that a cornerstone of my campaign/’

There was a shifting and murmering in the room which said, “Of course,” as if the group had been having weekly discussions on this very trend. Holmes restrained himself from bringing up any other of his goals in the state senate. He had already, with this single coup, established himself as the one person in the group whom anyone would have to consult before doing anything, and he knew this single idea would hold them for some time, without his having to expend any more political ammunition.