The Lawbringers 2, page 16
“Then will you, for God’s sake, see a lawyer?”
Ben came forward, near enough to touch him, but he kept his hands in his pockets. “Listen, Chico, I want you to look at my face. What do you see? I’m not white, and I’m not going to be white, no matter how hard I try. In this town or any other town I know, I’ll get a trial. A trial just like a dog gives a flea. Now quit throwing lawyers at me, all right? The lawyer hasn’t been born who can paint me white.”
Clay yelled at him. “You won’t even fight for your rights, will you? You’re my brother, Ben. You’re his son.”
“Not until he says I am,” Ben Harmony breathed. “Now go away, Chico. You don’t amuse me anymore.”
Susan Rand wrapped herself in a shawl and sat before the fire. The sheriff chewed a cigar to shreds. His wife said, “I went to church before the funeral. To pray for Ben Harmony. But I’m not sure I wasn’t praying for myself. You’re not just bringing it down on your own head—you’ll destroy us all. Why didn’t you take him in? Why didn’t you give him what’s his?”
“You wouldn’t understand,” Farris Rand said.
“If I wouldn’t understand, who would?” Her busy fingers mangled the ends of the shawl. “If I were Ben Harmony, I’d have made you crawl.”
“You’re not Ben,” he said.
“I’d squeeze you. I’d make you hurt, the way he must be hurting now.”
“Don’t you think I’ve done a fair job of that myself?”
“Nothing to what ought to be done to you,” she said. The room was gray and cold. “You!” She had to stop and start again. “For what you’ve done to Ben Harmony, Farris, there’s no one on this earth who’ll forgive you.”
“I did what had to be done. Ben knows that.”
“Nothing of the kind!”
“Nobody can turn black into white, Susan.”
“Nobody asked you to,” she answered. “But if you’d been a man, you’d have given him his due.”
“Do you think I’m the only white man on earth who’s fathered a black child? Do you think Ben Harmony is the only one ever born?” The sheriff’s massive head bowed. “Susan, do you want me to put on sackcloth and ashes for the rest of my life because I planted one seed?”
“Ask Ben, not me. And you should have asked him a long time ago.” Her hands were shaking so much she couldn’t get a proper grip on the crumpled shawl; she flung it away in despair. “Is there any doubt of his guilt?”
“Depends on what you mean by guilt. Shoumacher got what he deserved. I doubt it will get Ben in any trouble with the Almighty. Sooner or later we’ve all got to dirty our hands a little. I’m not convinced Ben did the murder, but if he did, he has no reason to regret it.”
“No reason to regret that he’ll hang?”
“That,” said the sheriff, “is justice.”
“Justice,” she said. “Justice? Is that what it is? What about mercy, then—or did mercy die on the cross?”
“That’s a matter for the judge, not for me. I’m only a sheriff.”
She said, “The body wears the badge, not the soul. Farris, you heard what Clay said last night. How can you ignore it? Ben went to Shoumacher’s place to stop him from printing evidence that would have ruined your life in this town. If you’d acknowledged that Ben was your son when he first came here, none of this would have happened. Shoumacher would have had no weapon against you. You murdered Shoumacher, Farris.”
“Don’t say that too often,” he droned. “And once more will be too often.”
“Hate. That’s the only thing that warms you anymore, isn’t it?”
“Grab yourself some sense. Sometimes you’re a foolish woman, Susan. You refuse to face the fact that life is real.”
“You never listen, do you?”
The sheriff went to his office. He said to Harry Greiff, “Does McAffee still want to talk to Ben?”
“I reckon.”
“Ask him to come in, then.”
Greiff went out. His boots banged down the hall toward McAffee’s office. The sheriff bit off the tip of a cigar and walked through the side door into the cell block. He looked into the first cell. Billy Cordell was waving flies away from his injured leg. Dr. Smyley was there; the cell door stood open. Smyley snipped out a fresh bandage and said to Cordell, “The first time I ever laid eyes on you, I knew you’d be one of those hell-raisers who had to do everything the hard way.”
“Give me another snort of that medicine,” Billy Cordell said. “Hello, Farris.”
“How’re you making it, old friend?”
Billy Cordell’s emaciated features were dignified by pain. He said, “This idiot sawbones says I ain’t going to pull through. I reckon you’ve killed me, Farris.”
The sheriff nodded. “I guess I have.”
“They tell me it hurts like hell to die.”
“That’s not true,” the doctor said sharply.
Billy Cordell raised his head. “How the hell would you know? You ever tried it?” His head sagged back onto the cot. “Goddam it, Farris, I still want to grab the world by the tail and spin it around.”
The doctor buckled his bag shut and stood up. “Try to get some sleep now.”
“Doctor, I won’t have to try.” Billy Cordell held out his hand, palm up. “Look there, Farris. Nothin’ left but a fistful of lost dreams. Thirty years I’ve spent prowling the hills, and seems to me I never yet walked down a mountain. They all go the same way—up. One way to get to heaven, I guess. That country’s full of bones that went out hunting for gold, but I never figured to be one of them. Hey, Farris?”
“Yes?”
“My belly feels like my throat’s been cut.”
“I’ll get you something to eat,” the sheriff said.
“Yeah. You do that.”
The sheriff followed Smyley back into the office. When he shut the door, Farris Rand said, “Damn it, Emmett, I shot him in the leg on purpose. What’s all this caterwauling about dying?”
“That leg’s crawling with death,” Smyley said. “Nothing I can do about it. Nothing anybody can do. I could saw it off at the hip and give him a few extra weeks, but he won’t let me do that. I’m kind of inclined to agree with him.”
“I never wanted this on my conscience.”
“I’m glad you can’t see yourself,” Smyley said. “I can look right through you and see your heart break. It isn’t your fault, Farris. Don’t search your soul. Billy’s dying because he couldn’t change when the country changed.”
At the door the doctor added softly, “I hope you don’t make the same mistake, Farris.”
He went out, leaving the door open to admit Harry Greiff. Greiff came in with Colonel McAffee in tow. The sheriff said, “Get a meal for Billy Cordell, will you?”
“He just ate a couple hours ago.”
“Get it anyway,” Farris Rand said. “Get him anything he wants and put it on my private bill.”
“Sure,” Greiff said, and went.
Colonel McAffee leaned on his walking stick. His nose, bloated and veined, was a beacon preceding him. He blinked with satisfaction. “Go right on mollycoddling the old bastard, Farris. You’re playing right into my hands. Election in eleven days, you know.”
“Is that what you wanted to see me about?”
“There’s no duck like a sitting duck,” the colonel said. “But no. Not that. I came to see the Nigra.”
“What for?”
“My duty, you know. I’m the only qualified defense lawyer in town.”
“You’d defend him?” the sheriff asked.
“I’ll be honest with you. I’ve got no use for him, no use at-tall. But I’m a fair man. The Nigra’s got to have a just trial. To vindicate what Shoumacher stood for. Law and order, Farris. Not your Old Testament kind, but the real animal.”
The sheriff said, “You won’t win any votes by defending him.”
McAffee smiled. “Won’t come to trial until after the election, will it, now?”
The sheriff stepped to the door. “All right. Come on.”
“Can I see him alone, please?”
“First we’ll find out if he wants to talk to you.”
They went back along the corridor. The sheriff glanced into Billy Cordell’s cell and kept right on going.
McAffee banged his walking stick on the bars of Ben Harmony’s cell. “Come over here.”
Ben Harmony was on the cot, hands laced behind his head. “I like it fine right here.” He had looked at McAffee just once.
McAffee said, “I hear you killed Philip Shoumacher. Is that right?”
“What do you think?”
“How did it feel?”
Ben Harmony said, “He didn’t say.”
“Have you been apprised of your rights?”
Ben Harmony just laughed. McAffee’s belly poked against the bars. “They’ll indict you, you know. And no prosecutor ever indicts a man unless he expects to convict him. You’ll need a defense attorney.”
Yawning, Ben Harmony patted his lips.
McAffee said, “Do you know what your future looks like, boy?”
Ben Harmony turned his head to one side to look at him. “Do you know what the future looks like? What do you use—tea leaves or a crystal ball?”
“Let’s try cards, boy. Let’s put them face up on the table. If I’m to defend you, I’ve got to know the facts.”
“Forget it.”
“You want to die, don’t you? Or am I mistaken?”
“Your mistake could be in asking,” Ben Harmony said. He seemed more indifferent than annoyed.
“Maybe you don’t know this, boy. A lawyer doesn’t have to believe in his client in order to defend him. I can help you.”
“Why?”
“Because justice will be on trial. I intend to see you’re treated fairly.”
“I’ll be treated fair,” Ben Harmony said. “I’ll be sentenced fair and hanged fair. You can draw lots for my corpse, and that’ll be fair, too.”
He looked straight at Farris Rand.
McAffee turned. He hawked and snorted. “Black, red, or white, he’s guilty, Farris. The Emancipation Proclamation doesn’t give them the license to commit murder.” McAffee clumped out of the corridor.
The sheriff remained at Ben Harmony’s cell. “You should have taken him up on it.”
“I don’t want any lawyers, old man.”
“Why not?”
Ben Harmony sat up and put his feet on the floor. “You know what’ll happen if they start a gum fight in court. Somebody will get the bright idea to put Dinwiddie on the stand. Dinwiddie knew all about it. Is that what you want?”
“I never expected anything else,” Farris Rand said.
“Then you’re not thinking straight. All you’ve got to do is let Clyde Littlejack and the rest of them get a little drunk. Just stand aside and let them drag me out and lynch me. Dinwiddie will keep his mouth shut, and you’ll be clear of it—clear of me. That’s what you want, isn’t it?”
The sheriff locked glances with him. “Are you trying to make it a question of conscience, Ben?”
“Yours or mine?”
“Because if you are, I won’t have it. McAffee was right. If you’re guilty, you’ll hang, and nothing you or Dinwiddie can say will stop it.”
“And if I’m not guilty?” Ben Harmony said. His voice was dust-dry.
“I haven’t heard you say you were.”
“Name one man who’d believe me if I did say it.”
“I might,” the sheriff said.
“Might. Not good enough, old man.”
“Try me.” The sheriff grasped the bars. “Try me, boy.”
When the sheriff left the courthouse, he went directly to Dinwiddie’s freight yards. He found Dinwiddie forted up in his office with a bottle. Dinwiddie regarded him owlishly. “Got some more money to give back to me?”
“Not this time,” the sheriff said. “I’d like a minute of your time.”
“Time,” said Dinwiddie. “At my back I hear time’s winged chariot hurrying near. Something like that, wasn’t it? There’s a glass someplace in that mess on the rolltop. Help yourself to a drink.”
“Not right now. Shoumacher told you certain things about me before he died.”
“You and your son,” Dinwiddie said. “Ben Harmony.”
“My son Clay,” the sheriff said, “had a talk with you.”
“That was several years ago. I seem to recall it vaguely.” Dinwiddie hoisted the bottle to his lips. His face was lobster red.
Farris Rand said, “I don’t intend to hold you to any promises you may have? made. When Ben Harmony goes on trial, I expect you to make yourself available as a witness, and I expect you to testify truthfully.”
Dinwiddie blinked. He coughed on the whiskey, put the bottle down, and searched for a handkerchief to wipe the dribble on his chin. Finally he blotted it with his sleeve. “Generous,” he said. “This may strike you as odd, but for the first time I find it in my power to do something worthwhile for a fellow human being. It’s just my misfortune the human being in question has to be you, Farris. But that’s the way it turned out. Life is an irony devoutly to be scorned. Be that as it may, I intend to keep my lips sealed upon the word that you are that black man’s father. Phil got what was coming to him, and if your son was the instrument of it, then it’s his hard luck. But I can’t take it on myself to show the world the skeleton in your closet. If you want that done, you’ll have to do it yourself.”
“Will you testify?” the sheriff insisted.
“Who knows? I may drink myself to death before then.” Dinwiddie lifted the bottle and waved it. “So long, Farris. Hard luck to you.”
The sheriff stopped at the Widow Shoumacher’s house. From the porch he could hear the sound of the woman’s choked sobbing. The preacher came out onto the porch, lifting his hat to his head; he stopped and said, “If I were you, Sheriff, I’d go on about my business and leave her to do her grieving in peace.” The preacher trotted down the steps and walked away.
Farris Rand raised his heavy silver head. He rapped with his knuckles and went inside.
Ethel Shoumacher recognized him through her tears. She wiped her face. “I often thought about him dying. He wasn’t well, you know. I didn’t think I’d care at all.”
The sheriff said, “I am sorry, ma’am.”
“Don’t be. There’s nothing that can touch him now.”
“He gave me something to keep for you,” the sheriff said. He placed an envelope on the table before her. The woman sat up on the divan, looked at Rand and at the envelope.
It made her laugh a little. “You’re lying, Sheriff. Of all the men he’d have given that to, you’d have been the last. Thank you, but no.”
She laughed again, with tears close behind.
The sheriff said, “He couldn’t trust himself not to spend it. It wasn’t much of a provision for you. He lost money on the newspaper, you know.”
“I know. And the rest went into bottles. But I can’t accept your money.”
“He left it to you. Don’t make me break the promise I made him.”
She broke down. “I’m not proud enough to refuse you again. I’m afraid I do need it. If it helps your conscience, then God reward you, Sheriff.”
The sheriff went outside quickly. She had surprised him; her sadness had been genuine.
A door flew open next door, as if the woman had been leaning against it with her ear to the wood. She came across the lawn. Wordlessly, the sheriff stepped aside. The woman rushed into the house. The sheriff jammed his hat down on his head and went away.
Chapter Eighteen
The wedge Ben Harmony had driven into Ocotillo divided the town into opposing camps of unequal proportions. Colonel McAffee, whose conscience had bitten him when he wasn’t looking, brought his walking stick and a bottle of John Vale into the sheriff’s office and said, “I suppose you’ve heard what Clyde’s up to.”
“I have.”
“He ought to be silenced. Before he whips them up into a mob.”
“I don’t think there’ll be any lynching,” said the sheriff. “Feelings are running pretty high. The argument got so bad last night at Dinwiddie’s house that his wife refused to feed him.”
“I know. I saw him drinking his supper in the Occidental.” McAffee said in a sour voice, “The Nigra is innocent until proved guilty. Equal justice under law. That’s what Shoumacher fought for. Farris, it’s a very strange turn of events that puts you and me on the same side of this.”
“For you,” the sheriff agreed, “it’s a political red-hot poker.”
“I’d be smart to drop it before it burns my hand to cinders, wouldn’t I?” He uncorked his bottle. “Can’t have the audacity to disagree with the moral codes of five thousand years, though. Right’s right. It’s open and shut.”
“Don’t you mean black and white?”
“Are you going to give me an argument, Farris?”
“Do you want one?” The sheriff sank his teeth in a cigar. “Your nose is out of joint. What do you want of me?”
McAffee said, “You wanted to break Phil Shoumacher, because he wanted to break you. The Nigra’s crime played right into your hands. That’s why you’re treating him like a house guest instead of a prisoner. Fight scum long enough and you become scum yourself. Farris, you’re not real anymore, you’re just playing the part of sheriff. You’ve let things get the better of you. You look terrible. You need a rest. Have you thought of retiring?”
The sheriff waggled his hand toward the door. “I won’t dignify that with an answer.”
“I’m quite serious.”
“You’re fat, McAffee. Where you sit and where you think.”
“And you are not a law unto yourself.”
“You’re reaching for any stick you can use to beat a dead horse’,” the sheriff said. “I tolerate you only because you’ve had the decency to sacrifice your ambition for the benefit of a principle, but it doesn’t make me feel charitable. You’ve lost the election. Don’t carp at me on that account. I’ve listened to your bumbling arguments and I—”
