Mississippi Blood

by Greg Iles

  “She’s absolutely right,” Quentin says. “I can tell you that from experience. I’ve taken medicines that make my legs hurt, and I don’t even have any legs.”

  The crowd laughs hesitantly.

  “Would you answer me this, Cora? Do you believe that Dr. Cage killed your sister to fulfill their suicide pact, out of mercy? Or did he do it to stop her from revealing the truth about their affair and the birth of that child? Or—did he do it to cover up whatever crime Viola seemed haunted by? The one she said Dr. Cage had helped her cover up?”

  Quentin’s questions nearly knock me out of my chair, so it’s no surprise that Cora seems to be thrown off balance by his apparent willingness to admit that his client might have killed her sister.

  “Well, I think . . . both. All of it, I mean. Maybe Dr. Cage didn’t know himself which it was at the time. That’s how people are. I know he loved my sister. But he’d gone a long time without doing right by that child. Lincoln, I mean. And everybody ’round here had thought so highly of him for so long. I think the idea that Natchez would learn the truth about everything was too much for him. Maybe he told himself he was helping Viola out of her pain. But a man that mixed up about what he’s doing ain’t got no business giving suicide drugs to people.”

  I can imagine Quentin absorbing this answer like a dutiful soldier standing resolute in the face of cannon fire. Then I hear the high-pitched whir again.

  “When Mr. Johnson asked you whether Tom knew that he had a son by your sister, you did not actually answer the question. You said that as of 1996, Dr. Cage had been sending money for twenty-eight years.”

  “That’s right.”

  “That doesn’t necessarily mean Dr. Cage knew he’d fathered a son by Viola. Does it?”

  “Well, sure it does.”

  “Your Honor?” says Quentin.

  “Ms. Revels, forget the money. Did your sister tell you specifically that Dr. Cage knew he had a son by her?”

  The pause that follows this must be killing Shad—to the same degree that it’s sparked hope in my heart—but then Cora says, “Of course she did. The night Mama died. She told me all of that.”

  “I see,” Quentin continues. “Cora, did any strange white men visit your house in the weeks before Viola died?”

  “What do you mean, ‘strange’?”

  “White men you’d never seen before?”

  “Your Honor!” Shad cries. “Mr. Avery is blocking my witness!”

  Quentin was a tall man before he lost his legs, and with Shad seated, he could easily interpose himself between the eyes of the DA and Cora.

  “I’m sorry, Judge,” Quentin says. “I didn’t realize Mr. Johnson was so sensitive about having eye contact with his witness.”

  Having made his point that Shad might be signaling his witness, Quentin quickly says, “You were saying, Miss Cora?”

  “Well, I wasn’t there all day every day . . . but I didn’t see any men like that.”

  “Did your sister tell you that men claiming to be members of the Ku Klux Klan or the Double Eagle group had visited her while you were gone? Threatened her, even?”

  “Your Honor!” Shad shouts. “Counsel is blocking my witness again! This is flagrant abuse!”

  A broad smile stretches my mouth. Quentin’s gamesmanship with Shad gives me the first real confirmation that he has a strategy and is carrying it out.

  “Mr. Avery,” Judge Elder says in a chiding tone, “you do seem to be playing games with your wheelchair. Please move aside.”

  “Thank you, Judge,” says Shad.

  “Now, the witness will answer the question, whether she can see you or not.”

  “No, sir,” says Cora. “Viola didn’t say nothin’ about strange white men comin’ to the house. Any white men, except Mr. Henry. God rest his soul.”

  “Miss Cora, earlier you testified that Viola returned to Natchez in 1996 to care for your mother. Do I have that right?”

  “Yes. Mama was dying, and we needed her.”

  “I see. And did Viola take a tour of her old hometown? Did she go out and see the sights of Natchez? Visit some old restaurants? Or maybe new ones?”

  “No, sir. No indeed.”

  “Objection, Your Honor,” Shad interrupts. “Relevance.”

  “Overruled.”

  “Please continue, Miss Cora,” Quentin says gently.

  After a pause, Cora Revels says, “Vee and Junius flew into Baton Rouge, then drove up in a rental car after dark. Vee didn’t leave our house the whole time she was in Natchez. She even stayed out of sight when anybody who wasn’t family visited. That way word never got out that she was home. Not out to any white folks, anyway.”

  “And why did Viola take those precautions?”

  “She didn't want any old klukkers finding out she was here.”

  “Because she was under a standing death threat?”

  “Objection, Your Honor. Leading the witness.”

  “Sustained.”

  “I don’t know about any death threat,” Cora says. “But Vee sure didn’t want anybody on the other side of town finding out she was home.”

  “By ‘the other side’ of town, did you mean the white side of town?”

  “That’s right.”

  There’s a silence in which I hear nothing, not even Quentin’s wheelchair. Then, in an incisive voice, he says, “Regarding this crime Viola told you had been bothering her. When was your impression that this had occurred?”

  My pulse is still accelerating. Why the hell is Quentin pressing an issue that could lead to new murder charges against his client?

  “Oh, long ago. Back before she left Natchez, when she was working for Dr. Cage.”

  “I see. Did Viola tell you why she hadn’t told anyone about it before?”

  “Judge, I’m forced to point out that counsel is purposefully blocking my view of the witness again.”

  “Please return to the podium, Mr. Avery,” Judge Elder says wearily.

  This time I don’t hear a whir, but Cora Revels goes on without prompting. She sounds as though she wants to be done with this topic. “Whatever it was, she said the law might have taken her away from Lincoln for it, and that terrified her. They could have hurt Dr. Cage, too. But now that she could see the end coming, she felt like it needed to be told.”

  “You had the feeling there was still risk in telling what she’d done?”

  “Oh, yes, sir.”

  “What about the risk to Dr. Cage? He wasn’t facing a terminal illness. He would have to live with the outcome of whatever Viola got off her chest.”

  “I think with all that had happened between them, she felt like she’d protected him long enough. All she really cared about at the end was Lincoln, and getting out the truth about how and why Jimmy and Luther were killed.”

  “I understand. But Viola did tell you that Dr. Cage was as guilty as she was?”

  This time Cora pauses, and my lawyer’s instinct tells me it’s the pause of a deceptive witness trying to be sure her lies dovetail before she answers.

  “I can’t rightly say. Whatever it was, Dr. Cage had been involved somehow, but more in the way of covering up what Viola had done.”

  “Your Honor, may I approach the witness?”

  “You’re fine where you are, Counselor.”

  Quentin’s brake clicks and his wheels squeak, as though he’s stopped suddenly or made a sharp turn.

  “Cora, you testified to being shocked at the idea that your sister could be guilty of a serious crime, yes?”

  “Of course I was.”

  “Because she didn’t steal, not even candy as a child?”

  “That’s right.”

  “And she was most assuredly not the type to cheat, counterfeit, assault, forge, or kidnap?”

  After a few seconds of what must be shocked silence, Quentin says, “I need you to answer out loud, Cora.”

  “Vee wouldn’t do nothing like that.”

  “Objection, Your Honor,” Shad says a
ngrily. “These questions are patently absurd. Irrelevant. Insulting. Take your pick.”

  “Judge,” says Quentin in a folksy voice, “I’ve given opposing counsel a remarkable amount of latitude during his examinations, and I’m afraid I must note that he has not returned the courtesy. He’s as jumpy as a puppy who needs a newspaper.”

  “Mr. Avery,” Judge Elder says sharply, “just because you’ve been lazy with your objections doesn’t mean the district attorney should hold himself to the same standard.”

  “Ouch,” I say aloud, wishing I could see Quentin’s face.

  “Miss Cora,” Quentin resumes, “do you realize that we are now left with only one crime on which the statute of limitations has not run out?”

  “I don’t know much about the law, sir.”

  “My point, Cora, was that after six or seven years, the only crime your sister, as we know her, would have had to fear being punished for was murder.”

  I can sense the shock of the spectators even through the phone.

  “Oh, Lord. That can’t be right.”

  “I’m afraid it is. Can you think of anyone whom your sister might have had reason to kill in 1968?”

  “No, sir! Good Lord. I can’t even imagine such a thing!”

  “But you’re sure that Viola had been raped by Ku Klux Klansmen that year. 1968?”

  “Yes, sir. I do know that.”

  “Cora, have you ever heard the name Frank Knox?”

  I feel light-headed enough to pass out. If Quentin establishes that Dad and Viola shared complicity in a secret murder, that gives Dad more motive to have killed Viola, not less. On the other hand . . . it would also give Snake Knox and the Double Eagles an even more personal motive: revenge.

  The silence after the Knox question lasts so long that I wonder whether my phone battery has gone dead, but then Quentin’s grandfatherly voice says, “Miss Cora? Frank Knox?”

  Even the hiss from the earpiece sounds brittle with expectation. Nearly everyone in that courtroom has heard of Frank Knox.

  “The name sounds familiar,” she says finally, “like from a long way back.”

  “Objection,” Shad says. “Irrelevant.”

  “Your Honor,” Quentin responds, “I am going to be delving very deeply into the history of the Double Eagle group during this trial. This is only the beginning.”

  After a long delay, Joe Elder says, “I’m going to allow it, but this line of questioning had better lead somewhere quick.”

  “Yes, Your Honor. Cora, Frank Knox was a former Ku Klux Klansman who founded a terrorist group called the Double Eagles. They were the leading FBI suspects in the rape of your sister in 1968.”

  “Lord Jesus.”

  “Did Viola ever mention that name to you?”

  “I don’t recollect that. Like I said, that was a long time ago.”

  “But you seem to remember everything else very clearly. I was hoping that name might not have escaped you. Do you remember a man dying in Dr. Cage’s office that year?”

  My hands are quivering the way they used to before I went into court to cross-examine a critical witness.

  “I don’t . . . know,” Cora says almost inaudibly.

  “He was a factory worker, badly injured at the Triton Battery plant. He was taken to Dr. Cage’s office, where your sister was helping to stabilize him for transport to the emergency room. But he died in Dr. Cage’s surgery room. Viola was treating him when it happened.”

  “You know, it seems like I do remember somethin’ ’bout that. Vee must have told me about it.”

  “That man was Frank Knox, Cora. The founder of the Klan offshoot group that specialized in terrorizing and murdering African-Americans in this area. They burned buildings, beat black people, killed black people. They also raped black women.”

  “Mm.”

  “And you remember Viola telling you that she was haunted by a terrible crime? One that had happened before she left Natchez?”

  The pause is almost painful. “Yes, sir.”

  “Thank you, Cora. No further questions at this time, Your Honor.”

  Out of the empty hiss, I hear Rusty Duncan whisper, “Holy shit. Did you hear all that?”

  Unmuting my phone, I whisper, “I heard it.”

  “Did you know about any of it?”

  “Some.”

  “Am I wrong, or is Babe Ruth back and swinging for the fence?”

  “I don’t know,” I confess. “I don’t know what the hell he’s doing. I think my blood pressure’s about two hundred over one hundred.”

  “I’m hanging up. I’ll text you in a minute.”

  The phone goes dead in my ear.

  “What happened?” Annie asks from the floor. “You look happy.”

  “I’m not sure. But things might look a little better than they did before. I think.”

  “Did Mr. Quentin do something right?”

  My cell phone pings in my hand. “I sure hope so.”

  Rusty’s text reads:

  3:12 p.m. Shad just recalled Billy Byrd. Elder asked if questioning would take long. Shad said no. Elder taking 15 minute break. Bathroom, probably. You should feel the vibe in here, man. Feels like 1965. It’s like the Klan’s in here with us.

  Billy Byrd? I say to myself. What can Bill Byrd testify about beyond the forensics?

  “What, Daddy? What did Mr. Quentin do?”

  “I’m not sure,” I say, still dazed by Quentin’s cross. “But I know what he didn’t do.”

  “What?”

  “He didn’t ask about the videotape.”

  “What videotape?”

  “The one in Henry’s camera.”

  “Daddy, I don’t understand.”

  Annie is trying hard to help me, despite being confused.

  Fifteen minutes, I think, my heart kicking in my chest.

  “What was on the tape, Daddy?”

  “Annie,” I say, sitting up and taking one of her hands in mine, “there’s one more witness against Papa today, and Mr. Rusty says Quentin needs my help to handle him.”

  Her eyes widen.

  “Do you think you can do without me for an hour?”

  She bites her lip for about three seconds, then nods.

  “Mia must still be around, right?”

  “She is. She probably just wanted us to have some time together.” Annie smiles with conscious bravery and gets to her feet. “Miiiaaaa?”

  Quick footsteps sound on the staircase, then Mia’s head pops through the door. “What’s up, kid?”

  “Daddy’s got to run to court for one more witness.”

  Mia smiles a little too quickly and brightly, and I realize she’s working hard to adapt to whatever comes next.

  “We’re good, no problem,” she says, glancing at her watch. “You’d better hurry, huh?”

  “Yeah. I’ll get Tim to drop me. I’ll see you guys in an hour.”

  Chapter 30

  A deputy lets me into the courtroom just as Judge Elder’s recess ends, and his friendly scowl makes it obvious he’s only doing it because he knows me. As I move to the front of the gallery, I realize there’s not a single open seat behind the bar. For a moment I consider taking one of the chairs immediately behind Quentin’s table—beside Doris—but that would draw too much attention to me. In the end, I return to the back of the room and lean against the wall with my arms folded. Quite a few people in the courtroom have recognized me, and they’re not shy about staring. A photographer I don’t recognize snaps my picture with a zoom lens.

  When Sheriff Billy Byrd’s name is called, he rises from the line of deputies’ chairs against the left wall and makes his way toward the witness box. Byrd looks like a drugstore cowboy with a beer belly, or a used car salesman got up in a sheriff’s costume. He settles into the witness box with the confidence of a man who’s been there hundreds of times. As they swear him in, Shad Johnson stands up from the prosecution table with a Ziploc bag in his hand. Looking closer, I see a mini-DV tape inside the bag.r />
  I hope Quentin isn’t as frightened by the appearance of that tape as I am. But from the back wall, I see what looks like tension in his posture.

  “Sheriff Byrd,” Shad says, “this morning your chief investigator testified that on the morning Viola Turner died, you found a video camera in her sickroom, and that this camera was found to belong to the reporter Henry Sexton. Is that correct?”

  “It is.”

  “Your investigator testified that no tape was found in the camera.”

  “That’s correct.”

  “Were any other tapes found in the house?”

  “Two blank tapes sealed in their original packages. Mini-DV type, brand Sony. Mr. Sexton informed us he had left four blank tapes for Mrs. Turner when he delivered the camera. All new and sealed.”

  Shad holds up the Ziploc bag. “I have here one of those two sealed tapes, which were stipulated into evidence as State’s Exhibits Eleven and Twelve.

  “Sheriff, Cora Revels told us that there was a tape in the camera when she left for her neighbor’s house, but none when she returned.”

  “Ms. Revels made a statement to that effect when we interviewed her the day of her sister’s death.”

  “What did you and your investigators surmise from this?”

  “Whoever killed Mrs. Turner took the tape with him.”

  “Why would the killer do that?”

  Quentin could object here, but he doesn’t.

  “Could be lots of reasons,” Byrd says, working his jowls like a man pondering this question for the first time. “Maybe the tape showed him injecting the lethal drug. Or maybe the victim had said things on the tape that he didn’t want anyone to know.”

  “Did you search extensively for that missing tape?”

  “Yes, sir, we did. We put our full effort into finding both that and the tape that Mrs. Turner had made for Henry Sexton. We searched the Revels house from top to bottom, and grid-searched the property. We searched Dr. Cage’s residence and office. But we still couldn’t find it.”

  “Did you give up?”

  Billy Byrd’s offended sneer makes plain that giving up is not a permissible action in his book of procedure. “No, sir. We did not.”