That call, I thought. What would my job be like without that call? And then I realized again as if for the first time: I spend my days dealing with other people’s crises. And I wondered if it was just an elaborate way of avoiding my own.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I get that reaction a lot.”
“It’s okay,” he said. “I know one day you’ll be calling me up there. I’m obviously not ready. But ready or not, I’m glad you’ll be the one.”
“Thank you,” I said. “How have you been?”
“Okay,” he said. “But I’m glad you’re back. I’ve missed our sessions.”
I nodded.
The cell seemed smaller than its six by nine foot dimensions- perhaps it was the bunks, sink, and toilet closing in on us-and we stood closer than we normally would have because of it.
Unlike closed custody cells, Paul was in a cell only because the open bay dorms were full, so his door stayed open, permitting him the freedom afforded to the entire open population.
“I wrote some more letters,” he said. “And I got three more back. The one from my sister was great. She said she forgave me and that she really believed I was well.”
I eyed him suspiciously.
“I already wrote her back and told her I’d never be well, and that she should never think that. I shared with her my commitment to recovery and how it’s a lifestyle and not a fix.”
“Good,” I said.
The cell had the sour sweet smell of sweat and cheap cologne. Occasionally a foul odor from the lidless toilet wafted between us, cutting violently through the other odors like a hostile intruder.
“The other letters weren’t so good,” he said. “One said I was a bottom feeder and a robber of innocence, and the other one said I should have my, ah, private parts cut off and crammed down my throat.”
“And?” I asked.
“And I was expecting it,” he said. “It still knocked me for a loop. I mean, I understand their feelings, but… I don’t know.”
“Why don’t you come to my office this afternoon,” I said. “Bring the letters and we’ll talk about them.”
“Thanks,” he said. “Now, whatta you want to know about last night? Let me help you for a change.”
“When did you go to the bathroom?”
“I didn’t,” he said. “I just went to get some water. To get out of the service mainly. Bobby Earl was hard for me to take. I just needed a break. I mean, he was so mean-spirited and his solution to everything was an oversimplified formula. You know?”
I nodded.
The huge dorm had an open, airy quality about it outside the cells, the cement floors and high, unfinished ceiling amplifying every sound. It was noisy, but none of the sounds were distinguishable.
“How long were you out there?” I asked.
He shrugged. “About ten minutes,” he said. “Long water break, huh? Like I said, I was stalling. Am I a suspect?”
I nodded.
“I guess I got to expect that,” he said. “But it doesn’t feel any better. Especially having you think it.”
He took a deep breath, dug a fire ball out of his pocket, pinched the clear plastic wrapper between his thumb and forefinger, and popped it in his mouth.
“Want one?” he asked.
“No, thanks,” I said.
The hard red candy sold in the canteen was all the rage on the compound, but was way too hot for me. I was convinced something that brought tears to my eyes could not be all that good for my taste buds.
“How much-”
And then it hit me. That was what was on my office floor. It looked like a pink marble, but it was a partially dissolved fire ball.
“What?” he asked.
“How much of the sermon did you hear before you got up?” I asked.
“Fifteen minutes, maybe,” he said. “Couldn’t’ve been much longer than that. He didn’t preach very long, which surprised me.”
“That surprised me, too,” I said. Was it because he was too busy killing his adopted daughter, I wondered. “Did you see anyone else in the hall?”
“Dexter Freeman was hanging around,” he said. “Sort of close to your office door. He was probably trying to get another look at Bunny. A lot of them were.”
“Anyone else?” I asked.
“Mr. Malcolm came in,” he said. “And Cedric Porter.”
“Have you heard anything on the compound since it happened?” I asked.
He nodded. “Everything,” he said. “You know how it is. Rumors’re flying. I’ve heard everything from Bunny to Officer Coel to you did it.”
“Me?”
“That surprise you?”
I shook my head. “Unfortunately,” I said, “nothing much surprises me anymore.”
“A lot of inmates say they’ve been with Bunny before,” he said. “Say she’s got a thing for black men. Used to be pretty wild when she and Bobby Earl first hooked up. Probably not true, but you never know.”
“Anything else?”
“They say Bobby Earl has serious mob money from New Orleans,” he said. “That he had to pay some debts, so he brought Nicole in just to murder her. Say he had a lot of life insurance on her. They say that’s why he preached such a short message. He really came in just long enough to do it. And then left.”
I nodded. “Will you listen out for anything else and let me know what you hear?”
He nodded.
Drifting into the cell with the snippets of inmate conversations that ricocheted off the cinder block walls was the acrid smell of cigarette smoke from the cheap tobacco sold in the canteen. Someone was smoking in his cell, hoping to get a little nicotine in his bloodstream before the dorm officer could determine where it was coming from. Within just a few moments, the inmate conversations bouncing around the dorm halted abruptly as the officer began to yell threats at whoever was stupid enough to smoke in his dorm.
“Who do you think did it?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” he said. “But a safe bet would be Abdul Muhammin.”
I smiled.
“What is it?” he asked. “I know he’s one of your chapel clerks, but-”
“No, it’s just he said the same thing about you.”
“Really?” he asked, his voice full of surprise and a touch of outrage, but he looked away, nervously averting his eyes from mine. “I wonder why.”
“Had you heard Bobby Earl preach before?” I asked.
He nodded. “Sure,” he said, pausing a moment and forcing himself to look at me. “Lots of times-on TV, on tapes, and here about a year and a half, two years ago. Why?”
“I was just wondering if you were familiar with his message and style.”
“Sure,” he said. “He’s so self-righteous, so rigid, so-”
“So you knew what to expect?”
“Yeah,” he said, growing impatient. “Why?”
“Because,” I said, “if you knew what to expect and you didn’t care for it, I’m wondering what your real reason for going was.”
CHAPTER 14
Walking out of G-dorm, I ran into Cedric Porter as he and the other inmates were coming in for the noon count. Porter was about three inches taller than my six feet, and he weighed about one-ninety. He had the height of a basketball player, but the build of a football player, his tall lean body cut with defining lines and rippled with muscles.
“I’ve been wanting to talk to you,” he said, his voice soft and respectful. “You looking into who killed Nicole?”
I nodded.
“Good,” he said. “More than anything in this world, I want her killer caught.”
Although his voice was respectful, his eyes were distrusting, even scared.
“Really,” I said. “Why’s that?”
“Because she was…” he started, then looked away.
“She was what?” I asked softly.
“She was my daughter,” he said, his eyes softening momentarily to match his voice, tears moistening their corners.
“What?” I asked in shock and disbelief, my mind unable to accept what he was saying. I’d have to follow it up like any lead, but I didn’t believe him.
“Yeah,” he said.
“Your daughter,” I said. “Are you sure?”
He looked at me as if he couldn’t believe what I had just asked. “Yeah, I’m sure,” he said, and his voice took on an edge that contradicted his eyes.
He then pulled out a folded sheet of paper from his shirt pocket and showed it to me. It was a crayon-colored picture of Jesus like the one Nicole had made for me.
“She sent me one every month,” he said.
Maybe she was his daughter. The picture had obviously been done by her. I felt bad for how I had responded when he told me.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
He waved off my apology with the sweep of his large hand.
A glazed, faraway glare filled his eyes. “I never really got to know her,” he said to himself.
“Do the Caldwells know?” I asked.
“Yeah, they know,” he said. “And they know I know a lot about them, too.”
“You know them well?” I asked. “When did they adopt her?”
He smiled weakly. “Did time with Bobby Earl when I was down the first time,” he said.
Behind Porter, inmates poured into the dorm for count, many of them sweating and panting from playing on the rec field. Like kids letting the screen door slam shut behind them, none of them made any attempt to prevent the massive metal door from ramming the steel frame that held it. A few of them spoke to me. Most did not.
“Were you up there to see Nicole?”
He nodded. “I was gonna try,” he said, “but they killed her before I could.”
“Who?”
“Just promise me no matter what happens to me, you’ll find and punish whoever killed my daughter.” Tears formed in his eyes again and he tried unsuccessfully to blink them away. “She was so beautiful. So sweet.”
“Yes, she was,” I said. “Who do you think killed her?”
“Who else?”
“What might happen to you?”
“Just promise me,” he said, his voice filled with desperation and fear. “I’d hate to think he got away with killing us both.”
Many of the inmates filing into the dorm had their shirts off, their hard bodies glistening as the sun hit the sheen of sweat covering them, and they looked like oil-covered body builders in the focused beam of a spotlight on center stage.
“Who?” I asked again.
His eyes widened momentarily at something behind me, and he quickly looked away. I turned to see Roger Coel walking toward us.
“Bobby Earl,” Porter whispered, then nodding toward Coel, “and he’ll probably use one of them to do it, too.”
“Coel?” I asked.
“A correctional officer,” he said.
Roger Coel walked past us and said, “You need to get in the dorm, Porter. It’s almost count time.”
“Yes, sir,” he said.
The compound had gone from playground to ghost town. The rowdy sounds of mean children in men’s bodies were replaced by the eerie sound of the nearly silent wind as it slithered through the structures.
“I was just tellin’ Dexter a coupla days ago to watch out for Bunny,” he whispered.
“Mrs. Caldwell?” I asked. “Why?”
“She bad news. Nothing but trouble. I’s a damn fool. I fell in love with her like no other woman in my life, but she didn’t love me. She don’t know how to. She’s just playin’ me.”
“You had a relationship with her?” I asked.
He nodded.
“When?”
“Before Bobby Earl,” he said. “She was a secretary in the chapel at Lake Butler. That’s where she met Bobby Earl. They hooked up while me and him was down the first time. Then when he started coming back in to preach, we’d get together. Usually in the back of the chapel. Sometimes in the bathroom or the kitchen.”
“After she was married to Bobby Earl?” I asked, thankful for something verifiable.
He nodded. “For a while. It was good while it lasted,” he said. “But when she’s finished with you…”
“So Nicole wasn’t adopted?” I asked in shock. “She’s your and Bunny, ah, Mrs. Caldwell’s child?”
“Bobby Earl adopted her, but she’s Bunny’s and mine’s daughter,” he said. “They told all they supporters they’s adopting some underprivileged little black girl who didn’t stand a chance in the world.”
“Bunny was with Bobby Earl when she had Nicole?” I asked.
“Yeah,” he said. “Fool thought he was havin’ a son, an heir to his empire, then a little black girl pops out. They say he beat Bunny black and blue, but she wouldn’t tell him who the father was.”
The compound was full of inmates who could spin a yarn, but as fantastic as his story sounded, I didn’t think that’s what this was. It was unbelievable, sure, but I was beginning to believe him, and not just because he was giving me information I could check, but because of his conviction and certainty. He was either telling the truth or genuinely believed he was.
“And you haven’t seen her since then?” I asked.
“I see her when they come in, but I ain’t messin’ with her if that’s what you mean.”
“And now you think she’s seeing Dexter Freeman?”
He shrugged. “She may’ve moved on from him by now,” he said. “Somebody say she with Walter Williams.”
“Who?”
“Oh,” he said with a contemptuous laugh. “His new Muslim name is Abdul Muhammin. Nigga’ say he all spiritual now, but I sure as hell can’t tell. Please just find out who killed her. And don’t let them get away with it. And if somethin’ happen to me, I guarantee Bobby Earl’ll be the one what done it.”
“Why would he want to kill you?” I asked.
He didn’t answer me, just looked around nervously.
“Tell me,” I said. “Why do you think he killed Nicole?”
“Because,” he said, putting his hand on the door of the dorm and looking away, as Coel walked back by again.
“I said get in that dorm, inmate,” Coel said. “Now.”
“Because?” I asked as Cedric opened the door and walked into the dorm.
“Because he finally found out I was Nicole’s father. He killed her and now he’s gonna kill me,” he added just before the solid metal door slammed shut, its loud clank reverberating through my body, the way the jolt he had just delivered echoed through my mind.
CHAPTER 15
After searching unsuccessfully for Anna, which it seemed I had been doing my whole life, I finally found her in the records vault in Classification.
Shoes off, long, elegant legs beneath the black sheer of her hose, perfectly painted nails, she had thrown herself into replacing the inmate files she had used over the last few days.
She went about her task with far more aggression than she normally did, violently cramming folders where there wasn’t sufficient space. When she noticed me, she stood upright, her body growing rigid. But that was the extent to which she acknowledged my presence.
“There are people paid to do this,” I said.
“It doesn’t matter,” she said without looking at me.
“I told you I’d do it,” Lisa, the file clerk, called from her desk just outside of the vault. “I don’t have anything else to do.”
I glanced out at Lisa, but it was the wall behind her desk that caught my attention. Beneath a wood-framed cork board filled with magazine cutouts of NASCAR drivers rather than the DC Memos it was designed to hold, a small black radio with a broken antenna emitted the grating sounds of slightly distorted country music. In front of her, Lisa’s desk was disorganized and cluttered, piled high with inmate files and requests, though I had never once seen her actually working.
I walked over and stood just behind Anna.
Lowering my voice, I said, “I’m sorry I was in no condition to receive you when you
called on me last night.”
“It doesn’t matter,” she said.
“Last night?” Lisa asked. “What were the two of you doin’ together last night?”
“I just got confused when I saw you,” I said. “Or maybe it was the bourbon.”
“Bourbon?” Lisa asked in shock.
Anna didn’t say anything, just continued to file. Beneath her dark eyes were even darker circles, her hair needed brushing, her clothes were wrinkled, and she wore none of her usual jewelry, save the huge albatross of a wedding ring hung round her finger.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “Why won’t you talk to me? I’m reasonably sober.”
“I don’t think I will, John,” she said. “And that’s nothing to tease about.”
“You’re right,” I said. “I’m sorry.”
“Last night, when I saw you like that,” she began, but then broke off.
“What?” I asked.
“You sure you don’t want me to file for you, Anna?” Lisa asked.
“I’ve got the damn files,” she said. “Go take another break.”
“But, I’ll-”
“NOW,” Anna yelled.
Lisa huffed out of the office, her cheap heels clicking hollowly on the over-waxed tile floor.
The small vault, dusty and smelling of mildew, seemed to shrink in on us, the naked flourescent bulbs above us making everything look flat and dull.
“Last night what?” I asked.
“That’s not the John I know,” she said, still without looking at me. “It’s not anyone I want to know.”
I nodded.
“I’m doing my best to forget last night,” she said. “I’m gonna try and just remember the John I knew, the John that could never talk to me like that.”
“Just a little too flawed for you?” I asked.
“You can believe that if you want,” she said, looking up at me for the first time, her eyes swimming in the mixed drink of anger and pain.
“So if it happens again,” I said, “you won’t come looking for me?”
“No, John,” she said. “I won’t. I’ve got a sober husband at home, and though he doesn’t need taking care of, I think I’ll do it anyway.”
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