Sycamore Row

by John Grisham

Page 57

 

  Reuben Atlee was incensed over the lawsuit and eagerly took on the defense of the church, and for no fee. He was a man of faith and considered it his Christian duty to defend a legitimate house of worship from such a worthless claim. During jury selection, he famously and arrogantly told the judge, “Give me the first twelve. ”

  The lawyer for the preacher wisely acceded, and the first twelve were sworn in and seated in the jury box. The lawyer proved the church’s front steps were in bad repair and had been neglected for years. There had been complaints, and so on. Reuben Atlee stomped around the courtroom, full of arrogance and bluster and indignation that the lawsuit had even been filed. After two days, the jury gave the preacher $40,000, a record for Ford County. It was a nasty rebuke to lawyer Atlee and he was ridiculed for years, until he got himself elected Chancellor.

  Later, it was learned that five of the first twelve jurors were also Pentecostals, a notoriously clannish and sensitive bunch. A cursory probing by any lawyer would have revealed this. Thirty years on, “Give me the first twelve” was often mumbled in jest by lawyers as they surveyed the pool of prospects sitting expectantly in the main courtroom.

  The One-Eyed Preacher was later elected to the state senate, brain damage and all.

  Jake said, “I’m sure Wade Lanier will have a jury consultant. He uses them all the time. I’m just trying to level the playing field. That’s all. ”

  “Did you use one in the Hailey trial?” Judge Atlee asked.

  “No sir. I got paid $900 for that trial, Judge. By the time it was over I couldn’t afford my telephone bill. ”

  “And you won anyway. I’m getting concerned over the costs of this administration and litigation. ”

  “The estate’s worth twenty-four million, Judge. We haven’t spent 1 percent of that. ”

  “Yes, but at the rate you’re going it won’t be long. ”

  “I’m not exactly padding the file. ”

  “I’m not questioning your fees, Jake. But we’ve paid accountants, appraisers, Quince Lundy, you, investigators, court reporters, and now we’re paying experts to testify at trial. I realize we’re doing this because Seth Hubbard was foolish enough to make such a will, and he knew there would be a nasty fight over it, but, nonetheless, we have a duty to protect his estate. ” He made it sound as though the money was coming out of his own pocket. His tone was clearly unsympathetic, and Jake was reminded of Harry Rex’s warnings.

  He took a deep breath and let it pass. With two strikes—no change of venue, no jury consultant—Jake decided to leave things alone; he would try again another day. Not that it mattered. Judge Atlee was suddenly snoring.

  Boaz Rinds lived in a sad, run-down nursing home on the edge of the north-south highway leading to and from the small town of Pell City, Alabama. After a four-hour drive, with some detours, wrong turns and dead ends, Portia and Lettie found the place just after lunch on a Saturday. Talking to distant kinfolk in Chicago, Charley Pardue had been able to track down Boaz. Charley was working hard to keep in touch with his newest and favorite cousin. The profit outlook for the funeral home was looking stronger each week, and it would soon be time to strike.

  Boaz was in poor health and could barely hear. He was in a wheelchair but unable to maneuver it himself. They rolled him outside onto a concrete deck and left him there for the two ladies to interrogate. Boaz was just happy to have a visitor. There appeared to be no others on that Saturday. He said he was born “around” 1920 to Rebecca and Monroe Rinds, somewhere near Tupelo. That would mean he was around sixty-eight years old, which they found shocking. He looked much older, with snow-white hair and layers of wrinkles around his glassy eyes. He said he had a bad heart and had once smoked heavily.

  Portia explained that she and her mother were trying to put together their family tree and there was a chance they might be related to him. This made him smile, a jagged one with missing teeth. Portia knew there was no birth record of a Boaz Rinds in Ford County, but by then she knew perfectly well how spotty the record keeping had been. He said he had two sons, both dead, and his wife had died years earlier. If he had grandkids he didn’t know it. No one ever came to visit him. From the looks of the place, Boaz was not the only resident who’d been abandoned.

  He spoke slowly, stopping occasionally to scratch his forehead while he tried to remember. After ten minutes, it was obvious he was suffering from some type of dementia. He’d had a harsh, almost brutal life. His parents were farmworkers who drifted throughout Mississippi and Alabama, dragging their large family—seven kids—from one cotton field to the next. He remembered picking cotton when he was five years old. He never went to school, and the family never stayed in one place. They lived in shacks and tents and hunger was not uncommon. His father died young and was buried behind a black church near Selma. His mother took up with a man who beat the kids. Boaz and a brother ran away and never went back.

  Portia took notes as Lettie prodded with soft questions. Boaz loved the attention. An orderly brought them iced tea. He could not remember the names of his grandparents and did not remember anything about them. He thought they lived in Mississippi. Lettie asked about several names, all in the Rinds family. Boaz would grin, nod, then admit he didn’t know the person. But when she said “Sylvester Rinds,” he kept nodding, and nodding, and finally he said, “He was my uncle. Sylvester Rinds. He and my daddy were cousins. ”

  Sylvester was born in 1898 and died in 1930. He owned the eighty acres that was deeded by his wife to Cleon Hubbard, father of Seth.

  If Monroe Rinds, father of Boaz, was a cousin to Sylvester, then he wasn’t really an uncle of Boaz’s. However, in light of the meandering nature of the Rinds tree, they were not about to correct him. They were too thrilled to get this information. Lettie had come to believe her birth mother was Lois Rinds, the daughter of Sylvester, and she was anxious to prove it. She asked, “Sylvester owned some land, didn’t he?”

  The usual nod, then a smile. “Seem like he did. Believe so. ”

  “Did you and your family ever live on his land?”

  He scratched his forehead. “Believe so. Yes, when I was a little boy. I remember it now, pickin’ cotton on my uncle’s land. Remember now. And there was a fight over payin’ us for the cotton. ” He rubbed his lips and mumbled something.

  “So there was a disagreement, and what happened?” Lettie asked gently.

  “We left there and went to another farm, don’t know where. We worked so many. ”

  “Do you remember if Sylvester had any children?”

  “Ever’body had kids. ”

  “Do you remember any of Sylvester’s?”

  Boaz scratched and thought so hard he eventually nodded off. When they realized he was napping, Lettie gently shook his arm and said, “Boaz, do you remember any of Sylvester’s kids?”

  “Push me over there, in the sun,” he said, pointing to a spot on the deck that wasn’t shaded. They rolled him over and rearranged their lawn chairs. He sat as straight as possible, looked up at the sun, and closed his eyes. They waited. Finally, he said, “Don’t know ’bout that. Benson. ”

  “Who was Benson?”

  “The man who beat us. ”

  “Do you remember a little girl named Lois? Lois Rinds?”

  He jerked his head toward Lettie and said, quickly and clearly, “I do. Now I remember her. She was Sylvester’s little girl, and they owned the land. Lois. Little Lois. It won’t common, you know, for colored folk to own land, but I remember now. At first it was good, then they had a fight. ”

  Lettie said, “I think Lois was my mother. ”

  “You don’t know?”

  “No, I don’t. She died when I was three and somebody else adopted me. But I’m a Rinds. ”

  “Me too. Always have been,” he said, and they laughed. Then he looked sad and said, “Not much of a family now. Ever’body’s so scattered. ”

  “What happened to Sylvester?” Lettie asked.


  He grimaced and shifted weight as if in great pain. He breathed heavily for a few minutes and seemed to forget the question. He looked at the two women as if he’d never seen them before, and wiped his nose on a sleeve. Then he returned to the moment and said, “We left. Don’t know. Heard later that somethin’ bad happened. ”

  “Any idea what?” Portia’s pen was not moving.

  “They killed him. ”

  “Who killed him?”

  “White men. ”

  “Why did they kill him?”

  Another drifting away as if the question had not been heard. Then, “Don’t know. We were gone. I remember Lois now. A sweet little girl. Benson was the man who beat us. ”

  Portia was wondering if they could believe anything at this point. His eyes were closed and his ears were twitching as if gripped by a seizure. He repeated, “Benson, Benson. ”

  “And Benson married your mother?” Lettie asked gently.

  “All we heard was some white men got him. ”

  34

  Jake was in the middle of a fairly productive morning when he heard the unmistakable sound of Harry Rex’s size 13s clomping up his already battered wooden staircase. He took a deep breath, waited, then watched as the door burst open without the slightest trace of a polite knock. “Good morning, Harry Rex,” he said.

  “You ever heard of the Whiteside clan from over by the lake?” he asked, huffing as he fell into a chair.

  “Distantly. Why do—”

  “Craziest bunch of lunatics I’ve ever run across. Last weekend Mr. Whiteside caught his wife in bed with one of their sons-in-law, so that makes two divorces all of a sudden. Before that, one of their daughters had filed and I got that one. So now I got—”

  “Harry Rex, please, I really don’t care. ” Jake knew the stories could go on forever.

  “Well, excuse me. I’m here because they’re all in my office right now, kicking and scratching, and we just had to call the law. I’m so sick of my clients, all of them. ” He wiped his forehead with a sleeve. “You got a Bud Light?”

  “No. I have some coffee. ”

  “The last thing I need. I talked to the insurance company this morning and they’re offering one thirty-five. Take it, okay? Now. ”

  Jake thought he was joking and almost laughed. The insurance company had been stuck on $100,000 for two years. “You’re serious?”

  “Yes, I’m serious dear client. Take the money. My secretary is typing the settlement agreement now. She’ll bring it over by noon. Take it and get Carla to sign it and hustle the damned thing back to my office. Okay?”

  “Okay. How’d you do it?”

  “Jake, my boy, here’s where you screwed up. You filed the case in Circuit Court and demanded a jury because after the Hailey trial you let your ego get carried away and you figured any insurance company would be terrified of facing you, the great Jake Brigance, in front of a jury in Ford County. I saw it. Others saw it. You sued for punitive damages and you figured you’d get a big verdict, make some real money, and knock a home run on the civil side. I know you and I know that’s what you were thinking, deny it or not. When the insurance company didn’t blink, the two sides settled into the trenches, things got personal, and the years went by. The case needed a fresh set of eyes, and it also needed someone like me who knows how insurance companies think. Plus, I told them I’d non-suit the case in Circuit Court, dismiss it, and then refile in Chancery Court where I pretty much control the docket and everything else. The idea of facing me in Chancery Court, in this county, is not something other lawyers like to think about. So we pushed and shoved and bitched a little, and I finally got ’em up to one thirty-five. You’ll clear about forty, no fee for me because that was the deal, and you’re back on your feet. I’ll call Willie and tell him you and Carla will pay two twenty-five for the Hocutt place. ”