The List

by Robert Whitlow

  “What do you think, Virginia?” A. L. asked as they walked down the hall toward the courtroom.

  “The investigative report was routine. I think the judge wants to make young Jacobson twist in the wind for a while.”

  “He’s been doing that longer than the judge realizes. It’s time to cut him down.”

  “I’ll try to pick a good time to call the case, A. L. That’s all I can do.”

  A. L. went to the holding cell and Renny came to the bars. “We talked with the judge.”

  “And?”

  “He wouldn’t commit beforehand. The D.A. says the investigative report is routine—no weapons, threats of violence. Judge Kincaid may want to dress you down in public. I just don’t know.”

  Renny’s shoulders slumped over. “What should I do?”

  A. L. thought a moment. “Stand up straight, answer his questions respectfully, and believe in Proverbs 21:1. Remember, the king’s heart is in the hand of the Lord. I will be with you to add anything extra.”

  The guards brought the prisoners into the courtroom through a back door and had them sit along the wall to the left of an open area in front of the judge’s bench. Also used for public meetings, the courtroom had twenty-five rows of benches. This morning there was a short calendar, and less than seventy-five people were scattered throughout the large room. A. L. and the other lawyers occupied several chairs in front of the “bar,” a railing that separated the space in front of the judge from the public seating area. A few police officers lounged in the jury box.

  As Judge Kincaid strode into the room, the clerk of court said in a loud voice, “All rise.”

  Judge Kincaid took his seat, and Ms. Adams began another day’s business. After disposing of several bond reduction motions and D.U.I. guilty pleas, she called out, “State versus Jacobson.”

  A. L. and Renny stepped into the open space before the judge’s elevated seat.

  “Your Honor, this is Mr. Josiah Jacobson. Ms. Adams and I spoke to you about this case in chambers this morning. Mr. Jacobson would like to enter a plea under the first offender act, and I have prepared a petition for your review.” A. L. handed him the papers.

  The judge glanced at the documents and peered over half-frame glasses at Renny. “Are you Josiah Jacobson?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Do you want to plead guilty to the charge of attempted burglary?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Has anyone promised you anything or threatened you in order to persuade you to enter this plea?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Are you entering this plea voluntarily and of your own free will?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Have you had opportunity to discuss this charge with your lawyer, Mr. Jenkins?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  The judge paused. “I understand that you yourself are an attorney licensed in North Carolina.”

  The other lawyers in the courtroom stopped shuffling their papers and stared.

  “Yes, Your Honor.” Renny’s mouth was as dry as stale toast.

  “Do you realize that a guilty plea on this charge may be considered a crime of sufficient severity to warrant disciplinary action against you by the State Bar of North Carolina, and that you may be disbarred?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Are you in fact guilty of this charge?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Tell me what you did.”

  “I was on the roof of the house trying to cut open a skylight so I could get inside.”

  “Do you have any prior arrests or convictions?”

  “No, sir.”

  The judge glared over his glasses for several seconds. “Mr. Jenkins has presented me with a request that you be sentenced under the first offender act. Do you understand that I do not have to accept this petition and could sentence you to up to ten years in prison and assess a $10,000 fine?”

  Renny swallowed hard. “Yes, Your Honor.”

  “Do you still want to plead guilty?”

  Renny felt the noose tightening around his neck. Maybe the judge was a friend of LaRochette’s. “Yes, sir.”

  “Do you have any questions before I enter sentence?”

  “No, sir.”

  “All right. The court is prepared to enter sentence. I hereby sentence you to three years in the South Carolina State Penitentiary—” He paused. All eyes in the courtroom focused on Renny, who felt his knees begin to buckle. “Said sentence to be served on probation under the terms and conditions of the first offender act. You are also required to perform two hundred hours of community service, pay restitution to the victim for damage to his property, and pay a probation fee of twenty dollars per month during the term of your probation. I am also ordering you not to enter Georgetown County during the term of your probation except for scheduled meetings with your probation officer or to perform your community service obligation. You are further ordered not to go on or about the person or property of Desmond LaRochette and are prohibited from any contact with him initiated by yourself. Do you understand the terms and conditions of your sentence?”

  His knees barely functioning, Renny said, “Yes, sir.”

  “Ms. Adams, please notify Mr. LaRochette of the court’s disposition of this case.”

  “Yes, Your Honor.”

  “Next case.”

  A. L. led Renny to a seat next to where the other prisoners were sitting.

  “He accepted it, didn’t he?” Renny asked anxiously.

  “Yes,” said A. L. with obvious relief. “The only surprise was the requirement that you get out of Dodge and the restriction against any contact with LaRochette.”

  “When he said three years in the penitentiary I thought I was going down Dante’s hatch to level nine.”

  A. L. managed a weak grin. “That’s just the technical way of ordering probation. It lets the defendant know he is only one mistake away from prison.”

  Renny watched as a man entered a guilty plea on his third D.U.I. in a year.

  “Is this what it will be like when God judges us?” he asked.

  A. L. glanced at the hapless defendant who was now the recipient of Judge Kincaid’s glare. “Not really. It will be a thousand times—a million times more intense.”

  Renny shook his head. It was beyond comprehension.

  “I know. It affects me every time I stand before the judge with a client. Don’t ever forget.” A. L. continued, “There won’t be any probation available on Judgment Day; it will be all or nothing, heaven or hell. But remember, as a Christian, when you stand before the ultimate Judge, you’ll have a lot better Lawyer than me. You’ll have the Lord Jesus Christ himself. Not only will he represent you, he’ll tell the Judge he’s already taken your punishment.”

  LaRochette skillfully tacked the sailboat into the marina entrance. “Robert!” he yelled. “Get ready to tie up at the slip.”

  After they secured the boat, LaRochette said, “Gus Eicholtz should be back in the country. I want to have a meeting Saturday night to address his late-blooming insubordination. Handle notification and the details at the inn.”

  “What’s your plan?”

  LaRochette pursed his lips. “Something different would be appropriate. Yes, something different.”

  33

  Thou shalt compass me about with songs of deliverance.

  PSALM 32:7, KJV

  Renny met briefly with a probation officer who scheduled a meeting the following week. During the ride back to the jail from the courthouse, one of the other prisoners, a young boy who didn’t look more than seventeen, whispered to him, “Did the judge say you are a lawyer?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’m in big trouble. Can you give me any advice?”

  Renny looked into the boy’s pleading eyes and understood why Jenkins did what he did. “No, but I’ll talk to my lawyer for you. What’s your name?”

  “Billy Adams. I need to do one of those first offender things, too.”

  “OK.
I’ll talk with Mr. Jenkins.”

  “Thanks.”

  Renny did not return to his cell. A guard left him in the booking area, where the blonde guard gave him his regular clothes and returned his money. Glad to shed his GCCC jumpsuit, he put on his sand-covered shirt and pants.

  When Renny returned from changing clothes, the blonde asked, “Do you have any personal belongings in your cell?”

  “No, but I didn’t get a chance to say goodbye to my cellmates.”

  The blonde put down her pen. “Are you serious?”

  Realizing how silly his comment sounded, Renny said, “Uh, we got to be friends.”

  “You can send them a letter. Every prisoner needs a pen pal. I’ll push the buzzer that unlocks the door down the hall. It leads to the front entrance.”

  “I need to make a phone call.”

  “Use the one in the lobby.”

  He called A. L.’s office. “I’m ready to check out of my free accommodations as soon as you have a chance to pick me up.”

  “Be there in a minute.”

  The sun was brighter and the air clearer as he walked across the parking lot to A. L.’s car.

  “Let’s go by my office for a few minutes, then I want to take you home for a victory lunch.”

  “Sounds great. I need to locate my rental vehicle. My suitcase was in it.”

  “You can call from the office.”

  They parked in front of a restored house a couple of blocks from the courthouse. A. L. shared the building with a workers’ compensation lawyer and an insurance broker.

  He took Renny into his office, a former bedroom with files stacked in the corners, a large wooden desk, and family pictures on a low credenza. A. L. leafed through his phone messages. “No word from Barnwell,” he said. “Oh, here’s a phone book. The car rental agency is between here and my house.”

  Renny dialed the number and found out the Jeep was at the lot.

  “Before we go, do you want to see the Wall of Faith?” A. L. asked.

  “Sure. Where is it?”

  “In the library.”

  One wall of A. L.’s library had no bookshelves. Instead, he had rows of plain black picture frames, each one containing a couple of pictures and a sheet of handwritten or typed paper.

  The big lawyer explained, “In Hebrews 11 there is a list of people: Abraham, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, and many others who overcame adversity in following the Lord. It’s commonly called the ‘Hall of Faith’ or ‘Heroes of Faith’ chapter. People sometimes challenge me when they find out I practice criminal law. ‘How can you, as a Christian, represent these horrible people?’ Part of me wants to grab them by the collar and ask how many down-and-out kids they’ve led to the Lord in the last year. But I don’t argue. Instead, I invite them to visit my office so I can show them this room. My primary job as a Christian is not to curse the darkness in the world but to bring in the light. Each of these frames represents a client in whose life God’s light has shone.

  “Because I represent so many people, I sometimes can’t remember a face. So when I take a case, I usually snap a Polaroid picture of my client and staple it to the file. The picture helps me make contact when we are scheduled to meet in court.”

  A. L. pointed to one of the frames. “This is Raymond Phillips. He was in jail after his fourth arrest for shoplifting at a local convenience store. When I took this picture nine years ago, he was eighteen years old.”

  A sullen-looking young man with eyes devoid of hope stared out of the picture.

  “Was that picture taken at the jail in one of the interview rooms?” Renny asked, looking closer.

  “Yes. The second picture was taken two years ago.”

  An older, neatly dressed Raymond stood in front of a convenience store with a woman and little girl.

  “At the time of the second picture, Raymond was managing the convenience store where he had committed his crimes. Today, he is assistant to the regional manager for this area and directly supervises three stores in the Georgetown area. He serves as a deacon at our church.” Also in the frame was a copy of a letter of commendation to Raymond from the vice president of his company.

  Renny said, “This is like one of the memorial walls they have in Washington.”

  “In a way, only it doesn’t honor the dead; it honors those who have been brought from death to life by the power of God.”

  “Do you have a favorite?” he asked.

  “Well, my latest addition is always my favorite.” He moved to the end of the third row. “This was an unusual situation. Norman Rasbury.”

  Renny looked at the photograph of an elderly white man with scruffy beard, soiled clothes, and bleary eyes.

  “Even though he doesn’t drink, Norman was frequently arrested for public drunkenness. He would shuffle along to jail without complaint and sit in the drunk tank until someone familiar with his situation ordered that he be released. Two years ago he was charged with vagrancy, and Judge Kincaid appointed me to represent him. After several sessions of prayer, his mind cleared and he is now a custodian at a local bank.” In the second picture, Norman was standing in a hallway with a broom in his hand and a smile on his face.

  “What was wrong with him?”

  “I never understood the specifics of his problem, but after he committed his life to the Lord, God set him free and gave him a sound mind. The practical effect on his quality of life has been huge. It made me wonder what he could have been in life if he had received help earlier.”

  A man no one saw as valuable enough to reach out to. Renny nodded. He silently examined several other frames, reading the testimonies of changed lives, seeing the difference of a transformed countenance.

  Stepping back from the wall, he asked, “A. L.?”

  “What?”

  “Could you put my picture on this wall?”

  A. L. smiled. “I think you qualify. Let me get my camera while you’re still wearing your burglary clothes.”

  The Jeep was at the lot. The employee on duty didn’t know why the vehicle had been towed in and let Renny renew the rental.

  Renny had forgotten how hungry he was. Sarah Jenkins had fixed a lunch of seafood quiche, salad, and baked apples with cinnamon for dessert. Everything was on the table when Renny came out of the shower wearing clean clothes.

  “I thought you cut a good figure in those jailhouse whites,” A. L. said. “They made you look taller.”

  “You’d look like a huge cloud on a summer day, A. L.,” Sarah said.

  “Thank you, Sarah,” Renny said. “I can see how desperately he needs you to keep him humble.”

  While they ate, Renny told Sarah about Jo.

  “I’ll be praying for her,” Sarah said.

  After Renny finished his last bite of baked apple, Sarah asked, “Where are you going from here?”

  “I’m driving to Charleston to see Agnes Flowers and catch a flight to Michigan as soon as possible. With no job, I don’t have to be in Charlotte anytime soon.”

  “If you need a place to stay when you come to Georgetown, you’re welcome here,” she said.

  “That’s true,” A. L. echoed.

  A. L. and Renny walked out together.

  “Call me late this afternoon,” A. L. said. “Hopefully, I’ll know what the Feds are going to do with the information we provided.”

  “OK.” Renny paused. “You know I don’t have the words.”

  The big man put his hand on Renny’s shoulder. “You’re welcome. It was my privilege.”

  Renny stopped at a pay phone and called Mrs. Stokes with the news. She had finally contacted Carol Edwards.

  “Jo has been fighting an infection so they put her in more restrictive isolation. Even her mother can’t go near her.”

  “What did you tell them about me?”

  “Just that you were delayed at the coast and would be in touch as soon as possible.”

  “OK. I’m on my way to Charleston to see Mama A and then fly to Michigan.”

  �
�I want to pay for your ticket, Renny.”

  Mama A wanted to pay for his lawyer; Mrs. Stokes wanted to buy his plane ticket. Did these women know anything other than giving? He started to say no, but said, “I’ll let you know how much it is. Thanks for everything you’ve been doing. The lawyer told me you and Mama A were like Aaron and Hur in the Bible.”

  “He did? Remember everything about these days, Renny. Not just the struggles, but also the lessons and victories.”

  “I’m so worried about Jo. Is she going to be OK?”

  “The Lord hasn’t shown me, but I believe we’ll make it to the next step in the fight.”

  A different Renny walked up Mama A’s sidewalk.

  “Come in, come in.” She shooed him in with her usual greeting. “A. L. told me the Lord is advancing on all fronts. Have a seat, and I’ll get you something cool to drink.”

  She left to get his drink and Renny could hear her singing in the kitchen. She had a new air conditioner that was humming the bass notes.

  When she returned, she handed him a glass of lemonade. “The Lord’s had me singin’ a song of victory most of the afternoon.”

  “The victory’s not won yet. Jo’s still sick, I don’t have a job, and I have a felony conviction on my record for three years.”

  “That doesn’t keep the Lord’s army from singin’ the victory. It was when Jehoshaphat praised the Lord before the battle that the enemy was defeated. Praise is a mighty weapon.”

  Renny smiled wryly. “I think I need some praising lessons. I have to come to Georgetown during my probation. Maybe I can come down and go to church with you.”

  “I’d love that,” she said, patting him on the arm. “You know, my people were praising in the slave cabins long before their circumstances changed. They praised by faith and so must you.”

  Renny pointed to his white face. “I’m not sure I have what it takes to praise the Lord.”

  “Nonsense. It’s not the color of your skin—it’s the attitude of your heart. Let’s give it a try right here and now.” She gave out a melodic, singsong hum and waited for Renny to follow. Renny didn’t budge. “You’re right, you need lessons,” she said. “Close your eyes and let me take you where it started.”