A House Divided

by Robert Whitlow

  “Mountain water, no ice,” Corbin began. “I’ll chase it with red beans and rice and cornbread.”

  “Onions on the beans?”

  “Yep, I don’t have to go to court this afternoon.”

  Sally left and Corbin rubbed his temples with his fingers. He leaned out of the booth and looked toward the rear of the restaurant as Sally disappeared through a swinging door. Regardless of the day of the week, a select group of Red’s customers could order a double shot of moonshine by the glass. Sally reappeared with a small plastic glass in one hand and a larger glass in the other. Both contained clear liquids. She set them down in front of Corbin.

  “It’ll bite you,” she said in a slightly hoarse voice.

  Corbin took a cautious sip from the smaller of the two glasses. The harsh burn of the alcohol scorched its way down his throat. Sally was right. The day’s batch could double as paint thinner. He licked his lips and took another sip. The second swallow’s journey was less traumatic than the first and fueled a warm glow in Corbin’s stomach. He sighed. Although of unknown proof, the alcohol content of the liquid in the glass was enough to have a rapid impact, especially on an empty stomach.

  Red had three moonshine suppliers, all reputable distillers in Rusk County with stainless steel rigs, who prided themselves on the consistent quality of their nontaxed brew. Corbin took a third, larger sip, then followed it with a drink of water. Sally returned with his food.

  “Have you tasted this?” he asked Sally.

  “I stay away from the beans and onions,” she replied.

  “I mean the hooch.”

  “This batch came from Beanpole. He was bragging about the size of the bead, so we all had a tiny taste when it was delivered after breakfast. That was it for me. I have to work all day, and I prefer something fruity.”

  A simple test for alcohol content involved shaking a jar of moonshine. The size of the bubbles that appeared and how quickly they popped revealed the proof. Some moonshiners infused their liquor with apples or pears for folks like Sally. Corbin was a purist.

  “How big were the beads?”

  “About the size of the dime Grover Ledbetter left as a tip after making us recook his bacon for breakfast.”

  “I’ll do better than that.”

  “Thanks.” Sally smiled. “I’m spending the extra money in my head already.”

  Corbin took a bite of the food. Beans and rice at Red’s were the result of a seasoning process that transformed ordinary pinto beans and white rice into tiny trucks of flavor. Bits of smoked pork and an explosion of spices created a savory dish. The onions provided a final wallop of taste.

  Corbin took tiny sips of whiskey while he ate. He didn’t want to enter the fuzzy world of semi-intoxication that would make it necessary for him to return to his office and take a nap on the sofa. When there were two swallows of moonshine left, he held the glass a few inches above the table and swirled the liquid around. He wished he could have seen the dime-sized bead.

  “Corbin?” A female voice interrupted his thoughts.

  Corbin looked up into the face of Maryanne Christopher, the executive director of a local nonprofit organization that helped people below the bottom rung of the economic ladder. Maryanne was a sturdy woman in her forties with curly brown hair and blue eyes that could both pry money out of a reluctant donor’s wallet and welcome a man without a coat off the street to shelter on a cold winter day.

  “May I join you?” she asked. “I didn’t get a chance to talk to you the other day at the funeral.”

  An Ohio native, Maryanne had retained her Midwestern accent and preference for sugarless tea even after fifteen years in Alto.

  “Uh, sure,” Corbin replied. She sat down across from him, and Corbin moved the glass of moonshine closer to his side of the table.

  Sally came up to them. “Would you like something to drink?” she asked Maryanne.

  Maryanne glanced at the two plastic glasses in front of Corbin, and a puzzled look crossed her face. Corbin’s hands were beneath the table, and his fingers tapped together nervously.

  “Unsweetened tea, please,” Maryanne replied. “And a bowl of vegetable soup.”

  Corbin picked up his glass of water and took a sip. He couldn’t remember seeing Maryanne in Red’s before.

  “I stopped by your office, and Janelle said to try here,” Maryanne said in answer to his silent question.

  “I’m a creature of habit,” Corbin replied. He was glad he was eating onions, which should mask the odor of alcohol on his breath.

  “Kitty told me that too,” Maryanne replied crisply.

  Corbin glanced past Maryanne as Jimmy Broome, the owner of a local auto parts store, came into the restaurant and approached their booth. Jimmy didn’t drink, and normally Corbin wouldn’t have any interest in talking to him, but today Corbin looked longingly at him, as if the man were his best friend. Jimmy offered his condolences on Kitty’s death and moved on.

  “You may not know it,” Maryanne continued, “but Kitty helped the ministry out of a financial jam several times over the past few years. I thanked her, of course, but I should have thanked you too.”

  “Not necessary,” Corbin said, holding up his hand. “What Kitty did was her doing. All the credit goes to her.”

  Sally returned with the tea and bowl of soup. Maryanne bowed her head for a silent prayer. While the woman’s eyes were closed, Corbin quickly dumped the rest of the moonshine into his water glass. Red’s secret stash of booze wasn’t the best-kept secret in Alto, but so far knowledge of its existence had remained hidden from anyone interested in stopping it. It helped that the local sheriff was Red’s first cousin.

  Maryanne finished her prayer and looked up. “The last conversation I had with Kitty took place a few weeks ago, shortly after she went into the hospital. She held my hand and asked me to tell you something, but not until after she was gone. Do you want to know what she said?”

  Corbin felt a lump rise in his throat. He wasn’t sure he wanted to hear a voice from a grave that was barely covered with soil.

  SEVEN

  Roxy’s meeting with Caldweller’s alpha team about the Boren litigation lasted four hours.

  “Where is the analysis of chlorazine’s interactions with other drugs in your memo?” Caldweller asked her impatiently as he scrolled through the document. “It’s not organized in a way that’s particularly helpful to me.”

  “Part C, subpart F. I put it there because I think you’ll benefit from letting him walk you through the background chemistry—”

  “That’s advice I don’t need from you.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Caldweller turned to another associate and asked a question the lawyer couldn’t answer.

  “Why are you working on this case if you can’t help me?” Caldweller growled.

  Roxy watched impassively. Rebukes and put-downs were standard practice at the firm. She never secretly exulted in someone else’s failure, because her own shortcomings, real or manufactured, would soon be identified. When she came to work for the firm, Roxy thought she had a hide as thick as a rhinoceros, but she quickly learned that her emotional calluses were softer than a little girl’s palm. However, she now appreciated the professional reasons behind the firm’s abrasive atmosphere. After surviving the meetings with the partners in the conference rooms, the attorneys weren’t intimidated by vicious adversaries or antagonistic judges. Caldweller’s reputation for toughening people up made him both hated and respected.

  When the meeting ended, Roxy closed her laptop and prepared to return to her office. No one in the room had mentioned her mother’s death. She glanced at her watch. At least two more hours of work to do before she could rendezvous with Peter.

  “Roxy, stay a minute,” Caldweller said.

  Roxy flinched. If a new urgent task landed on her desk, she might not get away from the office before midnight. Caldweller didn’t speak until everyone cleared the room.

  “I wanted to take you with
me to Chicago,” the senior partner said. “You’re ready to take your place on the front lines in this type of case. But when your mother passed away, I thought you should have time to get back into the flow of life. That doesn’t happen as quickly as some people assume. My mother died when I was in my early thirties, and it took months before I came to a place where my thoughts were more happy than sad.”

  “I appreciate that,” Roxy said, searching her boss’s face for confirmation of his sincerity. “A lot.”

  “Take a day or two off if you need it,” he continued. “But not too much. Within your niche of technical analysis, no one in the office can do exactly what you do better than you.”

  It was a stunning compliment. The collective IQ of the law firm rivaled that of any comparable group in the city.

  “Thank you,” Roxy managed.

  “Of course, give me as much notice as you can.”

  “Certainly.”

  Caldweller stood and resumed his usual imperial demeanor. “No time away for the next two days while I’m in Chicago, though. I want you on twenty-four-hour call in case I wake up in the middle of the night with a thought I need to run by you. Also, I may put you on a conference call with our expert if it seems beneficial to the discussion.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Roxy returned to her office, stared at her plant, and wondered about the implications of Caldweller’s compliment. Nothing at Frank and Donaldson happened by accident. Everything was calculated.

  Corbin sat in silence. To ask Maryanne to repeat Kitty’s dying request would somehow bind him to it. Maryanne kept her blue eyes focused on him and waited.

  “You should eat your soup before it gets cold,” he said.

  Maryanne picked up her spoon, dipped it into the soup, and raised it to her lips. Corbin’s inner tension rose higher and higher. Maryanne and Kitty were members of a women’s prayer group, and he was certain there’d be a religious component to Kitty’s request. Corbin didn’t like to be preached to, at, or about. He felt a rumbling rage boiling up inside him that the mellowing effect of the fiery moonshine couldn’t quench.

  Not wanting to say something he might regret, he glanced past Maryanne at Red, who was still standing behind the cash register. There was nothing to stop Corbin from bolting from the booth, paying his check, and returning to the safe isolation of his office.

  “Okay, tell me,” he blurted out.

  Maryanne placed the spoon beside the bowl and took a sip of tea. “She told me to tell you that she believed in you and for you.”

  “For me?” he asked after a few moments passed. “How does that work?”

  “I’m not sure, but she grabbed my hand and squeezed it tight when she said it.”

  Corbin visualized the scene in the hospital, then shrugged his shoulders to shake off the depressing image. “Kitty and I got along better after we divorced than when we were married,” he said.

  As soon as the familiar words rolled past his lips, Corbin wanted to take them back. “I mean, it was all so complicated,” he continued lamely.

  “I’m sure it was in your mind,” Maryanne said. “I’m not so certain about her.”

  Corbin had heard enough. “Thanks for tracking me down,” he said without meaning it. “I need to get back to the office.”

  He slipped out of the booth. Standing up, he felt slightly light-headed and rested his hand on the table.

  “Are you okay?” Maryanne asked.

  “Yeah, blood pressure dropped.”

  He made his way to the cash register and paid for his meal and drink.

  “How was your water?” the owner asked.

  “Not for the uninitiated,” Corbin replied.

  “Don’t go dropping those fancy words on me, Corbin.” Red shook his head.

  Corbin leaned in closer. “Beanpole needs to back off the sugar a little bit and go with bread yeast.”

  “I agree.” Red nodded. “He’s trying too hard to ratchet up the proof just to prove he can.”

  Corbin handed Red an extra twenty. “For Sally.”

  Red put the bill in a mason jar with the waitress’s name on it. Normally giving one of the waitresses a large tip made Corbin feel good. Today, it didn’t.

  District Attorney Steve Nelson was five years older than Ray. He’d received his appointment as DA not based on his expertise as a trial lawyer, but because his uncle knew the governor. Ray handled the more serious cases.

  “Ray!” Steve called out as Ray passed in the hallway.

  Ray stopped and entered the DA’s office.

  “What happened in the Colfax case? Did the judge go along with your recommendation?”

  Ray told him about Judge Ellington’s ruling. As a public official, the DA didn’t want to ruffle the feathers of the most politically powerful entity in the county. Virtually everyone in a management position with the local Colfax facility lived in Rusk County, and their support was crucial to any politician. They contributed money as a block and voted the same way.

  “Were any reporters present?” Steve asked anxiously.

  “No, I stuck it at the end of the calendar. Cecil Scruggs from the newspaper was there earlier in the morning for entry of the plea in the Davidson voluntary manslaughter case, but he left as soon as the judge sentenced the defendant.”

  “Did he accept our recommendation in that one?”

  “Yeah, he gave him twelve years, followed by ten on probation.”

  “That’s newsworthy. Maybe you should follow up with a phone call to Scruggs to see if he’d like an official comment about the Davidson plea.”

  “Will do.”

  Steve wrinkled his nose and grabbed a tissue from a large box on his desk. The DA had bad allergies and would loudly blow his nose during a closing argument by a defense lawyer or the cross-examination of a key witness. It wasn’t something that could be considered contempt of court, but it did create awkward tension in the courtroom.

  “I hate being bullied by a bunch of tree huggers from Atlanta into prosecuting a case against a local business that issues more paychecks every Friday than any employer within twenty miles,” Steve said. “The stuff they dumped is used by farmers on crops all over the country. Where is the criminal intent in that?”

  “I agree, but at least it’s over. I’ll prepare a report for the attorney general’s office and emphasize that the judge issued both a cease and desist order and a fine. That should satisfy them.”

  “Good work.” Steve nodded. “I don’t know what I’d do without you.”

  Ray hesitated. He hadn’t told Steve he was talking to Simpkin, Brown, and Stamper. For now he decided to keep his mouth shut.

  Ray’s office had a high plaster ceiling and narrow tall windows only seen in older buildings. The glass in his windows was distorted by changes over time and made the trees on the courthouse lawn look slightly crooked. He had a small wooden desk. On the credenza behind his desk were a photo from his wedding day and a picture of Billy as an infant when he left the hospital.

  The phone on the edge of his desk buzzed.

  “Branson Kilpatrick wants to see you,” said Sue, the office receptionist. “He doesn’t have an appointment, and you haven’t had lunch yet. Do you want me to—”

  “No, he was a big help to my mom. I’ll talk to him.”

  Ray stepped into the reception area. The stoop-shouldered owner of the landscaping business was standing beside Sue’s desk. In his hand he held a cap with the name of his business printed on the front. Branson’s clothes smelled of recently mowed grass.

  “Hey, Branson.” Ray shook his hand. “Come on back.” He led the way to his office. “What can I do for you?” he asked as he closed the door.

  Branson coughed into his sleeve and cleared his throat. “I tried to make it to court this morning but got caught at a job. One of my regular workers was out sick, and I had to run a mower.”

  While Branson spoke, Ray quickly ran down the docket in his mind and tried to identify a case that might be
of interest to the small business owner.

  “Which case were you interested in?” he asked.

  “The one against Colfax, about the chemicals they dumped on the tract of land that drains into the Cheola watershed. My boy, Tommy, and his family live near Colfax on Harris Street. They’re not on city water out there and noticed last year that their well water had a peculiar odor and odd taste.”

  “It should be better soon if what Colfax did had a negative impact on the water table, which I seriously doubt. The company stopped spraying residue on the field last week. There wasn’t any evidence of a real problem, but they agreed to stop it anyway.”

  “What kind of residue was it? I know they’ve been putting pesticides in some of their newer brands of fertilizer. I have to be careful with that stuff in my business. I make my boys wear gloves when they put it out and warn customers to keep their kids and pets inside for at least twenty-four hours.”

  “I don’t remember the exact names of the chemicals,” Ray said, trying to sound more authoritative than he was. “But it wasn’t full strength. It had to do with by-products of the manufacturing process that won’t kill anything. You know, most of the bag contains filler.”

  At the hearing Ray had simply presented the data collected by the experts in Atlanta and let the judge make up his mind. The information in the DA’s office file may as well have been written in hieroglyphics.

  “Well, I guess getting them to stop is the important thing,” Branson said. “Thanks for taking that on. It’s not everyone who’ll tangle with Colfax.”

  “You’re welcome,” Ray responded, slightly embarrassed. “I’m just doing my job.”

  “I’ll let Tommy know. His family is going through a tough time right now, with his little boy having cancer and all.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that. It’s worse when a young child gets sick.”

  “Yeah, it’s got us all torn up.” Branson stood up. “Thanks for seeing me.”

  After Branson left, Ray swiveled in his chair and saw the picture of Billy. If Billy had cancer, Ray would be torn up too.