'Sir, I don't know what you're talking about. I am Jack?'
'Now, see, there you go. Bigboy, did you see that? He's playing stupid again.
But if you watched his eyes as I spoke, as I did, as I know you did, what did you see?'
'Warden, what you see all the time,' said Bigboy.
'His pupils narrowed and darkened, his head got real still, and he put it down a bit as if it could help him hear better. His eyes didn't move, he was concentrating so hard. And when we brought him over here and in here, you should have seen him looking and memorizing.'
'How many Negro women were out front at the Store waiting admittance, Bigboy?'
'Warden, I don't know.'
'I'll bet he does. Convict, how many?'
'Don't know, sir.'
'Five or six?' Actually it was seven. 'Don't know, sir.'
'I watched his eyes again, Bigboy. He didn't involuntarily respond to either five or six, because he knows it was seven.'
'Sir, y'all are way beyond me.'
'Well, you have presented me with a problem here, boy. Now I want you to work it through that achy brain of yours what I should do. Okay?
You with me?'
'Yes, sir.'
'Okay. What I see before me can't be Jack Bogash of Little Rock.
There's no Jack Bogash in Little Rock. Documents phony, but very fine phonys. Skills highly developed. Marine background. Tough smart violent.
No, you'd be Mr. X. Mr. X is an agent. Maybe he was hired by someone in Arkansas, or maybe in Washington. He's a white man, he's very smart, he's been around. He's what you might call a professional operator. Yes, sir. Now, we can't do anything with him until we figure out who he is, why he's here, what his goal is. Unless we know that, we don't know a thing, but if we know that, then suddenly there are possibilities.
Without that, we're just stuck with another convict. And being a convict here, sir, is no picnic, for we believe that convicts should suffer for their crimes against society.'
'My name is Jack Bogash?'
'Damn! I thought I explained it to you. There is no Jack Bogash.
Jack Bogash doesn't help a thing. Jack Bogash isn't here. Jack Bogash doesn't exist. Jack Bogash is a fantasy, or a professional identity, well camouflaged, well thought out. I don't want to hear that again from you, convict. You understand. You are pulling a stunt, and you know how we deal with stunts.'
' Sir, I am Jack Bo?'
'Okay, Secret Agent X. You have made your choice. Sergeant Big boy, take Secret Agent X to the coffin.' sam sent his letter of report to his client, Davis Trugood, in Chicago and waited anxiously for a reply. He thought a telegram might be the fastest way, or a long distance call, which would come on the third day, but on that day there was no response. Then came the fourth, with nothing either.
In the meantime, he fretted wretchedly, and was unpleasant to everybody.
But he was hardest on himself, and for the intense relief he felt at being out of Thebes County, even if Earl was still there. He wished he didn't feel such pure joy in simple survival, in small things like his wife's grits on the table in the morning and his children's sullenness.
He had punishing horrors to be got through still, the worst of which was a terrible session with Junie and little Bobbie Lee, in which he assured them that Earl was fine, he was on confidential business regarding a legal matter for Sam and in no danger. He would report in soon, if he didn't reach Junie first.
Junie had become somewhat passive by this time in her life. She knew Earl's ways and his nature, and if she didn't accept it or understand it, she had made peace with the fact that her life would in some way be shaped by his needs.
'It's some war thing, isn't it, Mr. Sam? Earl is a man who somehow needs a war. He saw too much war and now he has no other way to feel fully alive. His wife and child just don't supply what he needs.
He tried to get to Korea, you know.'
'Yes, Junie, I know.'
'But they refused. They did not want a man with his record getting shot up on some terrible ridge in a little country nobody ever heard of.'
'I suppose no, they did not.'
'So Earl has gone looking for another ridge upon which to die, and this time, I'm sure, for even less. For nothing at all, in fact. Mr. Sam, no man that I have ever heard tell of is like that. Why is Earl like that?'
'Junie, I assure you, he is not in desperate, warlike circumstances.'
'Oh, Mr. Sam, you are such a bad liar for a man so good with words. Or maybe it's that you yourself see the truth of what I am saying regarding Earl, and so you can't lie with the usual polish. But we both know Earl is in some terrible mess and may well die. I hope if he dies we know about it, and so can go on with our lives. I cannot have him simply disappear. That would be too cruel. Death would be hard enough, and for this boy to have no father, that would be so tragic.
But for him just to be gone; no, I could not get through that.'
'He will return. I promise.'
'You cannot promise, Mr. Sam. You know Earl as well as I do, and you know no promise can cover his behavior. He makes his own choices on his own needs, for reasons about which I know nothing. No one does, no one ever will. That is the way he is.'
On that displeasing note, the conversation concluded, and Sam went out to his car. The boy, Bob Lee, was sitting on the running board.
'Whar my daddy?' the child asked sternly.
'Son, he is off someplace doing something important. He will return as soon as possible, but your father is a particular man of duty, and will do what must be done or bust. That is why he is such a good policeman.'
'What's'duty'?'
'I can't explain it. It's doing the right thing, no matter what it costs. If it's easy, it's not your duty, it's your job. Most people do their jobs, but only a few, like your daddy, do their duties.'
'I want my daddy.'
'Son, if it is possible, he will return, I swear to you.'
The boy fixed Sam with unblinking eyes and stared almost through him.
For a second, Sam thought he was confronted by the father himself, and then he concluded that little Bob Lee probably had it in him to be just such a man as Earl, as would any of Earl's sons, if he had more.
When Sam got back to his office on the town square, he discovered yet another surprise: what he recognized, outside, as the limousine owned by or rented by Mr. Trugood. That gentleman himself awaited indoors, in Sam's office.
'Mr. Trugood, sir.'
'Mr. Vincent, I came as soon as possible. This is very disturbing news.'
'Sir, I am as upset about it as you are.'
'You have to admit, please: I did not authorize the involvement of another man. This was your doing? I am not here to evade consequences, but I do have to have that acknowledged at the start.'
'Mr. Trugood, are you seeking to avoid a lawsuit?'
'No, I am not. I am more concerned with my own conscience. I would not have put another man in such jeopardy on so trivial a matter.
That's my concern, and only that.'
'Then you may rest. Earl did what he did for me, not for you. He doesn't know of you. But he is a man of great loyalty who may feel toward me what could be similar to a son's feelings, even though we are close in age. It was his decision to risk all on my behalf.'
'I do not mean to separate myself from him, but only to support him on my own moral compass. Is that fair? I seek to be fair. I know a good deal about unfairness.'
'Yes, sir. That would be fair. Fair as fair could be.'
