courtroom was starting to fill back up again.
I leaned over and got Mary Kay’s attention. “Are there add-ons I don’t know about?”
She frowned and hastily rechecked the calendar. “Oh, gosh, yes! A probable cause hearing’s scheduled for this morning. I’m so sorry, I don’t know how I could have left that off. Oh, gosh!”
“It’s okay,” I soothed and turned my attention back to the DA, who said, “Call Dava Edwards Triplett.”
An elderly attorney stood up and gestured to someone at the back of the courtroom. “Come on up, Dava.”
A rabbity-looking white woman with lank blond hair and a gray pallor to her skin came forward and stood beside the attorney at the defense table, and that’s when I finally realized that not a single person in this court today was black. Nor did I remember seeing any people of color on Cedar Gap’s crowded sidewalks yesterday.
I’d heard that there were very few African-Americans in this part of the Blue Ridge Mountains, and here was confirmation. Although Latinos and Asians are filtering in, the population is still mostly white, still mostly Protestant, and the perception, deserved or not, is that bigotry is alive and well up in the hollows. The mountains have a history of harboring white supremacists and paramilitary separatists—look how bomber Eric Rudolph hid himself from FBI agents and bounty hunters alike for five years down in Cherokee County. More than one fundamentalist, conservative cult flourishes throughout Appalachia, although up in Watauga County there’s a seven-thousand-acre transcendental meditation center founded by the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, so maybe that particular stereotype is breaking down?
“Your Honor,” said the DA, “Mrs. Triplett is charged with carrying a concealed weapon.”
“How do you plead?” I asked the woman.
“Not guilty, ma’am.”
“Proceed,” I told the DA.
“Call Detective Fletcher.”
The detective was of medium height and weight. Sandy brown hair thinning at the temples; neatly dressed in dark sports jacket, khaki pants, shirt, and blue tie. He came to the witness stand, placed his hand on the Bible, and swore to tell the truth.
“State your name and occupation.”
“Glenn Fletcher. I’ve been a detective with the Lafayette Sheriff’s Department for eight years now.”
“And where were you on the afternoon of September twenty-fourth?”
“At the home of Mrs. Dava Triplett up near the end of Little Carlton Road.”
“Why were you there?”
“We had been told that Mrs. Triplett was running a meth lab and we went up to ask her about it.”
“Objection, Your Honor. Hearsay,” said defense counsel.
Evidently, he was one of those who thought that every repeated conversation needed an objection, whether or not it pertained to the charges.
“Overruled,” I said.
“Did anyone else go there with you?” asked the DA.
“Yes, sir. Sheriff Horton, Officers McKinley and Adams, and Agent Forrester of the SBI.”
“Describe what happened when you got there.”
“We knocked on the door, but the house appeared to be empty and there were no cars in the yard. While we were deciding how to proceed, we saw Mrs. Triplett’s car slow down like she was going to turn in and then she must’ve seen us and changed her mind—”
“Objection,” said defense counsel. “Calls for an unwarranted conclusion by the witness.”
“Sustained,” I said.
“What did you see Mrs. Triplett do?” the DA asked.
“I observed her as she drove past her driveway, up to the end of the road, where she turned around and started back down, so I went out and waved to her to stop.”
“And did she?”
“Yes, sir. I identified myself and asked her if she was Dava Triplett. She replied that she was and asked if I wanted to see her driver’s license. She started to reach over for her purse—”
“Objection. Conclusion.”
“Overruled.”
“—and I told her to keep her hands on the steering wheel.”
“Then what happened?”
“I asked her if she had any weapons in the car?”
“What was her response?”
“She said she had a handgun, so I asked her to step out of the car and put her hands on the roof.”
“Then what happened?”
“I asked her where the gun was and she said it was on the seat. I found it down in the crack between the seat and the back, completely covered by her purse. It was a nine-millimeter semiautomatic pistol with a fully loaded
