cation out at Colleton Community, confirmed that he
162
HARD ROW
lived in the Harris Farms migrant camp out there on the
old Buckley place.
I appointed him an attorney, set his bond at five thou-
sand, and before remanding him to the custody of the
jailer, asked if he knew Mr. Harris.
“
From the negative gestures and the tone of his reply,
I was not surprised to hear that this guest worker knew
the “big boss” by sight but had never had direct deal-
ings with him.
The rest of his reply was almost lost to me as a dis-
traught white woman burst through the doors at the
rear of the courtroom with a wailing infant. There was
a huge red abrasion on the side of her face and blood
dripped from her cut lip onto the dirty pink blanket
wrapped around the baby.
A uniformed policewoman hurried in after her, call-
ing, “Ma’am? Ma’am?”
“Please!” she cried as the bailiff moved out to inter-
cept her. “He’s going to kill me and the baby, too! You
got to stop him! You
Between us, we got her calmed down enough to
speak coherently and give me the details I needed to
issue an immediate domestic violence protection order.
Someone from the local safe house was in the court-
room next door and she volunteered to take the woman
and her baby to the shelter.
As things returned to normal, I finished the last of
the first appearances and sent them snuffling back to jail
to await trial or try to make bail. While the ADA got
ready to pull the first shuck on today’s criminal trials,
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MARGARET MARON
I asked my clerk to check on when I’d signed the sum-
mary judgment for the Harris divorce.
At the break, I phoned Dwight, who was out at the
old Buckley place by then and gave him the date—
Monday, February 20. “Four full days before those legs
were found,” I said.
“So if he died before then, maybe the wife decided
she’d rather inherit everything instead of having to di-
vide it with his heirs?”
“Only if she withdraws her request for the ED,” I
reminded him.
“Who are they, by the way?”
“I haven’t a clue,” I said, resisting the urge to go into
