“So you started looking at Alexander?” I said.
“Let’s just say I was suspicious. A couple of weeks ago, I arrested this ol’ boy who lives on a farm out in the county and ran a little casino in what used to be the hayloft of his barn. Not real big-time, but big enough. So I got him into interrogation and started threatening him. I threatened to bring the feds in, which I’d never do, but he didn’t know it. I threatened to arrest his wife. Told him I knew she was in on it, too. Finally, after three or four hours, he told me he had some information that I might be interested in. Said it was big stuff. So I agreed to make a little trade with him if the information turned out to be useful. Turned out to be damned useful.”
We started walking again, slowly. I was having trouble believing what I was hearing, but Bates had no reason to lie to me.
“This boy said most of the people who run gambling operations around here-card games, bingo, video slots, tip boards, bookies, craps, roulette, you name it-used to make campaign contributions to the district attorney and the sheriff. Always in cash, even in years when there wasn’t an election. They had sort of an unspoken understanding. I’ve never taken any of their filthy money and never will, but a few months after Mooney got elected, Alexander started making the rounds. He told everybody there was a new deal. Monthly payments, cash, and he raised the stakes on them. My informant says they were all pissed about it, but what were they gonna do? Call me?”
“So how’d you set him up?”
“I just waited for him to make his regular monthly pickup. Had cameras inside and outside of the house, and the informant wore a wire.”
We turned a corner on the trail and started walking back towards the house. The quickly rising temperature had caused the air near the cool ground to condense, and a shroud of gray mist hung motionless among the trees. The thought of Alexander extorting money from gamblers blew my mind. He put forth such a polished public image, and he was so damned smug. Still, I took no pleasure in what Bates was telling me. It could only lead to a huge public scandal, with the district attorney’s office at its center.
“Have you talked to Mooney about this?” I said.
“Not yet,” Bates said, “but I’m going to. He’s got a tough row to hoe ahead of him, being that Alexander’s his nephew and Lee hired him and put him in charge of a bunch of big cases, at least until you came along.”
“Maybe that’s why he hired me,” I said. “Maybe he suspected something.”
“Maybe, but if he suspected something he should have told somebody about it. This is gonna cause him some real problems.”
“Any evidence that Mooney might be involved?”
“Nope. Not a bit.”
“So why are you telling me all of this, Leon? Why don’t you just turn it over to the feds and let them do their thing?”
“I don’t trust the feds. Lee Mooney and his wife both have a lot of political connections. We turn this over to the U.S. Attorney and there’s a good chance it goes away the same way my gambling cases did in state court. I want you to prosecute Alexander, and I want you to make sure the case is handled the way it should be handled.”
“That won’t be up to me, and you know it. That’ll be Mooney’s call.”
“Trust me,” Bates said, “you’ll catch the case.”
We made our way up the hill and back up the driveway to his Crown Vic. As he opened the door, he turned towards me and his eyes narrowed.
“Honest injun, Dillard,” he said, “you up for this? All I’m asking you to do is what’s right.”
I nodded my head.
“That’s all I need then. I’ll have a little chat with the district attorney when the time is right.”
Bates climbed into the car and started the engine.
“Hey, Leon,” I said, tapping on the window. He rolled it down. “You said you made a little trade for the information your informant gave you. What was it?”
He took off his cowboy hat and set it on the seat beside him. “You didn’t hear this from me,” he said, “but I told him I’d make sure he didn’t get no more than a year’s probation, and I told him he could keep his equipment and keep right on doing what he’s been doing for one more year. After that, I figure me and him will be even and all bets are off. You okay with that?”
I shrugged my shoulders and smiled. What could I say? It was just the high sheriff of Washington County, doing business the same way it had been done for decades.
I looked around the room at the portraits of the generals and presidents hanging on the oak-paneled wall: Robert E. Lee, Stonewall Jackson, Ulysses S. Grant, William Tecumseh Sherman, Jefferson Davis, Abraham Lincoln. Sandwiched between them was a framed law degree from the University of Tennessee and certificates that said Jim Beaumont was licensed to practice law in Tennessee and in the federal courts.
Beaumont walked in a minute later carrying two cups of coffee, his graying brown hair still wet from his morning shower. I’d called him right after Bates left and told him about Sarah’s case in Crossville, and he’d agreed to meet me at his office. He handed me a cup of coffee and sat down next to his antique mahogany rolltop desk. He was wearing a tweed vest over a white shirt with a string tie. He looked at me with his clear blue eyes, and I could see compassion.
“Never thought you and I would be talking under these circumstances,” he said in his syrupy drawl. “I’m truly sorry about what happened to your sister.”
“Thanks,” I said. “Can you work it into your schedule? I know it’ll be a pain driving back and forth to Crossville, but you’re the only guy around here I’d trust to handle it.”
“Appreciate the confidence,” Beaumont said, “but I’ve been thinking about this ever since you called, and there might be a better way to handle it than going into unfamiliar territory and trying a criminal case where the odds are likely to be stacked against us.”
“I’m open to suggestions.”
“This district attorney, Freeley Sells, I know a little about him. A friend of mine from law school’s been practicing down there for more than thirty years. We’ve stayed in relatively close contact over the years. We talk on the phone every six months or so, take in a Tennessee football game once or twice a year, that sort of thing. He’s told me quite a bit about Mr. Sells.”
“Good or bad?”
“Let’s just say he holds an extremely low opinion of the district attorney.”
“We share the same opinion,” I said. “I had the distinct displeasure of speaking to him face-to-face.”
“Did you now?” Lines formed ridges across his forehead as he raised his eyebrows. “And how did that conversation go?”
“Not well. I’m afraid I made things even worse. I called him a corrupt hick.”
Beaumont laughed richly. His laugh always reminded me of Santa Claus, a throaty “ho, ho, ho.”
“You’ll be pleased to know that from everything I’ve heard about Mr. Sells, you were right on both counts,” he said.
“You said something about another way to handle it. What do you have in mind?”
“A little trick I learned a few years back dealing with another politician whose name I can’t reveal. I know it’s hard to believe, but politicians are human, and humans have secrets. I found that the key to getting a politician to do what you want him to do is to find his secrets and threaten to reveal them.”
Beaumont was an intriguing character, with his mixture of Western outfits, country charm, and genteel mannerisms. On the surface, he was the perfect Southern gentleman. But he’d been playing the game, and playing it well, for three decades and I knew from experience that a person couldn’t be effective for long in criminal defense without a willingness to act ruthlessly when the situation called for it. He apparently was of the opinion that this was the right situation. What he was suggesting was clearly blackmail.
“So how does one go about finding the secrets?” I said. “Hire a private investigator?”
“Exactly, but not just any private investigator. We need experience, we need professionalism, we need discretion, but more than anything we need results.”
