Morning Glory

and cast a last lingering gaze over Elly as he reached the defense table and turned his back on them.

Collins was already there, dressed like a dotty museum curator in crinkled puce wool, smelly yellowed cotton, and a silk tie decorated with…pink flamingos! When the handcuffs were removed, Collins rose and shook Will’s hand.

'Things are looking good. I see you’ve got a cheering section.'

'I don’t want my wife on the stand, Collins, remember that.'

'Only if necessary, I told you.'

'No! They’ll tear her apart. They’ll dredge up all that stuff about her being crazy. You can put me on but not her.'

'That won’t be necessary. You’ll see.'

'Where were you yesterday? I sent word I wanted to see you.'

'Pipe down and have a chair, Parker. I’ve been out saving your hide, chasing down witnesses your wife dug up.'

'You mean it’s true? She’s been-'

'All rise, please,' the bailiff called dryly. 'The Gordon County Court is now in session, the honorable Aldon P. Murdoch presiding.'

Will gaped as Murdoch entered, garbed in black, but he resisted the urge to glance over his shoulder to see Elly’s reaction. Murdoch’s eyes scanned the courtroom, paused on Will and moved on. Though his expression was inscrutable, Will had one thought: by whatever miracle, he’d been delivered into the hands of a fair man. The conviction stemmed from the picture of two little boys in a swivel chair sharing a cigar box of jelly beans.

'All be seated, please,' ordered Murdoch.

Seating himself, Will leaned toward Collins and whispered, 'She didn’t really bribe him, did she?'

A pair of half-glasses hung on Collins’ porous nose. He peered over them at the papers he was withdrawing from a scuffed briefcase. 'Are you kidding? He’s unimpressible. He’d’ve had charges brought against her so fast it would’ve spun her honey.'

The trial began.

Opening statements were given by both attorneys. Collins’ was delivered in a slow drawl that gave the impression he hadn’t had enough sleep the previous night.

Solicitor General Edward Slocum’s was delivered with fire and flourish.

He was half Collins’ age and nearly twice his height. In a neat blue serge suit, freshly laundered shirt and crisp tie, he made Bob Collins look dowdy by comparison. With his ringing baritone voice and upright stature, he made Collins look ready for the boneyard. Slocum’s eyes were black, intense, direct, and the wave standing along the top of his dark head gave the appearance of a cocky rooster who dared anyone in his roost to cluck without his approval. Vocally eloquent and physically imposing, Slocum promised, through undisputable evidence, to show the jury beyond a glimmer of a doubt that Will Parker had cold-bloodedly, and with malice aforethought, murdered Lula Peak.

Listening to the two men, Will couldn’t help but think that if he were a member of the jury, he’d believe anything Slocum said and would wonder if the attorney for the defense was as senile as he appeared.

'The prosecution calls Sheriff Reece Goodloe.'

While questioning his witness, Slocum stood foursquare to him, often with his feet widespread, knees locked. He knew how to use his eyes, to pierce the witness as if each answer were a fulcrum on which the outcome of the trial hinged, then to pass them over the jury at the appropriate moment to inculcate upon them the most incriminating portions of the testimony.

From Sheriff Goodloe the jury learned of Will’s criminal record, the existence of the torn dustcloth and a note bearing the accused’s initials, and his own admission that he often read the Atlanta Constitution.

When Bob Collins shuffled to his feet, half the people in the courtroom suppressed a grunt of help. He spent so much time pondering each question that the jury shifted restlessly. When he finally drew it forth, their shoulders seemed to sag with relief. His eyes avoided everything in the room except the floor and the toes of his scuffed brown oxfords. His mouth wore a half-smile, as if he knew an amusing secret which he would, in his own good time, share with them.

His cross-examination of Sheriff Goodloe revealed that Will Parker had served his time in prison, been a model prisoner and been released with a full parole. It also revealed that Sheriff Goodloe himself read the Atlanta Constitution daily.

From a gaunt, bespectacled woman named Barbara Murphy, who identified herself as a typesetter for the Atlanta Constitution, came unassailable verification that the note was cut from a copy or copies of that newspaper. Upon cross-examination Miss Murphy revealed that the circulation of the newspaper was 143,261 and that it was conceivable that since Calhoun was one of 158 counties in the state, roughly nine hundred copies of the Atlanta Constitution flooded into it daily.

From a tired-looking elderly county coroner named Elliot Mobridge the jury learned the time and cause of death and that Lula Peak was carrying a four-month-old fetus when she died. Cross-examination established that there was no way to determine who had sired a four-month-old fetus of a dead woman.

From a brusque female medical examiner who identified herself as Leslie McCooms came the fact that remnants of dust and lemon oil matching those on the torn dustcloth had been found on Lula Peak’s neck, along with bruises caused by human hands-probably a man’s.

Defense counsel released the witness without questions, reserving the right to cross-examine her later.

From Gladys Beasley, long-standing lioness of estimable repute, came the concession that the dustcloth and lemon oil (exhibit A) could possibly have come from the Carnegie Municipal Library of Whitney, where Will Parker was employed and on duty the night of Lula Peak’s murder. Miss Beasley admitted, too, that the library did indeed carry two subscriptions to the Atlanta Constitution and she had given Will Parker permission to take home one of the two copies when it was three days old or more.

It was all testimony that Will had expected, yet he felt shaken at how incriminating it sounded when stated by witnesses under oath, from a hard wooden chair on a raised platform beside the judge’s dais.

But the tide subtly turned when Robert Collins cross-examined Miss Beasley.

'Did Lula Peak ever visit the library when Will Parker was there?'

'She most certainly did.'

'And did she speak to Mr. Parker?'

'Yes.'

'How do you know?'

'I could hear their conversation plainly from the checkout desk. The library is U-shaped, with the desk situated in the crossbar so that I can see and often hear everything that’s going on. The ceilings are high and everything echoes.'

'When did you hear the first such conversation between Peak and Parker?'

'On September Second, 1941.'

'How can you be sure of that date?'

'Because Mr. Parker asked for a borrower’s card and I began to fill one out before realizing he had not established residency in Whitney. The card was filled out in ink, thus I couldn’t erase and reuse it for another patron. Abiding by the motto, Waste not, want not, I filed Mr. Parker’s card in a separate place to reuse when he came back in with proof of residency, as I was sure he would. He still uses that original card, with the date of September second crossed off.'

Miss Beasley presented Will’s borrower’s card, which was entered as exhibit B.

'So,' Collins went on, 'on the day of September second, you overheard a conversation between Lula Peak and William Parker. Would you repeat that conversation, to the best of your recollection?'

Miss Beasley, prim and well-packed and indubitably accurate, repeated verbatim what she had overheard that first day when Lula sat down across from Will and stuck her foot between his thighs, when she trapped him between the shelves and attempted to seduce him, when she vindictively accused his wife of being crazy from the time Elly was a child, a time when Miss Beasley herself remembered Eleanor See as a bright, inquisitive student with a talent for drawing. She told of Will’s polite but hasty exit on that day and others when Lula followed him into the library under the pretext of 'bettering herself' with books which she never bothered to check out.