Turning Angel

also a female listed under the “Rejected by” heading. Apparently Kate liked to experiment.

But the entry that stops my breath is under the “Rejected” column:Cyrus.

There’s no surname listed, but the parenthetical, “Shit, close one!” seems to indicate some anxiety on Kate’s part that set this encounter apart from the others. She clearly felt less in control with “Cyrus” than with the other males she rejected. I can’t be sure that this Cyrus is Cyrus White, the drug dealer Sonny Cross warned me about, but I know of no Cyrus who attends St. Stephen’s or any other local school. At least Cyrus isn’t listed on the “Hook-ups” page, which tends to discredit Sonny’s theory that there was an ongoing sexual relationship between Kate and the drug dealer.

Studying the list in more detail, I can only hope that it’s comprehensive. The letters following the names seem to be a simple code signifying a graduated scale of sexual activity. I saw many similar codes during my time as a prosecutor in Houston, usually in the private documents or computer records of men. “K” probably stands for Kissed. “B”…Breasts? “F” probably stands for “fingers” or some variant thereof. The “ 69” and “bj” are self- explanatory. The letters following the entries under the “Real Hook-ups” heading are a bit surprising in their explicitness, but Mia did tell me that Kate was highly sexual. My guess is that “V” stands for vaginal intercourse. O/A must signify oral/anal contact. And the “EVERYTHING” following Drew’s name I can only guess at.

More than anything, I wish Kate had dated these entries. I’m sure Mia could give me at least a vague time frame, but I can’t afford to show her this journal-not yet, anyway. I need to read it from cover to cover, then load the computer disks and peruse everything on them. I hope Kate didn’t password-protect them, but I suspect she did. Even standing naked before a bathroom mirror, she radiates the self-possession of someone well practiced at protecting herself.

Staring at the photo in a kind of trance, I experience a rush of intuitive knowledge so powerful that, while I realize that facts could prove me wrong, I feel viscerally sure they will not. I race downstairs to my study, Annie’s voice pursuing me down the stairs. I call out reassurance, but I keep running.

In the study, I go to my bookshelves and pull out a folding map of Natchez. It’s a simple thing, a free handout produced for tourists by the Chamber of Commerce, but it’s proved invaluable to me during the writing of my last two novels. Spreading it open on my desk, I orient myself to Highway 61, then search for the Brightside Manor Apartments, the reputed lair of Cyrus White. I find them in short order, on the north side of town, near where the old black high school used to be. To the west of the apartments lies Lynda Lee Mead Drive, a street named for a Natchez-born Miss Mississippi who became Miss America. But to the east of them-my heart thumps against my sternum-to the east lies open land transected by a curving blue line.

St. Catherine’s Creek.

I close my eyes and breathe something very like a prayer of thanks. Though Brightside Manor is several miles from where Drew found Kate’s body-and even farther from where Kate’s corpse was discovered by the fishermen- the apartments stand a mere forty yards from the creek into which her body was dumped. This is something that will sway a jury, if not the district attorney. One glance at this map shows that Cyrus White could easily have raped and murdered Kate Townsend in his apartment, then dumped her body into the flooded torrent behind it with the near certainty that she would be swept far downstream from the crime scene, if not all the way to the Mississippi River.

“Daddy?”Annie calls faintly.

Remembering the nude photo lying on my bed, I leave the map and sprint back up the stairs. From the reverberation of Annie’s voice, I can tell she’s still in the bathroom. “I’ll be here in a minute, baby,” I promise, looking in through the steam. “I’m doing something.”

Annie smiles up from the tub. “I’m fine. I just wanted to know where you were. I heard you running.”

“Everything’s okay.”

I hurry back to the bedroom and pick up the photo of Drew and Kate.What were you doing at Cyrus White’s apartment? I ask silently.

It takes a few moments for my ringing cell phone to register. When I pick it up, the caller ID saysMIA. I’m almost afraid to answer and find out what new tragedy she’s discovered. “Hello?”

“Nancy Drew here,” she says in a deadpan voice. “Remember I told you I wanted to do what I could to help Dr. Elliott?”

“Yes.”

“Well, I got to thinking about what you told me about Shad Johnson hijacking the grand jury.”

“Yeah?”

“So I decided to take a ride down to his office.”

“You knew where it was?”

“I figured it would either be in the courthouse or in Lawyer’s Alley. I didn’t have to look very hard. Except for the bars and Pearl Street Pasta, the waterworks building was the only one downtown with lights blazing inside.”

“That’s the D.A.’s office, all right,” I say, not interested enough by Mia’s amateur detective work to remove my gaze from Kate’s body or my mind from the juxtaposition of Brightside Manor and St. Catherine’s Creek.

“Well, that’s not all I saw,” she says.

“No?”

“You sound distracted. What are you doing, watching soft porn on Cinemax?”

“Sorry. What else did you see?”

“Two people walking into the first floor of the waterworks building. They used the D.A.‘s door, and they looked pretty friendly.”

“Did you recognize them?”

“Sure did. One was the sheriff, Billy Byrd.”

My chest tightens. “And the other?”

“Judge Minor.”

Holy shit.Kate’s nude body is forgotten.

“Got your attention now?”

“You do indeed.” Arthel Minor is one of Natchez’s two circuit court judges. He was among the first African- Americans in Mississippi to be elected to the position after Reconstruction. As a circuit court judge, he has a 50 percent chance of handling the Kate Townsend murder case when it comes to trial. And like both Shad Johnson and Billy Byrd, Arthel Minor is known to have higher political aspirations.

“How did you recognize Judge Minor, Mia?”

She laughs. “I served on the Mayor’s Youth Council this year. I spent a couple of hours talking to him. He had me rolling on the floor with his jokes.”

This girl is good. “Can you see what they’re doing now?”

“Not from where I’m sitting, which is at the malt shop drinking a Parrot Ice. But I can get back there in about a minute.”

“Hang on a second. I need to think.”

“Don’t strain yourself.”

The image of Shadrach Johnson, Sheriff Billy Byrd, and Judge Arthel Minor meeting together after business hours sends a cold shot of fear through my veins. It might seem natural that these people should meet and discuss an investigation in progress. But in fact, this kind of meeting never happens. Contrary to what we see on television, the investigation of a crime is handled almost solely by police officers. After adequate evidence has been obtained, the case is then handed over to the district attorney, who takes it to a grand jury. If the grand jury binds the accused over for trial, there’s a preliminary hearing before a municipal court judge. Only then does a circuit judge enter the picture. What Mia has described is a meeting that, while legal by the strict letter of the law, is very dangerous to the integrity of the legal system, and more particularly, I fear, to my friend Drew Elliott. Together, those three men could investigate Drew’s life, try him for murder, and sentence him to death.

“Mia, can you come back here and watch Annie for an hour? I know I’m taking advantage, but can you do that?”

“I guess I’d better. The Ivy League isn’t cheap, you know.”

“You’re two minutes away, if you punch it.”

She laughs. “More like one.”

“Annie’s still in the bathtub. I’ll meet you at the front door.”