Turning Angel

more important to me than Drew’s fate, as terrible as that sounds.“

Quentin Avery appraises me for several moments. Then there’s a wrinkling around his eyes, a glint in his pupils, and finally his lips break open to reveal his shining white teeth. ”Boy, you’re gonna put a big old kink in Shad’s world, aren’t you? He’s gonna want to kill you before the month is out.“

Doris stops us at a shining new Mercedes and opens the passenger door.

”What do you think about me running for mayor?“ I ask.

Quentin shrugs. ”Don’t know you that well yet.“

”Fair enough. What do you think about another white mayor instead of a black one?“

The renowned lawyer chuckles and looks down into the valley of kudzu behind my father’s office. ”What I’d like to see is a good mayor. This town’s in a world of hurt, and it’s got no time for racial ideology. It’s got no time for anything but getting down to the business of business. Maybe you’re the man for the job, and maybe you ain’t. All I know is, you’re the man who put Del Payton’s killer behind bars, and that’s more than I could do back in 1968.“ He grins. ”So I’m willing to give you a look, anyway.“

Quentin climbs into the passenger seat, settles himself, then peers up at me. ”I sense you’ve got a question for me, too. Maybe more than one.“

He’s right. I want to ask him why he seemed to abandon the civil rights movement in the 1980s and ’90s to pursue personal injury and class action cases, which greatly enriched him but did little for the people he professes to love. But I don’t dare offend him. Drew can’t afford to lose a lawyer of this caliber, not with the system already aligned against him. ”I’m just trying to get my mind around all this,“ I reply, not untruthfully.

”No, you’ve got questions,“ insists Avery. ”But we’ll be seeing a lot of each other in the coming days. After you get your confidence up, you can grill me to your heart’s content.“ He faces forward and laughs. ”Tell your daddy I’ll see him later in the week.“

Doris Avery closes the door, then takes me by the upper arm, pulls me to the rear of the Mercedes, and speaks in a low but intense voice.

”I want to make you aware of something, Mr. Cage.“

”Please call me Penn.“

”All right, Penn. Quentin’s in a lot worse shape than he pretends to be. Diabetes is a terrible disease, and it’s taken more away from him than a foot. A lot more than he’ll admit.“

Doris Avery’s eyes are wet with private pain, but she doesn’t cry. ”I’m not going to tell him not to take this case. But I’m tellingyou -don’t push him too hard. I’ve already got a lot fewer years to spend with him than I’d like. And he gave far too much of himself over the years to people who didn’t appreciate it to kill himself doing the same thing now.“

”I hear you, Mrs. Avery.“

She nods once, then turns and walks to the driver’s door. Then she smiles, just a little. ”You can call me Doris from now on. Good day to you.“

Chapter 20

Driving up the curving entrance to St. Stephen’s Prep, I realize I’ve given Sonny Cross all the time I can afford. I voice-dial his cell phone as I park in front of the high school. He answers after five rings.

”Yeah?“

”It’s Penn, Sonny. It’s six p.m. I’m about to go into the board meeting. You have anything for me?“

A squawk like a muffled yell comes through my phone. A cutoff grunt follows.

”Soon,“ hisses Cross.

”Sonny? What the fuck was that?“

”Don’t know. Must be your cell phone. I’ll call you back as soon as I can.“

Something’s going down, but I don’t have time to press him on it. ”You’ve got nothing on Marko Bakic?“

”Right. As of now.“

”Don’t forget to call me.“

The St. Stephen’s boardroom looks just as it did on the night I learned Kate Townsend was dead. The ten faces gathered around the rosewood table are more than somber. It’s as though some catastrophic threat faces the entire town, and we are meeting to consider extreme responses. Holden Smith opened the meeting before I arrived, making it clear that my status in this group is now equivocal. Only the headmistress, Jan Chancellor, looks happy to see me arrive.

”Sit down, Penn,“ says Holden. ”Afraid we had to start without you.“

I sit but don’t respond.

Jan Chancellor says, ”The board has just scheduled a memorial service for Kate and Chris tomorrow.“

”Where?“

”The school gymnasium,“ says Holden. ”Chris was Methodist, but Kate was Presbyterian. And we wanted to do it during school hours. Better not to try to transport all the kids out to a church. We can do it right here.“

”Did you talk to Jenny Townsend about this?“

”I’m going to inform her as soon as the meeting’s over.“

Typical. As if the board’s decision should rule everyone else’s life. ”Okay. So why am I here?“

Holden’s voice takes on an almost feminine tone of irritation. ”The next order of business is the expulsion of Marko Bakic.“

”Expulsion and deportation,“ grunts Bill Sims. ”It’s time for that little bastard to go back where he came from.“

”On what grounds are you expelling him?“ I ask.

”They don’t really have anything specific,“ Jan informs me. ”Just a catalog of smaller infractions. Detention-type infractions.“

”Which I seem to remember he served detention for,“ I think aloud, noting Jan’s use of ”they.“

”Exactly,“ she says, turning to Holden and Bill. ”If you want to expel Bakic, you’re going to have to do it arbitrarily.“

”Fine,“ says Sims. ”He’s a damn Croatian. What can he do about it?“

”He can sue you and this school,“ I say in an even voice. ”Our insurance would cover it, but the publicity would eat us alive. You’d wake up every day and read the words ‘illegal drugs’ and ’St. Stephen’s Prep‘ in the same article.“

”He’s not even an American!“ blurts Smith.

”That makes no difference. The foreign prisoners being held at Guantanamo are suing the federal government for unlawful imprisonment, among other things. American lawyers are lining up down there to represent them.“

”Bullcrap!“ Sims bellows. ”That’s just bull crap. That’s what’s wrong with this country.“

”No, that’s one of the things that’s right with it.“

Sims glares at me, then looks at Holden Smith as if to say, ”What the hell’s he doing here anyway?“

”I’ll tell you something else,“ I go on. ”You pulled the trigger too fast on Drew. The more I find out about Kate’s death, the more certain I am she was raped and murdered by someone else.“

”Who?“ asks someone down the table. ”That drug dealer mentioned in the paper?“

”I can’t discuss that here.“

”We’re in executive session,“ says Holden. ”No one’s keeping minutes. Nothing will leave this room.“

”That’s the funniest thing I’ve heard all year. I don’t remember one sensitive topic discussed in this room that I didn’t hear about two days later from someone who shouldn’t have known a damned thing about it. Everyone in here talks out of school, to belabor the expression, and I’m not blowing Drew’s defense to hell to satisfy the curiosity of this group. I just want those of you who condemned Drew for murder the minute you heard about him and Kate to know you were wrong.“

”But he is guilty of the affair,“ insists Holden. ”Correct?“