THE REVEREND
By
Christamar Varicella
Published by Christamar Varicella at Smashwords.com
Copyright 2012 Christamar Varicella
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June 28, 1969
9:17 pm
The fight was over. All that was left was the pain: the radiating soreness of a broken jaw; the throbbing ache behind her swollen left eye; three cracked ribs; and a collapsed lung that whistled with every searing breath.
A gloved hand gripped her woolen braids, dragged her limp frame across the yard. Her body cut a trail through the pine straw. Grass and mud smeared her nightgown.
Trees grew up around her, first in scattered singles, then thick with multitudes, looming over her like the shadow of a crypt. A full moon traveled above her, bullying its way through the branches.
She craned her neck for a view of her tormentor—a white t-shirt hovering in the darkness. “Please don’t do this,” she begged. Tears streamed down her swollen cheeks. She lacked oxygen necessary to scream. Her nearest neighbor was a mile away.
Quietly, the black devil worked his evil. His only sound—the occasional grunt or blasphemy. He leaned forward as if marching into a hurricane. One hand towed all of his one hundred-and-forty-four pound cargo; the other hand clutched the nylon rope coiled over his shoulder. He paused to catch his breath and adjust the rope, momentarily relaxing his grip on his victim.
A surge of adrenalin temporarily quelled the woman’s pain, fueled one last desperate escape attempt. She rolled over, found traction, and shot off into the night.
For an instant, her mind reeled at the dazzling specter of freedom. If she could slip into the protection of the trees she might disappear in the blackness. She could fight through the brambles, work her way to the highway. With a little luck she’d meet a passing car, and then…
She did not feel the shove to her back. She drifted toward the ground, landing in a desperate crawl through the sludge. A gloved hand wrapped around her ankle, drew her backwards in a helpless belly slide. A blow to the side of the head turned her over. She lay on her back, looking up through her one good eye at her tormentor. He bent down, grabbed her by the wrist, and wrenched her off the ground.
“You do not want to make this harder for me,” he hissed. The rope twisted around her upper body, flattening her arms against her sides. Once she was secured, he stood between her feet, his back to his victim, and lifted her by the ankles, one in each hand, and dragged her forward again as if towing a wheelbarrow.
Sweat and blood flowed with the tears now streaming from the woman’s eyes. Up above, the trees blotted out the moon, and all around her cicadas clicked her death song. The air was hard and wet and suffocating. There was nothing left to do but surrender herself to the woods.
Her gown slid up to her waist. For a moment, she reflected on her appearance. How would she look when they stumbled across her body? It would have been nice to freshen up before her journey to meet the Lord.
After a few minutes, they entered a clearing. The stars were bright and clear, and the moon emerged triumphant. The man hauled the woman over to a lone pecan tree in an otherwise barren circle, positioning her against the gnarled base.
“Please,” she said without much hope or effort. “Don’t do this.”
He uncoiled his extra length of rope and looped it around the tree trunk.
“I don’t deserve this,” she said.
The man persisted. A drop of sweat, made visible by the light of the moon, clung to his chin for a lingering second before falling to the ground beside her. He mumbled something under his breath as he secured the final knot, and then he reached into a waistline sheath and withdrew a large hunting knife.
June 29, 1969
3:43 am
The bleating of a rotary phone lifted Melvin Little from a deep sleep.
“What?” he grumbled.
His wife jabbed him in the ribcage with the receiver. “You have a phone call.”
Melvin blinked at the light from her bedside lamp. He rolled over and squinted at the clock on his nightstand. “Good God, is that the time?” he asked, but his wife pulled the covers up to her chin. Her breathing settled into a steady rhythm.
“Hello,” he muttered into the phone.
“Is this Mr. Little, the attorney?”
“Yeah,” Melvin answered. His eyes were closed again. By his half-conscious reckoning the stranger’s voice belonged to a colored man.
“This is Reverend Baxter. I’m at my house. The police are saying I killed my wife.”
Melvin vaguely remembered the name, but couldn’t picture a face. He sat up and wiped his eyes, trying to help them adjust to the light.
“Why’d you call me?”
“I need a lawyer, Mr. Little. They say if you’ve been accused of murder, you’re the man to call.”
Melvin smiled. “Is that so?”
“Yes sir, it is.”
“Have you been charged?” His mind, like his vision, came into focus.
“The police are searching my home. I think they’re going to arrest me. You have to help me, Mr. Little. I did not do what they’re saying.”
“I’m sorry to hear about your loss. Do you have any money?”
“My wife had an insurance policy. I could pay you with that.”
“How much is it worth?”
“The policy is in my name. It’s for eighty thousand dollars.”
“I’ll take half.”
There was a pause at the other end of the line.
“Yes sir. That will be fine.”
“Where are you?” He flipped back the covers, swung his legs off the side of the bed. His feet searched the cold floor for his slippers.
“Do you know where Highway 11 and 22 cross?”
“Yeah.”
“I live about a mile east on 22.”
“Don’t say anything until I get there.”
Melvin dropped the phone on his sleeping wife. “I have to see about something,” he said. Doris continued to snore as he made his way to the bathroom.
Twenty minutes later, he located the crime scene. A pair of squad cars from the sheriff’s department and two belonging to state troopers—blue lights flashing—lined each side of the two lane highway. He parked behind a trooper and headed up the driveway. This must be Baxter’s house, he decided. He slowed his gait as he passed a brick house with newly painted trim and white shutters in the windows—a house befitting a preacher. There were no lights on, so he continued toward the crossing beams of flashlights floating in the trees up ahead. When he reached the back of the house, he glanced over at the purple Lincoln town car parked in the wraparound driveway. It had a white retractable top and was sure to have matching leather interior—a flashy enough car for just about anyone, let alone a man of God.
Melvin stepped carefully as he entered the wooded area behind the house. His loafers weren’t built for the great outdoors; his left shoe became entrenched in the mud. “Goddamnit,” he barked. He wobbled precariously as he navigated his foot back into the grip of leather. He cursed again as he examined his clothes in the early morning light. There was mud all over the cuffs of his favorite slacks. “Somebody should have told me I’d be wading through this slop.”
He fought his way through the woods, following a line of yellow police tape that marked the victim’s final path. He eventually found his way to the clearing. Up ahead he could see a group of uniformed officers gathered around a pecan tree, whose limbs sagged under the weight of several hanging bundles.
An officer noticed him stumbling out of the forest and came up to meet him.
“What the hell are you doing out here, Melvin?”
“I came to make sure you boys weren’t planting evidence.”
“Aw, Melvin. You know we wouldn’t do that.”
Sherriff Ford nodded and gestured toward the pecan tree. “Hell of a thing,” he said. A toothpick jutted through a gap in his teeth.
Melvin heard a gentle crackling sound, like raindrops dropping from the leaves after a rain shower. “What’s that in the trees?” he asked.
“See for yourself.”
Melvin ventured closer. His mouth dropped open as he came close enough to distinguish the suspended objects. Half a dozen headless chickens dripped blood into little pools along the base of the tree.
“Looks like he killed the nigger woman first,” Sheriff Ford said cheerfully as he walked Melvin through the crime scene. “Then he started wasting fowl. Chopped their heads off on that little stump over there then strung up the bodies like tinsel on a Christmas tree.”
Two deputies, who had been standing in front of the victim puffing cigarettes and chatting absently, stood aside so Melvin could view the gruesome spectacle. His gaze shifted from the dead chickens to the woman below. A black woman, around forty, with her arms tied down at the waist, sat motionless against the base of the tree. Her eyes were wide and empty of life. Her body was punctured with numerous stab wounds.
Melvin curled his nose at the sight. “What’s her story?” he asked.
The Sheriff flipped open a small notepad. “Her name is Shirley Baxter. Thirty nine years old. Unemployed. Married at the time of her death to the good Reverend William Baxter, currently in custody.”
“That’d be my client,” Melvin said. He put his hands behind his back, paced a circle around the tree as he meditated on the circumstances, momentarily forgetting the raining blood, which now splattered down on his foot. He lifted his foot into the air and scowled. “Goddamnit.”
The representatives of law enforcement chuckled merrily. A deputy shook his head. “You should ‘a worn your huntin’ boots.”
“I paid forty dollars for these loafers.”
“What’s a matter, Melvin? You act like you’ve never seen a voodoo killin’ before.” Sheriff Ford said.
“Is that what this is?”
“That’s what the colored folks are saying.”
“Are they now?”
“They are indeed. They say our chief suspect is a practitioner of the black arts.”
“This is the first I heard about voodoo.” It surely would not be the last.
Melvin turned to the sheriff. “You say you have the reverend in custody?”
The sheriff dropped his toothpick on the ground and then pulled a cigarette out of his shirt pocket. He was a big man with a belly like a bass drum. He lit his cigarette with a Zippo lighter and then blew a stream of smoke into the air above his head.
“I wouldn’t show him the respect of calling him reverend, but yeah, he’s in route to the jailhouse as we speak.”
“What about a murder weapon?”
“Found a knife in the house. Looks like a match.”
“What’s the motive?”
The sheriff waved his hand dismissively. “Aw Melvin, you know how these folks are with their women. He was probably running around with another gal, and when she raised a stink, he put her on the butcher’s block.”
“Along with a half-dozen chickens?”
Sheriff Ford coughed and spat on the ground. “Who the hell knows? Probably some crazy pagan nonsense brought over from Africa.”
“How can you be sure it’s the same knife?”
The sheriff pointed at the corpse. “The blade looks to fit them holes. Just to be sure, there’s a GBI man on the way out here to look it over. He’ll likely have his lab boys analyze it to be sure.”
“What’s the GBI man’s name?”
“Detective Abel. You know him?”
“I see him around from time to time. He’s testified against a few of my clients.”
In Melvin’s opinion, Abel was as capable as his name implied. He’d worked for the Georgia Bureau of Investigation for several years and had earned a stellar reputation. Melvin hoped the sheriff and his boys would disrupt the crime scene enough to destroy any evidence the detective might hope to find. He turned to go, but the sheriff stopped him cold with a line intentionally delivered to sound like an afterthought.
“We also have an eyewitness.”
“The hell you say.”
“Saw him coming out of the woods naked with a shovel in his hand not four hours ago.”
“Where’s the shovel?”
“We’re looking for that.”
“Well, let me know when you find it,” Melvin said as he wandered off toward his car, but in his head he was cursing this horrendous piece of luck. The prosecution had, in all likelihood, the murder weapon and enough circumstantial evidence to convict his client. It didn’t help matters that the Reverend was black and the jury would be chosen from a pool that was majority white. If Baxter copped a plea, the insurance wouldn’t pay out on the policy.
Melvin berated himself for taking the case in the first place and vowed never again to agree to anything before having at least one cup of coffee.
October 7, 2007
11:32 a.m.
The little old man sat slumped behind a hand-carved Mahogany desk; his wrinkled jowls rested near the polished surface. Though closing in on his seventieth birthday, he looked at least ninety. He wore a cheap salt-and-pepper toupee that seemed to hover above his liver-spotted forehead. His narrow shoulders sank beneath the rising hump on his back. Staring at the unwanted visitor standing in his office doorway with a mixture of curiosity and annoyance, he offered a curt nod and pointed an index finger across his desk to an ornately designed wooden chair cushioned with red velvet.
The young man accepted the gesture without expression or comment. To the great irritation of his host, he disregarded the proffered chair and chose instead to mosey around the office, observing the decor.
The room was set up like a shrine to Melvin Little. Photographs of the old lawyer decorated the walls along with various degrees and honors. Melvin graduated magna cum laude from the University of Georgia. He was Phi Beta Kappa and an editor of the law review. What Peter had first taken to be a bronze bust of Ronald Reagan was revealed on closer inspection to be, in fact, Melvin himself. Peter couldn’t help but chuckle.
“What’s so funny?” Melvin asked. He glared at the interloper, this man with long black hair pulled back into a ponytail. He was strongly inclined to take a pair of scissors out of his desk drawer and show him how a real man wore his hair. He could do it too. Appearances aside, he was spry for his age, but he was also a Christian, and this was America after all, where any fool could grow his hair down past his ass if that’s what he wanted to do. Of course, not many boys wore long hair in South Point. Peter stood out like a red devil at a church picnic.
Peter shook his head dismissively, but said nothing.
“Why are you here?” Melvin growled.
Peter straightened a crooked frame. He gazed intently at the photograph probably taken back in the eighties. It was a rare photo of the lawyer letting his playful side show. A much younger version of Melvin stood behind a podium, obviously giving a speech, his palms raised beside his head with his thumbs extended into his ears and his fingers protruding into the air like the horns of a moose. He seemed to be making fun of the camera, or someone, in the taunting manner of a child. Peter double-checked to be sure the photo was level before aiming his gaze at the old man behind the desk.
“Why am I here in your office, or why did I return to South Point?” he asked casually before answering his own question. “Because you invited me.”
“Your email made me curious,” Melvin said. He spoke through the side of his mouth, which seemed to be lined with cotton, a lingering effect of the stroke he’d suffered a year before. “What’s your interest in Reverend Baxter?”
Peter sauntered over and plopped down in the chair. His gaze drifted up to the ceiling as he stroked his chin. “It’s like I told you in the email. I’m doing research.”
“So you drove down from Atlanta after all these years for a school paper?”
Peter nodded. “Something like that.”
Melvin narrowed his eyes. “And what exactly do you want from me?”
“I want to hear you tell the story.” Peter squeezed a hand into the pocket of his blue jeans and withdrew a digital recorder. To the old lawyer’s astonishment, he pressed the record button. “Why don’t you tell me everything you remember about your connection with the case, everything you remember about the Reverend, and then…”
Melvin pushed back from the desk. His leather chair rolled until it stopped against the wall. “That’s an awful long story, and I don’t have time to tell it now. I didn’t mean to waste your time. I invited you here out of a courtesy. I knew your family well. But I …” He looked at his watch. “I’m afraid I’m going to have to cut this meeting short. I’m supposed to see a client in a few minutes.”
“I just got here.”
“Yeah, but I didn’t know this would take all day. My clients take precedence.”
Peter watched and listened to the old man with amused interest. He let Melvin’s words hang in the air for several beats before opening his mouth. When he did speak, his voice was quiet but confident. “You wouldn’t be stonewalling me, would you, Melvin?”
Melvin waved a hand in the air as if to brush away a fly. “I told you, I have a client. If you’d like we can talk about this later, though I don’t know that there’s anything I can tell you that you couldn’t find in a newspaper from the period. It was a real tragedy what happened, but my life went on. Good luck with your research paper.”
Peter sat in his seat, calmly examining the septuagenarian.
Melvin shuffled around his desk. He reached toward Peter’s elbow, but then seemed to rethink the idea. “It was nice to see you again.” He shuffled out into the hall, turning to Peter, who lingered in the office. “Thanks for stopping by.”
A few minutes later Peter stood outside the office, his hands jammed into the pockets of his windbreaker. He took two steps toward the parking lot, stopped, and then turned back toward the building. He took another step toward the door and then changed his mind again. Inside the office, he’d worn a mask of confidence. Outside, standing in the cool air, he wasn’t sure of anything.
Across the street, two members of the volunteer fire department washed their truck in the driveway. Peter heard the sound of men laughing. He turned and watched as one of the firemen blasted his Dalmatian mascot with a hose. Peter felt sorry for the dog, now wet in the chilly air. He stood watching for a moment and then walked to his car.
One of the firemen elbowed his coworker. “Did you see that guy over there coming out of Melvin’s office?”
“What about him?”
“He was acting strange.”
“That guy over there in the blue Toyota?”
“Yeah. He was just standing there staring.”
“Well, if he came out of Melvin’s office, he’s probably guilty of something.”
The barking Dalmatian roused them back to their duties. Thoughts of the stranger quickly faded.
October 7, 2007
2:05 p.m.
Erin Barksdale rocked forward in her chair, propelled by the force of her sneeze. She trapped most of the viscous expellant in a tissue paper whipped from a box on her desk at the last possible moment, but the forced air fluttered loose papers across her desk. She had no business coming to work this day, but the newspaper was short-staffed. A third of The Observer’s reporters were out sick, and if she went home too, that fraction would increase by another third. Without demonstrable proof of a fever, her editor Arnold Strasser, a.k.a., Arnold the Terrible, would lay a guilt trip upon her the likes of which had not been experienced since the time she tried to take personal leave on the day of the annual homecoming parade.
God forbid she should take a day off. Who would be left to report on the high school basketball team’s new uniforms? Such were the demands of the frenzied news cycle in South Point, Georgia.
She stifled a cough as she searched her cubicle for her purse, misplaced again. She sifted through the mess surrounding her keyboard and monitor, looked in the cubbyhole beneath her desk and on the floor, and finally found what she was looking for slung across the back of her own chair. She fumbled around for some time before locating the half-drunk bottle of codeine cough syrup that would dull the itch in her throat and leave her in a semi-trance for the next three to four hours. Erin opened the bottle and tossed back a long swig.
She still had the bottle pressed to her lips when she noticed the stranger. He stood at the edge of the newsroom nodding politely to whatever stream of nonsense emerged from the mouth of Denise the receptionist, a woman renowned for a recurring affliction of endless banter that Arnold had mistaken for personality when he hired her the previous spring. Erin quickly honed in on the man.
It wasn’t the fact that he was handsome that boosted her curiosity—though he was striking, with brilliant blue eyes and long black hair pulled back into a pony tail—but the way he tilted his head slightly as he peered intently into the eyes of Denise, as if he really cared about what she was saying, though Erin knew this to be impossible. Something about him was different, and in a town where change happened every other ice age, anything different was interesting.
As a reporter, she held her finger on the town’s pulse. The problem was the town was dying. Day by day, week by week, year by year, the pulse was growing weaker. Carmichael Mills, once the region’s lifeblood, had long since closed its doors, outsourcing most of the city’s jobs to southern Asia. Most young people with means fled to Atlanta at the first opportunity. Erin had moved back home after college to save money and be near her family, only to find her parents’ marriage had soured and she could no longer stand to be near them. She tolerated their constant bickering for more than a year while she saved up a down payment on a house. By then she had landed her job at the newspaper, yet another dying industry.
Denise pointed a long bony finger in the direction of the archives room. The stranger smiled, offered a word of thanks, and then traveled down the line of cubicles until he disappeared out of sight.
Erin’s natural inclination was to follow him. What was this man doing in town? What was he looking for in the archives? Was he a fellow reporter? More importantly, was he single?
A fit of coughing choked off any notion of an introduction. She felt disgusting. Her voice was raspy; her nose was running. She would probably sneeze on him. Besides, she was beginning to register the effects of the cough syrup, which always left her feeling loopy. Rather than wasting the effort, she decided to sit in a semi-vegetative state and stare at her computer screen for the afternoon.
June 29, 1969
9:43 a.m.
Reverend Baxter sat with his back against the wall in one of the brightly-colored plastic chairs bolted along the periphery of his holding cell. He was the only person in the room, and to Melvin, peering through a slit in the iron door, he appeared perfectly at ease. Melvin had not yet met his client; he had been curious as to how he might look. He found a man of such casual composure he might as well have been sitting in the waiting room of a doctor’s office rather than a jailhouse facing murder charges. One long leg crossed over the other. He wore a white suit with a light blue pinstriped shirt beneath the vest and a thick pink tie. As Melvin entered the room, he turned and greeted his lawyer with a broad, easy smile.
“Melvin Little, I presume.”
The iron door slammed shut behind the young lawyer. Melvin turned and motioned to the guard peering through the small rectangle of plexiglass. He nodded and disappeared.
“That’s what it says on my driver’s license,” Melvin said as he strode across the vast empty center of the room to shake his client’s hand. A thin man with angular features, the Reverend appeared remarkably well kept despite a night spent in the tank. His suit was clean and free of wrinkles, and his face was cleanly shaven.
“Thank you for seeing me,” Reverend Baxter said. Melvin was surprised by the strength of his elocution. The civil rights movement had been slow to catch up to South Point. In public, black people were still expected to act out a ‘Stepin Fetchit’ routine. They were expected to say “yes suh” and “no suh” and generally play the roles the whites had come to expect. In truth, Reverend Baxter was an educated man with little interest in playing the part assigned to him by the white community.
Melvin released his client’s hand and then took a seat two chairs down, dropping his briefcase in the open space between. “I’ve arranged for your bail. You should be getting out of here soon. I convinced the judge a preacher with plenty of ties to the community, and a World War II vet to boot, was no flight risk.”
Baxter nodded his approval.
“The prosecution has your knife, which it claims was used to kill your wife. They also have a witness who says she saw you walking out of the woods with a shovel not long after your wife was killed.”
Baxter raised an eyebrow slightly, but showed no other sign of concern. “That’s ridiculous,” he said.
“Well, the DA seems to believe it.” Melvin leaned down and snapped open his briefcase. He fumbled through the contents until he located a legal pad.
“I did not kill my wife,” Baxter said. He removed a piece of lint from a crease in his pants and then uncrossed his legs. His arm was still wrapped around the chair containing Melvin’s briefcase.
“Well if that’s true, it sure would be nice to find some evidence that proves your innocence. And of course, you’re going to need a decent alibi.”
“I was out of town and did not arrive home until late in the evening.”
“Can anyone else corroborate that?” Melvin clicked a ballpoint pen and prepared to write down the Reverend’s answer.
“I was at a revival all day. Hundreds of people must have seen me.”
“Well, that’s great.” Melvin nodded appreciatively. “If I could just have the names of some of the people who can verify that you were with them at the time of the murder…”
Baxter said nothing, just stared into space.
“It’s very important that we produce at least one name.”
“I’ll have to get back to you on that,” the Reverend said.
Melvin reviewed his notes. “The prosecution is going to say you and Mrs. Baxter had a volatile relationship. They’re going to say you killed her for the insurance money.”
“Ridiculous,” Baxter repeated.
“Well they got a murdered woman tied to a tree, and they’re going to want to make somebody pay for it. Right now, you’re the best chance they’ve got to put someone in the state’s new electric chair.” Melvin needed to impress on his client the seriousness of the situation. Somehow the message wasn’t getting through.
Baxter studied his lawyer in silence for a long time before he spoke. “The righteous will rejoice when he sees the vengeance. He shall wash his feet in the blood of the wicked.”
“What’s that?” Melvin asked.
“Psalm 58:10,” Baxter said.
Melvin let dropped his pen in the open briefcase. “I’ve been known to teach Sunday school myself. I guess I’m not familiar with that verse.” He scanned the room. He knew the county couldn’t afford any advanced monitoring equipment, but a statement like that made him paranoid. He leaned in close to the Reverend and spoke in a hushed tone. “I’m all for a client of mine spouting off a good bible verse to show the community he’s a God-fearing Christian. That can work in our favor, but you need to be careful which verse you pick to speak in public. How am I supposed to defend you if you go around talking about bathing in blood?”
“You’re asking me to edit God’s word?”
“Of course not, I’m just saying you have to be selective about what you say; that’s all. No more talk about bloody feet washing. Now, I’m going to represent you either way because you seem like a nice man, and I’d like to have some of your money, but if you’re found guilty of murder there ain’t no insurance company in the world that’s gonna pay you a damned thing.” Melvin suddenly realized he’d been growling in the face of a man who most likely butchered his own wife. He grabbed the lapels of his suit jacket and slowly backed away. He could be extremely feisty when he was riled up. Many prosecuting attorneys in Georgia had learned that lesson, but this was Baxter’s first sight of it, and Melvin didn’t know how his client would react. Baxter continued to smile.
“At least you’re honest about your motivation for helping me,” he said. “Now I know you only want my money.”
“Of course I do. Why else would I be doing this?”
The Reverend laughed. “Your greed will be your undoing.”
“It probably will,” Melvin agreed. “But you need to watch what you say. Some people might interpret your words as a threat.”
Baxter gestured to an empty room. “Look around. There is no one else here. I am just a man having a normal conversation with another man.”
“I wouldn’t call this conversation normal.”
“Do you think I’m guilty?”
“That’s not for me to decide.” Melvin examined his client, trying to discern intent behind those cold eyes.
“But you must have an opinion.”
“I think everybody is entitled to a sound defense, and my clients always get the best defense money can buy.”
“Do you believe me when I say I’m not guilty?”
“I have no reason not to believe you.” Other than all the evidence, Melvin thought. “But I honestly don’t care if you’re guilty or not. I’d defend you either way.”
“I could never defend the wicked.”
The words put Melvin in an uncomfortable position. He had no response.
“Some people were put here by the devil,” Baxter continued. “They come to tear you down and rob you of your soul.”
This is why it’s almost always a mistake to put your defendant on the witness stand, Melvin thought. “If the DA was listening to this,” he said, “he might conclude you were talking about your wife.”
“I was speaking in general terms.”
Baxter was obviously one of those fire-and-brimstone preachers, Melvin decided. He was glad he was born a Methodist. A Methodist preacher might bore you to death, but other than that you were safe.
“I can’t say if I believe in justifiable homicide. I suppose if my life was in danger I would defend myself. Or if my family’s life was in danger, I believe I would be justified in taking a life, but that’s about it. We have laws in place for a reason. We have to leave it to the courts to administer justice.”
“And when they fail?”
“Our system may not be perfect, but it’s the best we’ve got. Usually, if a guilty man goes free, he’ll end up in jail sooner or later for something else.”
“After more crimes are committed?”
“Unfortunately.” Melvin was not at all comfortable having this conversation with his client, especially when everything Baxter was saying seemed to apply to Baxter alone. Melvin wasn’t sure if the man was incredibly simple or incredibly complicated. He supposed he’d have plenty of time to figure that out over the course of a trial. “Enough of this nonsense,” he said finally. “It’s unproductive. Let’s get you out of jail.”
Henry Russell, the assistant district attorney who would be prosecuting the case, had provided Melvin with a copy of his witness list, and Melvin had dutifully combed through the names, interviewing each person to get an idea of what he or she would say. One afternoon, he sat down with Mr. Russell’s chief witness, a woman named Calpurnia Murphy, on her front porch. She lived about a mile away from where the victim was found. A solidly built woman in her early forties, Mrs. Murphy had spent nearly twenty five years caring for her disabled husband. Mr. Murphy had finally passed away the previous fall, and now she was alone.
She told Melvin the same thing she told the DA. On the night of June 28, she came home late after an evening visiting with relatives. At around eleven p.m., she was getting ready to go to bed when she suddenly realized that she had not brought in the day’s mail. She put on a shawl and a pair of slippers and made her way down the gravel path to her mailbox. She retrieved a stack of letters and was about to return to her house when she noticed a shirtless man emerging from the woods across the street, carrying a shovel.
Melvin asked Ms. Murphy how she could be so certain that the man she saw was Baxter—after all, it was late at night in a poorly lit area—but the witness harbored little doubt. The man had crossed the street directly beneath the only street light within a half-mile radius. Calpurnia had a perfect view of his face from less than five yards away. Also, the man had smiled, tipped an imaginary cap and said, “Good evening Ms. Murphy,” while using Baxter’s voice and mannerisms.
When the police beat on her door early the next morning, Calpurnia relayed the strange encounter. For the next three days, volunteers from the sheriff’s department scoured the woods for buried evidence—a weapon used in the crime or blood-stained clothes—but nothing was ever found. Their only piece of hard evidence came back from the crime lab with a note. “It has been determined that this knife could not have been used to commit the murder.” The prosecution would have to rely on the eyewitness account to secure a conviction.
On the day Ms. Murphy was scheduled to testify, the courtroom was packed. With a Baptist minister charged with murder and rumors of voodoo circulating, the trial had attracted the curiosity of both the black and white community, and this would prove to be the climactic moment of the trial. Henry Russell looked supremely confident sitting behind the prosecutor’s table. His hands were folded in front of him and he wore a little worm of a smile on his face.
Melvin looked away in disgust. He badly needed to win this case. His future depended on it. If he won, his reputation would be solidified. If he lost, he would be just another lawyer struggling to make a living.
There was no air conditioning in the courtroom. A pair of ceiling fans recycled the hot air. Melvin mopped up the rain pouring from his forehead with a sopping handkerchief. His client was dressed in yet another expensive suit. Other than a few beads of sweat on his forehead, he appeared perfectly content.
Melvin heard doors swing open behind him, and turned in time to see Calpurnia enter the courtroom. She wore a dark blue Sunday dress with a white floral pattern and white pumps. She had a hat to match her dress, but removed it after the bailiff leaned in and whispered something to her as he was escorting her to the witness box. She took her seat and then immediately stood for the swearing in. After she vowed to tell the truth and nothing but the truth, Henry Russell began the questioning.
“Miss Murphy, would you state your full name to the jury and tell us where you’re from?” Russell began.
“My name is Calpurnia Barrett Murphy. I was born in Hartselle, Alabama, but now I live in Yamacraw County, down by the highway.”
“How do you know the defendant?”
“He’s been my neighbor for about ten years. His wife used to do my hair.” She fanned herself with her hat.
“And did you see the defendant on the night of June 28, 1969?”
“Yes sir, I did.”
The testimony was unfolding just as Melvin had feared. Soon he would have an opportunity to try and discredit the witness. He would try to paint her as an aging woman with failing eyesight trying to identify a black man at night; a racially insensitive defense that he hoped would resonate with an all-white jury. Unfortunately for Melvin, the assistant DA had arranged for Murphy’s eye doctor to testify that the woman had perfect vision. Also, there was the fact that his client had made the bone-headed decision to speak to the woman. That and the fact that the two neighbors had been well acquainted for the majority their lives would leave little doubt in the jury’s mind that Ms. Murphy had indeed seen a shirtless Reverend Baxter carrying a shovel not long after his wife was murdered a short distance away. This testimony, Melvin realized, would most likely be the nail in Baxter’s coffin.
He wiped his eyes and then looked up at his client. Baxter sat perfectly erect. He was freshly shaven and wore a neat burgundy ensemble. He seemed to be following the testimony without the least trace of concern.
“Can you describe the circumstances of what you saw?” Mr. Russell asked the witness.
Baxter turned to Melvin and winked.
“Reverend Baxter and I attended a revival meeting together that night down in Wilcox County,” Calpurnia said.
“Excuse me?” Russell asked in a confused voice. Even old Judge Abrams seemed taken aback, and he’d seen just about everything during his forty years on the bench. He scratched his balding head as he stared down into the witness box over the pair of wire-rimmed glasses perched on the end of his nose, as if mentally asking, “Did she really say that?”
“We attended a tent revival down in Wilcox County. We didn’t arrive home until after midnight.” The witness answered confidently. She was almost glowing.
“That’s not what you said before.”
“I object.” Melvin reacted quickly. “The question has been asked and answered.”
“Sustained,” Judge Abrams said.
The prosecutor looked at the judge for help. Veins bulged out of his neck and forehead. “She’s lying,” he said.
Melvin stood up. “I object, Your Honor. He’s trying to impeach his own witness.”
“Sustained.”
“Are you going to sit there and tell the jury, after all this time, that you and the Reverend were together on the night in question?”
“Objection, Your Honor. That question has been asked and answered.”
“Sustained.”
“What about what you said before? Did you not tell us that you were home alone that night?”
The witness tilted her head as if to say, “What are you going to do about it?” Under the law there was little Russell could do. He could have her arrested for perjury after the fact, but the charge would be almost impossible to prove. Baxter would almost certainly confirm her story. There was no law against lying to him or to the police during the initial statement.
“The defense objects to what she may or may not have said in the past,” Melvin said.
“She’s gone and changed her story on us, Your Honor,” Russell explained.
“The prosecution has no case, Judge. I move for a directed verdict in favor of the defendant.” For Melvin, the case was all but won.
“Your Honor,” Russell pleaded, but even he knew it was over.
“The motion is granted. Verdict is directed in favor of the defendant. Case dismissed.” The judge banged his gavel and that was it. The courtroom spectators murmured as they gathered their things and headed toward the door. Few had expected such an entertaining turn of events. Only the friends and family of the victim seemed truly disappointed. The others had enjoyed the spectacle.
Melvin rose and shook Baxter’s hand. His client flashed his trademarked grin. He had known this would happen, Melvin realized now. Somehow, he had gotten to the witness. Had he threatened her? “I don’t know how you did it,” Melvin said. “I don’t think I want to know.”
“Everything happens for a reason,” Baxter answered. He turned to greet a throng of well-wishers. Melvin slipped away.
He would have to sue the Providential Causality Company in order to collect the insurance Reverend Baxter had taken out on his wife, but Melvin had the law on his side. For his efforts, he would eventually collect a little over forty thousand dollars in legal fees, enough to purchase a small office building downtown. Reverend Baxter would rake in the other forty thousand.
Three weeks after the judge dismissed the case, Calpurnia Murphy and Reverend William Baxter were married in a private ceremony.
October 7, 2007
4:48 p.m.
As the day progressed, Erin’s physical condition improved while her mental condition deteriorated considerably. A combination of codeine cough syrup and various over-the-counter pharmaceuticals alleviated most of her cold symptoms while eliminating all remnants of motivation and self-consciousness. Not surprisingly, she accomplished very little work.
Twice she noticed the stranger emerge from the archives room. Once he went to use the restroom, and then an hour or so later Erin watched with glazed indifference as he ambled past the front desk, offered a friendly nod to Denise, and then pushed through the double doors and out into the street. A half-hour later, he returned through the front door with a cup of Starbucks coffee. He stayed in the back room for the rest of the afternoon.
Near quitting time he materialized at the copy machine, not three feet from her desk, carrying one of the unwieldy bound editions containing old issues of The Observer. (The newspaper’s owner lacked both the funds and the manpower needed to convert the archives to microfilm.) Despite the bulkiness of the volume, the stranger seemed to have little trouble manipulating the giant book onto the flatbed copy machine.
Erin realized that if ever there was an opportunity to meet this person, that time was now. In codeine-induced slow motion, she flipped open a compact mirror and examined the strange reflection. Her nose and eyes were red and her hair was frizzy and tangled. She reminded herself of a clown. And yet, she felt strangely calm as she tapped her nose with fresh powder and then casually sidled up next to the stranger.
Peter was still investigating the intricacies of the copy machine when he heard the sound of a young woman clearing her throat.
“You want some help?” she asked.
Peter turned and was surprised to find a pretty young brunette standing before him. Shoulder length hair, oval eyes with emeralds in the center, she was a knockout. She looked to be in her early to mid twenties and was dressed professionally. Her voice was relaxed, and Peter thought he detected a tinge of apathy, as if she really didn’t care whether he needed her help or not. He didn’t, but he had no interest in letting an opportunity to meet a pretty young woman slip away. “If you don’t mind,” he said.
Erin grabbed one end of the giant volume. Together they flipped it over and set it back down on the copy bed. She surveyed the room, which seemed different somehow. All the cubicles and plants and people walking about seemed to be surrounded by a soft halo effect. Damn, she thought, this medicine is kicking my ass.
“So, tell me, Stranger,” she said. “Who are you? What are you doing here?” She almost laughed out loud at the sound of her own voice. Who talks like this?
Peter dropped the second quarter into the coin slot, and then looked directly at Erin. “I’m Peter and I’m making a copy,” he said, deadpan.
“I realize that probably sounded rude,” Erin explained. “I was just wondering who you were and what you were doing here, so I thought I’d ask. That’s one of the things I do around here. I ask questions.” Just say you’re a reporter, she thought. She smiled dopily.
Peter cast a curious glance. “Well you’re very good at it,” he replied. He collected the oversized sheet of paper that popped out of the copy machine and examined it. “I need one more page. Do you mind?”
“Oh, right.” Erin lifted the lid of the copy machine. Once again, she helped him flip the huge book onto its back, so Peter could turn the large yellowing pages until he found the one he was looking for. Erin noticed the date under the banner headline was in June of 1969. “So you’re researching the Reverend, huh?”
“You’ve heard of Reverend Baxter?” Peter seemed to perk up.
“Oh yeah. Everybody’s heard of the Reverend. Are you writing a book or something?”
“I hadn’t planned on it.”
“Then what’s your plan, Man?” She felt like some other person, the kind of person who got high at work, perhaps.
“You have a very odd way of speaking,” Peter said.
“Uh huh. I’m getting over a cold.”
Peter eyed her strangely. He collected his copies and stacked them on top of the volume of newspapers. “Well, uh, thanks for your help.”
Erin watched him gather his materials and walk off in the direction of the archives room. She paused momentarily and then followed him into a small, sparsely decorated area illuminated by a solitary 60-watt light bulb hanging from the ceiling. A couple of heavy wooden tables dominated the room, along with two iron bookcases that lined the cinderblock walls and bore the weight of heavy bound volumes dating back to the 1880s. Peter was sitting down at one of the tables, bent over, examining a line of text. It was very cute, Erin thought, the way he studied so intently.
“I’m Erin by the way.”
Peter looked up and smiled. “Nice to meet you, Erin” he said. He was about to say something else when one of Erin’s coworkers popped into the room.
“Erin, I thought I saw you go in here. Are you going bowling with us tonight, or are you still sick?”
“I’m not sick,” Erin answered. “I feel great.”
The coworker looked confused. “Oh. Good. Well. Are you going?”
“It’s league night,” she explained to Peter. “That’s Brian.”
Peter nodded politely.
To Brian she said, “I was thinking about it.”
“Ok, well, if you decide to go, we meet at Phil’s in an hour.”
“Okeedokee.”
Brian stuffed his hands in his pocket and moped back to his desk.
Erin continued to stare at Peter. “You like bowling?”
“I love bowling.” His smile broadened.
“You’re welcome to come along.”
Peter closed his book and hauled it over to the proper shelf.
“Don’t feel pressured or anything.” Erin’s normal habit was to allow herself to be pursued, but this was a very strange day, and therefore it seemed strangely fitting that, at that moment, despite making the first move, she really didn’t care whether he went bowling with her or not. Either way, at least for the next few hours, she would feel just fine. Thank god for Codeine.
“I’d love to go bowling,” Peter said. “But I don’t want to intrude on a work thing.”
Erin shrugged. “People bring friends all the time. I figured you were new in town and you might want something to do. You should come if you feel like it. If not, you shouldn’t.”
Peter nodded. “Ok. Why not? Do you want to get something to eat first? I skipped lunch.”
“I like pizza.”
“Pizza is good.” Peter smiled. He leaned forward and quietly asked, “Are you stoned?”
Erin smiled and shook her head. “Nope,” she lied.
“Sorry. It’s just… never mind. Let me get my coat.”
They bought a pitcher of beer at dinner, and the alcohol softened and extended her high. She felt warm, and relaxed, and wonderful.
“So. Where are you from, Peter Marshall?”
Peter smiled. “I’m from here.”
“Impossible. I’ve lived here all my life. I would have noticed you.”
“I moved away when I was four.” He paused, seemed to ponder taking the next step, and then did. “After my parents died.” He drew a line with his finger through the frost on his beer glass.
Erin melted. “I’m so sorry.” Her eyes welled.
“It’s OK. It was a long time ago.” He sipped from his glass.
Erin dabbed her eyes with a napkin. “What are you doing nowadays?”
“I’m in grad school,” he said. “Doing research for my dissertation.”
That explains the long hair, Erin thought. “Studying what?”
“Criminology.”
Now she understood. “That’s why you’re looking into the Baxter story.”
“It’s one of the reasons.”
Erin was about to ask about other reasons when the server arrived with their pizza. Peter changed the subject. It was good conversation, never an awkward silence, and one subject flowed naturally into another.
At Carmichael Lanes, they sat beside each other in a row of plastic chairs bolted to the parquet floor. Each was more interested in the other’s company than in the game they were playing. Brian constantly had to remind them when it was their turn to roll the ball. Twice, Erin excused herself to scratch the itch in the back of her throat with swigs of cough syrup.
Peter was guarded at first, but he opened up as the alcohol flowed—he drank beer at the pizzeria and later switched to whisky and soda. He said he thought about writing crime novels—he’d read enough of them as a teenager—but he never found the time to write.
“Why are you so interested in all this crime?” Erin asked, but she slurred her words slightly so it came out, “Why are you tho interethted.” They both laughed, and the conversation turned to alcohol and drunkenness. Erin swore she was sober and in complete control of her actions.
Peter admitted he was half sloshed. His face was flushed and Erin had no trouble believing him; the fact was corroborated by the steady deterioration of his bowling game. He broke one hundred by the fifth frame, but he went downhill from there—to Erin’s amusement. Peter smiled, hurt. He tried not to let it bother him. Erin thought of the perfect word to describe him—adorkable.
She teased him, mussed his hair. She liked touching him. As the night wore on and the drinks continued to flow, the amount of touching increased. The couple inched closer and closer together until they were practically on top of one another. It was to their great delight at the time and their extreme embarrassment the next day that they began making out by the ball-return, in plain view of everyone in the bowling alley. Luckily, by then it was almost closing time and most of the patrons had gone home, including Erin’s coworkers. The only witnesses to their frenzied groping were a few die hard bowlers and the alley’s cleanup crew.
They were both too intoxicated to care, too overcome by physical chemistry. At closing time, they were in such a hurry to leave the bowling alley they almost forgot to turn in their shoes.
1969 - 1972
In the immediate aftermath of the first trial, the most popular word around town was voodoo. Rumors spread like wildfire. Evil spirits, it was said, protected the Reverend from the penalty of law. His wicked magic cast a spell over the widow Murphy, lured her into his murdering arms and convinced her that lies were equal to the truth.
The rate of stolen chickens in and around the county increased dramatically, and many wound up butchered and hanging from the trees. Blake Whitney, a part-time stock boy at the Piggly Wiggly, was said to have found blood smeared across his doorway, a warning for failing to repay a ten-dollar loan owed to the Reverend since the early sixties. Sitting at his dining table, surrounded by friends and family members, he made a show of stuffing an envelope with the amount due plus interest. “Let no man say I don’t repay my debts,” he announced. Outside in full view of all the neighbors, he held the letter over his head before dropping it into his mailbox. “You are all my witnesses,” he said. Everyone knew he was afraid.
A number of the Reverend’s neighbors found strange hand-made dolls in their mailboxes. Some were made of wood, others cloth. One cloth model was full of needles. The dissimilarity of features led police investigators to conclude that the “voodoo dolls” were made by more than one individual. While every threat was taken seriously, without any evidence or witnesses, there wasn’t much they could do.
Only Melvin and the Reverend himself appeared unruffled by all the talk and innuendo. Indeed Reverend Baxter was rather conspicuous driving around town in a new Ford Torino. He filled his closet with expensive suits and modeled them on his morning stroll downtown.
Melvin also made conspicuous purchases. He began a lifelong love affair with British Jaguars, always forest green. He drove his new sports cars to and from his newly constructed office building. He was now operating in a prime location peripheral to the courthouse, where he held court with any and every accused man or woman in the county who could scrape together the hefty retainer he now demanded.
Much like the plague of voodoo talk, word of Melvin’s courtroom skills was embellished and spread throughout the county. He had inadvertently won the best form of publicity—free publicity. The kind a lawyer can only get from defending a high profile client. Everywhere he went, people were talking about him. He was almost as notorious as the Reverend. As a result, everywhere he went—from the diner on weekdays to his Saturday night family outing at the Lakeside Grill—he received friendly ribbing from members of the town’s professional elite: lawyers, businessmen, and the sheriff himself.
“You need to do something about that client of yours,” Sheriff Ford announced through a mouthful of crumbling hushpuppies. “He’s got the colored folks scared half to death.”
Melvin smiled as he pulled out a chair for Doris over at the next table. A waitress was laying down the menus. “Which client would that be, Sheriff? I have so many.”
“You know who I’m talking about. The one that likes to hang dead chickens on his Christmas tree.”
“That doesn’t sound like any client of mine.”
“How do you explain the blood on Blake Whitney’s door?”
“Kids, I expect.”
“And the spirit doll Sarah Cutcliff found in her mailbox?”
“That was Ronnie Cutcliff’s way of warning her not to run around on him. He’s jealous and meaner than boiled hell.” Both men laughed. Melvin was used to this kind of back and forth. It was like that everywhere he went.
Overall, Melvin was about as happy as a man could be. The money was rolling in and the wife and kids were well provided for. He certainly enjoyed standing at the center of the town’s attention. Even so, a small part of him would be grateful once everything settled down and life in South Point went back to normal.
The ringing telephone split the early morning silence and awakened Doris Little. Without bothering to say hello, she lifted the phone off of its cradle and handed it directly to her husband’s slumbering form. Melvin did not stir. Undeterred, Doris placed the handset across Melvin’s neck, gave him a shove, and then settled back into unconsciousness.
Melvin picked up the phone and looked at it for a dazed minute until he realized what it was and put it to his ear. “Hello,” he mumbled.
He kept his eyes tightly closed throughout his side of the conversation—if a series of grunts can be considered conversation. “OK, I’ll be there,” he said finally.
He reached over his wife and replaced the phone on its cradle and then settled back down on his side of the bed. Suddenly, he sat up straight, his eyes wide open. He pulled the lamp switch, bathing the room in light. He poked his wife in the side until she stirred, lifted her head, and squinted at the brightness.
“I just had the strangest dream,” he said. His voice was soft and reflective. “I dreamed Reverend Baxter called me again saying his wife had died. He needed a lawyer.”
“That was no dream.” Doris’s head fell back against her pillow. “That just happened.”
“It did?” he asked, but Doris had fallen back asleep.