Between Black and White (6 page)

“I know it is,” Tom said, smiling at her and closing the door behind him.

10

The law office of Raymond Pickalew was located on First Street, about a block south of the courthouse square and two doors down from Bo’s office. The receptionist, a big-busted redhead named Bonnie who dressed in jeans and a low-cut sweater, said that her boss was working from home today. He lived in a cabin just off the Elk River about twenty minutes south of town. She had no qualms giving Tom the address of the cabin and Ray Ray’s cell number but said, “He’s bad about not answering it.”

On the way to the cabin, Tom called Rick and filled him in on the meeting with Helen.

“I need you to research the requirements for change of venue in a capital murder case in the State of Tennessee.” He paused. “If there’s any way possible, we need to get this case out of Pulaski.”

“It’s that bad?” Rick said.

“Pulaski is a small town, kid. Everyone here is probably familiar with Bo’s backstory, which is entirely consistent with a revenge killing.” He sighed. “We have to try.”

“What does Bo say?”

“I haven’t seen him yet. Still doing the groundwork. Visiting hours at the jail are this afternoon, and I’ll discuss venue with him then.”

“Professor, do you think he did—?”

“Doesn’t matter what I think right now,” Tom interrupted. “It’s too early to be making snap judgments. The bottom line is that Bocephus Haynes is my friend, and he saved my ass last year when I was feeling sorry for myself on the farm.” Tom paused, feeling heat behind his eyes. “I owe him.”

“I do too,” Rick said. “He saved Dawn’s life during the trial last year. If he hadn’t found her when he did, Willistone’s henchman might’ve . . .” He trailed off, and Tom began to slow down as he saw the sign for the Buford Gardner Bridge. Bonnie had said to take a left on Highway 31 just past the bridge. Tom clicked his blinker, knowing it was time to end the call.

“Listen, Rick, that reminds me. Can you talk to Powell?”

“Of course, but why?” Powell Conrad was an assistant district attorney in Tuscaloosa County. He was also Rick’s best friend.

“Because Andy Walton was thick as thieves with Jack Willistone.”

“Really?” Rick asked, his voice incredulous.

“That’s what General Lewis said. Anyway, we need to get an update on Willistone from Powell.” He sighed. “And we may have to pay the bastard a visit in prison. We need to know all we can about the victim.”

Silence for several seconds on the other end of the line. Then: “OK.” The trepidation in Rick’s voice was palpable, and Tom felt a little himself. Neither one of them relished the idea of seeing Jack Willistone again.

“One last thing,” Tom said, seeing Ray Ray’s cabin up ahead. “I need you to research the requirements for out-of-state admission to Tennessee in a criminal case and draft the necessary paperwork.”

“We’ll need local counsel, right?” Rick asked.

“Right,” Tom said, turning into the gravel drive that led up to the small cabin. “And I’m about to speak with Ray Ray now.”

“Ray who?”

Tom smiled. “I’ll call you later.”

He found Raymond Pickalew fishing off his pier. His old friend sat in a lawn chair and wore a navy-blue T-shirt, tattered khaki shorts, and a crimson visor with the letter
A
stenciled on the front. Even sitting down, his bare feet propped on a cooler, Ray Ray displayed the long, wiry muscles that had made him an excellent wide receiver.

“What do you say, Ray Ray?” Tom said, smiling at his old teammate.

Raymond Pickalew had been called Ray Ray since he was a baby. His father had suffered from a bad stutter, and when he tried to say “Ray,” it always came out “Ray Ray.” His mother had wanted him to just go by Ray, but when his two-year-old sister started calling him Ray Ray, she adopted it too, and before long everyone in town did. Ray Ray made all-state at Giles County High in football and went on to play at Alabama, graduating in 1960. Law school followed, and then back to Pulaski, where Ray Ray had been a general practitioner specializing in divorce since the late ’60s.

Ray Ray had a grin that seemed to curl up past his cheekbones, which made him always look like he was up to no good. It was his trademark, and though he hadn’t seen Tom in years, he gave it now, standing from his lawn chair. “Well, shit fire and save the matches. Tommy goddamn McMurtrie.” He set his rod and reel down and gave Tom a bear hug, and the strong scent of Miller High Life enveloped Tom’s nostrils. “How in the hell are you?”

“Just fine, Ray Ray.”

Ray Ray sat down and pulled two Miller High Life cans from his cooler. He pitched one to Tom and popped the top on the other one. “How about a taste of the champagne of beers?” he asked, smiling and taking a long sip from the can. “Goddamn, it’s good to see you, Tom. How long’s it been?”

Tom smiled and opened the beer. Though it was a little early in the day for a cold one, Tom figured it was best to be agreeable. After all, he was about to ask the man for a favor. “Oh . . . maybe five years. Didn’t we meet up after the spring game in Tuscaloosa a few years back?”

Ray Ray took a sip of beer and gazed down at the pier. “Actually, I saw you after that . . . at Julie’s funeral.”

Tom winced. He remembered little about his wife’s funeral. Everything a blur of handshakes, hugs, and pain. “That’s right,” he said, feeling a lump in his throat.

“Sure was sorry about that. Goddamn cancer . . .” Ray Ray had lost his sister and mother to breast cancer.

“How . . . is Doris doing?” Tom asked, and Ray Ray took a long swallow of beer, wiping his mouth and looking out at the river.

“Same,” Ray Ray said. “Still at the nursing home. The Alzheimer’s has completely taken over now. She don’t remember me at all. Used to, I’d have one day every two weeks that she’d say, ‘Ray Ray, where the hell am I?’” He chuckled bitterly. “Now I don’t even get that. I even tried that thing the guy did in the movie. What’s it called . . . ?”

“The Notebook,”
Tom offered.

Ray Ray snapped his fingers. “That’s right.
The Notebook
. Well, I tried that mess. Wrote the whole story of our courtship out and read it to her every morning. Course it wasn’t as pretty a tale as the one in the movie. Anyway . . . she don’t remember shit, and I’ve stopped going out there every day. Now I go every Friday at lunch and then come out here.” He stopped and took down the rest of his beer in one swallow. Then he crushed it in his hand and set it beside the cooler next to two similarly crushed cans. He opened another one and set his foot on top of the cooler, still watching the water. “No one ever said life was fair, Tommy old boy. I put Doris through hell for thirty years. Boned pretty much every secretary I ever had, drank like a fish, and chased cases and tail like there was no tomorrow. And then one day I wake up and tell Doris it’s all over. I’m quitting the booze. The other women. All of it. She cries and we go on a second honeymoon trip to the Keys.” He took a sip of beer. “A week after we get back, the clerk at Davis & Eslick grocery tells me that Doris is down there and can’t remember why she came. The rest . . . well, you know the rest, Tom.

“Jesus Christ, listen to me,” Ray Ray said after several seconds of silence. He took another long sip of beer and turned to Tom. “So how’s Musso doing?”

Again, Tom winced. “Dead. He killed a bobcat on my farm last year. Saved my life actually, because the bobcat was rabid and was going for me. He died from his wounds.”

Ray Ray whistled. “Goddamn. Sure sorry to hear that Tom. Damn, I loved that dog too.”

“It was hard not to love Musso,” Tom said, clearing his throat. “Got me a new dog, though. Bo gave me a white and brown bulldog last year. I named him Lee Roy.”

Ray Ray smiled. “Good name.” Then just like that the smile was gone. “You came out here because of Bo.”

Tom nodded.

“He’s in a world of shit,” Ray Ray said. “I mean a fucking F5 shit tornado.”

“He is,” Tom agreed.

“So are you out here as his friend or his lawyer?” Ray Ray asked, and the wide grin was back. Had his face been painted white and his lips red, he would’ve looked a little like one of the main villains from the Batman movies. In fact, Coach Bryant had always referred to Ray Ray as Joker.

“Both,” Tom said. “I plan to make my notice of appearance tomorrow morning.” He paused. “I need local counsel.”

“Oh, hell no,” Ray Ray said, standing abruptly and walking past Tom up the pier. “Hell . . . fucking . . . no!” he bellowed from halfway down the pier.

Tom watched Ray Ray ascend a rocky hill toward his one-story cabin. Thirty seconds later he was pacing back down the hill, shaking his head the entire way. In his right hand he held a large bottle of brown liquid.

“Tommy, you are dumber than a box of hammers, you know that?” Ray Ray said. The bottle was a handle of Evan Williams whiskey.

“Drinking the good stuff I see,” Tom said.

“Fuck you,” Ray Ray said, taking a pull off the bottle and handing it to Tom.

“I’ll pass,” Tom said, holding his hand up. “I’m still working on this beer.”

“Whatever,” Ray Ray muttered. He started to lift the bottle to his lips but then set it on the pier. He plopped down in the chair again and reached into the cooler and popped the top on another beer.

“What can you tell me about Andy Walton’s murder?” Tom asked.

“Nothing really,” Ray Ray said, squinting at Tom. “Just what’s been in the papers.
General
Lewis is usually pretty good about keeping a closed lid on information in important cases.”

This Tom believed, having just been stonewalled by the General herself. “Well, how about Andy Walton? What can you tell me about him and his family?”

Ray Ray belched, picked up the bottle of whiskey on the ground, thought about it, and then put the bottle back down. “Goddamnit.” He wiped his mouth and sighed. “The Curtis family was actually settled in Pulaski long before Andy Walton showed up. In fact, the parcel of land now called Walton Farm was where Maggie Curtis and her brother, George, were raised as kids. Andy was from Selmer, Tennessee, over in McNairy County. He made a fortune running bootleg whiskey before Buford Pusser became sheriff. Instead of going to war with Buford like the other State Line Mob folks did, Andy came over this way and started buying up land and businesses. When George and Maggie’s daddy was about to lose the farm, Andy bought the old man out and all the surrounding land too.” Ray Ray laughed as the sun began to seep behind a few clouds and the sound of thunder echoed from a good distance away. “It’ll be on us in a few minutes,” he said.

“How did Andy end up with Maggie?”

Again, Ray Ray laughed. “Some say old man Curtis offered her as part of the deal.” He shook his head. “I never bought that. I think Ms. Maggie just couldn’t bear to part with that land or the status associated with owning it. I think she made the deal with Andy more so than the old man, and Andy took it because a wife like Maggie could help him in a new town. She was big in the church. The DAR. All the little foofoo women’s clubs.”

“What happened to George?”

“He was in medical school when the old man was losing the farm, so there wasn’t anything he could do to help.” Ray Ray shrugged. “I’ll say this for George, he’s a survivor. I’m sure he had to be bitter that the family farm went to Andy, but he moved on and opened his medical practice after the old man’s death and has been a local fixture ever since. But . . .”

“But what?’ Tom asked.

“I don’t know, he’s just a strange bird. Never married. Lives in a small house two doors down from his office. Kind of a loner. Outside of going to medical seminars every so often in different places, I’ve never known him to leave town.”

“Can he shoot a twelve-gauge?” Tom asked, smiling.

Ray Ray chuckled. “I ’spect everybody in Giles County can shoot a shotgun.”

“We need another suspect,” Tom said.

Ray Ray shook his head and again grabbed the bottle of whiskey. He took a long pull off the bottle and wiped his mouth. “No. What you need is to be talking a plea deal with the General, Tommy boy.”

It had begun to rain, and Ray Ray fished out an umbrella from behind his chair and opened it. “We probably need to move this party inside.”

“Ray Ray, I need you, man. I’m filing the notice of appearance tomorrow morning. Can I put your name on it?”

Thunder clapped hard from the east, and a bolt of lightning lit up the sky. Ray Ray Pickalew gave the umbrella handle to Tom and stepped out from under the cover. “I’m just a washed-up old drunk, Tom. Bo will tell you. I’d be a cancer to his defense. You need a criminal defense guy anyway, not a divorce thug like me. Go with Lou Horn. His office is a block north of mine. Or Dick Selby. Horn and Selby have cases against Helen all the time.”

“Which means she has both of their dicks in a jar above her mantle at home,” Tom said. “You’ve beaten her before, Ray Ray. And you know this county like the back of your hand.”

“He’s guilty, Tom,” Ray Ray said, the alcohol slurring his words. “It’s a barking dog of a case. Have you read the papers? Helen ain’t going to stop until Bo is lethally injected. You understand what I’m saying.”

“He’s our friend,” Tom said.

“Wrong,” Ray Ray said. “He’s your friend.” He took another sip from the bottle, closing his eyes and grimacing as the liquid burned his throat. “If I was lit on fire and Bo had to piss, he might shoot a few drops my way, but that’s the extent of our relationship. The last time I tangled with Bo in court, we about ended up in a fistfight on the steps of the courthouse.”