Sycamore Row jb-2 Read online

  She put on sandals, tightened the bathrobe, and walked outside. It was October 15, and the air was chilly again. The leaves were turning and fluttering in the breeze. She sipped from her favorite cup and ambled across the grass to a small shed where they stored their lawn mower and other necessities. Behind the shed a swing hung by ropes from a hemlock, and Lettie sat down. She kicked off the sandals, shoved back with her feet, and began flowing through the air.

  She had already been asked and the questions would return again and again. Why did Mr. Hubbard do what he did? And, did he discuss it with her? The latter was the easier-no, he never discussed anything with her. They would talk about the weather, repairs around his house, what to buy at the store and what to cook for dinner, but nothing important. That was her standard response, for the moment. The truth was that on two occasions he had casually and unexpectedly mentioned leaving something behind for her. He knew he was dying and that death was near. He was making plans for his exit and wanted to assure her that she would get something.

  But why did he leave her so much? His kids were not nice people but they didn’t deserve such a harsh penalty. Lettie certainly didn’t deserve what he left her. None of it made sense. Why couldn’t she sit down with Herschel and Ramona, just the three of them without all those lawyers, and work out a deal where they split the money in some reasonable manner? Lettie had never had anything and she wasn’t greedy. It wouldn’t take much to satisfy her. She would yield most of the estate to the Hubbards. She just wanted enough to start another life.

  A car approached on the county road in front of the house. It slowed, then kept going, as if the driver needed a long look at the home of Lettie Lang. Minutes later, another one came from the other direction. Lettie recognized it: her brother Rontell and his passel of rotten kids and bitch of a wife. He’d called and said they might be coming over, and here they were, dropping in too early on a Saturday morning to see their beloved Aunt Lettie, who’d gotten her picture on the front page and was everybody’s favorite topic now that she had wormed her way into that old white man’s will and was about to be rich.

  She scampered into the house and began yelling.

  As Simeon hovered over his grocery list at the kitchen counter, he caught a glimpse of Lettie reaching her hand into a box of saltines in the pantry. She withdrew cash. He pretended not to notice, but seconds later, as she went to the den, he grabbed the box and pulled out ten $100 bills.

  So that’s where she’s hiding “our money.”

  At least four of the kids along with Rontell said they wanted to go to the store, but Simeon needed some quiet time. He managed to sneak out the back door, hop in his truck, and leave without being seen. He was headed to Clanton, fifteen minutes away, and enjoying the solitude. He realized he missed the open road, the days away from home, the late-night bars and lounges and women. He would leave Lettie eventually, and move far away, but it damned sure wouldn’t happen now. No sir. For the foreseeable future, Simeon Lang planned to be the model husband.

  Or so he told himself. He often did not know why he did the things he did. An evil voice came from nowhere, and Simeon listened to it. Tank’s Tonk was a few miles north of Clanton, at the end of a dirt road that was used only by those looking for trouble. Tank had no liquor license, no permit, and no Chamber of Commerce sticker in the front window. Drinking, gambling, and whoring were illegal in other parts of the county. The coldest beer in the area was kept in Tank’s coolers, and Simeon suddenly had a craving as he puttered innocently down the road with his wife’s grocery list in one pocket and their lawyer’s borrowed cash in another. Ice-cold beer and Saturday morning dice and cards. What could be better?

  Last night’s smoke and debris were being cleared as a one-armed boy they called Loot mopped around the tables. Broken glass littered the dance floor, evidence of the inevitable fight. “Anybody get shot?” Simeon asked as he popped the top of a sixteen-ounce can. He was alone at the bar.

  “Not yet. Got two in the hospital with cracked skulls,” replied Ontario, the one-legged bartender who’d been to prison for killing his first two wives. He was now single. Tank had a soft spot for amputees and most of his employees were missing a limb or two. Baxter, the bouncer, was minus an ear.

  “Sorry I missed it,” Simeon said, gulping.

  “I hear it was a right good scrape.”

  “Looks like it. Benjy in?”

  “I think so.” Benjy dealt blackjack in a locked, windowless room behind the bar. Next to it, in a similar room, they were shooting dice at the moment and anxious voices could be heard. A comely white woman, with all limbs and other critical body parts intact and exposed, walked in and said to Ontario, “I’m here.”

  “I thought you slept all day,” he replied.

  “Expecting some customers.” She kept walking, and when she passed behind Simeon she gently raked her long, fake, pink fingernails across his shoulder. “Ready for business,” she cooed into his ear, but he pretended not to hear. Her name was Bonnie, and for years she’d worked the back room where many of the young black men of Ford County first crossed the line. Simeon had been there several times, but not today. When she was out of sight, he drifted to the rear and found the blackjack dealer.

  Benjy closed the door and asked, “How deep, man?”

  “A thousand,” Simeon said, cocky with the cash, a big player. He quickly spread the ten bills across the felt surface of the blackjack table. Benjy’s eyes widened. “Good God, man, you clear this with Tank?”

  “No. Don’t tell me you ain’t seen a thousand bucks before.”

  “A minute.” He took a key out of his pocket and opened the cash box under the table. He counted, pondered, worried, then said, “I guess I can do it. As I recall, you ain’t much of a threat anyway.”

  “Just shut up and deal.”

  Benjy exchanged the cash for ten black chips. The door opened and Ontario hopped in with a fresh beer. “You got any peanuts?” Simeon asked. “Bitch didn’t fix breakfast.”

  “I’ll find somethin’,” he mumbled as he left.

  Benjy, shuffling, said, “I wouldn’t be callin’ that woman no names, from what I hear.”

  “You believe everything you hear?”

  They split the first six hands, then Bonnie arrived with a platter of mixed nuts and another cold beer in a frosted mug. She had changed costumes and was wearing skimpy, see-through lingerie with black stockings and kinky platform high heels that would make a tart blush. Simeon took a long look. Benjy mumbled, “Oh boy.” Bonnie inquired, “Anything else you want?”

  “Not right now,” Simeon said.

  An hour and three beers later, Simeon looked at his watch, knew he should leave, but couldn’t force himself. His home was packed with freeloading kinfolk. Lettie was impossible. And he hated Rontell on a good day. All those damn kids running around.

  Bonnie was back with another beer, one she delivered topless. Simeon called a time-out, said he’d be back shortly.

  The fight started after Simeon doubled down on a hard 12, a stupid move in anyone’s how-to book. Benjy dealt him a queen, busted him, and pulled away his last two chips. “Loan me five hundred,” Simeon demanded immediately.

  “Ain’t no bank round here,” Benjy said, predictably. “Tank don’t do no credit.”

  Simeon, drunk, slapped the table and yelled, “Give me five chips, a hundred each!”

  The game had attracted another player, a burly young man with biceps as round as basketballs. They called him Rasco and he’d been playing $5 chips as he watched Simeon throw around the big money until it was all gone. “Watch it!” Rasco snapped as he grabbed his chips.

  Simeon had been irritated by Rasco’s presence to begin with. A high roller like himself should be able to play alone, one-on-one with the dealer. In a flash, Simeon knew there would be a fight, and in these situations he had learned that it was best to draw first blood, to land the initial and maybe decisive blow. He swung wildly, missed badly, and as Benjy was yell
ing, “Stop that nonsense! Not in here you don’t!” Rasco bounced from his chair-he was much taller than he appeared sitting down-and pummeled Simeon with two brutal shots to the face.

  Simeon woke up later in the parking lot, where they had dragged him to his truck and laid him on the tailgate. He sat up, looked around, saw no one, gingerly touched his right eye, which was closed, and delicately rubbed his left jaw, which was quite tender. He glanced at his watch but it wasn’t there. In addition to blowing the $1,000 he’d stolen from Lettie, he realized he’d lost $120 he’d planned to use for the groceries. All cash and coins had been pilfered. They had left behind his wallet, though it contained nothing of value. For a moment, Simeon thought about rushing into the tonk, grabbing one-legged Ontario or one-armed Loot, and demanding to be reimbursed for the stolen money. After all, he’d been robbed on their premises. What kind of tonk were they running?

  He changed his mind, though, and drove away. He’d come back later and meet with Tank, get things settled. Ontario was watching, and when Simeon’s truck was out of sight, he called the sheriff’s office. They stopped him at the Clanton city limits, arrested him for drunk driving, handcuffed him, and gave him a ride to jail. He was thrown in the drunk tank and informed he could not use a telephone until he sobered up.

  He wasn’t too eager to call home anyway.

  In time for lunch, Darias arrived from Memphis with his wife, Natalie, and a carload of kids. They were hungry, of course, and Natalie had at least brought a large platter of coconut squares. Rontell’s wife had brought nothing. No sign of Simeon and the groceries. Other plans were made, with Darias dispatched by Lettie to the store. As the afternoon dragged on, the crowd moved outdoors where the boys played tackle football and the men sipped beer. Rontell fired up the grill and the rich aroma of barbecue ribs settled like a fog over the backyard. The women sat on the porch and talked and laughed. Others arrived-two cousins from Tupelo and some friends from Clanton.

  They all wanted to spend time with Lettie. She loved the spotlight, the admiration, the fawning, and even though she was suspicious of their motives, she couldn’t deny the pleasure of being the center of attention. No one mentioned the will, the money, or Mr. Hubbard, at least not in her presence. The figure of $20 million had been tossed around so much, and with such authority, that it was now accepted fact, established and well known. The money was there and Lettie was all set to collect 90 percent of it. At one point, though, Darias couldn’t resist. When he and Rontell were alone by the grill, he asked, “You see the paper this morning?”

  “Yep,” Rontell replied. “Don’t see how that can help much.”

  “That’s what I was thinkin’. But it sure makes Booker Sistrunk look good.”

  “I’m sure he called the newspaper, planted the story.”

  Front page, Mid-South section of the Memphis morning paper. A nice, gossipy story about Mr. Hubbard’s suicide and his unusual will, with the same photo of Lettie all dressed up in her courtroom best with Booker Sistrunk and Kendrick Bost pawing at her.

  “They’ll be comin’ out of the woods,” Darias said.

  Rontell grunted and laughed and waved his arm. “They already here,” he said. “Lined up, just waitin’.”

  “How much you reckon Sistrunk’ll take?”

  “I asked her but she ain’t tellin’.”

  “He won’t get half, will he?”

  “Don’t know. He ain’t cheap.”

  A nephew stopped by to check on the ribs, and the two uncles changed the subject.

  Late in the afternoon, Simeon was removed from the drunk tank and led by a deputy to the small windowless room used by the lawyers to huddle with their clients. He was given an ice pack for his face and a cup of fresh coffee. “What now?” he asked.

  “You got a visitor,” the deputy said.

  Five minutes later Ozzie walked in and sat down. He was wearing blue jeans and a sports coat, with a badge on his belt and holster on his hip. He said, “Don’t think we’ve ever met.”

  “I voted for you twice,” Simeon said.

  “Thank you, but they all say that after you win.” Ozzie had checked the records and knew damned well Simeon Lang was not registered to vote.

  “I swear I did.”

  “Got a call from Tank; said stay away, okay? No more trouble out of you.”

  “They cleaned my pockets.”

  “It’s a tough place. You know the rules because there are no rules. Just stay away.”

  “I want my money back.”

  “You can forget that money. You wanna go home or you wanna stay here tonight?”

  “I’d rather go home.”

  “Let’s go.”

  Simeon rode in the front seat of Ozzie’s car, no handcuffs. A deputy followed in Simeon’s pickup. Nothing was said for the first ten minutes as they listened to the squawking on the sheriff’s radio. Ozzie finally turned it down and said, “None of my business, Simeon, but those Memphis lawyers got no business down here. Your wife’s already lookin’ bad, at least in the eyes of the rest of the county. This all comes down to a trial by jury, and ya’ll are pissin’ everybody off.”

  Simeon’s first thought was to tell him to butt out, but his brain was numb and his jaw was aching. He didn’t want to argue. Instead, he thought how cool it was, riding shotgun in the big car and being escorted home.

  “You hear me?” Ozzie asked. In other words, say something.

  “What would you do?” Simeon asked.

  “Get rid of those lawyers. Jake Brigance will win the case for you.”

  “He’s a kid.”

  “Go ask Carl Lee Hailey.”

  Simeon couldn’t think quick enough for a response, not that there was one. For blacks in Ford County, the Hailey verdict meant everything.

  Ozzie pressed on. “You ask what I would do. I’d clean up my act and stay out of trouble. What you mean drinkin’ and whorin’ and losin’ money at cards on a Saturday mornin’, or any other day for that matter? Your wife’s gettin’ all this attention. White folk already suspicious, and you’re lookin’ at a jury trial down the road. Last thing you need is your name in the paper for drunk drivin’ or fightin’ or whatever. What’re you thinkin’?”

  Drinking, whoring, and gambling, but Simeon fumed without speaking. He was forty-six years old and unaccustomed to being reprimanded by a man who was not his boss.

  “Clean your act up, okay?” Ozzie said.

  “What about the drunk drivin’ charge?”

  “I’ll put it off six months, see how you behave. One more screwup and I’ll have you in court. Tank’ll call the minute you walk through his door. Understand?”

  “I got it.”

  “There’s somethin’ else. That truck you been drivin’, from Memphis to Houston and El Paso, who owns it?”

  “Company in Memphis.”

  “This company got a name?”

  “My boss got a name, I don’t know who his boss is.”

  “I doubt that. What’s in the truck?”

  Simeon went quiet and gazed through the side window. After a heavy pause he said, “It’s a storage company. We haul a lot of stuff.”

  “Any of it stolen?”

  “Of course not.”

  “Then why is the FBI askin’ questions?”

  “I ain’t seen no FBI.”

  “Not yet, but they called me two days ago. They had your name. Look, Simeon, you get your ass busted by the Feds, and you and Lettie can forget about a jury trial in this county. Can’t you see this, man? Front-page news. Hell, everybody in town is talkin’ ’bout Lettie and Mr. Hubbard’s will anyway. You screw up, and you get no sympathy from any jury. I’m not even sure the black folk’ll stick with you. You gotta think, man.”

  The Feds, Simeon almost said, but he held his tongue and continued looking through the window. They rode in silence until they were close to his home. To spare him the indignity, Ozzie allowed him to get in his truck and drive. “Be in court at 9:00, Wednesday morning,”
he said. “I’ll get Jake to handle the paperwork. We’ll bump it down the road for a while.”

  Simeon thanked him and drove away, slowly.

  He counted eight cars parked in his driveway and around his front yard. Smoke lifted from the grill. Kids were everywhere. A regular party as they closed ranks around their dear Lettie.

  He parked on the road and began walking toward the house. This might get ugly.

  16

  Since the arrival of Mr. Hubbard’s last will and testament two weeks earlier, the morning mail had become far more interesting. Each day brought a new wrinkle as more lawyers piled on and scrambled for position. Wade Lanier filed a petition to contest the will on behalf of Ramona and Ian Dafoe, and it proved inspirational. Within days, similar petitions were filed by lawyers representing Herschel Hubbard, his children, and the Dafoe children. Since petitions were allowed to be liberally amended, the early drafts followed the same basic strategy. They claimed that the handwritten will was invalid because (1) Seth Hubbard lacked testamentary capacity and (2) he was unduly influenced by Lettie Lang. Nothing was offered to substantiate these allegations, but that was not unusual in the suing business. Mississippi held to the practice of “notice pleading,” or, in other words, just lay out the basics and try to prove the specifics later.

  Behind the scenes, Ian Dafoe’s efforts to convince Herschel to join ranks with the Wade Lanier firm proved unproductive and even caused a rift. Herschel had not been impressed with Lanier and thought he would be ineffective with a jury, though he had little to base this on. In need of a Mississippi lawyer, Herschel approached Stillman Rush with the idea of representing his interests. As the attorneys for the 1987 will, the Rush firm was facing a declining role in the contest. It would have little to do but watch, and it looked doubtful Judge Atlee would tolerate its presence, even from the sideline, with the meter ticking, of course. Herschel made the shrewd decision to hire the highly regarded Rush firm, on a contingency basis, and said good-bye to his Memphis attorney.