Grass Roots (48 page)

The anchorman came back on the screen.

“That opinion of Will Lee’s performance in the trial was backed up by the foreman of the jury, Mrs. Evelyn Everett, in an interview taped only a few minutes ago.” He turned and looked at a monitor.

Mrs. Everett appeared on screen.

“I think that, up until the point of the testimony of the schoolteacher. Miss. McLnvale, most of us on the jury were leaning in favor of acquittal. Mr. Lee had poked a lot of holes in the other evidence in the case. Her testimony, however, turned the tide in favor of conviction, and I think that testimony surprised Mr. Lee as much as it did us.”

“Was there much argument about the life sentence among the jurors?” the reporter asked.

“Yes, some of us were in favor of the death penalty. It was Mr. Lee’s summation, though, that kept us from going that route. I think that, although we all felt that Larry Moody was guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, Mr. Lee made some of us feel that there was, at least, some doubt, and that made us reluctant to take the man’s life.”

“That’s a pretty good review,” Tom Black said.

“We may come out of this well, after all.”

The camera returned to the anchorman.

“All during the trial, members of a white supremacist group kept a vigil on the courthouse lawn. Our reporter interviewed one of their leaders.”

The camera switched to a young man, severely dressed in a dark suit and black tie, being interviewed by a reporter.

“Mr. Johnson,” she asked, “what is the feeling of your people about the verdict in this trial?”

The young man’s brow furrowed.

“We think this is a major miscarriage of justice, brought on by racist attitudes favoring blacks in our society,” he said, “and by a particularly poor performance by the defense lawyer, Mr. Will Lee.”

“Thank you. God,” Will said, bringing his hands together.

“We feel,” continued the man, “that a good attorney would have destroyed the credibility of the Wilson woman when she took the stand.

We don’t think we got our money’s worth from Lee.”

“Are you saying that your organization hired Mr. Lee and paid his fees?”

“Oh my God,” Tom Black said.

“Is that true?”

“While we didn’t choose him, we certainly paid his fee—twenty-five thousand dollars,” the young man said.

The reporter came on camera.

“I asked Will Lee about this only moments later,” she said.

Will’s face appeared on camera, looking serious.

“Mr. Lee,” the reporter asked, “were you aware that your fee was being paid by a white supremacist group?”

“I was completely unaware of that until five minutes ago,” Will replied.

“Shortly after Judge Boggs assigned me to the case, my office received a plain brown envelope containing twenty-five thousand dollars in cash and an unsigned note saying it was for the defense of Larry Moody.

That same day, I reported to Judge Boggs that someone, who wished to remain anonymous, had paid a retainer for the defense of Larry Moody, and I asked that Larry be removed from the indigent defendants’ list and that I not be paid a fee from public funds.”

“So you were well paid for your defense work?” she asked.

“The envelope containing the money is still in my safe, and I have not spent a dime of it. In light of today’s discovery of where it came from, I have decided to donate the entire amount to ARE, Attorneys for Racial Equality, where I hope it will be used in the defense of indigent black defendants. I myself want no part of it.”

“Whew!” Tom Black sighed.

“That was scary,” Kitty said, holding a hand to her breast.

“You never mentioned the money,” Billy Lee said.

“To tell you the truth, I just forgot about it,” Will said, “and a good thing, too, or I would probably have dumped it into the campaign. It’s still sitting in my safe in the cottage.”

“You know,” Tom Black said, “I’m beginning to think I may not be cut out for politics; I’m not sure my heart is strong enough.”

“So what’s the next step in the campaign, Will?” his mother asked.

“I’m flying back to Atlanta with Tom and Kitty tomorrow morning. We’re going to spend the rest of our time in the Atlanta suburbs, where we badly need votes. My only scheduled appearance is Sunday morning at Doctor Don’s church.”

“Have you figured out what you’re going to say to those people?” Patricia Lee asked.

Will shook his head.

“I haven’t a clue.”

Ferkerson had never seen the Archon in this sort’of mood. The man seemed both depressed and agitated.

He ranged nervously about his study, pouring drinks, fiddling with things on his desk, warming his hands at the fire.

“The girl was an FBI informer,” Willingham said, taking a large sip of his bourbon.

“I got some inside information.

She was arrested last year on a drug charge, and she dealt with them in order not to be prosecuted. Apparently, they sent her to Leonard Allgood’s office, where she was hired.”

Ferkerson was shaken.

“That means the FBI must know about me,” he said.

“Why haven’t they tried to arrest me?”

“Perhaps they were hoping you’d lead them to me. Are you sure you weren’t followed here tonight?”

“Absolutely positive.”

“Well, you’re out of the net, then, since the girl and I are the only ones who knew where you were, right?”

“That’s right.”

“Did the girl know about me?”

“No,” Ferkerson lied. How long had it been since he had told her who the Archon was? Had she had time to report the information?

“Good. Apparently, I’m in the clear, too. I’ve had the house and my telephones swept. No devices.” He went to the safe behind the liquor cabinet and took out an envelope.

“Here is a new set of identification,” he said.

“Burn your old license and cards in the fireplace now. Your new name is Howard James.”

Ferkerson did as he was told. The plastic cards melted away in the fire.

The Archon tossed him some keys.

“There is a Volvo station wagon parked in the northeast corner of the Lenox Square shopping mall. Take the Volvo and leave your car there with the keys in the glove compartment. It will be disposed of.”

Ferkerson nodded.

The Archon still looked worried.

“Is something else wrong, sir?”

“We have a situation,” Willingham said.

“How can I help?” Ferkerson asked, leaning forward and resting his elbows on his knees.

“I’ll come to that in a minute. Harry, I’ve never for a moment questioned your loyalty, but I have to now. I want to know if you’re ready to die, if necessary.”

“Yes sir, I am,” Ferkerson answered without hesitation.

Willingham sat down heavily in the chair across from Ferkerson.

“It may come to that,” he said.

“I hope not, but it may.”

“I understand, sir.”

“You’re like a brother to me. Harry. You know I wouldn’t give the order unless I absolutely had to.”

“I know that, sir.”

“There’s something else. I’m beginning to feel the strain of leadership; I have to question my own resolve.”

“Not you, sir.”

“You have to help me. Harry.”

“Of course I will, sir.”

“I’m going to give you an irrevocable order.”

“I would never allow anyone to revoke your orders, sir.”

“I mean irrevocable, even by me. If I should weaken, you must be strong and carry out this assignment, regardless of anything further I have to say about it.”

“If that’s what you want, sir.”

“We have a situation,” Willingham said again.

Ferkerson waited for him to get to the point.

“This fellow Lee has turned out to be a problem. He failed us in Larry Moody’s trial. I had high hopes for Larry. I had hoped that, one day, he might be as good as you. It was only chance that tripped him up on his maiden assignment. Lee allowed Larry to be convicted, I think, because after he heard the schoolteacher’s testimony, he began to think that Larry was guilty. I tried to reason with him, but he ignored me, even insulted me.”

“Sir, as far as I’m concerned, that’s reason enough to kill him.”

“Perhaps, but there’s the election, too. I thought Lee would be a weaker candidate than MacK Dean, but I was wrong. Calhoun’s pollsters are showing the two nearly even. I can’t take a chance on Lee’s getting any luckier;

there’s too much riding on it. You realize that, with Calhoun elected, we would have our own man in the United States Senate?”

“Yes sir.”

“My plan is twofold: first, I want his death to look accidental, if at all possible. I believe I know how to accomplish that. Second, I have a way to simultaneously destroy his reputation. This is important to me. It’s because of the way he spoke to me this morning at the courthouse.”

Willingham reached into his pocket and produced a handful of plastic bags. He smiled slightly.

“This is something I came up with in Vietnam, but I’ve never had a chance to use it until now. These bags can be bought at any grocery store. They are of two thicknesses of weight:

one will dissolve in gasoline in a little over an hour; the other will take something between two and three hours.”

Willingham went on explaining exactly how his plan would work.

Ferkerson had to admit it was brilliant.

“If this doesn’t work,” Willingham said, “then I will leave his demise in your hands. I realize that on such short notice it may not be possible to make his death look like an accident. In that event, you may use whatever means are necessary, and I realize that may mean the sniper’s rifle.”

Ferkerson nodded.

“I’ll use it if I have to.”

“If you have to kill him openly, you must never be taken alive, do you understand?”

“I understand, sir. In that event, I know what I have to do.”

“If my plan works, he will be dead before his appearance at the church on Sunday. If not, stay away from the church. We can’t have it seem that his death has anything to do with his appearance there. It would be best if he died before the polls open on Tuesday, but he absolutely must be dead before the polls close on Tuesday, at seven p.m. A dead man can’t be elected; the man with the second-largest number of votes will be declared the winner.

Do you have it all straight?”

Ferkerson nodded.

“Yes sir, I do. I promise you he will not live to see the polls close.”

“This order is irrevocable; not even I may change it.”

“I understand, sir.”

They walked to the door together.

“Wait until just before daylight to plant the plastic bags,” Willingham said.

“He has to be back in Atlanta early tomorrow morning;

he’s advertised to be speaking at nine.”

“Yes sir.”

Willingham put his hands on Ferkerson’s shoulders.

“I know I can count on you, my boy,” he said.

“If we don’t meet again, I want you to know how grateful I am for your loyalty.”

Ferkerson’s eyes brimmed over with tears.

“Yes, sir.”

Willingham embraced him, then sent him on his way.

will, Tom, and Kitty left the Delano farm at six-thirty, in the dark of the November morning. It was Friday, and he had a nine-o’clock appearance at a businessmen’s breakfast in Lawrenceville, in the northern Atlanta suburbs. Tom and Kitty tried to doze in the car, to catch a few moments more of sleep before truly greeting the day. Will was working on waking up, because he had to fly.

As he pulled into the entrance of Roosevelt Memorial Field, the Meriwether County airport, a pre-dawn light was in the sky, and he was surprised to be met by a station wagon, on its way out of the airport.

He got a glimpse of the driver, but he didn’t know him. Could some visitor have arrived at this hour? Will looked at the pilot-operated runway lights, which turned themselves off automatically after fifteen minutes of use. They were off. He wondered if someone had perhaps been trying to steal gear from the airplanes parked there.

As he pulled the car up to the Cessna, he could see nothing amiss, with his airplane or the others, nor were there any airplanes he didn’t know. He roused his companions, and they got their bags into the luggage compartment.

Tom and Kitty climbed aboard while Will did his normal preflight inspection and checked the fuel for water, which sometimes condensed in the tanks during the cool evening hours, or arrived in contaminated fuel. Then he climbed into the airplane and began working through his checklist.

Tom was already snoring softly.

Will started the engine, taxied into the runway, performed his usual run-up procedure, then centered the airplane on the runway, put in ten degrees of flaps, and shoved the throttle in. The airplane began to roll; at sixty knots, he pulled back on the yoke, and the Cessna rose into the air. The sun was just coming up.

They climbed through the morning haze, over the green fields and woods, and Will set the autopilot to take them to a point southeast of Hartsfield International Airport, so as to avoid the Terminal Control Area around the huge facility. He never filed a flight plan on this forty-minute hop, and at this time of day, there would be few planes at his altitude, so he didn’t check in with air-traffic control and ask for traffic advisories. He leveled off at three thousand feet, and the little airplane drummed its way smoothly through the still morning air.

Thirty-five minutes later, they were over Stone Mountain, the huge lump of granite in the northeast Atlanta suburbs, and descending into Peach tree De Kalb Airport, to the traffic pattern of two thousand feet above mean sea level, which was a thousand feet above ground level. Will listened to the Automated Traffic Information Service on the radio, then switched to the frequency of Peach tree De Kalb Tower.

“Good morning, Peach tree Tower, this is November One Two Three Tango, six miles to the southeast, with information Alpha, for landing.”

Then the airplane’s engine stopped.

“Good morning. One Two Three Tango,” the controller answered.

“Enter a left downwind for runway two zero left; cleared to land; no traffic in the pattern.”

One moment the engine had been running smoothly, now there was only the sound of the wind rushing past the airplane.