Alex Cross’s Trial

“I don’t care what anyone says,” the younger woman said as they passed, “they are human beings too. It isn’t right! Those boys are acting like heathens!”

Mr. Baker and I tipped our hats, but the ladies failed to notice us.

I excused myself and walked up Maple Street, around the corner where they had appeared. What I saw made my heart drop.

Three white men, maybe my age, were holding the heads of two black boys under the surface of the horse trough in front of Jenkins’ Mercantile.

They were drowning those boys. It scared me how long they were submerged after I came around the corner and saw them. Then, as if on cue, they were yanked up from the water. They spluttered out a desperate heaving breath, and then their heads were plunged into the water again.

Those boys were just kids-twelve or thirteen at the most.

When their heads came up out of the water again, they cried and begged the men to please let them go.

“Whatsa matter, you thought them white ladies was gonna save you?”

Their heads went back under.

I remembered the closing words of Mr. Clemens’s address: “Where shall these brave men be found? There are not three hundred of them on the earth.”

I took three long strides forward. “What’s going on here? Let ’ em up. Do it now.”

The white men whirled around. In their surprise, they jerked the heads of their victims clear of the water. The boy on the left used the moment to make his escape, but the largest man tightened his grip on the other boy’s arm.

He was a mean-looking fat man with red hair, bulging muscles, and a tooth missing in front. “These niggers was sassing us,” he said.

“Turn him loose,” I said.

“Shit, no.”

“He’s about twelve years old,” I said. “You men are grown. And three of you against two little boys?”

“Why don’t you mind your own damn bidness,” said the second man, who had a greasy head of black hair and a face that even his mother could not have loved much. “These nigger boys was out of line. We don’t allow that in this town.”

“I’m from this town too,” I said. “My father’s a judge here. Let him go.”

I guess I sounded just official enough for Big Red to relax his grip. The black boy took off like a shot.

“Look what we got here, men,” said Red then. “A genuine nigger-lover.”

Without warning he charged and struck me full force with the weight of his body. I went flying.

Chapter 59

I WAS SLAMMED DOWN on the hard dirt street, and before I could catch my breath Red jumped on top of me.

“Reckon I’ll have to teach you how to mind your own business.”

I was trying to figure a way out of this. I had once watched Bob Fitzsimmons demolish an opponent with a third-round knockout. That was one way to do it. But there was another way to win a fight.

I reached up and pressed my thumbs into the soft, unprotected flesh of the fat man’s throat. I got my leverage, then slung him off me, right over my head. Red landed face-first in the dirt and scuffed up his lip. Blood was coming out of his nose too.

I jumped to my feet and his buddies charged at me. The first ran hard into a right uppercut. He dropped like a rock and was out cold in the street.

Now there were two dazed bullies down, but the third got behind me and jumped on my back. He started pounding his fists into my ribs.

I knew there was a thick wooden post supporting the gallery in front of Jenkins’ Mercantile, so I leaned all my weight into the man, propelling us backward, smashing him right into it. His arms unraveled from my neck and he lay on the ground twitching. He’d hit that post pretty hard, maybe cracked a couple of ribs.

“Nigger-lover,” he spat, but then he struggled up and started to run. So did the other two.

It was quiet again, the street empty.

Well, almost empty.

Chapter 60

STANDING ON THE BOARD SIDEWALK beside Jenkins’s display window was the dapper local photographer, Scooter Willems. Today he looked extra-fashionable in a seersucker suit with a straw boater. As always, he had his camera and tripod with him. I wondered whether he had just photographed me in action.

“Where’d you learn to fight like that, Ben?”

“Boxing team at college,” I said.

“No, I mean, where’d you learn to put your thumbs in a man’s throat like that? Looks like you learned to fight in the street,” Scooter said.

“I reckon I just have the instinct,” I said.

“Mind if I take your photograph, Ben?”

I remembered the night I first saw him, photographing George Pearson. “I do mind, Scooter. My clothes are a mess.”

“That’s what would make it interesting,” he said with a big smile.

“Maybe for you. Not for me. Don’t take my picture.”

“I will honor your wishes, of course.” Scooter folded the tripod and walked away.

I tucked my shirt into my torn trousers, and when I brushed my hand against my chin, it came back bloody.

Moody Cross stepped out of Sanders’s store with a sack of rice on one hip and a bag of groceries on her arm. She walked toward me.

“You are beyond learning,” she said.