The Quiet Game

Pinder stands motionless in the open doorway. "Get a little of my own back, I guess. I knew I'd be the last black chief for a long time." He smiles oddly, as though he has just seen something in a new light. "Maybe that file's been waiting here for you all this time. Mysterious ways, right? Maybe the bastards won't get you after all."

I give Pinder a salute. "Hope they're biting today, Chief."

He winks at me. "They biting every day, if you know where to look."

CHAPTER 16

The Payton house is a typical rural home, built with cheap materials on concrete blocks, but better maintained than most. Lovingly tended flower beds border the front, concealing the dark crawl space beneath the structure. The cars in the driveway are probably worth more than the house, but at least the nearest neighbor is fifty yards up the road.

Georgia Payton sits beneath a large pin oak, rocking slowly in a white cotton dress. She lifts a hand as I pull into the driveway, but she does not get up.

I walk over to say hello before going to the front door. "Hot one, isn't it?"

She cackles at me. "I lived three-quarters of my life without no air conditioning. The Lord's breeze be good enough for me."

"Mr. Cage?"

Althea Payton is beckoning to me from the door. She wears navy shorts and a red blouse tied at the waist. She looks like she's been gardening.

"Come in out of that heat!" she calls. "Georgia's fine out there."

I smile at the old woman, then cross the drive and follow Althea into the house.

"Georgia's like an old loggerhead turtle sunning itself on a rock," she says. "I asked her to stay outside while we talk. She can be a little hard to handle. Have a seat."

I sit on a flame-print love seat, and Althea takes a cloth-covered easy chair to my right. The living room holds old but clean furniture, all of it arranged around a new television set. Dozens of framed family photos hang on the wall behind the TV. I look away when I realize I'm staring at a wedding photo of Del and Althea. They look young and happy, destined for anything but what happened to them in the spring of 1968.

"On the phone," she says hesitantly, "you said it was about my husband."

"Yes, ma'am." My next words are an irrevocable step. "I've decided to look into Del's death after all. I've already taken some steps in that direction."

She seems not to have understood. Then her eyes well up and her voice spills out in a reverent tone. "Sweet Lord Jesus, I can't believe it."

"I don't want us to get ahead of ourselves. There may not be anything to find out."

She nods, her hands clasped over her chest. "I realize that. I just… it's been so many years. Do you have any idea what you need to charge me?"

"Yes. I'm going to need a retainer of one dollar. And I'll bill you for my time at the rate of one dollar per day."

She shakes her head in confusion. "You can't be serious."

"I'm deadly serious, Althea. Don't give it another thought."

She wipes tears from her eyes, and I look away. The wall to her left holds the sacred trinity of photographs I've seen in the homes of many black families: Martin Luther King, JFK, and Abraham Lincoln. Sometimes you see Bobby, or FDR. But the Paytons have only the big three. A plastic clock hangs above the photographs, its face painted with a rather bloated likeness of Dr. King. The words I have a dream appear in quotes beneath him.

"Georgia bought that clock from some traveling salesman in May of 1968," Althea says. "It stopped running before that Christmas, but she never let me get rid of it."

"Maybe it's a collector's item."

"I don't care. Those clocks probably put a million dollars in some sharpie's pocket." She grips her knees with her palms and fixes her eyes on me. "Could I ask you one thing?"

"Why did I change my mind?"

"Yes."

"I have a personal stake in the case now. I want to be honest with you about that."

"Are you going to write a book about Del? Is that it?"

"No. But if anybody asks you what I was doing here, that's what you tell them. And I mean anybody, police included. Okay?"

"Whatever you say. But what is your personal interest, if not a book?"

"I'd prefer to keep that to myself, Althea."

She looks puzzled, then relieved. "I'm glad you've got a stake in it. You having a child like you do. It would be too hard if I thought you were taking this risk only for me."

"I'm not. Rest assured of that."

"Thank you." She leans back in her chair and looks at me with apprehension. "What can you tell me? Have you learned anything yet?"

"We won't be getting any help from the district attorney. The police either, if my guess is right. I've managed to obtain some documentary information dating back to 1968 that could be helpful, but that's between us and God."

"Can you tell me what it is?"

"No. I won't expose you to potential criminal charges."

She nods soberly. "Just tell me this. Do you think there's any hope? Of finding out the truth, I mean."