Grass Roots Read Free Page B

would come.
    I hope you don’t mind.
    We’ll all be out Christmas shopping this afternoon, so we’ll see you at the big house around seven for drinks and dinner.
    Love, Your Ma What would the Judge want with him on a Saturday afternoon? He hadn’t seen the old man for more than a year, when he tried a personal-injury case in his court.
    Will sighed and turned the car away from Delano toward Greenville, the seat of Meriwether County.
    He drove slowly into the quiet antebellum town, remembering that the sheriff didn’t like speeders. He parked in the courthouse square, in a space reserved for lawyers, and another car pulled into the spot next to him. As he got out of the Wagoneer, someone called out to him.
    “Hello, Will, it’s Elton Hunter,” the man said, sticking out his hand.
    Will took the hand. Hunter was dressed in a dark business suit, severe for a Saturday afternoon. Will thought.
    “Hello, Elton, how are you?” He didn’t know the young lawyer well.
    Hunter was from Columbus, had married the banker’s daughter in Greenville and set up a practice four or five years before, with the bank as his first client. He was prospering, from all accounts. The two men exchanged small talk as they entered the courthouse together The old courthouse, built in the 1840s, looked fresh and new, having recently been restored after a disastrous fire.
    Inside the door, Will stopped.
    “Well, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got to see Judge Boggs,” he said.
    “Yeah? Me, too,” Hunter said, frowning.
    “What could he want with both of us?” “Let’s find out,” Will said, steering him through the courtroom and to the door of the Judge’s chambers.
    “Come in!” a voice rumbled.
    Will ushered Hunter ahead of him into the office, which had been restored to its original condition after the fire.
    Dark oak paneling and bookcases rose to a considerable height above the massive desk. The Judge, a short, stout man in his late sixties, with thick, white hair and a florid complexion, stood to meet them. He beamed at the two younger men.
    “Elton, how’s Ginny? The children?
    Good.” He turned to Will.
    “How’s the view from the Hill these days, boy?”
    Will grinned.
    “Pretty murky, as usual. The Senator’s humming on all cylinders, got a clean bill of health from Walter Reed yesterday, looking forward to running again.” “I know,” the Judge said, sinking into an enormous leather chair that nearly swallowed him.
    “I just talked to him.” “Where?” Will asked, surprised.
    “I reached him at home, down at Flat Rock Farm, fresh from the airport.”
    Will took a chair, wondering what was going on, but not asking.
    Judge Boggs brushed aside a strand of snowy hair and looked at the two younger men for a moment.
    “Gentlemen,” he said finally, “I need your help.”
    “Of course. Judge,” Will said.
    “Surely,” Hunter replied.
    “We had a pretty bad murder around here this past week.”
    “The Cole girl?” Hunter asked.
    “Yes.” “I haven’t heard about it,” Will said.
    “No, you wouldn’t have,” the Judge replied.
    “Bad one.
    Rape, strangulation. Her daddy’s a farmer, right prosperous.”
    He paused.
    “Colored fellow.” “I know him,” Hunter said.
    “Drew his will. I’ve seen her around the square.”
    “I don’t know them,” Will said. He waited to find out why he was here.
    “Sheriff made an arrest this morning,” the Judge said.
    “One Larry Eugene Moody, fixes furnaces for a living.
    Works for Morgan and Morgan, over in La Grange.” “They do my work,” Hunter said.
    “Don’t know whether this Moody was ever at the house, though.” “Just as well you don’t know him,” the Judge said.
    “Will?”
    “Nope. Manchester Heating Supply does our work.”
    “Larry Eugene Moody is white,” the Judge said, rather suddenly.
    Neither Will nor Hunter said anything. Everyone seemed to have stopped breathing.
    “He’s asked for a public defender,” the Judge