“All that dancin’, I suppose.”
“You still go out dancing? I thought Roger was worried about gettin’ shot?”
“He hired a quartet to play Tuesdays, Thursdays, and every other Friday. Got me so I can take a walk around the property every mornin’ ’fore five.”
“He wake up that early too?” I asked.
“You know I don’t sleep in that white man’s bed, King.”
“I don’t know,” I protested with a smile. “It’s been a while, and he’s got you up on your toes.”
“He’s a fine man, okay? But a woman cain’t be rushed.”
I wondered what a rush to sex felt like at ninety-plus years of age.
“You have any idea why your friend called me?” I asked, wondering when she was going to invite me inside.
“No. But you don’t want to get too deep into anything with a man like that.”
“Because he’s white?”
“Because he’s rich and spoiled and don’t give a goddamn about little people like you and me.”
“But he’s your boyfriend.”
“That don’t matter. One time, back down in Mississippi, I had a beau name of Rooster, his given name. He ran a juke in the Delta and killed four men and one woman — that I know of. I loved that man like okra loves rain, but you better believe I knew what he could do.”
“You gonna let me in, Grandma?”
While she pondered that question, the sound of hard-soled footsteps came from one of the five halls leading into the deep yellow foyer.
“Joseph!” Roger Ferris hailed from a doorway to my left.
My grandmother winced.
“Roger,” I intoned.
“Come join me in the office, young man.”
I did not take umbrage, because forty-four compared with ninety-one actually was young.
“Lead the way.”
Considering the general lavishness of the manor, Roger’s den was an anomaly, as it was small and unadorned. The walls, ceiling, and floor were all somewhere around eighteen feet in width and length. The floor was sealed pine, and the desk pressboard lined with lime-colored linoleum. Slatted folding chairs were the only seats. There wasn’t even a window.
He went to stand behind the zombie desk.
“You don’t have a bookcase?” I asked, lowering into my seat.
“This is the room I do business in,” he said. “No comfort, no distractions.”
Roger was six feet tall and weighed maybe forty pounds more than my grandmother. He sat, exhibiting both gravity and elegance. Then he took out a pair of glasses with semitransparent red frames and donned them. Staring at me through those lenses, he was reminiscent of a predatory bird from thousands of years before humans dominated the Americas.
Having been told that this utility closet of an office was only about business, I asked, “This got to do with your kids?”
“Not at all.”
“Huh.”
“There’s a man named Alfred Xavier Quiller,” Roger began.
I’d heard the name. The natural-born genius Quiller was a poster boy for the Men of Action and other like-minded alt-right organizations. I knew the name, though at that moment I couldn’t recall his shtick.
“Mr. Quiller has been detained by an as-yet-unidentified branch of the government. That or maybe an independent agency representing them.”
“An independent agency? How does that work?”
Roger sat back in his folding chair, evaluating the question.
“There are times,” he said, “when legitimate federal institutions are not allowed to take action. At these times they often use independent agencies to obviate the law.”
“I see,” said the blind man.
“Quiller is being investigated for tax evasion,” Roger continued, “of involvement in the murder of a US citizen on foreign soil, and for the sale of sensitive information to the Russians.”
“That’s a full dance card.”
“I don’t like him. He’s a misogynist, a racist, a thief, and an elitist of the highest order. I’d be happy to see him shot by a firing squad, hanged by the neck, or stoned in the town square. But the government may very well be railroading him, and the betrayal of our civil rights is a crime worse than any he’s being held for.”
“So the stoning has to wait for a constitutional review?”
“Excuse me, Joe, I... This issue is important to me.”
His plaintive response was a surprise. Ferris was an easygoing boss man — most of the time. That and he usually laughed at my jokes.
“Sorry,” I said.
King Silver squinted hard and then lowered his head. He had to reach up to keep the red glasses from sliding off his nose. After a few seconds, he looked up again.
“Quiller got a note to me. He said that he was innocent of the crimes he was blamed for, that he was extradited from France only after being kidnapped from a dacha he owns in Little Peach. That’s an exurb of Minsk in Belarus. He says that the government has been holding him without due process.”
“When did this all happen?” I asked. “I mean, usually something like that is twenty-four-hour news fodder.”
“I’m not sure. Maybe the government is afraid of what might come out. That’d be a good reason to hold him without a judicial review. Fucking Patriot Act.”
“If he’s being held unofficially, how did he manage to reach out to you?”
“He bribed a guard. Gave him a, you know, um, a token I’d know was his and a note explaining his situation.”
Roger looked into my eyes, nearly beseeching me, though I could not tell for what.
“They have him in a private cell on Rikers Island,” he added.
“Rikers.” I uttered the word with hardly a tremor.
The cold went through my shoulders all the way down to my fingertips. I’d spent time as a prisoner at Rikers. They gave me a private room too; it was called solitary confinement and nearly broke me.
“Yes,” Roger concurred. “They’re holding him there illegally while getting their ducks in a row.”
“What does that have to do with you?”
The billionaire let out a silent sigh, then hesitated.
“He knows that my weak spot is human rights.”
It didn’t sound like much of a reason, but I kept that opinion to myself.
“I want you to go to Quiller,” Roger went on. “Question him and then look into his claims. Find out if he really was kidnapped. Identify the dead man. Decide if he was murdered, and if he was, was the killing justified.”
“Guilt or innocence is why you have a trial,” I countered.
“A trial would be meaningless in this case. I’ve reached out to the so-called authorities, and they have turned a cold shoulder.”
I smiled, thinking about my own joints.
“Something funny?” Roger wanted to know.
“Calm down, man. You asked me to come, and I’m here. You wanted me to hear you out, and I’m listenin’.”
Roger nodded and leaned back in his uncomfortable chair.
“I know, Joe. Thank you for coming.”
“So what if you believe this man is not getting a fair shake? I could point at ten thousand young, and old, men and women around the country in the same situation. What’s special about Quiller? Or, in other words, what’s he got on you?”
My question had a definite impact on Roger’s face. It was the look of haggard determination.
“I have committed no crime,” he said.
“But are you innocent?” I shouldn’t have asked, but I just couldn’t help it.
“I’ve done my share of wrong in this long life,” he acknowledged. “I’ve cheated and stolen. Some might even say that I’ve been the cause of a few deaths. You’re right, I owe a debt to Quiller, but not because of any culpability on my part.”
It was a delicately constructed claim. A slight breeze could have blown it over. But that was true of most of my clients.