“Roxanne Barrett.” Roy looked at Mars. “That was your mother’s real name. But she liked Lucinda better.”
“How did you pick Mars as your last name?” asked Decker.
Roy grinned. “Always liked the red planet, even when I was a kid. Seemed cool.”
Decker nodded. “You were on the football team with them. Left tackle, which means you guarded Huey’s blindside. He was the QB.”
“Guy was a mediocre signal caller that we made look good. McClellan was a rabid dog fullback and safety on the D-side. The kind who’d take a bite out of your leg in a pileup. Eastland was the slick scatback. Never went over the middle on pass routes, and on running plays he’d always run out of bounds before he got nailed. Prick didn’t like to get hit. A real pussy. But he was good-looking and smart and came from money and he was obviously going places, so the girls dropped their panties when he showed up anywhere. He and Thurman. But that was because of the old man. He was the big dog in Mississippi. Everybody knew him.”
Decker said, “Huey Sr. was an all-around racist. Segregation now and forever, like George Wallace said.”
“Hey, back then in Mississippi those were all positives. Maybe they still are in some quarters.”
“You grew up with these pricks?” said Mars.
“Well, everyone has to grow up somewhere. But I never ran in their circles. I had the wrong pedigree.”
“And you helped them bomb those two places?”
“I told you before, Mellow. I see no need to repeat myself.”
Decker said, “And you have the evidence to bury them. Which is why you disappeared after the bombings.”
“I chose to leave.”
“Why?”
“My reasons. No business of yours.”
“Was it the kids? The kids who died in the church?”
“Why do you think I’d care about some colored kids?”
“You said they weren’t supposed to be there, that it wasn’t part of the plan,” said Mars.
“And you ended up marrying a black woman,” Decker added.
Roy shrugged but said nothing.
“You can bring these assholes down, Roy. Almost fifty years later. Justice?”
“Why would I care about that? I’m just trying to survive here.”
“Eastland’s goons killed McClellan. And Huey has already taken steps to throw a monkey wrench in the FBI’s investigation.”
“None of that surprises me. They were always the brains. McClellan was just the attack dog. It was why he became a cop. I wonder how many skulls old Mac busted when he was wearing the uniform?”
“Plenty,” said Decker. “And I would wager most of them were black skulls.”
“But why the bombings?” asked Mars. “Like you said, they were going places. Huey had his dad’s connections. So why?”
“You hit it on the head, Mellow. Huey Sr. I don’t know this for a fact, but I strongly suspect he put them up to it.”
“But why would they go along with it? They had to know this might come back to haunt them later.”
“They were young punks who thought they were invulnerable. They really saw themselves as like the Three Musketeers, fighting to defend their way of life. Their white life. You should’ve seen them. They always acted so noble, like they were doing God’s work or some shit like that. Hell, they could’ve been living in the 1860s.”
“So they were fighting the good fight to keep the South the way God wanted it?” said Mars.
“Something like that. Me, I just wanted the money.”
“How noble of you,” said Mars in disgust.
“Shit, you think this was the only church or NAACP office to be bombed? Hell, in the South in the fifties and sixties, it was like the Middle East. Didn’t you ever see the old newsreels? People getting knocked off their feet by fire hoses. Dogs attacking women. Places blowing up. Beatings at the lunch counters. Bodies hanging from trees. Bullets flying.”
“I grew up in Texas over thirty years ago with biracial parents, so no, I never saw any racism at all,” said Mars sarcastically.
Roy smiled and inclined his head. “Anyway, the son always lived to impress the dad. Thurman was going to follow in his footsteps, be a player on the national stage. I’m not speculating here. That’s all he talked about in high school. And Eastland was always going to go into business. But he also had a God complex, I guess coming from so much money. He and Huey, knights in shining armor defending their lily-white kingdom. So you had a future politician and a future businessman, match made in heaven. And Mac signed on because, well, as you probably saw, Mac doesn’t like people who look different from him.”
“And you?” asked Decker. “What was the incentive for you?”
“You’re not listening. I already told you. Money! And back then I admit I was a lemming. Just followed the crowd. The Hueys had power. The Eastlands had money. I got to live in that world for a little bit, which was a lot better than my real one. My parents were pretty much sharecroppers. The only toilet I had growing up was the one at school. Most days I went out into the fields and picked my own meals. My parents worked hard, don’t get me wrong, but they were never going to have two dimes to rub together.”
“So you went along?”
“Hell, yes. They paid me. A shitload of money. More than I’d ever make doing anything else. I was always good with putting stuff together, fixing things. Motors, transmissions, appliances.”
“And explosives,” added Decker.
“I started making little pipe bombs in high school. Then I moved on to bigger stuff. They got me the materials and I built explosives with a timer.”
“And Charles Montgomery ran interference.”
“Shit, the local cops knew what was going to happen, but yeah, Chuck did the drunk driving act so they could have a reason to leave the church.”
“And the same in Tuscaloosa with the NAACP office?” asked Decker. “Montgomery did his thing to distract so the bomb could be planted?”
“I wasn’t there, but I assume so. Huey did tell me later that the cops were watching that office because there’d been threats.”
“And who brought Montgomery in?”
“McClellan and Eastland.”
Decker nodded. “He played football with them at Ole Miss.”
“Right. But he dropped out of college, got drafted, went to ’Nam, and came back with a lot of problems. He needed money and they had it. I used the same ploy on him when I looked Chuck up to lie about killing us to get Mellow out of prison. Figured a dying guy wouldn’t care. And he wanted to take care of his kid. At least that’s what Regina told me.”
“So what happened?” asked Decker. “Why disappear, change your name, and go on the run?”
Roy didn’t answer immediately. “I didn’t agree to meet with you so we could play twenty questions.”
“Granted, but you did agree. Did you have a falling-out?”
“What makes you say that?”
“Because you have something they want. Whatever was in the safe deposit box. They know you’re alive, Roy. They’re never going to stop looking.”
“You think that worries me?”
“I don’t know. Why not just give us the evidence and we’ll use it to bring them down?”
“And what, you just let me walk off into the sunset?” He shook his head.
Decker said, “It was your leverage against them, right? They come after you, you’ll just turn it over to the authorities.”
“Damn straight it was.”