Hick nodded and he and Royal crept out of the shed and made their way toward the flames, where the two men were distracted by fire, bravado, and a day’s worth of drinking.
Royal pounced first and knocked Hoyt’s companion to the ground where the two men scuffled, rolling closer toward and then away from the line of fire. Hoyt turned and his eyes widened at the sight of Hick. Hoyt charged and they slammed to the ground. Stunned by the hard earth on his back, Hick felt the air go out of him and, for a brief moment, couldn’t think straight. Then Hoyt’s fist crashed against his cheekbone sending stars whirling behind Hick’s eyelids. Hick blinked, cleared his mind, and shoved hard against Hoyt, sending him reeling backwards. Hick scrambled to his feet and grabbed Hoyt by the front of his shirt. It was impossible to deny how good it felt when Hick’s fist met the hard bone of Hoyt’s jaw. Hoyt sprawled backward and Hick was on him. Grabbing his arm and twisting it up hard and fast behind his back, Hick hissed, “Go ahead and resist. Nothing would give me more pleasure than to beat the hell out of you.”
Instead Hoyt slumped to the ground and Hick clapped the handcuffs Royal had given him around Hoyt’s wrists. Blood dripped from a cut near Hick’s eye and mingled with sweat from exertion and the heat of the flames. He wiped his face with his sleeve, stood, and looked over to see Royal straddling Hoyt’s companion, who was now face down in the dirt. Royal pulled out his cuffs, slapped them closed around the man’s wrists, and then hoisted himself off a narrow, rumpled backside.
“Get up.” Royal commanded as he brushed dirt from his hands.
“You know him?” Hick asked.
“Know him?” Royal repeated, wiping dirt from his shirt. “Hell, I’m related to him. Ain’t that right, Cousin Dan?”
Royal’s cousin scrambled to his knees and looked up at the deputy with a dark, sullen expression.
Hick heaved Hoyt Smith to his feet in the bright orange glow of the burning building. Flames licked up the walls and a window shattered from the heat. Something caught inside and flames shot through the window with a roar. “Let’s get these two over to Vance,” Hick shouted. “We need to get out of here before any more of your kin show up.”
“You can’t take me nowhere,” Hoyt protested in the defiant tone of one who knows how to manipulate the law. “You ain’t got jurisdiction in this town.”
“You want me to leave you in a cell and go find the sheriff?” Hick asked, putting his face close to Hoyt’s. “I’ll be glad to escort you inside where you can wait.”
The clanging bells of the Volunteer Fire Department sounded in the distance as Hoyt’s narrow gaze slid toward the jailhouse. The back of the building was now fully engulfed, and Hoyt swallowed hard.
“I didn’t think so,” Hick said. “Besides, Royal’s got all the jurisdiction we need.”
“Where’re we going?” Hoyt asked with a scowl as Hick pushed him into the back seat of Arthur Vance’s hired car. “What are you—” Hick slammed the door on Hoyt’s questions as Royal deposited Cousin Dan next to Hoyt.
The two lawmen climbed in the front seat as the firetruck drew closer. Hick turned to Hoyt. “You’ve got some explaining to do.” Royal slid the car in gear and pulled away from the back of the station just as the firetruck screeched to a stop up front.
At the Reverend Michael Russell’s home, the two men were greeted by an irate preacher and a cool Arthur Vance, both seated at the kitchen table.
“Why are these ruffians being brought here?” Russell demanded.
Vance leaned back in a kitchen chair and regarded the men before him in silence. Hoyt and Dan were surly and appeared even shabbier next to Vance’s subdued poise. Hoyt rubbed his bruised jaw while Dan stared down at his shuffling feet.
Vance looked them up and down, and the longer he waited to speak, the more the two men fidgeted.
“Well?” Russell asked Vance.
Vance barely glanced at the preacher. Instead, he gently knocked some tobacco from the bowl of his pipe into an ashtray in the center of the table. He pulled the stem from the pipe and began to carefully clean it with a pipe cleaner. The clock ticked as Russell fumed and Dan fidgeted while Hoyt’s face took on crimson hue. Royal and Hick observed Vance’s tactics with growing admiration. Finally Hoyt leaned forward, placing his knuckles on the table. “I don’t know who you think you are, but you can’t keep us here.”
“Can’t I?” Vance asked in a calm voice not looking up from his pipe.
Hoyt’s face took on a crimson hue, and he pounded the kitchen table. “Do you know who my cousin is?”
“Why don’t you tell me about your cousin,” Vance replied calmly, setting down the pipe stem and scraping the caked tobacco from the pipe bowl with a metal tool. Barely glancing up, he said, “Feel free to have a seat, gentlemen.”
Hoyt and Dan looked at one another and then back at Vance. They shifted their feet and remained standing.
Arthur finally looked up at them fully with a cold, calculated gaze. “Sit,” he repeated, more firmly, removing his glasses and cleaning them with his handkerchief.
The two men sat and waited. Vance pulled a packet of tobacco from his inside coat pocket. He methodically inspected the pipe and then filled the bowl, tamping the tobacco. Biting the pipe between his teeth, he took a match and lit it, puffing in short bursts until the tobacco glowed and aromatic smoke filled the room. He leaned back in his chair, crossed his legs, hand on the bowl of the pipe, and studied the two men before him.
He said nothing and seemed to be lost in his own thoughts as he enjoyed his smoke.
After several minutes, Hoyt rose. “I’m not going to sit here for this.”
Hick gripped Hoyt’s shoulder and shoved him back into the chair.
Hoyt narrowed his eyes and studied Vance. “Who are you?”
“I am one who has the power to put you away for a very, very long time. Unless …”
“Unless what?”
Vance smiled and leaned forward. “I’d like you to entertain me.”
Hoyt frowned. “What the hell are you talking about?”
“I’d like to hear a story,” Vance said. “A family story.”
25
Tuesday, July 20, 1954
“And that’s nail number three in the fat bastard’s coffin,” Carol said, stubbing a cigarette out in an ashtray on the back porch. Ice clinked in her glass as she took a long drink.
Hick stared across the street at darkened, sleepy houses. The nighttime air smelled of humidity, and heat lightning flickered in the distance. The town of Broken Creek was quiet after the earlier excitement of a fire at the police station. Doors were locked and curtains drawn as if the houses themselves had closed their eyes to the town’s troubles.
Lost in thought, Hick was startled from his reverie.
“You tired, Hillbilly? You’re awful quiet.” Hick nodded and she continued. “If half of what Royal says about Brewster is true, he’s a real piece of work. To stand there and publicly congratulate himself on saving Thad and Enos Burton by saying he hid them away in the holding cells of the courthouse to protect them from the town’s understandable and righteous anger. To twist what he ordered done to make himself look good …” She shook her head and repeated the part of Brewster’s speech Royal had memorized, saying in a mock, male voice, “‘It is a mercy I had the foresight to keep the suspects safe. We are not a town of vigilantes. We are better than what happened here tonight. I am thankful that when Senator Richardson comes tomorrow, he will not be greeted by the news that we took the law into our own hands.’” She lit another cigarette and threw the lighter on a crate beside the wall. “He thinks we’re dead and is probably congratulating himself as we speak.”
Royal reported that the evidence room was reduced to charred remains. Anything or anyone in that room was forever gone and Sheriff Earl Brewster made a great show of being devastated by the loss. The fire was hot enough that there could be no inspection of the scene for several days and as Brewster would be the inspector, no one
would have ever learned of Hick’s and Carol’s demise had they been inside. They would have seemingly disappeared and regardless of the weight of suspicion on Brewster, no amount of investigation by Adam or Royal or even Arthur Vance would have ever uncovered the truth.
Unfortunately, much of the evidence that could have been used against Brewster had also gone up in flames. In spite of this, Arthur Vance was unconcerned. While Brewster might be able to shake off the accusations of kidnapping by Hick and Carol, by saying they were interfering with an investigation and had to be held for safekeeping, it would be harder to defend himself against the testimony of the Reverend Russell, Royal Adkins, and Grover Sutton. This evidence coupled with what he had wrenched from Hoyt and Dan would be more than enough to make a solid case against Sheriff Earl Brewster.
Arthur Vance was heavy on Hick’s mind when he felt Carol touch his arm and ask, “Is something wrong?”
Hick was uneasy, though he couldn’t say why. He turned to Carol. “Your uncle,” he said, with a nod toward the house. “He’s—”
“He’s a relentless son of a bitch,” she interrupted. “And he’s damned good at what he does.”
“I can’t help but feel …” Hick began.
Carol rolled her eyes. “Please don’t tell me you feel sorry for those two. Don’t forget, they thought we were inside that police station. They meant to burn us alive.”
“No, I don’t feel sorry for them at all,” Hick said. “Hoyt Smith is a habitual lawbreaker and the sooner he’s put away the better for everyone in Broken Creek.”
“Then what?” “Carol asked.
Hick shook his head. “I don’t know,” he said. “I just never knew you could break a man like that. I never realized how effective silence, time, and cold, hard questioning could be.”
Arthur Vance’s slow, methodical questioning of Hoyt and Dan was bone chilling. The man never once raised his voice. He had the self-assurance and disregard of the powerful. The room in which they sat was stifling hot and, yet, Vance seemed unaffected by the heat. Hick had felt the sweat roll down his spine as he stood behind Hoyt. The room was so close and with Vance’s pipe smoke, it was hard to breathe. Hoyt and Dan were forced to wipe their brows with their handkerchiefs over and over again to keep the stinging sweat from their eyes while their shirts grew dark in the armpits.
Not so Arthur Vance. He remained cool and deliberate, as if the very blood in his veins was chilled. No sweat beaded on his forehead, he was seemingly unbothered by the sweltering heat. The prisoners were not offered food or water. No bathroom breaks were allowed and, as the air grew thicker, Hoyt and Dan grew fidgety. As time passed, the prisoners became desperate, their eyes wild like those of trapped animals. Vance had asked Hoyt to “entertain” him and, to Hick, it did seem the agent was enjoying himself. It was now close to two in the morning. The questioning had lasted hours and there was a calculated cruelness in it that caused first Dan and then Hoyt to tell Vance everything he wanted to know.
Carol looked into Hick’s face and he saw understanding register in her eyes. “It’s just the way it’s done. You make your suspect see that they’re isolated, that they have no recourse, nowhere to go. Convince them that they’re powerless and their only escape is to cooperate.” Carol shrugged. “It works.”
“It sure does. Hoyt Smith may have been saved from federal prison by his cousin, Earl, seven years back, but no one can save him now.”
“And he spilled enough information to find who really ran over that man, and to put your Brewster away for life as well,” Carol agreed. “At least you know what became of the witness.”
Hoyt Smith, like so many others had a debt to pay to Earl Brewster … that being his avoidance of prison for breaking into the Cherokee Crossing Post Office. He had been Brewster’s lackey for years, and under the intense scrutiny of Arthur Vance, had divulged the fact that, at the sheriff’s bidding, he had picked up Pack Barnes and, saying he was hallucinating, had him locked away in the State Mental Hospital in Little Rock.
“When Royal returns after speaking with Pack I’m sure we’ll know who ran down that vagrant. The town of Broken Creek, Arkansas will be out from under Brewster’s yoke, Thad will be free, and the case will be closed. And, yet, it’s clear Vance doesn’t give a damn about any of this. What about Richardson?” Hick asked. “What’s the plan?”
“I don’t know any particulars. I only know Uncle Arthur is trying to make a name for the Civil Rights Section of the Justice Department. As he said, he’d like it to be recognized as its own Division and I guarantee you that cuffing some two-bit sheriff and his kin won’t do it.” She hesitated, seemingly realizing what she was implying, and then continued, “If Richardson and Brewster have made some sort of agreement, if promises of promotion or financial compensation have been made, and most importantly, if they have conspired to suppress the colored vote like my uncle suspects, this will be huge. It will show that while everyone has been distracted by McCarthy’s witch hunt, real evil has gone unpunished.”
“How does he think he can do this?”
“My guess is Brewster needs to be backed into a corner. He needs to know that we’re on to him and that he’s in deep. Once that’s established, Uncle Arthur can offer him some kind of deal. He doesn’t seem like the type to take the fall for someone else.”
Hick laughed. “No one would accuse Brewster of loyalty or integrity,” he agreed. “So what are we supposed to do? Arrest him?”
Arthur Vance entered the room, smoking his pipe. “I see you’re still up.”
“Sleep’s hard to come by with so much going on,” Hick said. “Besides, I hardly feel welcome here in the good reverend’s house.”
Nodding, Vance slowly looked Hick up and down. “Tell me,” he said. “Why are you here? You’re a sheriff from another town, with no stake at all in the outcome of these events.”
“The priest at the Catholic Church here in town called me. His secretary is Thad’s big sister.”
Vance shook his head. “That doesn’t explain why you’re here. What exactly do you expect to gain from this?”
“I don’t expect to gain anything,” Hick said with a frown.
“Then why risk your life? You could have easily been killed at that jailhouse.”
“I know that.”
“Then why?”
Hick’s heart began to thud against his ribcage as his frustration rose. What was Vance trying to prove? He looked the older man in the eye and said, coldly, “Sometimes you just do things because they’re right. In the war I did what I was told. I sat by and watched one too many wrongs because I was afraid to speak up. And I did things I shouldn’t have done. Yet I survived. I made it home. Now, I don’t intend to live the rest of my life sitting by and keeping my mouth shut. I did that before, and I’ll be damned if I ever do it again.”
Vance’s face barely changed, though his brows rose slightly. “Good. As long as we’re all on the same page.” He turned and went back into the house. “Step inside,” he called behind him. “We have some things to discuss.”
Hick hadn’t realized his fist was clenched until he felt Carol’s hand cover it. He turned to her and she shook her head slightly. “Here,” she said, fishing out an ice cube from her glass and wrapping it in her handkerchief. “Your eye is swelling.” She paused. “You know he’s only doing his job.”
Hick let a ragged breath escape and then pursed his lips. He recognized that Vance was very good at what he did, but he didn’t have to like him. Forcing a small smile at Carol, he followed Vance into the kitchen.
Arthur was already seated at the table, the ever present pipe was in two pieces and he was using a pipe cleaner on the stem again. He barely glanced up as Hick and Carol sat across from him.
“I understand there’s to be a hearing tomorrow,” Vance said not looking up.
“The judge and the prosecutor are back in town from their fishing trip,” Carol said.
“And these two, the judge and prosecutor,” Van
ce said. “Do we think they’re in on this?”
Carol shook her head. “There’s no way to prove what they do or don’t know. They were gone when the crime took place and have not been briefed on any of the particulars to my knowledge. As far as they’re both concerned, all these proceedings are supposed to be nothing more than a hearing for Thad to plead guilty and sentence him.”
“I see,” Vance replied, filling his bowl with tobacco. “And the courthouse, Thad and his father will be safe there tonight?”
Hick nodded. “Brewster has more to gain in keeping them safe than in allowing harm to come to them. He thinks this is as good as done. In his mind, tomorrow night he’ll be at that rally and the whole town will be up in arms over desegregation and practically begging to give Richardson their vote or even their money if he asks.”
Vance glanced at his watch. “The hearing commences in a little more than six hours. Our advantage over Brewster is the element of surprise. He doesn’t suspect you’re still alive or that the federal government has any knowledge of what is happening.” He puffed on his pipe until the tobacco burned red. “I understand the State Police will be here?”
“According to Royal, Brewster called then in to protect public property,” Hick said. “He pointed to the burning of the police station as cause enough for their help. He doesn’t want anyone in the courtroom for this hearing but the judge. Not Thad’s mama or sister, and especially not Father Grant. He wants a quick guilty plea and a fast hearing.”
Vance leaned back and puffed his pipe. His glance went from Hick to Carol. “I need you two there. Your presence in the courtroom will be unexpected and will throw Brewster off his game. We need him uncomfortable and unsteady so he’ll be more inclined to tell us what we want to know.”
“What about you?” Hick asked.
Vance smiled. “Oh, I’ll be there. I believe I’ll pay an early morning call on the judge and give him an escort to the courthouse.” He glanced at his watch. “Brewster’s deputy ought to be in Little Rock by now to question this Pack Barnes character. Hopefully he really does know something about the hit and run.”
Between the Lies Page 17