Three Classic Thrillers

by John Grisham

  Adam stepped from his car, felt suddenly claustrophobic, and squeezed the handle of his thin briefcase as he glared through the chain link at the hot, flat little building where they killed people. He slowly removed his jacket, and noticed his shirt was already spotted and sticking to his chest. The knot in his stomach had returned with a vengeance. His first few steps toward the guard station were slow and awkward, primarily because his legs were unsteady and his knees were shivering. His fancy tasseled loafers were dusty by the time he stopped under the watchtower and looked up. A red bucket, the type one might use to wash a car, was being lowered on a rope by an earnest woman in a uniform. “Put your keys in the bucket,” she explained efficiently, leaning over the railing. The barbed wire on the top of the fence was five feet below her.

  Adam quickly did as she instructed. He carefully laid his keys in the bucket where they joined a dozen other key rings. She jerked it back and he watched it rise for a few seconds, then stop. She tied the rope somehow, and the little red bucket hung innocently in the air. A nice breeze would have moved it gently, but at the moment, in this stifling vacuum, there was scarcely enough air to breathe. The winds had died years ago.

  The guard was finished with him. Someone somewhere pushed a button or pulled a lever, Adam had no idea who did it, but a humming noise kicked in, and the first of two bulky, chain-link gates began to slide a few feet so he could enter. He walked fifteen feet along the dirt drive, then stopped as the first gate closed behind him. He was in the process of learning the first basic rule of prison security—every protected entrance has either two locked doors or gates.

  When the first gate stopped behind him and locked itself into place, the second one dutifully snatched itself free and rolled along the fence. As this was happening, a very stocky guard with arms as big as Adam’s legs appeared at the main door of the unit and began to amble along the brick path to the entrance. He had a hard belly and a thick neck, and he sort of waited for Adam as Adam waited for the gates to secure everything.

  He eased forward an enormous black hand, and said, “Sergeant Packer.” Adam shook it and immediately noticed the shiny black cowboy boots on Sergeant Packer’s feet.

  “Adam Hall,” he said, trying to manage the hand.

  “Here to see Sam,” Packer stated as a fact.

  “Yes sir,” Adam said, wondering if everyone here referred to him simply as Sam.

  “Your first visit here?” They began a slow walk toward the front of the building.

  “Yeah,” Adam said, looking at the open windows along the nearest tier. “Are all death row inmates here?” he asked.

  “Yep. Got forty-seven as of today. Lost one last week.”

  They were almost to the main door. “Lost one?”

  “Yeah. The Big Court reversed. Had to move him in with the general population. I have to frisk you.” They were at the door, and Adam glanced around nervously to see just exactly where it was that Packer wished to conduct the frisk.

  “Just spread your legs a little,” Packer said, already taking the briefcase and placing it on the concrete. The fancy tasseled loafers were now stuck in place. Though he was dizzy and momentarily without the use of all his faculties, Adam could not at this horrible moment remember anyone ever asking him to spread his legs, even just a little.

  But Packer was a pro. He patted expertly around the socks, moved up quite delicately to the knees, which were more than a little wobbly, then around the waist in no time flat. Adam’s first frisk was mercifully finished just seconds after it started when Sergeant Packer made a rather cursory pass under both arms as if Adam might be wearing a shoulder harness with a small pistol inside it. Packer deftly stuck his massive right hand into the briefcase, then handed it back to Adam. “Not a good day to see Sam,” he said.

  “So I’ve heard,” Adam replied, slinging his jacket once again over his shoulder. He faced the iron door as if it was now time to enter the Row.

  “This way,” Packer mumbled as he stepped down onto the grass and headed around the corner. Adam obediently followed along yet another little red-brick trail until they came to a plain, nondescript door with weeds growing beside it. The door was not marked or labeled.

  “What’s this?” Adam asked. He vaguely recalled Goodman’s description of this place, but at the moment all details were fuzzy.

  “Conference room.” Packer produced a key and unlocked the door. Adam glanced around before he entered and tried to gather his bearings. The door was next to the central section of the unit, and it occurred to Adam that perhaps the guards and their administrators didn’t want the lawyers underfoot and poking around. Thus, the outside entrance.

  He took a deep breath and stepped inside. There were no other lawyers visiting their clients, and this was particularly comforting to Adam. This meeting could become tumultuous and perhaps emotional, and he preferred to do it in private. At least for the moment the room was empty. It was large enough for several lawyers to visit and counsel, probably thirty feet long and twelve feet wide with a concrete floor and bright fluorescent lighting. The wall on the far end was red brick with three windows high at the top, just like the exterior of the unit’s tiers. It was immediately obvious that the conference room had been added as an afterthought.

  The air conditioner, a small window unit, was snarling angrily and producing much less than it should. The room was divided neatly by a solid wall of brick and metal; the lawyers had their side and the clients had theirs. The partition was made of brick for the first three feet, then a small counter provided the lawyers a place to sit their mandatory legal pads and take their pages of mandatory notes. A bright green screen of thick metal grating sat solidly on the counter and ran up to the ceiling.

  Adam walked slowly to the end of the room, sidestepping a varied assortment of chairs—green and gray government throwaways, folding types, narrow cafeteria seats.

  “I’m gonna lock this door,” Packer said as he stepped outside. “We’ll get Sam.” The door slammed, and Adam was alone. He quickly picked out a place at the end of the room just in case another lawyer arrived, at which time the other lawyer would undoubtedly take a position far to the other end and they could plot strategy with some measure of privacy. He pulled a chair to the wooden counter, placed his jacket on another chair, removed his legal pad, unscrewed his pen, and began chewing his fingernails. He tried to stop the chewing, but he couldn’t. His stomach flipped violently, and his heels twitched out of control. He looked through the screen and studied the inmates’ portion of the room—the same wooden counter, the same array of old chairs. In the center of the screen before him was a slit, four inches by ten, and it would be through this little hole that he would come face-to-face with Sam Cayhall.

  He waited nervously, telling himself to be calm, take it easy, relax, he could handle this. He scribbled something on the legal pad, but honestly couldn’t read it. He rolled up his sleeves. He looked around the room for hidden microphones and cameras, but the place was so simple and modest he couldn’t imagine anyone trying to eavesdrop. If Sergeant Packer was any indication, the staff was laid-back, almost indifferent.

  He studied the empty chairs on both sides of the screen, and wondered how many desperate people, in the last hours of their lives, had met here with their attorneys and listened for words of hope. How many urgent pleas had passed through this screen as the clock ticked steadily away? How many lawyers had sat where he was now sitting and told their clients that there was nothing left to do, that the execution would proceed? It was a somber thought, and it calmed Adam quite a bit. He was not the first to be here, and he would not be the last. He was a lawyer, well trained, blessed with a quick mind, and arriving here with the formidable resources of Kravitz & Bane behind him. He could do his job. His legs slowly became still, and he quit chewing his fingernails.

  A door bolt clicked, and he jumped through his skin. It opened slowly, and a young white guard stepped into the inmates’ side. Behind him, in a bright red jumpsuit, h
ands cuffed behind, was Sam Cayhall. He glowered around the room, squinting through the screen, until his eyes focused on Adam. A guard pulled at his elbow and led him to a spot directly across from the lawyer. He was thin, pale, and six inches shorter than both guards, but they seemed to give him plenty of room.

  “Who are you?” he hissed at Adam, who at the moment had a fingernail between his teeth.

  One guard pulled a chair behind Sam, and the other guard sat him in it. He stared at Adam. The guards backed away, and were about to leave when Adam said, “Could you remove the handcuffs, please?”

  “No sir. We can’t.”

  Adam swallowed hard. “Just take them off, okay. We’re gonna be here for a while,” he said, mustering a degree of forcefulness. The guards looked at each other as if this request had never been heard. A key was quickly produced, and the handcuffs were removed.

  Sam was not impressed. He glared at Adam through the opening in the screen as the guards made their noisy departure. The door slammed, and the deadbolt clicked.

  They were alone, the Cayhall version of a family reunion. The air conditioner rattled and spewed, and for a long minute it made the only sounds. Though he tried valiantly, Adam was unable to look Sam in the eyes for more than two seconds. He busied himself with important note taking on the legal pad, and as he numbered each line he could feel the heat of Sam’s stare.

  Finally, Adam stuck a business card through the opening. “My name is Adam Hall. I’m a lawyer with Kravitz & Bane. Chicago and Memphis.”

  Sam patiently took the card and examined it front and back. Adam watched every move. His fingers were wrinkled and stained brown with cigarette smoke. His face was pallid, the only color coming from the salt and pepper stubble of five days’ growth. His hair was long, gray, and oily, and slicked back severely. Adam decided quickly that he looked nothing like the frozen images from the video. Nor did he resemble the last known photos of himself, those from the 1981 trial. He was quite an old man now, with pasty delicate skin and layers of tiny wrinkles around his eyes. Deep burrows of age and misery cut through his forehead. The only attractive feature was the set of piercing, indigo eyes that lifted themselves from the card. “You Jew boys never quit, do you?” he said in a pleasant, even tone. There was no hint of anger.

  “I’m not Jewish,” Adam said, successfully returning the stare.

  “Then how can you work for Kravitz & Bane?” he asked as he set the card aside. His words were soft, slow, and delivered with the patience of a man who’d spent nine and a half years alone in a six-by-nine cell.

  “We’re an equal opportunity employer.”

  “That’s nice. All proper and legal, I presume. In full compliance with all civil rights decisions and federal do-gooder laws.”

  “Of course.”

  “How many partners are in Kravitz & Bane now?”

  Adam shrugged. The number varied from year to year. “Around a hundred and fifty.”

  “A hundred and fifty partners. And how many are women?”

  Adam hesitated as he tried to count. “I really don’t know. Probably a dozen.”

  “A dozen,” Sam repeated, barely moving his lips. His hands were folded and still, and his eyes did not blink. “So, less than ten percent of your partners are women. How many nigger partners do you have?”

  “Could we refer to them as blacks?”

  “Oh sure, but of course that too is an antiquated term. They now want to be called African-Americans. Surely you’re politically correct enough to know this.”

  Adam nodded but said nothing.

  “How many African-American partners do you have?”

  “Four, I believe.”

  “Less than three percent. My, my. Kravitz & Bane, that great bastion of civil justice and liberal political action, does, in fact, discriminate against African-Americans and Female-Americans. I just don’t know what to say.”

  Adam scratched something illegible on his pad. He could argue, of course, that almost a third of the associates were female and that the firm made diligent efforts to sign the top black law students. He could explain how they had been sued for reverse discrimination by two white males whose job offers disappeared at the last moment.

  “How many Jewish-American partners do you have? Eighty percent?”

  “I don’t know. It really doesn’t matter to me.”

  “Well, it certainly matters to me. I was always embarrassed to be represented by such blatant bigots.”

  “A lot of people would find it appropriate.”

  Sam carefully reached into the only visible pocket of his jumpsuit, and removed a blue pack of Montclairs and a disposable lighter. The jumpsuit was unbuttoned halfway down the chest, and a thick matting of gray hair showed through the gap. The fabric was a very light cotton. Adam could not imagine life in this place with no air conditioning.

  He lit the cigarette and exhaled toward the ceiling. “I thought I was through with you people.”

  “They didn’t send me down here. I volunteered.”

  “Why?”

  “I don’t know. You need a lawyer, and—”

  “Why are you so nervous?”

  Adam jerked his fingernails from his teeth and stopped tapping his feet. “I’m not nervous.”

  “Sure you are. I’ve seen lots of lawyers around this place, and I’ve never seen one as nervous as you. What’s the matter, kid? You afraid I’m coming through the screen after you?”

  Adam grunted and tried to smile. “Don’t be silly. I’m not nervous.”

  “How old are you?”

  “Twenty-six.”

  “You look twenty-two. When did you finish law school?”

  “Last year.”

  “Just great. The Jewish bastards have sent a greenhorn to save me. I’ve known for a long time that they secretly wanted me dead, now this proves it. I killed some Jews, now they want to kill me. I was right all along.”

  “You admit you killed the Kramer kids?”

  “What the hell kind of question is that? The jury said I did. For nine years, the appeals courts have said the jury was right. That’s all that matters. Who the hell are you asking me questions like that?”

  “You need a lawyer, Mr. Cayhall. I’m here to help.”

  “I need a lot of things, boy, but I damned sure don’t need an eager little tenderfoot like you to give me advice. You’re dangerous, son, and you’re too ignorant to know it.” Again, the words came deliberately and without emotion. He held the cigarette between the index and middle finger of his right hand, and casually flipped ashes in an organized pile in a plastic bowl. His eyes blinked occasionally. His face showed neither feeling nor sentiment.

  Adam took meaningless notes, then tried again to stare through the slit into Sam’s eyes. “Look, Mr. Cayhall, I’m a lawyer, and I have a strong moral conviction against the death penalty. I am well educated, well trained, well read on Eighth Amendment issues, and I can be of assistance to you. That’s why I’m here. Free of charge.”

  “Free of charge,” Sam repeated. “How generous. Do you realize, son, that I get at least three offers a week now from lawyers who want to represent me for free? Big lawyers. Famous lawyers. Rich lawyers. Some real slimy snakes. They’re all perfectly willing to sit where you’re now sitting, file all the last minute motions and appeals, do the interviews, chase the cameras, hold my hand in the last hours, watch them gas me, then do yet another press conference, then sign a book deal, a movie deal, maybe a television mini-series deal about the life and times of Sam Cayhall, a real Klan murderer. You see, son, I’m famous, and what I did is now legendary. And since they’re about to kill me, then I’m about to become even more famous. Thus, the lawyers want me. I’m worth a lot of money. A sick country, right.”

  Adam was shaking his head. “I don’t want any of that, I promise. I’ll put it in writing. I’ll sign a complete confidentiality agreement.”

  Sam chuckled. “Right, and who’s going to enforce it after I’m gone?”

&nb
sp; “Your family,” Adam said.

  “Forget my family,” Sam said firmly.

  “My motives are pure, Mr. Cayhall. My firm has represented you for seven years, so I know almost everything about your file. I’ve also done quite a lot of research into your background.”

  “Join the club. I’ve had my underwear examined by a hundred half-ass reporters. There are many people who know much about me, it seems, and all this combined knowledge is of absolutely no benefit to me right now. I have four weeks. Do you know this?”

  “I have a copy of the opinion.”

  “Four weeks, and they gas me.”

  “So let’s get to work. You have my word that I will never talk to the press unless you authorize it, that I’ll never repeat anything you tell me, and that I will not sign any book or movie deal. I swear it.”

  Sam lit another cigarette and stared at something on the counter. He gently rubbed his right temple with his right thumb, the cigarette just inches from his hair. For a long time the only sound was the gurgling of the overworked window unit. Sam smoked and contemplated. Adam doodled on his pad and was quite proud that his feet were motionless and his stomach was not aching. The silence was awkward, and he figured, correctly, that Sam could sit and smoke and think in utter silence for days.

  “Are you familiar with Barroni?” Sam asked quietly.

  “Barroni?”

  “Yes, Barroni. Came down last week from the Ninth Circuit. California case.”

  Adam racked his brain for a trace of Barroni. “I might have seen it.”

  “You might have seen it? You’re well trained, well read, etc., and you might have seen Barroni? What kind of half-ass lawyer are you?”

  “I’m not a half-ass lawyer.”

  “Right, right. What about Texas v. Eekes? Surely you’ve read that one?”

  “When did it come down?”

  “Within six weeks.”

  “What court?”