Gideon - 05 - Blind Judgement Read Online Free PDF

afford to overlook it, despite the declining population. Beside the celebrities are framed certificates showing his participation in various law enforcement and community activities. On his desk is a picture of presumably his wife and his two children, both teenaged girls who look just like him.
    “I’m originally from Bear Creek,” I say as I sit down, determined to make an ally of this man even though he surely must be convinced of my client’s guilt.
    “But we didn’t have many big names stopping by here thirty years ago. I remember Orval Faubus campaigning once at the square, but I doubt you would have had his picture up here.”
    Sheriff Bonner smiles politely, presumably blanching inwardly at the thought of the state’s most famous segregationist schmoozing for votes in his office.
    “If the ugliest girl in town had the only car,” he points out, “there comes a time when it’s convenient to forget who used to ride around with her.”
    “I guess you’re right,” I say, not about to rub this man’s face in
    whatever compromises he’s needed to make to get where he is today.
    Rubbing his chin, he asks, “Did your daddy own a pharmacy here a long time ago?”
    I’ll take whatever mileage I can get out of Page’s Drugs.
    “On the square. You’ve got a good memory.” My mind plays back summer Saturday evenings at closing time, when, locking the front door, my father, invariably dressed in muted slacks and short-sleeved shirts, would stare balefully across the square and shake his head in distaste at the gaudily dressed black males strutting like peacocks as they dipped in and out of the Busy Bee, a black cafe. I recall a liquor store and black movie theater adjacent to the restaurant.
    “I used to go in there when I was a kid, and he’d shoo me out,” Bonner says.
    “I’m pretty sure he thought I was stealing comic books.”
    “He thought everybody was,” I say hastily.
    Though I don’t remember my father as a rude man, I doubt if he was overly polite to the black kids who waited restlessly for their parents to decide what store-bought nostrums would ease their aches and pains.
    I try to picture Bonner as a ten-year-old and imagine him already picking up cues on how the world worked—slowly in our part of the state. I add, “You might not remember he became seriously mentally ill.”
     
    Bonner, to his credit, doesn’t pretend sympathy he can’t feel.
    “I had forgotten that,” he says.
    “Well, what can I do for you, Mr. Page?”
    I explain that I am merely trying to get oriented and haven’t even seen the charges filed against my client.
    “Did your office handle the investigation,” I ask politely, “or did the state police get involved?” Usually, small-town sheriffs need all the help they can get.
    Bonner spins a small globe on his desk.
    “Do you know how many investigators there are on the state police force that are minorities? I’ll give you a hint. Not many. As you probably know, Bear Creek is now seventy percent black. To maintain the credibility of law enforcement over here, I do all my own investigations.”
    And it keeps you in the public eye, I think to myself. In ten years I can see this man being the first black Congressman from the 1 st District. He has that much charisma.
    “I can understand that,” I say.
    “Though I’m just getting started, it seems to me that my client could easily have been set up. Weren’t there other suspects besides him?”
     
    Bonner puts his hand behind his head.
    “My policy is that once I’ve turned over a file to the prosecutor, I don’t say anything about it until trial.”
    “So you don’t have any doubts,” I ask, “that my client was hired by Paul Taylor to murder Willie Ting Instead of responding right away, Bonner rocks gently in his chair.
    Finally, he says, politely, “I think I just answered that question.” He stands up, dismissing me.
    “Our prosecutor is upstairs.
    I’m sure he’ll answer any questions