A Time for Mercy (Jake Brigance #3) - John Grisham Page 0,25

claimed to be studying for the bar exam, a monumental challenge for an old man with much of his mental strength sapped by years of heavy drinking. Lucien claimed that by keeping hours at the office he stayed away from the whiskey cabinet at home, but before long he was sipping at his desk. He had assumed ownership of a small downstairs conference room, far away from Jake but too close to Portia, and usually spent the afternoons snoring off his liquid lunches with his feet on his desk.

Lucien had made one crude comment of a sexual nature to Portia, after which she threatened to break his neck. They had been civil ever since, though she was happier when he was absent.

To round out the firm’s lineup, most of the typing was being done by a twenty-hour-a-week former client named Beverly, a perfectly nice lady of middle age whose entire existence revolved around smoking cigarettes. She chain-smoked, knew the habit was killing her, and had tried every gimmick on the market to quit. The addiction prevented her from keeping a full-time job, and a husband. Jake fixed her an office behind the kitchen where all windows and doors could be left open and she could peck away in a blue haze. Even then, everything she touched reeked of stale smoke and Jake was worried about how long she would last. He quietly speculated to Portia that lung cancer might get her before he was forced to terminate her employment. But Portia did not complain, nor did Lucien, who still smoked cigars on his porch and often smelled of old fumes himself.

Jake eased upstairs to his grand office and did not turn on the lights because he did not want to attract attention. Even on Sunday afternoons, he had heard people knocking on his door. Not often, though. Not often enough. Some days he wondered where the next clients were coming from. Others, he wanted to get rid of all of them.

In the semidarkness, he stretched out on the old leather sofa purchased by the Wilbanks brothers decades earlier, and he stared at the dusty fan hanging from the ceiling and wondered how long it had been there. How much of the practice of law had changed over the years? What were the ethical dilemmas faced by those lawyers back then? Did they worry about taking unpopular cases? Were they afraid of a backlash if they represented murderers?

Jake chuckled at the stories he’d heard about Lucien. He had been the first, and for years the only, white member of the county’s chapter of the NAACP. And later, the same for the ACLU. He had represented unions, a rarity in rural north Mississippi. He sued the state over the lousy schools for blacks. He sued the state over capital punishment. He sued the city because it refused to pave the streets in Lowtown. Until he was disbarred, Lucien Wilbanks had been a fearless lawyer who never hesitated to fire off a lawsuit when he thought one was needed, and never failed to help a client who was being mistreated.

On the sidelines now for the past eleven years, Lucien was still a loyal friend who reveled in Jake’s success. If asked, there was no doubt in Jake’s mind that Lucien would advise him to not only take on the defense of young Drew Gamble but to do so with as much noise as possible. Proclaim innocence! Demand a speedy trial! Lucien had always believed that every person charged with a serious crime deserved a good lawyer. And, Lucien had never, throughout his colorful career, dodged the attention that a bad client could bring.

Jake’s other close friend, Harry Rex, had already weighed in and there was no reason to revisit the question with him. Carla was on the fence. Noose was waiting by the phone.

He wasn’t worried about the Kofers. He didn’t know them and believed they lived in the southern part of the county. Jake was thirty-seven years old and had practiced law successfully for twelve years without that family. He could certainly prosper in the future without knowing them.

He was thinking about the cops—the city policemen, and Ozzie, and his deputies. Six days a week, Jake had breakfast four doors down at the Coffee Shop, and Marshall Prather was often there, waiting with the morning’s first insult. Jake had done legal work for many on the force and knew that he was their favorite lawyer. DeWayne Looney had testified against