A Visit with The Judge

Ninety Days Inside The Empire: A Novel by William Appleman Williams

Page 39

"Listen, Henry. You get yourself and Frankel and the barber out of this and stay out of it. Doc, we'll talk if I get desperate for proof of no rape. Otherwise you stay out, too. I did it and I'll see to it. One last thing. Henry, you tell Becky not to come by my house. Skedaddle you all down the back stairs. NOW!"

They did not like it, but they went.

Marsh sat there a long time. He knew he was in big trouble. He worked a bit on the bottle, but mostly he thought about Becky.

-- Damn, damn, damn. But if I didn't do it then she'd never look at me the same anymore.

Finally the street was quiet and the sun was down and he rode over to the County Judge's house and walked up on the porch. The door opened before he knocked.

"Been expectin' you, Marsh. "

Judge Thomas was a stout man somewhere in his sixties and Marsh thought him fair if slow, and now getting lazy.

"Thank you, Judge. I figured we better talk about it."

"Thank you, Marsh. Come in."

So Marsh told him everything except where the boy was.

-- Well, that ain't really lying because by now I don't honest to God know myself.

"What do you suggest, Marsh?"

"Let it rest and forget it."

"What if it don't?"

-- Marsh sat there wishing he'd been offered a drink.

"Well, we don't want any lynching, do we Judge?"

"Certainly not, but what if he is found and arrested and brought to trial? You goin' to defend him?"

-- Please, Judge, a drink.

"No, I have a friend who will do that."

"How's that?"

"Judge, I will testify that I saw everything and that the boy saved the woman's life and the charge of attempted rape is to be thrown out of court."

The judge was silent a good while.

"Would you like a drink, Marsh?"

-- Too late now.

"No thanks, Judge; better be movin' on home."

"They may come after you."

"I've thought on that."

The judge stood up. "Well, be careful for a while, Marsh, and see if it goes to sleep; and thanks again for comin' by."

Marsh rode home and tired as he was made it work to do several things. First he wrote Becky a long love letter and walked down to a Negro woman who worked there sometimes and asked her to take it over. Then he did his gun from scratch. Next he went through his papers, folded the few really important ones into his poncho and put that under the blanker under his saddle. Finally he made himself a drink, listened to the record that Becky had put on that first Sunday and then went to bed.

Nothing happened until the third night about eleven. He was about to tuck in when he heard the scratching at the door. A little girl he had never seen before handed him a note and fled. Henry's scrawl: "They's comin' tonight."

-- Fight or run?

No time. The first shots slammed into windows. Then the torches on the roof and through the shattered glass. He made it to his horse just as they surrounded him

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A Visit with The Judge

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