Deeper Water (23 page)

"I hope things continue to go well," Ms. Patrick said, returning to her salad.

I stepped outside into the heat, which made me doubly thankful I wouldn't have to stand on a street corner, waiting for a bus or ride in a smelly cab. I found the car. It had just been returned, and the air conditioner began to cool the interior by the time I left the parking lot. Several minutes later I parked in front of the Chatham County Correctional Center. The size of the sheriff's department complex surprised me. It was larger than I suspected.

I didn't feel very confident. I'd gritted my teeth all the way through criminal law and procedure, and the law school course trained us to argue a case before the Supreme Court, not figure out the best way to dispose of a petty criminal offense. I wasn't even sure how to conduct an effective interview.

I presented the order from Judge Cannon to a female deputy in the lobby area of the jail. She left with the order. Beyond the lobby was a large open room with chairs and phones on either side of clear glass. It wasn't visiting hours, and the room was empty. To my surprise, the jail smelled as clean as a hospital. The woman returned and handed the order to me.

"Wait here until someone brings the prisoner from lockup," she said. "Jones is a trusty so they may have to track him down."

I didn't know what "trusty" meant, but it made me feel better about meeting a man who lived behind bars. A door behind the woman opened and a male deputy appeared.

"Tami Taylor?" he asked.

"Yes sir," I answered before realizing it probably wasn't necessary to be so formal.

The deputy grinned. "Follow me."

The door clicked shut with a thud behind me. We walked down a short hallway to another door that opened when the deputy pushed a series of buttons. I could see surveillance cameras mounted on the wall. If the twins had been with me they would probably have waved to the cameras.

We entered another room with several numbered doors around an open space. None of the doors had windows in them. A deputy sat behind a desk at one end of the room.

"He's in room 5," the deputy said.

"Do I go in alone?" I asked.

"I don't think Jones is a security risk," the deputy answered. "If you have a concern, you can leave the door open. Deputy Jenkins and I will be on the other side of the room."

"All right." I nodded grimly.

I approached the door and pushed it open. It contained a small table and four plastic chairs. Standing by the table was an old black man with graying hair.

"I'm Tami Taylor," I said. "Are you Mr. Jones?"

"Yes, missy. But you can call me Moses."

The man extended his hand. It felt like old leather. His fingernails were cracked and yellowed with age. I let the door close. The deputy was right. Moses didn't look like a serious threat to my personal safety.

"You be my lawyer?"

"Sort of," I said, then quickly added, "I'm a law student working for a law firm in Savannah this summer. One of the firm's lawyers will be supervising what I do for you."

I put a blank legal pad on the table. We both sat down. I clicked open my pen. I wanted to be professional and efficient.

"First, I need some background information. Your full name, Social Security number, and date of birth."

Moses turned his head to the side and made a sucking noise as he drew air into his mouth. I couldn't see more than a couple of teeth.

"Moses Jones is all I go by. My mama, she give me another name, Tobias, but I don't never use it. I lost my Social Security card. The boss man, he pays me cash under the table. What else you want to know?"

"Date of birth."

"I was born on June 5."

"What year?"

"I'm seventy-one years old," he said, "if that helps you figure it."

I wrote down the date and other information on the legal pad.

"And your address?"

"I ain't got none."

"You're homeless?"

"No!" he said with more force than I expected. "I got me a place down on the river, but it ain't on no road or nothing."

"Are you married?"

"No, missy. I ain't had a woman in my life for a long time."

"Any children?"

"I had one, a boy, but he be dead."

"I'm sorry."

Moses leaned forward and his eyes became more animated. "I never seen his face in the water. If'n I did, I don't think I could stand it."

"What water?" I asked.

"The black water. In the night. That's when the faces come up to look around. They don't say nothing, but I can read their thoughts. They know that I know. They be calling out to me."

I wrote down his words. When I saw them on the legal pad, it made me feel creepy. I looked up. The old man was staring past my shoulder. I quickly turned around. All I saw was the blank concrete wall.

"Do you see something in this room?" I asked hesitantly.

"No, missy. But the faces ain't never far from me. You from Savannah?"

"No."

Moses Jones was obviously delusional and had mental problems much more serious than twenty-four counts of misdemeanor trespassing in his boat. He needed professional help. No one in our church ever admitted going to a psychologist or psychiatrist, but it made sense to me, at least until God came in to straighten out a person's life.

"Well, you may need to talk to someone about that later," I said.

"I told the detective all about it. He asked me a lot more questions than you."

"Which detective?"

"I don't know his name. He be young and black."

"Did he question you about tying your boat up to docks where you didn't have permission?"

Moses nodded his head. "Yeah, but I told him the river, it belong to God who made it. How can anyone own a river? It always be moving and changing. You can't hold on to water like you can a piece of dirty ground."

I was startled by his logic. In a way, it made sense.

"But when a person builds a dock on the river, that's private property," I answered. "That's why you were arrested, because you tied up your boat where you didn't have permission."

"Who'm I going to ask? Will a man be happy and hug my neck if'n I come up on his house in the dark, beat on his door, and say, `I want to tie up for the rest of the night. I won't hurt a thing. My rope, it don't leave a mark. And I'll be slipping away at dawn light?"'

"The law says you have to get permission."

"You be the lawyer. Make the law right so I can leave this jailhouse with my boat."

"Where is your boat?"

"In amongst the cars behind that tall fence. I can see it, but I can't touch it. I don't know if it be leaky or not."

"It's here at the jail?"

Moses nodded.

"I'll check into that for you. Have they set your bond?"

"I reckon, but I ain't got money for no bondsman. My boat ain't worth nothing to nobody but me."

"Have you had a court hearing of any kind?"

"I ain't been before no judge, if'n that's what you mean."

"So they'll leave you in here indefinitely for trespassing?" I asked, expressing my private thoughts.

"That be your job, missy. Most of the time, the lawyer be the one to get a man out of this jail."

"Okay."

I opened the folder and looked again at the twenty-four counts. The scenario seemed clear. I spoke slowly.

"You would fish at night and tie up at a private dock for a few hours of sleep until the sun came up."

"Yes, missy. That part be true. I never took nothing that weren't mine." He looked away. "Except for some other stuff."

"What other stuff?"

"At the taverns where I cleaned up. I'd grab cooked food, a knife, a fork. Not every week, only when I was extra hungry or needed it."

All theft is wrong, but these newly admitted offenses weren't part of the case I had to resolve, and I wasn't a prosecutor. I sat back in my chair.

"So what is our defense to the charges against you? They've listed twenty-four counts of trespassing when you tied up without permission at private docks. I agree with you that the river belongs to God, but the docks are private property."

Moses looked at me and blinked his dark eyes. "I want my boat back and to get out of this jailhouse so I can go to the river and catch fish. I won't bother nobody else. Never again."

"Will you stop tying up at private docks?"

He rubbed his hand across the top of his head. "I been on that river before there be docks. I reckon I can say to myself they ain't there no more."

"Does that mean you won't tie up there?"

"Yes, missy. That be exactly what that mean."

I WATCHED DEPUTYJENKINS ESCORT MOSES OUT OF THE INTERview area. I wasn't sure I'd conducted an adequate first interview or not. I glanced down at my single page of notes. There didn't seem to be any benefit in asking the old man about each count. I'm sure the story was the same. I considered my options.

I could remind the judge that God, as the Creator of all things, owned all the rivers of the world and looked favorably on baby Moses when his basket trespassed onto waters reserved for Pharaoh's daughter. Such an argument, while creative, wouldn't make me look like a competent lawyer-in-training. I could follow Julie's advice to subpoena the twenty-four dock owners to trial and hope none of them showed up. While trying the case would give me courtroom experience, it would also drag Zach Mays away from his more important work at the firm.

The best course of action was obvious. Moses Jones ought to plead guilty to the charges with a promise not to trespass in the future. After receiving a stern lecture from the judge, he could be placed on a short period of probation. I reached the lobby.

"Could I find out the name of the detective who interviewed my client, Moses Jones?" I asked the woman deputy on duty.

"Give me the case number."

I handed her the file. She opened it and returned my notes.

"You might want to keep this."

"Thanks."

"Wait here."

She left for several minutes. While I waited a deputy brought in a woman in handcuffs accompanied by two small girls. She stood forlornly with the little girls holding on to her legs while the officer spoke on a walkie-talkie to someone in another section of the jail. I stared, unable to pull my gaze away from the tragedy. The woman looked at me with eyes that pleaded for help. I took a step forward, then stopped. I had no right to intrude. The deputy took the woman by the arm and led her into the lockup area with the children trailing along behind.

The woman officer returned.

"It's Detective Branson. He's on his way up to see you."

"He's willing to talk to me?"

"I showed him the order from the judge."

A different door than the one I'd taken to the interview area opened, and a black man in his thirties wearing a casual shirt and dark pants entered.

"I'm Sylvester Branson," he said.

"Tami Taylor."

"Come with me."

I followed him through the door into a suite of small offices.

"Have a seat," the detective said.

On the detective's desk was a picture of a woman and two girls about the same ages as the ones I'd seen a few minutes before.

"You're working for Braddock, Appleby, and Carpenter?"

"Yes sir."

"Mr. Carpenter represented my father and his brothers in a civil case several years ago. He's a great trial lawyer, one of the best crossexaminers in this part of the state."

"That's what I've been told. I hope to see him in the courtroom while I'm here."

"Did he send you down here to represent Moses Jones?"

"In a way. He asked Judge Cannon to appoint summer clerks to work on misdemeanor cases so long as another lawyer in the firm supervised our work."

The detective didn't say anything. I shifted in my chair, not sure about the proper way to proceed.

"When I met with Mr. Jones, he mentioned that he had been interviewed by a detective," I said.

"That's right. I talked to him."

"Could you tell me what he told you?"

Branson tapped a folder on his desk. It was much thicker than mine.

"After waiving his Miranda rights, he talked freely about the charges."

"Did he sign a statement?"

"Yes, but I won't give it to you now. You can obtain a copy once you file the proper request with the court."

"I'm going to have to research how to do that." I bit my lower lip and tried to think of something else to ask. I decided to broach the ultimate issue. "If Mr. Jones wants to enter a plea, could I talk to you about that?"

"No, the district attorney's office will have the case assigned to a prosecutor. All plea negotiations are handled by the prosecutor."

"Who has the case?"

"I'm not sure. No one has contacted me."

I ran down my mental checklist. "Is there a bond set in Mr. Jones' case?"

"Yes, it's five thousand dollars."

"I don't think he has much money."

"That's why he's still in jail and represented by an appointed lawyer. "

"I'm sorry. That was a stupid question."

The detective smiled. "No need to apologize. There are a lot of lawyers in Savannah who ask stupid questions. They could use a dose of your honesty."