Juror #3(20)

He looked away and picked up an ancient People from a rack of battered magazines I set out for my clients. “Nothing big. Just a local organization.”

“Oh, you’re going to make me guess.” I looked him up and down, pretending I was trying to fit him in a box. “Lions Club? Rotary? Shrine?”

He gave a half shrug, as if he didn’t want to talk about it. I laughed, enjoying the brief distraction from my trial preparation.

“Church choir? Young Democrats? Republicans?”

“Nope. You’re not such a good guesser.”

I gasped in mock horror. “Square dancing? No!”

“Quit deviling me and clean your plate.”

I ate up, so glad to have a hot plate of food that I wasn’t even self-conscious as Shorty watched me gobble it down. When I paused to wipe gravy from the corner of my mouth, he said, “Can Lee Greene fry chicken that good?”

I had to laugh. “Oh, Shorty, please. Lee never toiled over a frying pan for me, I promise.”

My plate was almost clean, except for a chicken leg for tomorrow’s breakfast. “Thanks so much for dinner. I’m going to put this in the fridge for later.”

Shorty followed me into the back room. As I set my prize in the fridge, he walked around the space with his hands clasped behind his back.

“So this is home?” he said.

Seeing my dwelling through his eyes was awkward. In a teasing voice, I said, “Let me take you on a tour of House Beautiful. This is the state-of-the-art kitchen,” indicating my microwave and hot plate with a flourish of my arm.

“The dressing room is on the right.” I had a particleboard dresser and a portable rod for hanging clothes.

“And finally, the elegant bedroom.” I scooted to my sofa bed, still unmade from the night before.

When he came closer and took my face in his hands, it didn’t take me by surprise. It was a blessed relief to escape from Darrien Summers and his fate, to block it out completely. I pulled Shorty onto the unmade bed, ready for a roll in the hay.

After some much-needed distraction, Shorty didn’t suggest sleeping over, for which I was grateful; I still had work to do. As he buttoned up his shirt, he shot me a wink.

“Anything else I can do for you tonight, Ruby?”

“Well, you brought me supper and took my mind off my troubles. That should do it.”

He was whistling as he shut the door behind him. Suddenly remembering, I followed.

“Hey, Shorty! You got a pen on you?”





Chapter 16



ON MONDAY MORNING, I sat beside Darrien at the counsel table in Judge Baylor’s courtroom. I wore my Goodwill suit, the errant button sewn firmly into position. My client was better dressed than I was, in the navy wool suit that Suzanne Greene had provided. It looked sharp, though as we’d predicted when I’d picked it up, it was a tight fit.

I looked around at the prospective jurors assembled in court. The racial makeup was not what I had hoped: roughly three-quarters of the panel was white, only a quarter black.

Judge Baylor’s door swung open, and he emerged from his chambers in his robe. The bailiff called: “All rise!”

“Be seated,” the judge said, as he settled into his seat behind the bench. He had a sheaf of papers in his hand. “The following panelists are excused from their duty.”

Leafing through the sheets of paper, he called out names; as he did, people left the courtroom. With each departure, my anxiety increased.

He was excusing people of color. My black jurors.

After a dozen or more prospective jurors departed, I jumped to my feet.

“Your Honor! May we approach the bench?”

He looked up from the papers. “Now?”

“Yes, Your Honor.”

Lafayette joined me at the bench. The judge said, “What is it, Miss Bozarth?”

“Your Honor, I object to the elimination of these jurors. I demand an explanation.”

He leaned back, regarding me with surprise. “Demand? You demand?”

I was starting off on the wrong foot with the judge, I knew that, but this wasn’t an ice cream social. “The court is affecting the racial diversity of the panel. Of the thirteen people you excused, eleven were black.”

Lafayette shrugged, nonplussed. “The judge is just doing his job.”

“What?” I said, in a voice too loud for a bench discussion.

Baylor shook the sheets of paper he held. “You’re surely aware that Mississippi has a literacy requirement for jury service.”

Did I know that?

“And as the circuit judge, it’s my responsibility to remove any panelists whose ability to read or write doesn’t stand up to my scrutiny. The panelists filled out these questionnaires this morning. This is standard procedure.”

Lafayette’s mouth was twitching. My radar was buzzing like crazy.

“This is subjective, an abuse of power by the court.”

“Your objection is noted,” Baylor said. “Sit down.”

Once the preliminary panelists named by the judge had been excluded, Judge Baylor gave us a chance to ask the remaining prospective jurors questions. Lafayette went first. He asked whether any members of the panel were friends or acquaintances of the defendant, Darrien Summers. Only one woman raised her hand: a black woman in her twenties. She said she’d gone to school with Darrien. Lafayette approached the bench; I joined him as he whispered to Judge Baylor.