وکلا و افراد اف‌بی‌آی

Chapter four

Lawyers and FBI Men

Mark was a thinker and a worrier. When he couldn’t sleep he went for long secret walks. It started when his mother and father were fighting. He wore dark clothes and left the trailer to move like a thief through the night. He saw lovers, and he saw crime. He learned much, but he never told. He loved to sit on the hill above the trailer park and enjoy a quiet smoke. He was glad to find peace when he got home.

Now his mother and his brother were asleep in the hospital room, but Mark was still awake. He watched them sleep for twenty minutes, and then got bored. He was not afraid of strange places. He quietly covered his mother with a blanket and left the room. The hall was quiet and empty. He took the lift down to the cafe.

There were two people at one of the tables. One was in a wheel-chair. The other was offering him a white card.

‘My name’s Gill Teal,’ he said with a big smile. ‘Did you have an accident? Maybe I can help you.’

The other man didn’t smile. ‘Road accident,’ he said. ‘Two broken legs.’ Mark could see he was in pain.

‘Well,’ said Gill Teal. ‘I’m a lawyer and maybe you have a case. Who hit you?’

The other man looked at the lawyer carefully. ‘It was an Exxon lorry,’ he said. ‘He didn’t stop at a red light.’

‘Great,’ said Gill Teal. ‘I’ve got money from Exxon before. What have you got - two broken legs? I can get you six hundred thousand dollars for that.’

‘I talked to another lawyer today. He said he could get me a million.’

‘He’s lying,’ said Gill Teal. ‘Trust me. But maybe we can get more. Are you married? Have you got kids?’

‘Three kids,’ said the man. He looked tired.

‘Great,’ said Gill Teal. ‘For a family we can get more. Five hundred a month until you get back to work. Look, choose me and you’ll get the best, I promise.’

‘I’ll think about it,’ said the man.

‘Can I call you tomorrow’ said the lawyer.

‘No,’ said the man, ‘I said I’d think about it.’

Gill Teal got up. ‘OK,’ he said, ‘you think about it. You’ve got my card.’ He shook hands and left.

The man in the wheelchair pushed himself away, leaving the card on the table. When he had gone Mark took the card. He looked at the name and the address. He put the card in his pocket and sat back to watch the television.

Roy Foltrigg liked to be on television. He really enjoyed those moments when the cameras were waiting for him. Just at the right moment he would arrive, walking quickly, holding his hand up like a very important man who would love to answer questions but just didn’t have the time. He spent many pleasant moments watching videos of himself arriving at important places. Tonight, however, there were no cameras, and no reporters when he arrived at the FBI offices in Memphis. It was after midnight.

Jason McThune and Larry Trumann introduced themselves. There was only one chair, and Foltrigg took it. McThune explained the facts quickly. He told Foltrigg about finding the car, what was in it, the gun, the time of death, and about Mark Sway. ‘Mark and his younger brother found the body and told the police. They live about half a mile away in a trailer park. The younger kid is in hospital now. He’s in shock. His mother, Dianne, is with him, and Mark is there too. He’s lying.’

‘What’s he lying about’ asked Foltrigg.

‘He says he arrived after Clifford shot himself, but we don’t believe him,’ said McThune. ‘First, his fingerprints are all over the car, inside and out. They’re on Jerome’s whisky bottle, and they’re on the tail pipe too.’

‘How did you check his prints’ asked Foltrigg.

‘Off a bottle of Coke he drank tonight,’ said McThune. ‘Next, we found three cigarettes near the car. We think the boys were having a quiet smoke when Clifford arrived. They hid and watched him. Maybe they pulled his tube from the tail pipe. We’re not sure, and the kids aren’t telling. The little boy can’t talk just now, but we’re sure Mark is lying.’

‘What about Clifford’ asked Foltrigg.

‘We checked his blood,’ continued McThune. He was drunk, and full of drugs too. We can’t know what he was thinking. We know he left New Orleans in the morning, and we think he bought the gun here in Memphis.’

‘Why Memphis?’

‘He was born here,’ said McThune. ‘Maybe he wanted to die where he was born. He left a note,’ he added, picking up a piece of paper. ‘It tells his secretary what to do after his death. We couldn’t find the pen that wrote it.’

Foltrigg took it from him and read it. ‘What’s this at the bottom’ he asked. The ink is different. It says “Mark, Mark where are.” but I can’t read the rest.’

‘Right,’ said McThune. ‘We can’t read that bit either. We found the second pen in the car, so maybe Clifford used it there, but he was too drunk to write clearly.’

Foltrigg listened with his mouth open. ‘So what does it mean’ he asked.

‘There’s no Mark in Clifford’s family,’ said McThune. ‘We checked. So we think the note is for Mark Sway. But how did he know Mark’s name unless he talked to him?’

‘Why would the kid lie?’

‘Because he’s afraid,’ said McThune. ‘We think he was in the car. We think he and Clifford talked about something. At some point the kid left the car. Clifford tried to add something to the note and then shot himself.’

Foltrigg’s mouth was open again.

‘Maybe the kid’s afraid because Clifford told him something he doesn’t need to know,’ finished McThune.

Foltrigg shut his mouth, put the note on the desk and cleared his throat. ‘Have you talked to the kid’ he asked.

‘Not yet,’ said McThune. ‘We’ll do that first thing in the morning. We’d like to talk to his little brother too, but we’ll have to ask his doctor.’

‘I’d like to be there’ said Foltrigg, thinking about the body. ‘We must know everything Mark Sway knows.’