Sparring Partners

Read Excerpt

HOMECOMING

(1)

It was one of those raw, windy, dreary Monday afternoons in February when gloom settled over the land and seasonal depression was rampant. Court was not in session. The phone wasn’t ringing. Petty criminals and other potential clients were busy elsewhere with no thoughts whatsoever of hiring lawyers. The occasional caller was more likely to be a man or woman still reeling from holiday overspending and seeking advice about unpaid credit card accounts. Those were quickly sent next door, or across the square, or anywhere.

Jake was at his desk upstairs, making little progress with the stack of paperwork he’d been neglecting for weeks, even months. With no court or hearings scheduled for days, it should have been a good time to catch up with the old stuff—the fish files that every lawyer had for some reason said yes to a year ago and now just wanted to go away. The upside of a small-town law practice, especially in your hometown, was that everyone knew your name, and that was what you wanted. It was important to be well thought of and well liked, with a good reputation. When your neighbors got in trouble, you wanted to be the man they called. The downside was that their cases were always mundane and rarely profitable. But, you couldn’t say no. The gossip was fierce and unrelenting, and a lawyer who turned his back on his friends would not last long.

His funk was interrupted when Alicia, his current part-time secretary, chimed in through his desk phone. “Jake, there’s a couple here to see you.”

A couple. Married but wanting to get unmarried. Another cheap divorce. He glanced at his daily planner though he knew there was nothing.

“Do they have an appointment?” he asked, but only to remind Alicia that she shouldn’t be bothering him with the foot traffic.

“No. But they’re very nice and they say it’s really urgent. They’re not going away, said it wouldn’t take but a few minutes.”

Jake loathed being bullied in his own office. On a busier day he would take a stand and get rid of them. “Do they appear to have any money?” The answer was always no.

“Well, they do seem rather affluent.”

Affluent? In Ford County. Somewhat intriguing.

Alicia continued, “They’re from Memphis and just passing through, but, again, they say it’s very important.”

“Any idea what it is?”

“No.”

Well, it wouldn’t be a divorce if they lived in Memphis. He ran through a list of possibilities—Grandma’s will, some old family land, maybe a kid busted for drugs over at Ole Miss. Since he was bored and mildly curious and needed an excuse to avoid the paperwork, he asked, “Did you tell them that I’m tied up in a settlement conference call with a dozen lawyers?”

“No.”

“Did you tell them I’m due in federal court over in Oxford and can only spare a moment or two?”

“No.”

“Did you tell them that I’m slammed with other appointments?”

“No. It’s pretty obvious the place is empty and the phone isn’t ringing.”

“Where are you?”

“I’m in the kitchen, so I can talk.”

“Okay, okay. Make some fresh coffee and put ’em in the conference room. I’ll be down in ten minutes.”

(2)

The first thing Jake noticed was their tans. They had obviously been somewhere in the sun. No one else in Clanton had a tan in February. The second thing he noticed was the woman’s smart short haircut, with a touch of gray, stylish and obviously expensive. He noticed the handsome sports coat on the gentleman. Both were well dressed and nicely groomed, a departure from the usual walk-ins.

He shook their hands as he got their names. Gene and Kathy Roupp, from Memphis. Late fifties, quite pleasant, with confident smiles showing rows of well-maintained teeth. Jake could easily picture them on a Florida golf course living the good life behind gates and guards.

“What can I do for you folks?” Jake asked.

Gene flashed a smile and went first. “Well, sad to say, but we’re not here as potential clients.”

Jake kept it loose with a fake smile and an aw-shucks shrug, as if to say, What the hell? What lawyer needs to get paid for his time? He’d give them about ten more minutes and one cup before showing them the door.

“We just got back from a month in Costa Rica, one of our favorites. Ever been to Costa Rica?”

“No. I hear it’s great.” He’d heard nothing of the sort but what else could he say? He would never admit that he had left the United States exactly once in his thirty-eight years. Foreign travel was only a dream.

“We love it down there, a real paradise. Beautiful beaches, mountains, rain forests, great food. We have some friends who own houses—real estate is pretty cheap. The people are delightful, educated, almost all speak English.”

Jake loathed the game of travel trivia because he’d never been anywhere. The local doctors were the worst—always bragging about the hottest new resorts.

Kathy was itching to move along the narrative and chimed in with “The golf is incredible, so many fabulous courses.”

Jake didn’t play golf because he was not a member of the Clanton Country Club. Its membership included too many doctors and climbers and families with old money.

He smiled and nodded at her and waited for one of them to continue. From a bag he couldn’t see she whipped out a pound of coffee in a shiny can and said, “Here’s a little gift, San Pedro Select, our favorite. Incredible. We haul it back by the case.”

Jake took it to be polite. In lieu of cash fees, he had been paid with watermelons, fresh venison, firewood, repairs to his cars, and more bartered goods and services than he cared to remember. His best lawyer buddy, Harry Rex Vonner, had once taken a John Deere mower as a fee, though it soon broke down. Another lawyer, one who was no longer practicing, had taken sexual favors from a divorce client. When he lost the case, she filed an ethics complaint alleging “substandard performance.”

Anyway, Jake admired the can and tried to read the Spanish. He noticed they had not touched their coffee, and he was suddenly worried that perhaps they were connoisseurs and his office brew wasn’t quite up to their standards.

Gene resumed with “So, two weeks ago we were at one of our favorite eco-lodges, high in the mountains, deep in the rain forest, a small place with only thirty rooms, incredible views.”

How many times might they use the word “incredible”?

“And we were having breakfast outdoors, watching the spider monkeys and parakeets, when a waiter stopped by our table to pour some more coffee. He was very friendly—”

“People are so friendly down there and they love Americans,” Kathy interjected.

How could they not?

Gene nodded at the interruption and continued, “We chatted him up for a spell, said his name was Jason and that he was from Florida, been living down there for twenty years. We saw him again at lunch and talked to him some more. We saw him around after that and always enjoyed a friendly chat. The day before we were to check out, he asked us to join him for a glass of champagne in a little tree-house bar. He was off-duty and said the drinks were on him. The sunsets over the mountains are incredible, and we were having a good time, when all of a sudden he got serious.”

Gene paused and looked at Kathy, who was ready to pounce with “He said he had something to tell us, something very confidential. Said his name was not really Jason and he wasn’t from Florida. He apologized for not being truthful. Said his name was really Mack Stafford, and that he was from Clanton, Mississippi.”

Jake tried to remain nonchalant but it was impossible. His mouth dropped open and his eyes widened.

The Roupps were watching closely for his reaction. Gene said, “I take it you know Mack Stafford.”

Jake exhaled and wasn’t sure what to say. “Well, I’ll be damned.”

“He said you guys were old friends,” Gene added.

Stunned, Jake was still grasping for words. “I’m just glad he’s alive.”

“So you know him well?”

“Oh yes, quite well.”

Praise

"John Grisham is about as good a storyteller as we've got."

PURCHASE

Sparring Partners

Also by John Grisham

Listen to an Audio Sample

John Grisham Scroll to Top
A Time for Mercy - John Grisham

A Time for Mercy

Sign me up to get more news about John Grisham Books.



By clicking "Sign Up", I acknowledge that I have read and agree to Penguin Random House's Privacy Policy and Terms of Use and understand that Penguin Random House collects certain categories of personal information for the purposes listed in that policy, discloses, sells, or shares certain personal information and retains personal information in accordance with the policy. You can opt-out of the sale or sharing of personal information anytime.

Six days a week, every day but Sunday, Jake Brigance allowed himself to be dragged out of bed at the unholy hour of 5:30 a.m. by a noisy alarm clock. Six days a week he went straight to the coffeepot, punched a button, then hurried to his own private little bathroom in the basement, far away from his sleeping wife and daughter, where he showered in five minutes and spent another five with the rest of his ritual before dressing in the clothes he’d laid out the night before. He then hurried upstairs, poured a cup of black coffee, eased back into his bedroom, kissed his wife goodbye, grabbed his coffee, and, at precisely 5:45 closed the kitchen door and stepped onto the rear patio. Six days a week he drove the dark streets of Clanton to the picturesque square with the stately courthouse anchoring life as he knew it, parked in front of his office on Washington Street, and, at 6:00 a.m., six days a week, walked into the Coffee Shop to either hear or create the gossip, and to dine on wheat toast and grits.
     But on the seventh day, he rested. There was never an alarm clock on the Sabbath, and Jake and Carla reveled in a long morning’s rest. He would eventually stumble forth around 7:30 and order her back to sleep. In the kitchen he poached eggs and toasted bread and served her breakfast in bed with coffee and juice. On a normal Sunday.
     But nothing about this day would be normal. At 7:05 the phone rang, and since Carla insisted that the phone be located on his night table, he had no choice but to answer it.
     “If I were you I’d leave town for a couple of days.” It was the low raspy voice of Harry Rex Vonner, perhaps his best friend and sometimes his only one.
     “Well good morning, Harry Rex. This better be good.”
Harry Rex, a gifted and devious divorce lawyer, ran in the dark shadows of Ford County and took enormous pride in knowing the news, the dirt, and the gossip before almost anyone not wearing a badge.
     “Stuart Kofer got shot in the head last night. Dead. Ozzie picked up his girlfriend’s boy, sixteen-year-old kid without a trace of peach fuzz, and he’s at the jail just waitin’ on a lawyer. I’m sure Judge Noose knows about it and is already thinkin’ about the appointment.”
     Jake sat up and propped up his pillows. “Stuart Kofer is dead?”
     “Deader’n hell. Kid blew his brains out while he was sleeping. Capital, dude, death penalty and all. Killing a cop will get you the gas nine times outta ten in this state.”
     “Didn’t you handle a divorce for him?”
     “His first one, not his second. He got pissed off about my fee and became a disgruntled client. When he called about the second, I told him to get lost. Married a couple of crazies, but then he had a fondness for bad women, especially in tight jeans.”
     “Any kids?”
     “None that I know of. None that he knew of either.”
Carla scurried out of bed and stood beside it. She frowned at Jake as if someone was lying. Three weeks earlier, Officer Stuart Kofer had visited her class of sixth graders and given a wonderful presentation on the dangers of illegal drugs.
     “But he’s only sixteen,” Jake said, scratching his eyes.
     “Spoken like a true liberal defense lawyer. Noose will be calling you before you know it, Jake. Think about it. Who tried the last capital murder case in Ford County? You. Carl Lee Hailey.”
          “But that was five years ago.”
     “Doesn’t matter. Name another lawyer around here who’ll even think about taking a serious criminal case. Nobody. And more important, Jake, there’s no one else in the county who’s competent enough to take a capital case.”
     “No way. What about Jack Walter?”
     “He’s back in the sauce. Noose got two complaints last month from disgruntled clients and he’s about to notify the state bar.” How Harry Rex knew such things was always a marvel to Jake.
     “I thought they sent him away.”
     “They did, but he came back, thirstier than ever.”
     “What about Gill Maynard?”
     “He got burned in that rape case last year. Told Noose he’d surrender his license before he got stuck with another bad criminal appointment. And, he’s pretty awful on his feet. Noose was beyond frustrated with the guy in the courtroom. Give me another name.”
     “Okay, okay. Let me think a minute.”
     “A waste of time. I’m telling you, Jake, Noose will call you sometime today. Can you leave the country for a week or so?”
     “Don’t be ridiculous, Harry Rex. We have motions before Noose at ten Tuesday morning, the rather insignificant matter of the Smallwood case? Remember that one?”
     “Dammit. I thought it was next week.”
     “Good thing I’m in charge of the case. Not to mention such trivial matters as Carla and her job and Hanna and her classes. It’s silly to think we can just disappear. I’m not running, Harry Rex.”
     “You’ll wish you had, believe me. This case is nothing but trouble.”


Excerpted from A Time for Mercy by John Grisham. Copyright © 2020 by John Grisham. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.

A Time for Mercy - John Grisham

A Time for Mercy

JOIN THEJOHN GRISHAMMAILING LIST

JOIN THEJOHN GRISHAMMAILING LIST

Sign up to get breaking news, exclusive
content and thrilling offers.



By clicking “Sign Up”, I acknowledge that I have read and agree to Penguin Random House’s Privacy Policy and Terms of Use and understand that Penguin Random House collects certain categories of personal information for the purposes listed in that policy, discloses, sells, or shares certain personal information and retains personal information in accordance with the policy. You can opt-out of the sale or sharing of personal information anytime.  
Skip to content