Free Natchez Burning by Greg Iles Page A

single syllable, my father’s powerful baritone inspires calming confidence. “Peggy told me you were looking for me.”
    “Dad, where are you?”
    “Just running some errands.”
    Errands!
With my father, that could mean anything from shuffling through old bookstores to searching out ammunition for a Civil War–vintage musket. Before I blunder into a conversation about Viola Turner’s death, my lawyerly instincts kick in with surprising force. I spent most of my legal career as a prosecutor, but I’ve always known the first rule of defense lawyers: never ask your client if he did it. Even those who protest their innocence will be putting their lawyer in an untenable position. For if your client gives you one version of the truth, you cannot knowingly put him on the stand later and listen to him tell another. And no defense attorney wants to be bound by something as unforgiving as the truth.
    The most alarming thing about this train of thought is that I can’t remember a single occasion when my father lied to me. So why am I planning for the possibility now? Paranoia? Or is the knowledge that Shad Johnson is an unscrupulous man with no love for my family forcing me into such pragmatism? “Dad, is anybody with you?”
    “No. Why?”
    “I got a call a couple of minutes ago from the district attorney. I don’t want you to say anything until I finish telling you what he said. All right?”
    He hesitates before replying. “All right.”
    As concisely as possible, I brief him on my conversation with Shad Johnson. “Viola’s son is still in Natchez,” I conclude. “He’s pressing Shad to charge you with assisted suicide. At first he asked for murder, but he’s since checked the Mississippi statutes. Now, I’m not asking you to tell me what happened at Cora Revels’s house, or even if you were there last night. But will you tell me if you have been treating Viola?”
    Dad waits a considerable time before he answers. “I have.”
    “Does anybody know that?”
    “Melba knows. And Cora Revels, of course.”
    “Mom?”
    Another pause. “No. A local pharmacist knows. Maybe some people who lived near the Revels house. I’ve stopped by there every couple of days, sometimes once a day, for the past six weeks. People out that way know my car. Viola was in bad shape, son.”
    “Lung cancer?”
    “That’s right. It metastasized some time ago.”
    The very word
metastasized
brings back all the horror of my wife’s illness. Almost against my will, I ask for details. “
Were
you at Cora Revels’s house last night?”
    “I’d prefer not to discuss it, Penn.”
    “I understand. But with a family member pushing for criminal charges, you’re going to have to say something if you want to avert a very public mess.”
    Dad pauses again, and I can hear him breathing. “I’m not concerned about that. Whatever happened between Viola and me last night occurred between a patient and her physician. I have nothing to say to Shad Johnson about it—or to you or anybody else. I’m sorry if that sounds harsh, but there it is.”
    This statement leaves me speechless for several seconds. “Dad, the penalty for assisted suicide is ten years. Even without prison, you could lose your medical license.”
    “I realize that. But I still won’t talk about it. If Shad Johnson wants to arrest me, he can do it. I’m not hard to find.”
    Jesus Christ
. “You and I should speak face-to-face.”
    “There’s no point, Penn. I have nothing else to say about the matter.”
    “Silence isn’t an option! Viola’s son is an attorney. If he keeps pushing the DA, and there’s corroborating evidence, you could well be tried in criminal court. Believe it or not, Shad Johnson would like to avoid that prospect. But to help him, we’re going to have to give him your side of the story.”
    “I don’t
have
to do anything,” Dad says, neatly separating his fate from my own in a tone I recognize all too well.
    “Refusal to talk about what