Free Trouble in July by Erskine Caldwell Page B

flickered through the trees, making patterns on the pavement that reminded him of his wife’s fancy needlework.
    Going carefully to the rear door, he took out his ring of keys and searched for the proper one. The key opened the lock, making only a single rusty squeak. He listened for a moment and then, secure in the knowledge that the noise had not attracted attention, he opened the door and stepped inside. He was careful to leave the door wide open.
    Jeff stood in the darkness of the cage-room listening to the sound of Sam Brinson’s heavy breathing. Sam’s presence seemed to make everything all right from that moment on.
    He felt his way through the passage between the two tiers of cages. It was pitch black in the room and he had to feel every inch of his way along the passage.
    It was no trouble to feel the familiar pass-key on the ring, and he unlocked one of the cages and let himself inside. The rusty hinges creaked loudly when he moved the steel-barred door, but Sam Brinson’s heavy breathing continued without a pause. He had selected one of the cages on the south side of the passageway, because he remembered distinctly having locked Sam in the colored men’s usual cage on the opposite side.
    Jeff closed the door slowly, taking care not to allow it to squeak any more than necessary. When it was closed, he put his hand between the bars, locked it, and tossed the ring of keys down the passageway as far as he could heave them.
    He knew precisely what he was going to tell Bert the next morning when Bert came to give Sam Brinson his breakfast. He was going to explain that he was in the act of carrying out Judge Ben Allen’s orders when five men, masked with hankerchiefs tied over their faces, had abducted him in the courthouse square, threatening to knock him unconscious with pistol-butts if he made any outcry. After they had taken his keys from him, they locked him in the jailhouse, threw the keys away, and left before he could call for help.”
    He planned to tell Judge Ben Allen that the men had locked him up in his own jailhouse and told him they were doing it in order to keep him from organizing a posse and interfering with their search for Sonny Clark. Judge Allen would not be able to hold him responsible for failing to deputize a posse as he had ordered and, what was equally as important, he would not have to go out to Flowery Branch and commit political suicide by antagonizing voters who were determined to catch the Negro.
    Jeff chuckled to himself, his flesh shaking pleasantly, when he thought how lucky he was to have been able to think of such a fool-proof scheme. He knew Corra would be pleased, too, when she found out how well he had taken care of his political interests. She would be sure to forgive him for his failure to hide himself on Lord’s Creek.
    “Man alive!” he whispered to himself. “If I had gone out there to Flowery Branch, it would have been just like cutting my own throat. That would have been a foolish, far-fetched thing for me to do.”
    He felt sorry for the little Negro boy, Sonny Clark. A feeling of helplessness came over him. He hated to think of the boy’s life being taken away from him, but now that the situation was threatening his own political existence he knew he would have to safeguard his future at any cost. He tried to put Sonny out of his mind by thinking how sleepy he was.
    There were two tiers of bunks in the cage, each tier containing two sleeping-shelves. Jeff felt his way to the bottom bunk on the left. He searched through his pockets for matches, but could not find a single one. He sat down anyway, and took off his shoes. In a few moments he was stretched out on his back sound asleep.
    During the night he woke up once when he thought he heard several men shouting somewhere about the jailhouse, but he could not keep awake long enough to open his eyes. He turned over with his face against the wall and went back to sleep.
    Just as dawn was breaking, shouting voices