“What’s this supposed to be,” he said, “a Yoruban war room?”

  His lips must have moved as he muttered, because the next thing he heard was: “Say what?”

  It was Wes Jordan emerging from his inner sanctum. Big grin. No jacket. Pizza Grenade necktie. “Say what?”

  Roger now realized it was a parody of a street voice. So he started to say, “I was just asking, What’s this supposed to—”

  Wes cut him off before he could utter another word. “Roger, I got things to tell you, things to tell you, things to tell you, things to tell you, things to tell you.” He pulled up an armchair, sat down, leaned forward until his forearms rested on his thighs, and said, “Do you want to take a guess as to who was sitting on that couch, exactly where you are right now, not even an hour ago?”

  “No, because I have a feeling you’re going to tell me anyway.”

  The Mayor stared at him and waited a couple of seconds before saying, “Inman Armholster.”

  Roger leaned forward himself and said, “You’re—” He caught himself before saying “kidding.” “Well, I’ll be damned. What’d he have to say?”

  “Started to say ‘kidding,’ didn’t you. You’ve got to steel yourself against that particular response to life’s little surprises. He was startled and upset by the fact that I knew about his daughter’s predicament.”

  “What’d you say to that?”

  “I said things just have a way of reaching the Mayor’s office. I told him it’s a good thing they do, because this situation with his daughter and Fareek Fanon, given his prominence in the corporate world of Atlanta and Fareek’s prominence as a sports star—I told him this situation could blow the city apart. I said if we didn’t work together in a statesmanlike manner, this thing could lead to a race riot.”

  “Race riot?” said Roger. “You said ‘race riot’?”

  Wes Jordan smiled faintly and said, “That’s exactly what I said. In Atlanta I can’t think of any two words that panic people more. It’s the fear that’s always just beneath the surface. The last real race riot in Atlanta—started by white people, by the way—was in 1906. It was horrible, and if we had one now it would be a lot worse.”

  “So what did Armholster say to that?”

  “I don’t think he heard ‘race riot.’ I don’t think he heard a thing after ‘statesmanlike.’ ‘Statesmanlike?’ he kept saying. ‘Statesmanlike like who? Like Bismarck, like Chou En-lai, like John Foster Dulles, like Dean Rusk?’” The Mayor smiled. “I was surprised he remembered Chou En-lai and John Foster Dulles. ‘I’ll be damned if I’ll be statesmanlike,’ he says. ‘My daughter’s been raped, and that sonofabitch is gonna pay.’ I’d say the word that was right below the surface on that one was ‘lynch.’”

  “He said ‘lynch’?”

  “No, no, no, I’m just interpreting his mood. He didn’t say ‘lynch,’ although if that were any longer a practical choice, I’m sure he’d be considering it. That’s how angry he is.”

  Roger said, “But when you get right down to it, he really hasn’t done anything so far. He hasn’t gone to the police, he hasn’t gone to the press, I don’t know what he’s doing with people at Tech. I hear things, but I don’t really know.”

  “Have you ever seen Inman Armholster, seen him in action?”

  “Mmmmm—no.”

  “He’s fat,” said the Mayor. “He is one fat man. He’s fat from top to bottom. I’ll bet you the soles of his feet are fat. But he’s a sort of fat white man who exists only in Georgia. All the fat is pure orneriness, and he’s ready to chew your head off. The fat doesn’t slow him down. He feeds off it. No, the only thing holding him back is that he doesn’t want his daughter’s name to be made public. The press never does identify the girl in a rape case. But this case is different. I can think of rape cases in which the man was as well known as Fanon, but I can’t think of a single one in which the man was as well known as Fanon and the girl was the daughter of anyone as prominent as Inman Armholster. The combination of Fareek ‘the Cannon’ Fanon and Inman Armholster’s daughter might be more of a temptation than the press can resist. That’s the way Armholster looks at it.”

  “So what did he want from you?”

  “Nothing,” said the Mayor. “He only came to see me because I asked him to. At the suggestion of my friend Roger White II, although I didn’t get into that. Anyway, Armholster is literally and figuratively a loudmouth. But he’s also ornery and angry, and I don’t see him as being all bluff, by any means. Sooner or later he’ll do something. So I suggested a way out.

  “I said to him, ‘Why not turn the case over to the student government Sexual Harassment Committee, or whatever it’s called at Tech? They’d have a much better chance of ascertaining the facts and coming to a decision quietly, without any publicity, than anything involving the police or the court system.’”

  “What did he say to that?”

  “He laughed in my face. He says, ‘A bunch of students? They’ll cave in to the Administration or the Athletic Department or some”activist” group or anybody else who puts a little pressure on them.’ To tell the truth, he may be right about that.”

  “Well, what should I do?”

  “I don’t know, other than keep your client out of sight. Or as out of sight as an all-American football player with diamonds in his ears and a couple of pounds of gold around his neck can be. You’re supposed to be very persuasive, Counselor. Can’t you get your client to take all that junk off his head and his neck?”

  Roger said, “I’m afraid Fareek and I aren’t—”

  “I suppose it would be asking too much to hope he might also grow some hair on his head while he’s at it, so he doesn’t look like some predatory gladiator.”

  “Fareek and I aren’t on the same page,” said Roger. “He thinks of me as part of an alien world of suits and ties.”

  “I feel the same way,” said Wes Jordan. “Your clothes always make me want to get to a mirror and find out what’s wrong with mine.”

  “Might be a good idea,” said Roger, looking Wes Jordan up and down. “Anyway, he feels more at home with Don Pickett.”

  “Well then, get Don to do it. But I didn’t really bring you over here to give you advice. I just want to warn you of something that’s inevitable, something that’s bound to happen.”

  “What’s that?”

  The Mayor said, “Roger, this thing is going to spread all over town, with or without the press. Too many people already know about it. So you might as well face facts. This story is … coming out. The question is not … Is it coming out? The question is … And then what?”

  “Well … I don’t know, Wes. I don’t have any clear idea of what would happen then. What do you think?”

  “Oh, I don’t know exactly,” said the Mayor, “but I have a general idea.”

  “Which is what?”

  “Which is that—let me think of just how to put it … Okay, not to belabor the obvious, there are two Atlantas, one black and the other white, but that only begins to say it.” The Mayor paused, as if he was having difficulty putting his thoughts together. “You see all the towers in Downtown and Midtown—that’s all white money, even though the city is 70 percent black, perhaps 75 percent black by now.” He paused again, and then he said, “Our brothers and sisters in this city are not blind.” He paused once more, and Roger wondered what his descent into the conventional political rhetoric of the times, “our brothers and sisters,” signified. It wasn’t Wes Jordan. “They see,” resumed the Mayor—but then he stopped and gave Roger a searching look. “It’s hard to put it into words.”

  Roger smiled. “You? Having a hard time putting it into words? What’s today’s date? Jot it down.”

  The Mayor finessed the remark and said, “It’s going to be a whole lot easier if I show you.”

  “Show me?”

  “I’d like to take you on a little ride, a little tour.”

  “What kind of tour?” Involuntarily Roger looked at his watch.

  “It won’t take long.”

  “Gee, I don’t know,” said Roger. “I’ve got some appointments, Wes. I had to interrupt a meeting with my biggest client, biggest client I’ve ever had, as a matter of fact, to come here. Please don’t get me wrong, it’s not that—”

  “You are wrong,” said the Mayor. “You may not know it yet, but Fareek Fanon is the biggest client you ever had. I’m not just going to take you sightseeing, Roger. I have something very specific to tell you, but I want to put it in the right context. Okay?”

  Wes looked dead serious, and Roger felt powerless to say no, even though his hopes for the value of any “little tour” were negligible. “Well … okay,” he said, “but I’ve got to call my secretary first.”

  “Go ahead,” said Wes Jordan. “I’ll ask Gladys to get hold of my driver and have the car ready. You look dubious, Roger … I promise you, you won’t be bored.”

  “It’s not that—”

  “And don’t worry about Wringer Fleasom & Tick. They may not realize it yet, either, but this is the biggest case they’ve got.”

  So Roger called up Roberta Huffers, and the Mayor had a talk with Gladys Caesar, and soon they were heading down a small stairway that led to an underground parking garage. A big chocolate-colored man, probably in his early fifties, stood beside a pearl-gray Buick sedan. The man was a tank. His shirt-collar size must have been twenty at least. He had a narrow mustache that ran along his upper lip. He already had the back door open for them. For a chauffeur, he was dapper; no two ways about it. He was wearing a double-breasted bluish-gray twist-weave suit and a navy necktie. Twist-weave! Roger wished he’d thought of that.

  “Roger,” said the Mayor, “this is Dexter Johnson. Dexter, this is my old fraternity brother, Counselor Roger White.”

  They shook hands; Mr. Dexter Johnson’s hands were so big, each finger so gigantic, that somehow Roger’s hand got caught up in the man’s forefinger, middle finger, and thumb. He couldn’t get his fingers around the entire hand.

  Roger and the Mayor got in the back seat of the Buick, which was upholstered in burgundy leather, and Dexter Johnson got behind the wheel. He was so massive through the back and shoulders, the front seat seemed incapable of containing him.

  The Mayor said, “Let’s go up to Tuxedo Park, Dexter, but take Piedmont instead of Peachtree.” Then to Roger: “I want to show you Inman Armholster’s house.”

  Roger looked at Wes Jordan and, with a questioning arch of the eyebrows, motioned his head toward the driver.

  “Nothing to worry about,” said the Mayor, “nothing to worry about at all. Besides, anybody might swing by for a look at Inman Armholster’s house. You know the expression showplace? Inman Armholster’s house is a showplace.”

  In no time they were heading north through the old Black Downtown, the onetime center of Black Society, black shopping, black professional life, black restaurants, black nightlife … Edgewood Avenue, Auburn, Ellis Street, Houston … above all, Auburn. Back in the day, as the old folks said, the black leader for whom Wesley Dobbs Jordan had been named, John Wesley Dobbs, had dubbed it “Sweet Auburn.” Nothing sweet about it now, thought Roger. Black Society had pulled out a long time ago in favor of the West End, Cascade Heights, and other neighborhoods to the west. An enormous elevated highway had been built through the heart of Sweet Auburn. The house where Martin Luther King’s parents lived when he was born was right over there on Auburn, and in the next block was a big memorial to King, the Center for Nonviolent Social Change. King’s remains reposed in a marble bier out in the middle of a reflecting pool within the center’s walls. Those two blocks were among the most popular destinations in the country for tourists … but they didn’t stick around to spend money in Sweet Auburn.

  The driver, Dexter, went under the Highway 75 overpass and then past the old Atlanta Convention Center, which meant they were already on Piedmont. Then the Mayor said, “You know what street we just crossed?”

  “I didn’t notice,” said Roger.

  “Ponce de Leon.”

  This required no amplification, since practically everybody in Atlanta old enough to care about such things knew that Ponce de Leon was the avenue that divided black from white on the east side of town. On the west side it was the Norfolk Southern Railroad tracks. They might as well have painted a double line in the middle of Ponce de Leon and made it official, a white line on the north side and a black line on the south.

  “Incidentally,” said Wes Jordan, “just to put things in perspective, two-thirds of the land in Atlanta is now behind us, back there.” He motioned with his thumb. “And 70 percent of the population. But to the rest of the world it’s invisible. Did you happen to see any of those ‘guides to Atlanta’ they published for the Olympics? Big, thick things, some of them, regular books, and I couldn’t believe it at first. It was as if nothing existed below Ponce de Leon other than City Hall and CNN and Martin Luther King memorabilia. The maps—the maps!—were all bobtailed—cut off at the bottom—so no white tourist would even think about wandering down into South Atlanta. They didn’t even mention Niskey Lake or Cascade Heights.”

  “I’m not too sorry about that,” said Roger.

  “I’m not, either,” said Wes, “but you get the picture, don’t you? How do you segregate white tourists from black people in a city that’s 70 percent black? You render the black folks invisible! Okay, now you’ll notice we’re on Piedmont Avenue, and we’re heading uphill. Now, why do I mention that?”

  Wes had on one of his smiles.

  “I couldn’t begin to tell you,” said Roger.

  “Right this moment,” said Wes, “we’re driving up a paved-over foothill of the southernmost range of the Blue Ridge Mountains. This whole city is in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains. That’s why there are so many hills in Cascade Heights and, as far as that goes, so many neighborhoods named Something Heights or Something Hills. Atlanta’s elevation—Atlanta is up higher than any other large city in the country, with the exception of Denver. Most of the rest are at sea level. They’re ports. Even Chicago’s a port. Atlanta’s elevation is a thousand feet. That’s the average elevation, the one printed in the atlases. But some people in Atlanta are more elevated than others, and you know what they say always flows downhill. You and I live in the best parts of South Atlanta, but don’t kid yourself. We still live downhill.”

  When they stopped for a light at Piedmont and Tenth, it dawned on Roger that it was just a few blocks up the slope that he had been stuck in Freaknic traffic on the Saturday night that great rocking hulk, Fareek Fanon, had come, contemptuously, into his life.

  The Mayor gestured off to the right. “There’s Piedmont Park. But do you know what that is up there on the right, the first building you come to? The one I’m pointing to?”

  Roger realized that Wes wished to enjoy the minor status thrill of endowing the ignorant with knowledge, but this was his, Roger’s, territory. So he immediately replied, “The Piedmont Driving Club.”

  Disappointed: “Ah. You already knew that.”

  “I didn’t tell you about the night I met our boy Fareek?” He proceeded to recount the whole incident, with a special emphasis on the young Kentucky board-chairman-to-be’s mooning of the black-tie party of white people up on the terrace.

  This provoked no reaction from the Mayor, and so Roger turned to look squarely at him. His face seemed to be sagging with disappointment. He was waiting for Roger’s lips to stop moving.

  “Well, I’ll tell you something,” said the Mayor. “Last year I was invited—all very quietly, you understand—I was invited to join the Piedmont Driving Club.”

  “You were? So was I!”

  Now Wes Jordan looked squarely at Roger. He seemed more disappointed than ever.

  “I’m not convinced that’s a good sign,” said Roger.

  “Take my word for it,” said Wes, “it’s not. And that gets down to a problem I have, which I’ll tell you about in a minute.”

  Now they were driving up the hill past the white fence with the stone pillars that led up toward the Driving Club’s entrance. Because of the hill it was difficult to see the building itself.

  “I don’t want to be in that club,” said Wes Jordan, “but I do have my eyes on someone who is in there.”

  “You have your eyes on someone?”

  “I’ll tell you about that, too. This all has to do with your client. This entire excursion of ours has to do with your client. I just want to give you a little background first, the lay of the land, you might say, the lay of the land.”

  Well, Wes knew his topology, in any event. Roger never had noticed just how steep a climb it was from Downtown up Piedmont Avenue and up into the North side and Buckhead. Near the top of the foothill, if this really was a Blue Ridge Mountain foothill, Piedmont had been voraciously developed: all concrete and asphalt, not a tree in sight.

  By now they were in the commercial district of Buckhead. A conglomeration of shopping malls, hotels, faceted-glass office buildings, showrooms, and restaurants was spread out before them. This was the shopping heart of Atlanta. Downtown and Midtown were all office and hotel towers; shopping scarcely existed. At the very top of the Piedmont Avenue hill was Peachtree Street, where they turned left.

  “Peachtree’s built on top of a ridge,” said the Mayor. “That’s the reason it curves the way it does, all the way into Downtown.”

  “I always heard it was built on top of an old Indian trail,” said Roger.

  “The two statements are not mutually exclusive,” said the Mayor. “I don’t know how smart the Indians were, but I bet they were smart enough to walk on top of the ridge and not on the slope.”

  At an office tower called Buckhead Plaza they turned right onto West Paces Ferry Road, and in two or three blinks they were beneath a lush canopy of trees. The branches and leaves arched over the road until they created an ethereal green tunnel aglow with the sun. Down below, in fabulous planes that began only three or four feet above the ground, were the dogwood blossoms, the heavenly white ones, that had so impressed Roger that Saturday night, the Saturday night of Freaknic, the heavenly Buckhead blossoms through which he had first laid eyes on Buck McNutter’s house.