At that precise moment, in the unbearable silence of a room full of fifty-eight grown men who all tacitly agreed they had nothing to say to one another, Sam understood the South.

Waddell sat rigid, enforcing the silence. When even he couldn’t stand it any longer, he abruptly presented a typewritten copy of the declaration to lawyer Henderson and stood up, a signal to the others. The white men exited first, collecting down the corridor at the bar. Sam stood at the doorway next to an armed guard. The Negroes filed past him with their heads down, except for Tom Miller, who paused, looked him in the eye, and shot him with his index finger. Sam remembered him from the tugboat. Now, he was part of this, too.

Sam joined the other white men at the bar. Hand trembling, he drank a tall glass of mineral water to soothe his dry throat. George Rountree appeared across the room, talking heatedly with Hugh MacRae and J. Allan Taylor. As Sam watched them wag their fists and shake their heads in the filtered, golden light of late afternoon, as he tried to comprehend the shifting alliances of this affair, Harry Calabash stole up on him.

“I take it events have escalated to a new level.”

“Jesus, Harry—I’ve never seen anything like this before.”

“Seen what? Bartender!”

“Somebody who really won’t give in. I mean, everybody always says they won’t give in, but sooner or later everybody gives in on something.”

“Maybe there’s still some hope for your soul.”

“They won the election,” Sam said. “What more do they want?”

Harry sighed. “You haven’t been listening, Samuel. They’ve never been subtle about it. What do you think all that white supremacy talk was about?”

“Talk, that’s what. I thought it was just talk. People don’t actually believe that crap, do they?”

“Don’t ask me to tell you what people believe. I can’t even say for sure what I believe. How about you? You’ve been having it both ways for some time now.”

“Harry, philosophy doesn’t help. Leave me out of it.”

“I believe a man can convince himself he believes in something—”

“Goddamnit, Harry—make sense.” He shoved Harry’s glass out of reach. “Lay off the sauce.”

“—if what he convinces himself he believes will get him ahead in the world.” Harry stood and stretched to retrieve the glass.

Sam raised his glass of mineral water. “The hell with you.”

“To vectors of ambition.”

Sam drank the rest of his water and still felt parched. “Now what, Harry?”

“You tell me. I wasn’t at the secret meeting.”

“You heard the whole thing at the courthouse. They’ve got till tomorrow morning to give in to the demands. In writing.”

“Yes, we must have it in writing. Make it all neat and legal.”

“That’s the plan, all right.”

“Well, you should be glad. Colonel Waddell apparently likes the cut of your jib. You’ll be sailing right along with the new wind that’s blowing.”