John Grisham

I finally fall asleep on the sofa, and someone wakes me just after nine. It is not Miss Birdie. It’s two cops in plain-clothes. They flash their badges through the open door, and I invite them in.- I’m wearing gym shorts and a tee shirt. My eyes are burning so I rub them and try and figure out why I suddenly have attracted the police.

They could be twins, both about thirty, not much older than myself. They’re wearing jeans and sneakers and black mustaches and act like a couple of B actors from television. "Can we sit down?" one asks as he pulls a chair from under the table and sits down. His partner does the same, and they are quickly in position.

"Sure," I say like a real smartass. "Have a seat."

"Join us," one says.

"Why not?" I sit at the end, between them. They both lean forward, still acting. "Now what the hell’s going on?" I ask.

"You know Jonathan Lake?"

"Yes."

"You know where his office is?"

"Yes."

"Did you go there last night?"

"Yes."

"What time?"

"Between nine and ten."

"What was your purpose in going there?"

"It’s a long story."

"We have hours."

"I wanted to talk to Jonathan Lake."

"Did you?"

"No."

"Why not?"

"Doors were locked. I couldn’t get in the building."

"Did you try to break in?"

"Nope."

"Are you sure?"

"Yep."

"Did you return to the building after midnight?"

"Nope."

"Are you sure?"

"Yep. Ask the security guard."

With this, they glance at each other. Something here has hit the mark. "Did you see the security guard?"

"Yep. He asked me to leave, so I left."

"Can you describe him?"

"Yep."

"Then do it."

"Big black guy, probably six-six. Uniform, cap, gun, the works. Ask him, he’ll tell you I left when he told me to leave."

"We can’t ask him." They glance at each other again.

"Why not?" I ask. Something awful is coming.

"Because he’s dead." They both watch me intently as I react to this. I’m genuinely shocked, as anybody would be. I can feel their heavy looks.

"How, uh, how did he die?"

"Burned up in the fire."

"What fire?"

They clam up in unison, both nodding suspiciously as they look at the table. One pulls a notepad from his pocket like some cub reporter. "That little car out there, the Toyota, is that yours?"

"You know it is. You’ve got computers."

"Did you drive it to the office last night?"

"No. I pushed it over there. What fire?"

"Don’t ibe a smartass, okay?"

"Okay. It’s a deal. I won’t be a smartass if you won’t be a smartass."

The other chimes in. "We have a possible sighting of your car in the vicinity of the office at two this morning."

"No you don’t. Not my car." It is impossible at this moment to know if these guys are telling the truth. "What fire?" I ask again.

"The Lake firm was burned last night. Completely destroyed."

"To the ground," the other adds helpfully.

"And you guys are from the arson squad," I say, still stunned but at the same time really pissed because they think I was involved in it. "And Barry Lancaster told you that I’d make a wonderful suspect for torching the place, right?"

"We do arson. We also do homicide."

"How many were killed?"

"Just the guard. First call came in at three this morning, so the building was deserted. Evidently the guard got trapped somehow when the roof fell in."

I almost wish Jonathan Lake had been with the guard, then I think of those beautiful offices with the paintings and rugs.

"You’re wasting your time," I say, angrier at the thought of being a suspect.

"Mr. Lancaster said you were pretty upset when you went to the office, last night."

"True. But not mad enough to torch the place. You guys are wasting your time. I swear."

"He said you’d just been fired, and you wanted to confront Mr. Lake."

"True, true, true. All of the above. But that hardly proves I had a motive to bum his offices. Get real."

"A murder committed in the course of an arson can carry the death penalty."

"No kiddin’! I’m with you. Go find the murderer and let’s fry his ass. Just leave me out of it."

I guess my anger is pretty convincing because they retreat at the same time. One pulls a folded piece of paper from his front shirt pocket. "Gotta report here, couple of months ago, where you were wanted for destruction of private property. Something about some broken glass in a law office downtown."

"See, your computers do work."

"Pretty bizarre behavior for a lawyer."

"I’ve seen worse. And I’m not a lawyer. I’m a paralegal, or something like that. Just finished law school. And the charges were dropped, which I’m sure is written somewhere conspicuously on your little printout there. And if you guys think that my breaking some glass in April is somehow related to last night’s fire, then the real arsonist can relax. He’s safe. He’ll never get caught."

At this, one jumps up and is quickly joined by the other. "You’d better talk to a lawyer," one says, pointing down at me. "Right now you’re the prime suspect."

"Yeah, yeah. Like I said, if I’m the prime suspect, then the real killer is a lucky soul. You boys are not close."

They slam the door and disappear. I wait half an hour, then get into my car. I drive a few blocks and carefully maneuver myself close to the warehouse. I park, walk another block and duck into a convenience store. I can see the smoldering remains two blocks away. Only one wall is

standing. Dozens of people mill about, the lawyers and secretaries pointing this way and that, the firemen tromp-ing around in their bulky boots. Yellow crime scene tape is being strung by die police. The smell of burned wood is pungent, and a grayish cloud hangs low over the entire neighborhood.

The building had wooden floors, ceilings, and, with few exceptions, the walls were pine too. Add to the mix the tremendous number of books scattered throughout the building and the tons of paper necessarily stored about, and it’s easy to understand how it was incinerated. What’s puzzling is the fact that there was an extensive fire sprinkling system throughout the warehouse. Painted pipes ran everywhere, often woven into the decorative scheme.

FOR OBVIOUS REASONS, Prince is not a morning person. He usually locks up Yogi’s around 2 A.M., then stumbles into the backseat of his Cadillac. Firestone, his lifelong driver and alleged bodyguard, takes him home. A couple of times Firestone himself has been too drunk to drive, and I took them both home.

Prince is usually in his office by eleven because Yogi’s does a brisk lunch business. I find him there at noon, at his desk, shuffling paper and dealing with his daily hangover. He eats painkillers and drinks mineral water until the magic hour of five, then slides into his soothing world of rum and tonic.

Prince’s office is a windowless room under the kitchen, very much out of sight and accessible only by quick footwork through three unmarked doors and down a hidden staircase. It’s a perfect square with every inch of the walls covered with photos of Prince shaking hands with local pols and other photogenic types. There are also lots of framed and laminated newspaper clippings of Prince be-