She’s clad in a modest green jumper with a white blouse underneath, Julia’s outfits, by comparison, look like the getups of a low-rent call girl. I realize how low my expectations are in the Delta. If you believe everything you read, you’d expect to find a girl this age at the welfare office with two children hanging on to her as she signs up for food stamps and AFDC.

“I’m Gideon Page,” I say, holding out my hand for my coffee. She takes my hand and pumps it as if she were a politician seeking votes.

“I’m Yolanda Ford, Sheriff Bonner’s secretary,” she replies.

“It’s nice to meet you.”

The door opens, and there is no mistaking the sheriff. Bonner is a

compact black man in his early forties, in an olive and tan uniform. He measures no more than 5‘9”, and that may be stretching it because of the boots he is wearing.

He sports a firm black mustache, and as he grins at Yolanda, I notice he has the whitest teeth of any black I’ve seen this side of Hollywood.

The color of dark chocolate, Bonner is undeniably an attractive man. He smiles easily at me, but instead of introducing himself, he turns back to Yolanda and asks, “Who do we have here?”

By allowing her to make our introduction, I see he is training her, and I watch closely as Yolanda replies, “Sheriff Bonner, this is Mr. Gideon Page. He hasn’t been here long enough to let us know what we can do for him.”

Revealing his gun at his side as he takes off his leather jacket, Bonner offers his hand.

“I’m Woodrow Bonner. How’re you, Mr. Page?”

Such friendliness seems genuine enough, and with his firm handshake I begin to perceive why Bonner is surely the first black sheriff in Bear Creek since Reconstruction. He radiates a politician’s affability. I tell him I am fine and that I am Class Bledsoe’s attorney.