In the Heat of the Night

go more or less in a heap.”
    Sam’s mind leaped ahead as the light began to dawn. “But Mantoli’s body was all spread out. His hands were over his head!”
    "That’s right,” Tibbs agreed. “I saw the pictures of the body just as you found it.”
    Wait a minute,” Sam interrupted. “Suppose he was still conscious for a few seconds or so after he was hit...”
    “Go on,” Tibbs invited.
    “Then he’d throw out his arms and try to save himself.”
    “Now you’re beginning to sound like a homicide man,” Virgil encouraged.
    “And that’s the way I found him.”
    “That’s right.”
    “So perhaps he was conscious after he was hit.” Sam was so interested in the conversation that he missed a turning. Looking quickly behind him, he made a U turn a quarter of the way up the block and fed a spurt of gas to make up the time he had lost.
    “I don’t think so,” Tibbs said.
    “Maybe I missed a point.”
    “Suppose Mantoli had been hit where you found him. For his body to be spread out that way, he would have had to try and break his fall with his hands.”
    “I get it!” Sam exploded. “If he had done that, the pavement would have scratched his hands, probably taken off some skin.”
    “So?”
    “Then if there was no skin off the palms of the hands, or any marks like that, that wasn’t where he fell.”
    “Or if it was,” Tibbs finished, “someone was careful to spread the body out afterward.”
    “Yes; though that isn’t likely,” Sam added. “Because it was in the middle of the highway and a car could have come along any time. I could have.”
    “Sam,” Tibbs said, “you have the makings of a real professional.”
    This time Sam didn’t even notice that Tibbs had used his first name. His mind was jumping ahead to himself, Sam Wood, professional homicide detective. Then he remembered that the black man seated beside him was just that. “How did you learn your trade, Virgil?” he asked.
    “Some of the best training in the world and ten years’ experience. Everybody who joins the Pasadena force starts out by going to school. It’s amazing how much they teach you in a comparatively short time.”
    Sam thought carefully for a minute before he asked his next question. “Virgil, I’m going to ask you something you aren’t going to like. But I want to know. How did they happen to take you? No, that isn’t what I mean. I want to ask you point-blank how come a colored man got all those advantages. Now if you want to get mad, go ahead.”
    Tibbs countered with a question of his own. “You’ve always lived in the South, haven’t you?”
    “I’ve never been further than Atlanta,” Sam acknowledged.
    “Then it may be hard for you to believe, but there are places in this country where a colored man, to use your words for it, is simply a human being like everybody else. Not everybody feels that way, but enough do so that at home I can go weeks at a time without anybody reminding me that I’m a Negro. Here I can’t go fifteen minutes. If you went somewhere where people despised you because of your southern accent, and all you were doing was speaking naturally and the best way that you could, you might have a very slight idea of what it is to be constantly cursed for something that isn’t your fault and shouldn’t make any difference anyhow.”
    Sam shook his head. “Some guys down here would kill you for saying a thing like that,” he cautioned.
    “You made my point,” Tibbs replied.
    Sam pondered that one for some time. Then he decided that he had had enough conversation and he remained silent until he at last slid the car up to the curb across from the Simon Pharmacy. When he checked his watch for the last time, he was exactly a minute ahead of schedule. Carefully he picked up the clipboard and slowly filled in the report line. Then he looked at his watch, which now showed him that he had succeeded in filling half of the surplus minute. With a clear conscience, he noted down the time and then, switching on the dome light, handed the board silently to Tibbs.
    The Negro detective studied it carefully and then handed it back. Sam knew without asking that he would have noticed that the times this evening and on the fatal night were identical. And he was right. “That’s amazing, Sam,” Tibbs told him. “I know very few men who could have done that and come out right on the nose the way you did.” Tibbs paused for a moment. “The next part is the most critical; you know