Dixie City Jam (Dave Robicheaux 7)

'Now listen, my friend—'

'Hands on your head, down on your knees, motherfucker! Do it! Now! Don't think about it!'

I heard the weight of two large bodies crash against the wood slats and rake across the tangle of garden tools on the porch; then Buchalter and Clete Purcel fell into the kitchen, and Clete's blue-black .38 revolver skittered across the linoleum.

Buchalter got to his feet first, his flat buttocks pinched together, the change jangling in his slacks, his triangular back rigid with muscle, and drove his right fist into the center of Clete's face. Clete's head snapped sideways with the force of the blow, blood whipping from his nose across his cheek. But he grabbed Buchalter around the legs, locked his wrists behind Buchalter's thighs, and smashed him against the doorjamb.

'Chuck!' Buchalter yelled out, as he tried to get his hand into his pants pocket.

But Chuck had taken his crossbow and gone through the hallway and out the front door like a shot.

Buchalter began swinging both his fists into the top of Clete's head. He wore a large Mexican ring on his right hand, one with a raised, knurled design on it, and each time he swung his right fist down, he twisted the ring with the blow, and I could see gashes bursting like tiny purple flowers in Clete's scalp.

But Clete Purcel was not one who gave up or went down easily. With rivulets of blood draining out of his hair into his eyes, he reached behind him, grasped a three-pronged dirt tiller by the wood handle, and jerked the sharpened tines upward into Buchalter's scrotum.

Buchalter's face went white, his mouth opening wide with a roar that seemed to rise like a rupturing bubble from the bottom of his viscera, as though bone and linkage were being sawed apart inside him. He stumbled sideways, lifting his knees into Clete's face, and crashed through the screen door into the backyard. Then I heard his feet running into the darkness.

Clete pulled himself up by the doorknob and walked like a drunk man into the kitchen, soaked a dish towel under the faucet, and pressed it to the top of his head. He kept widening his eyes and breathing hard through his mouth. His knees were barked, and one sock was pulled down over his ankle.

'Pick up your piece,' I said.

He wiped at his nose and eyes with the towel, then leaned over heavily, holding the towel to his scalp, and closed his hand around his .38.

'The handcuff key is on the dresser in the bedroom,' I said.

He went into the bedroom, came back with the key, and began unlocking the handcuffs. I could feel water dripping out of his hair onto my neck. The handcuffs clattered to the floor. My hands were purple, bloated with lack of circulation, the skin dead to the touch. I opened my pocketknife, cut through the electrician's tape at the back of Bootsie's head, eased it out of her mouth, then began sawing loose the tape on her arms.

'Oh God, Dave,' she said. Her breath came in gasps, as though she had been held underwater for a long time and her lungs were

aching for air. 'Oh Lord, God. Oh God, he was going—'

'It's over,' I said.

'He was going to cripple you. He was going to deliberately cripple you,' she said, then squeezed her eyes shut against the tears that coursed down her cheeks. I held her face against my chest and kissed the top of her head. I could smell the heat in her hair.

'Your phone's dead. They must have cut it outside,' Clete said.

'Give me your piece,' I said.

'Where's yours?'

'In the glove compartment of the truck.'

'Man, I can't see straight. That guy's got fists like chunks of concrete.'

'Take Boots down to the bait shop and call the sheriff's office from there,' I said.

'Where are you going, Dave?' Bootsie said, her eyes clearing with a new sense of alarm.

'They probably parked their car farther up the road,' I said.

'No,' she said. 'Let somebody else handle it this time.'

'He's a fanatic and a psychopath, Boots. If we don't nail him now, he'll be back.'

I looked away from the expression on her face. I started out the door with the revolver in my hand.

'Hey, Dave—' Clete said.