”You want another one?“ he said. ”Tell me now, Mingo. Go ahead, open your mouth again.“
I cupped my palm around Clete's bicep. It felt like a grapefruit.
”I'm fed up with this shit. Somebody get security in here,“ Johnny said.
”You're looking good, John,“ I said.
”You're a lucky man, Dave.“ He pointed his fork at me. ”You ought to burn a few candles at your church.“
”That's not quite how I see it, John,“ I said. ”You don't want to queer your people's action in Iberia Parish by killing a police officer, but then again you're not always predictable. That means I need to do something about you, like maybe squeeze Patsy Dapolito until he gives you up. You think Patsy will give you up, John?“
”What's to give? He don't work for me no more. He never really did.“
”Oh?“ I said.
”That's right, he's a malignant geek, a short-eyes, a freak. You gonna nail me with the testimony of a child molester? You know what my lawyer would do with a guy like that on the stand? When he gets excited he drools. Hey, you guys, picture star witness Patsy Bones drooling on the stand.“ Johnny stretched his face out of shape and let his tongue roll wetly in his mouth while all his crew laughed. ”You two twerps get out of here.“
?
??It's always a pleasure, John,“ I said.
Clete picked up a bread stick, dipped it in a Sangria pitcher, and snapped it off in his jaw, winking at me while he grinned outrageously.
Outside in the parking lot, he pulled up his shirt and removed the tape recorder from under his belt, popped out the cassette, and flipped it in his palm.
”Isn't life grand?“ he said.
Chapter 34
l&I WAS FILLING out my time sheet the next day when Helen Soileau knocked on my office door, then sat on the corner of the desk and looked me in the face, her eyes seeming to focus on words or sentences in her head that would never become the right ones to use.
”Say it,“ I said.
”I just got off the phone with Fart, Barf, and Itch in New Orleans.
Marsallus is dead. They've got his body.“
I returned her stare and didn't answer.
”Dave?“
”Yeah.“
”Did you hear me?“
”I heard you. I don't believe it.“
”The body never washed up because it was wedged in the pilings of that collapsed pier.“
I looked out the window. The sky was thick with lead-colored clouds, the trees filmed with dust, motionless in the trapped heat. The traffic on the street seemed to make no sound.
”How'd they ID the body?“ I said.
”Dental records.“
”What dental records?“ I said, the irritation rising in my voice.
”Sonny grew up in a welfare project. He probably went to a dentist as often as he went to a gynecologist.“