“You treated me like I’m a rapist or a drug dealer in front of all those people. You can’t do that unless you charge me with something,” Tony said.
“We don’t have to charge you, because you’re not under arrest,” I said.
“Then why am I in handcuffs?”
“You gave us a bad time,” I replied.
“If I’m not under arrest, take the cuffs off.”
“When we stop,” I said.
I saw Top look into the rearview mirror. His red hair was turning gray and two pale furrows ran through it on each side of his pate. His mustache looked as stiff as a toothbrush. “I’m not as forgiving as Dave, here,” he said.
“What I’d do?”
“You stepped on my spit shine. You scratched the leather on my brand-new shoes. Those are forty-dollar shoes.”
“I’m sorry,” Tony said.
“How would you like it if somebody stepped on your new shoes?” Top said.
“This is crazy. I want to call my father.”
“Your father is under arrest. I don’t think he’s going to be of much help to you,” I said.
“Arrest for what?”
I turned around in the seat so he could look directly into my face. “Either you or he or your mother killed a homeless man with your automobile. Y’all thought you could get away with something like that, Tony? How old are you, anyway?”
“Twenty.” The handcuffs were on tight and he had to lean forward on the car seat to keep from pinching them into his wrists.
“You’re studying to be a doctor?” I said.
“I’m in my second year of premed.”
“And you’re starting out your career with blood splatter all over you?” I said.
“I didn’t kill anybody.”
“How did the dead guy’s blood get on your headlight?” Top said.
“I’m not saying anything else. I want to talk to my father. I want to talk to a lawyer.”
“Glad to hear that, kid, because I’m very upset over what you did to my shoes,” Top said. “You just graduated from ‘friend of the court’ to ‘punch of the day’ in the stockade shower. I hear if you close your eyes and pretend you’re a girl, it’s not so bad after a couple of months.”
Then both Top and I turned to stone and watched the billboards and fields of young sugarcane slide past the windows. After we had crossed into Iberia Parish, I gestured toward a turnoff. We left the four-lane and drove through a community of shacks and rain ditches that were strewn with litter and vinyl bags of raw garbage that had been flung from passing vehicles. Thunderclouds moved across the sun and the countryside dropped into shadow. The wind smelled like rain and chemical fertilizer and dead animals that had been left on the roadside. Beyond a line of trees I could see the ugly gray outline of the parish prison and the silvery coils of razor wire along the fences.
“Stop here,” I told Top.
“He wants to lawyer-up. He’s a fraternity punk who deserves to fall in his own shit. Don’t end up with a bad jacket, here,” Top said.
“I’m going to do it my way. Now stop the car.”
I got out of the cruiser and opened the back door. Tony looked at me cautiously. “Outside,” I said.
“What are we doing?”
I reached inside and pulled him out on the road, then marched him toward a clump of cedar trees. He twisted his head back toward the road, his face stretched tight with fear. “People at UL know we left together. You can’t do this,” he said.