Crusader's Cross (Dave Robicheaux 14)

She sat on the corner of my desk and fed a stick of gum into her mouth. Her triceps were ridged like rolls of nickels. "I've gotten three phone calls and several anonymous letters about someone you might be seeing," she said.

"Who might that be?"

She chewed her gum, her eyes roving over my face. "I'm your friend, bwana. Don't treat me disrespectfully."

"A person's private life is his private life," I said.

"That might flush in San Francisco, but not on Bayou Teche. If you're involved with a Catholic nun, I'd damn well better know about it."

"The person you're tal

king about never took vows. In fact, she's been thinking about returning to the role of a lay person. She's a person of enormous conscience."

My words sounded rehearsed, even to me, as though I had read them off an index card. Helen looked out the window at a freight train wobbling down the tracks between two rows of shacks. "They're going to put you inside the Iron Maiden," she said.

"Who's 'they'?" I said.

"Take your choice," she replied.

Three more days went by. People were polite to me on the street and at the supermarket or the filling station, but it was obvious that something in my life had changed. Few stopped to talk, and none joined me at a coffee counter or table in a restaurant. Those who could not escape a social encounter with me held their eyes steadily on mine, fearful I would read the knowledge that was hidden there. Frequently another cop gave me a thumbs-up or hit me on the shoulder, as if I were spiritually ill. I even cornered one of them in the department's men's room and learned quickly that acceptance of sympathy is not without a price.

"I look like the walking wounded?" I said, and tried to grin.

"Thought you needed a boost in morale, Dave, is all I was doing. Didn't mean to get in your face," he said.

"Can you spell that out?"

"My ex spread rumors I molested my stepdaughter. So I know where you're at right now. I say, screw all them people. You know the troot' about my situation? She come on to me. But don't nobody care about the troot'. So I'm like you, screw 'em."

Then, just before quitting time, a phone call changed my perspective in ways I could not quite put together. It was from Dana Magelli in New Orleans. "We got the DNA report back on Holly Blankenship. It's a match," he said.

"Match with what?" I said.

"The Baton Rouge serial killer. He killed her within twelve hours of the time you and Purcel interviewed her. I don't get it, Dave. This guy hasn't struck in New Orleans, but he shows up in town the same day you do and murders a hooker. That's not the guy's M.O. So far, he's left street people alone. Got any thoughts?"

"No."

"Gee, I wish I had that kind of latitude. Blow into town, blow out of town, body dumped in a trash pit, sayonara, sonofabitch. Can I get a job over there?"

I wanted to be angry at Dana, but I couldn't. The fact the Baton Rouge serial killer had targeted a teenage prostitute, a girl who bore no similarity to his other victims, indicated either a dramatic change in the nature of his obsession or the possibility he was sending a message.

"Did you hear me?" he said.

"Yeah, I did. I wish I hadn't gotten near that girl," I replied.

That evening I stood outside my bedroom window, staring at the indentations sculpted into my flower bed. Were these from the workboots of the Baton Rouge serial killer? I called Mack Bertrand, our forensic chemist, at his home. "Can you make some casts in my flower bed?" I said.

"We're a little backed up, but, yeah, what d'you got, Dave?" he said.

"Maybe just a Peeping Tom."

"Can you be a little more forthcoming?"

"I interviewed the latest serial killer's victim shortly before she was killed. Maybe the guy knows me."

Mack was quiet a moment, and I realized how grandiose if not paranoid my statement must have sounded. But Mack was always a gentleman. "We'll get it done first thing in the morning, podna," he said.

That night I placed flowers on Bootsie's tomb in St. Martinville. The bayou was black, wrinkled with wind, bladed by moonlight. I sat for a long time on the steel bench in the darkness, saying nothing to Bootsie, not even thinking thoughts she might hear. Then I walked to the old church in the square, pressed a folded five-dollar bill into the poor box, and returned with a votive candle burning inside a small blue vessel. I heard a flapping of wings overhead., but could see no birds in flight. Then I told Bootsie about Molly and me.