A Private Cathedral (Dave Robicheaux 23)

“When did your uncle become the John Brown of New Iberia?” I said.

“You mean the guy who tried to set the slaves free?”

“Yeah, that John Brown.”

“Uncle Mark has always treated black people okay. Right?”

Because to him, they’re not important enough to think about one way or another, I thought. “How do you feel about the issue?”

“A lot of our fans carry Styrofoam spit cups. Plus, they don’t come to a concert to beat each other up.”

“I’m not objective about your uncle,” I said. “But everyone in this town knows he does nothing that is not in his interest. They also know he will destroy anyone who gets in his way. Why would he want to help college kids tear down statues of people who have been dead for over a hundred years?”

“You got me,” he said.

“If you really want to make people mad, tell them you’ve decided which flags they can fly and which icons they can see in public places,” I said. “You’re a smart kid, Johnny. Whom do you think this benefits?”

“Right-wing dipshits in general?”

“That says it all, partner.”

He looked wanly at the ceiling. It was plated with stamped tin and had been there since the nineteenth century. “Can I say something else?” he asked.

“I’m listening.”

“Isolde’s mother has got it in for you. The only thing stopping Adonis Balangie from hurting you has been Miss Penelope.”

“I hope you and Isolde have great careers,” I said.

“Don’t shine me on, Mr. Dave. You’ve seen Gideon recently, haven’t you? Up so close you couldn’t lie to yourself about who or what he is?”

I felt the air go out of my lungs. “How do you know that?”

“It’s in your eyes. You’ve seen things other people won’t believe. So you’ve stopped talking about them.”

“I stopped talking about them after I came back from Vietnam, Johnny.”

“Yeah? Well, the Shondells and the Balangies stopped jerking themselves around over four hundred years ago. That’s why Adonis Balangie’s eyes are dead. That’s why I accept the fact that my uncle Mark might be a monster. The world is a fucking zoo.”

“Don’t use language of that kind, Johnny,” I said.

“I got to ask you something.”

“What?” I said, knowing what was coming next.

“Did you sleep with Miss Penelope?”

I crimped my lips and didn’t answer.

“I didn’t think you were that kind of guy, Mr. Dave,” he replied. “She’s a sweet lady. I think that blows.”

Try going home and falling asleep with words like those in your head.

Chapter Thirty-one

THAT NIGHT THE sky was sealed with clouds that resembled the swollen bellies of whales, and when lightning split the heavens, hailstones thundered down all over Iberia Parish, particularly out on the four-lane, where a slender man wearing a tall-crown hat and a three-piece suit and spit-shined pointy-nose cowboy boots entered a truck stop café and sat down in a booth and ordered a piece of pecan pie and a glass of chocolate milk.

The storm was so severe that most truckers traveling the four-lane had parked under the overpasses to protect their windshields and windows. As a consequence, the man in the Stetson was the only customer in the café. The only waitress on duty, Emily Thibodaux, said she never believed that one day a man in a café would cause her to lose control of her bladder and pee a pool of urine around her shoes.