A Private Cathedral (Dave Robicheaux 23)

“Could be.”

“Dallas is putting his airboat in the water,” he said.

“What’s under your coat?”

He opened the flap. A cut-down sawed-off Remington twelve-gauge pump hung under his armpit.

“I hope we don’t have to use that,” I said.

“Shondell could grind us into fish chum and nobody would miss a beat, Dave.”

I let my eyes go flat.

“Not in front of Penelope Balangie?” he said.

“Something like that.”

“Dave, your learning curve never ceases to surprise me.”

* * *

DALLAS LANDRY HAD pulled the airboat up to the dock. I knocked on Carroll’s door at the motel. He pulled it open so quickly that my hand fell into empty space. “It’s time?” he said.

“Yeah, what do you think?” I said.

He had showered and changed into elastic-waist slacks, boat shoes, a long-sleeve jersey, and a sport coat. He was wearing a shoulder holster, his badge hanging from his neck. “What are you carrying?” he said.

“Snub thirty-eight.”

“You got an ankle rig?”

“Dial it down, Carroll.”

“What do we do about the guys on the tug?”

“That’s up to them,” I said.

“You’re not talking about blowing up anybody’s shit?”

“No.”

“Because that sounds like Purcel. Are there twelve-step programs for brain disease? That guy doesn’t understand boundaries.”

“Is there anything you want to tell me, Carroll?”

“Like confess something?”

“Call it what you will.”

“I already told you. My daughter needs my help.”

“Time to rock, partner,” I said.

We walked outside, into the wind and salt spray and the smell of shellfish stranded in the sawgrass by receding waves. Carroll was breathing heavily, his mouth tight, his nostrils swelling. “I’m with you, Robo. If we got to put hair on the walls, that’s the way it is. Right? Fucking A. We got to keep the lines simple.”

This was the guy afraid of blowing up people’s shit?

* * *