A Private Cathedral (Dave Robicheaux 23)

“Clete?” I said.

“Shut up, Dave.”

“You forgave LeBlanc.”

“Hey,” Clete said to Gideon. “Why’d you tie a dead guy to the mast and tear out his guts?”

“I was angry. He was going to torture you and your friends to death. Sometimes I lose control.”

“Sometimes?” Clete said.

Gideon was silent. I could hear waves hitting against both vessels, and feel the deck rising and falling under my feet. “Do it, Clete,” I said.

“I don’t usually listen to Dave’s advice, but I owe him a solid or two,” he said. “You reading me on this? Look at me. I’m talking to you, asshole.”

“There’s a sailboat in the distance,” Gideon said.

“Screw the sailboat,” Clete said. “I forgive you. That means get out of our lives. Freshen up, take a shower, get yourself some breath mints and industrial-strength deodorant, haunt a house, find a girlfriend who’s not choosy, get your ashes hauled, but leave us the fuck alone.”

“You have to stop Mark Shondell,” Gideon said. “He is about to bring a great evil upon the earth.”

The clouds of fog billowed across the deck, as cold as ice water, so white and thick I could not see my hands. I clenched Clete’s upper arm to make sure he was there. It was as hard as a chunk of curb stone. “Can you see anything?” I said.

“No, nothing,” he replied.

I wiped my face with my hand. It was as slick as rainwater. “Where’s the sun?”

“I don’t know,” he said.

The fog broke into dirty wisps, like smoke from a garbage incinerator. I could see the water now. It was dark green and streaked with froth and lapping against the hull. As the fog thinned, I thought I saw baitfish in the waves or perhaps seaweed or flotsam from a wreck. Then I saw pieces of cloth, what looked like sweaters and stocking caps and primitive tunics made of coarse wool, shoes that were hardly more than leather wrapped around the foot, glimpses of bone and a hank of hair, faces that were as gray as soaked parchment, arms and naked legs and bloated stomachs roiling with a wave, then sinking into the depths.

“What happened to the galleon?” I said.

Clete shook his head. “I need a drink. I’d settle for a quart of gasoline.” Then he looked at me blankly, as though reviewing a video in his head.

“What is it?” I said.

“The storage compartment down below. One of them had emergency flares and two gasoline cans in it.”

I heard footsteps approaching us. Clete took the .25 semi-auto from his pocket.

“It’s me. Johnny,” a voice said. “Everything is down. The whole electrical system. Even the batteries are dead. Did you guys see anything?”

Neither of us answered, because neither of us trusted Johnny anymore. I had also lost faith in Penelope. Perhaps they were simply people who represented an idea or a cause that was greater than themselves, and as for all surrogates, the burden was greater than they could bear. I wanted also to believe that Penelope was not married to Adonis, and I wanted to believe this namely because, even with all my faults, I had never slept with another man’s wife.

What was the shorter truth? The woman I wanted with me was Leslie Rosenberg, and I knew that she and her daughter, Elizabeth, whose blue eyes were like looking into the face of God, were about to be taken from me forever.

I looked down at the flotsam in the water. I had no doubt it contained the clothing and shoes and remains of people who lived hundreds of years ago. “Did you see that down there?” I said to Johnny.

“Yeah, Gideon turned his rowers loose,” he replied. “That’s what he’s supposed to do.”

“Would you explain that, please?” I said.

“He’s a revelator. He makes people reveal who they are. Then they’re free. Leslie changed, too. She became an angel.”

I didn’t want to hear any more theology from Johnny Shondell.

“Sooner or later Shondell is going to search the ship,” Clete said. “Are you our friend or foe, Johnny?”