Robicheaux (Dave Robicheaux 21)

“You don’t know how much I admire your novels and your wife’s art,” Nightingale said. “Drunk or sober, I would never do either of you harm. For God’s sake, use reason, man.”

Levon watched a black custodian drag a wheeled bucket of soapy water down the corridor. Then he looked at Nightingale and the electric-blue vase and the roses inside it. “Thank you, sir. I’ll take care of those.”

His fingers were and long and tapered, like a pianist’s or a basketball player’s. He took the vase from Nightingale and walked to the elevator and pushed the button. When the doors opened, he lobbed the vase inside and watched the doors close again. He walked past us to the custodian and handed him a crisp fifty-dollar bill. “I had an accident in the elevator,” he said. “Sorry to make trouble for you.”

“It’s all right, suh,” the black man said.

Then Levon turned around and walked calmly toward Nightingale and me.

“Whoa,” I said.

“Woe unto thyself,” he replied.

He grabbed Nightingale by the lapels and crashed him into the wall, pinning him against it, staring straight into his eyes. Then he gathered all the spittle in his mouth and spat it in Nightingale’s face.

I placed my hand on Levon’s arm. “That’s enough.”

He released Nightingale and stepped backward. I moved between him and Nightingale. “Let’s go, Jimmy.”

Nightingale wiped his face on his sleeve. His skin was discolored, as though it had been freeze-burned; his eyes were full of tears.

“Did you hear me?” I said. “I’ll walk with you to your car.”

“Yes, let’s do that,” he replied.

I rested my hand on his shoulder. “We’ll take the stairs.”

“That would be fine.” He started to look back.

“Step along now,” I said.

“It’s funny how things can go amiss, isn’t it? A wrong word here, a misunderstanding there. I don’t think I’ll ever quite get over this.”

“Let it slide, Jimmy.”

“There’s nothing like mora

lizing at the expense of another, is there? I must learn the art of it.”

I accompanied him to his car and then went back to the office.

* * *

CLETE CALLED JUST before noon. Maximo and JuJu hadn’t filed charges. Clete had paid a fine at guilty court and was back on the street. “I’ll be in New Iberia this afternoon.”

“Did Tony Nemo actually buy your markers?”

“If he did, he screwed himself. I already paid them off.”

“I don’t think Fat Tony will see it that way.”

“He’s one step away from worm food and knows it. You know what I think? Every one of these bastards is scared shitless of dying.”

The gospel according to Cletus Purcel.

* * *

THAT EVENING BROUGHT rain and an ink-wash sky and the throbbing of hundreds of frogs. The air was sweet and cold, and I put on a jacket and opened a can of sardines and poured the juice on top of Tripod’s old hutch and set the can inside, next to a bowl of water, careful not to get the smell on my hands or clothes. Then I sat in a big wooden deck chair outfitted with water-resistant cushions and watched the light go out of the sky and the shadows disappear from the bayou’s surface and the alligator gars rolling like serpents on the edge of the lily pads.