Robicheaux (Dave Robicheaux 21)

“What does Wooster have to do with anything?” I said.

“Nothing. I think I saw Smiley. He’s posing as a beer vendor. I was maybe forty feet from him when Wooster came down on me.”

“You let a hump for Nightingale stop you from taking down Smiley?”

“Not exactly.”

I couldn’t put together what he was saying. Then it hit me. “You were going to let Smiley get to Nightingale?”

“The thought occurred to me.”

“I’m with Sherry Picard. Wait for us.”

“You brought her here?”

“No, she came on her own.”

“Butt out on this, Dave. I got a handle on it.”

“The way you handled Smiley?”

“You want the truth?” he said. “I was going to make sure both of them went off the board. Wooster screwed things up.”

“Stay where you are.”

“I’m going to the casino. My car is parked six blocks away. It’ll take me a while to get there.”

“What’s at the casino?”

“A reception for Nightingale.”

“I’ll drop the dime on you, Cletus.”

“No, you won’t. Keep Sherry out of it. I’m copacetic and very cool and collected and totally in control of the situation. You’re the best, big mon.”

* * *

CLETE HAD TO walk to the other side of LaSalle to retrieve his Caddy. The sky was still dark, the rain blowing off the roofs of the few lighted buildings along the street. He cut through an alley lined with banana plants and garbage cans that had been knocked over by the wind. Twice he thought he heard footsteps behind him, but when he turned around, no one was there. The second time, he stepped between two buildings and waited. An elderly black man on a bicycle pedaled down the sidewalk at the end of the alley. Clete continued on.

He walked past a collapsed garage to the back of a deserted brick house where he had parked his vehicle. A tall man in a slicker and a wilted rain hat was standing by the driver’s door. His face was dark with shadow. His shoulders were rectangular, his coat open, his hands invisible. “Beat you to it.”

“You’d make a good bird dog,” Clete said.

“Nice wheels,” the tall man said.

“Am I going to have trouble with you?” Clete said.

“You hold grudges, Purcel. That nigger I popped had a shiv on him.”

“After you planted it.”

“You killed a federal witness.”

“It was an accident.”

“That’s why you hid out in El Salvador. A lot of people go down there when they do something by accident.”

Clete looked at his watch. “What’s your problem, Wooster?”