Light of the World (Dave Robicheaux 20)

“Oh, I will.”

“What did the killer do to Pepper?”

“Probably several things. I’ll have to wait on the coroner’s report to know for sure. His penis and testicles were in the sink. You believe in an afterlife?”

“Why do you ask?”

“I suspect Bill Pepper found his hell right here on earth

,” the sheriff said.

CLETE HAD FALLEN asleep sitting on a bench in a holding can somewhere on the north end of Flathead Lake. In his dream, he was a little boy and had gone with his father and mother and sisters to Pontchartrain Park for July the Fourth. It was dusk in the dream, and the sky was printed with the fireworks exploding over the lake, and he could hear the popping of rifles in the shooting gallery and the music from the carousel. His father and mother were smiling at him, and his sisters were holding hands and skipping down the boardwalk, the wind smelling of salt and caramel popcorn and candied apples.

When he woke from the dream, he looked through the window and saw the pink glow in the sky and thought the neon-striped Kamikaze packed with screaming kids was teetering against the sunset, about to rip like a scythe through the air and plummet toward the ground, then rise again into the gloaming of the day. He closed and opened his eyes and looked at the peeling yellow paint on the walls, the names burned into the ceiling with cigarette lighters, the toilet where someone’s vomit had dried on the rim.

The sheriff of Missoula County pulled up a chair to the barred door and sat down. He placed a yellow legal pad on his knee and studied it. “Other people will be talking to you, Mr. Purcel. But since it was a member of my department who was killed, I want the first crack at you,” he said.

“Y’all towed my Caddy?”

“I think that’s the least of your worries.”

“Where’s it parked?”

“You want to explain what you were doing at Bill Pepper’s cottage?”

“I already did. To anyone who’d listen. I went there to talk with him. The back door was open. He was lying in the hallway. I didn’t touch anything other than the outside doorknob. I left the inside as I’d found it. I tried to call in the 911, but I didn’t have cell service. I got stopped at the roadblock five miles from Big Fork. Where’d you put my Caddy?”

“Why were you carrying burglar tools and ligatures and all those weapons in a duffel bag?”

“I’m sentimental about memorabilia.”

“That’s pretty amusing. You think cutting off a man’s penis and testicles is amusing?”

“The guy was a dirty cop, and somebody caught up with him. But it wasn’t me.”

“How do you know he was a dirty cop?”

“He was compromising the investigation into the death of Angel Deer Heart in order to earn favor with her grandfather.”

“So you went up to his cottage on Swan Lake to talk to him about that?”

“That and a couple of other things.”

“What might the ‘other things’ be?”

“He and another idiot in your department made sexual remarks about my daughter in front of her and others. This was right after your man kicked the shit out of Wyatt Dixon.”

“When were these remarks made?”

“Why don’t you ask your crime scene investigator? He was there.”

“You were just looking out for your daughter’s interests?”

“Wouldn’t you?”

The sheriff stared at his legal pad. “Detective Pepper left a note behind. Did you know that?” he said.

“No.”