Light of the World (Dave Robicheaux 20)

“We’re still in the early stages of the investigation,” he said. “You made a remark about the integrity of my department. I want you to take that back.”

“I think the problem is yours, sir, not mine.”

He lit his cigarette and puffed on it thoughtfully, the smoke drifting from under the brim of his hat, his pale blue eyes fixed on the horses. “Did you know Albert Hollister did time on a Florida chain gang?”

I didn’t know what he was getting at, but it wasn’t good. “Albert makes no secret about his jail time. He was a kid. He wasn’t a criminal, either.”

“So how’d he end up on a chain gang?”

I didn’t want to pursue it. “How did Zappa die?” I asked.

“He was shot to death. Two in the head, one in the mouth. Sound like the signature of anyone you know?”

“What caliber?” I said.

“Approximately forty-four.”

“Approximately?” I said.

“The ballistics on this one will probably remain uncertain.”

/>

“What the hell are you talking about?” I said.

“There are no striations in the ball,” he said.

“The ball?” I said.

“All three projectiles were fired from a weapon with no rifling in the barrel.”

“Like a cap-and-ball pistol or a smoothbore musket?”

“Like one that Albert Hollister might have in his gun cabinet,” he replied. “One he might have given to Gretchen Horowitz.”

“Or like one that Love Younger might own?” I said. “It’s funny how his name keeps getting pushed out of the conversation.”

“Use your common sense, Mr. Robicheaux. Do you believe Love Younger is a killer?”

It was pointless to argue with Bisbee’s mind-set or his frame of reference. Would historians call John D. Rockefeller a murderer because his goons killed women and children at the Ludlow Massacre? Did the Du Pont family have blood splatter on their shoes? Was dropping a five-hundred-pound bomb marked “occupant” a questionable act? What greater authority is there than ignorance?

“I’ve got to ask you one more question, Sheriff,” I said. “Why would you promote a man like Boyd to detective grade?”

“He passed the test. He claims to be Indian, so I have to deal with affirmative action. Also, I didn’t have anybody else, and it’s a temporary appointment. Anything else?”

“Yeah, you’ve got the wrong person in custody, and I think you know it,” I replied.

“I’ll hate myself later for saying this,” he said. “I know I will. It will eat my lunch. But I have to do it, so please accept my apology in advance. I can’t stomach you two guys. I look at you and get mad. I wish you’d go back home and drown in the mosquitoes or whatever it is you grow down there. I don’t know why I have these feelings. There’s just something about you that really pisses me off.”

BAIL WAS TO be set for Gretchen early Tuesday morning. Clete and I drove to town and ate breakfast in a café across from the courthouse and waited on a bondsman Clete knew. Clete had lied when he told Elvis Bisbee he was with Gretchen the night Anthony Zappa was shot to death. I had not been able to bring myself to ask him where he actually was. The waitress set down our order and refilled our coffee cups and went away. Clete dipped a biscuit in a bowl of milk gravy and bit into it. So far all he’d told me was that Gretchen and Dixon had gone after Zappa because he was one of the men who’d attacked Dixon and his girlfriend on the Blackfoot River.

“Where’d you go Sunday night?” I asked.

He kept chewing, his gaze fixed on a group of homeless people sitting under the trees on the courthouse lawn. “I think some of those homeless guys are Rainbows,” he said. “They used to follow the Grateful Dead around. When I came back from Vietnam, I got stoned in Oakland with the Merry Pranksters. At least the girl I woke up with said she was a Merry Prankster. She introduced me to Hunter Thompson. I ever tell you that?”

Clete had gone into his old mode of slipping the punch and talking about every subject on earth except the one at hand. “You were with Felicity Louviere Sunday night?”

“What do you want me to say? I’m getting it on with a married woman? I can’t keep it in my pants?”