He was right. The image was partially obscured by another boat, but I could make out the shape of a fish, thick through the middle, cartoonish in its dimensions. It seemed to have a snout. Maybe a marlin or a bottlenose dolphin? The image was like one I had seen somewhere, as though in a dream. I tried to remember, without success.
“You have any other photos?” I asked.
“No, that’s it, Dave,” the photographer said.
“Did you see a girl on board?”
“I’m sorry, I just wasn’t paying that much attention. Maybe there were two guys in the cabin. The only reason I remember them is because they were pretty rude about pushing their way ahead of the other boats.”
“Do you remember what they looked like?”
“No, I’m sorry.”
“How about the painting of the fish on the bow? You remember any details about it?”
“Yeah, it was like the paintings you see in photographs of World War Two bomber planes, like Bugs Bunny or Yosemite Sam.”
I thanked him for his time and went back to my office. It was past noon, and officially I was off the clock. I checked my mail and returned a couple of phone calls and thumbed through my in-basket. For the first time in years, there seemed to be no pressing matters on my desk. So why was I standing in the middle of my office rather than walking out the front door and down the street to my house, where I would fix ham-and-onion sandwiches and eat with Alafair?
There was only one answer to my question: Clete Purcel had told me he’d seen his out-of-wedlock daughter cap Bix Golightly. I wanted to go into Helen Soileau’s office and tell her that. Or call Dana Magelli at the NOPD. What was wrong with making a clean breast of it?
Answer: Clete Purcel would be in the cook pot; he had not seen his daughter since she was fifteen, and his identification of her as Golightly’s killer was problematic; last, the NOPD and the Orleans Parish district attorney were in the process of investigating and prosecuting New Orleans cops who had shot and killed innocent people during Katrina, in one instance trying to hide their guilt by burning the victim’s body. Other than exploiting the opportunity to ruin Clete’s career, how much time would the DA be willing to invest in finding the killer of men like Bix Golightly and Waylon Grimes?
My conscience wouldn’t let go of me. I went down to Helen’s office, perhaps secretly hoping she wouldn’t be there and the issue would be set in abeyance and would somehow resolve itself. When she saw me through the glass, she waved me inside. “Did you have any luck at The Daily Iberian?”
“I was going to write you a memo in the morning. The photographer has a shot of a white fiberglass boat that has a fish painted on the bow. I suspect the guys on board are the ones who abducted Blue Melton.”
“Can you see them in the photo?”
“Not at all.”
“You wanted this case, Dave. The boat’s presence at the bridge gives us jurisdiction. What are you down about?”
I repeated everything Clete had told me about his daughter, about her status as a killer, about the fact that the woman Bix had called Caruso before he died was, in Clete’s opinion, his errant daughter, Gretchen. Helen sat motionlessly in the chair while I spoke, her chest rising and falling, unblinking, her hands resting on her desk blotter. When I finished, there was complete silence in the room. I cleared my throat and waited. No more than ten seconds passed, but each of those seconds was like an hour. Her gaze locked on mine. “I’m not interested in thirdhand information about a street killing in New Orleans,” she said. I started to speak, but she cut me off. “Did you hear me?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“My office is not a confessional, and I’m not a personal counselor. Do you copy that?”
“I do.”
“You tell Clete Purcel he’s not going to drag his prob
lems into my parish.”
“Maybe you should do that.”
“What if I twist your head off and spit in it instead?”
“I’m going to ask that you not speak to me like that.”
She stood up from her desk, her face tight, her breasts as hard-looking as cantaloupes against her shirt. “I was your partner for seven years. Now I’m your supervisor. I’ll speak to you in any fashion I think is appropriate. Don’t push me too far, Dave.”
“I told you the truth. You didn’t want to hear it. I’m done.”
“I can’t begin to tell you how angry you make me,” she said.
Maybe I had handled it wrong. Maybe I had been self-serving in dumping my problems of conscience on Helen’s rug. Or maybe it was she who was out of line. Regardless, it wasn’t the best day of my life.