Creole Belle (Dave Robicheaux 19)

“I called Pierre because him and me and my daughter own half of Redstone. I’m retired, but I still consult for them. I wanted Pierre to know that I’ll sell him my shares in the company at the stock option price if he’ll treat my daughter right in their divorce settlement. The phone call to the boat dock was a misdial. What difference does any of this make, anyway?”

“You dialed the wrong number?” she said.

“I guess. I didn’t give it any thought.”

“Your phone records show you called that same boat dock four times in the last month. Were those all misdials?”

“I’m old. I get confused,” he said. “You’re talking too fast and trying to trip me up. I want my daughter here.”

“Lafayette PD was on the shooter from the jump,” Helen said. “He’s a guy you know, Mr. Leboeuf. He doesn’t want to go back to Camp J. Are you going to take his weight? At your age, any sentence can mean life.”

Leboeuf stared into space, his unshaved cheeks threaded with tiny purple veins. I realized we had been foolish in thinking we could take him over the hurdles. He belonged to that group of people who, of their own volition, eradicate all light from the soul and thereby inure themselves against problems of conscience and any thoughts of restraint in dealing with the wiles of their enemies. I cannot say with certainty what constitutes a sociopath. My guess is they love evil for its own sake, that they chose roles and vocations endowing them with sufficient authority and power to impose their agenda on their fellow man. Was Jesse Leboeuf a sociopath? Or was he something worse?

“I don’t like you staring at me like that,” he said to me.

“Did you ever think about the emotional damage you did to the peopl

e you tormented with your slingshot years ago?” I asked.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“When you and your friends went nigger-knocking in the black district.”

He shook his head. “I have no memory of that,” he replied.

“Get him out of here,” Helen said.

I unlocked Leboeuf’s cuffs. He stood up, rubbing his wrists. “You charging me on the beef with the black woman?”

“You’re free to go, sir,” I replied.

Leboeuf huffed air out his nose and left Helen’s office, trailing his cigarette odor like a soiled flag. But it wasn’t over. Five minutes later, I was standing by the possessions desk when a deputy handed Leboeuf the manila envelope that contained his wallet and keys and pocket change and cigarette lighter. I watched him put each item back in his pockets, gazing indolently out the window at the oak-shaded grotto dedicated to Jesus’ mother.

“Mind if I have a look at your key chain?” I said.

“What’s so interesting about it?” he asked.

“The fob. It’s a sawfish. It’s like the one I think was painted on the bow of the boat that abducted Blue Melton.”

“It’s a goddamn fish. What kind of craziness are you trying to put on me now?”

“I remember where I saw that emblem painted on another boat many years ago. It was in sixty feet of water, south of Cocodrie. The sawfish was on the conning tower of a Nazi submarine. It was sunk by a Coast Guard dive-bomber in 1943. That’s quite a coincidence, isn’t it?”

“Give your guff to the devil,” he replied.

Later, I made two calls to the boat dock whose number Helen had pulled from Leboeuf’s phone records. In each instance the man I spoke with said he knew nothing of a white boat with a sawfish painted on the bow.

THAT EVENING, CLETE Purcel pulled his Caddy to the curb one house down from ours and walked back across our yard to the front door, tapping softly, as though preoccupied about something. When I answered the door, I could see the Caddy in the shadows, a solitary spark of red sunlight showing through the live oaks that towered over it. The air was humid and warm, the trees along the bayou pulsing with birds. Clete untwisted the cellophane on a thin green-striped stick of peppermint candy and put it in his mouth. “Where’d you get the cuts on your face?” he asked.

“A situation in Lafayette. Why’d you park up the street?”

“I’ve got an oil leak.”

“I thought you were in New Orleans. Come inside.”

“I think NOPD still wants to hang Frankie Giacano’s murder on me. I’ll be at the motor court. I’ll see you later. I just wanted to tell you I was back in town.”

Through the gloom, I could see someone sitting in the passenger seat, even though the top was up. “Who’s with you?”