Purple Cane Road (Dave Robicheaux 11)

A man I didn’t know grabbed my arm, and a big uniformed policeman crashed into me from the other side, wres

tling with both of his big meaty hands to get his arms around me and smother me against his girth. But even while the two men tried to pull me off of Gable, I kicked him in the side of the head and kicked at him once more and missed his face and shattered his watch on the cement.

I fell over a chair and stared stupidly at the faces looking down at me, like a derelict who has collapsed on a sidewalk and must witness from the cement the pity and revulsion he inspires in his fellowman. Bootsie was between me and Gable now, her face incredulous. A wet cigarette butt clung to my cheek like a mashed cockroach. I could smell whiskey and beer in my clothes and Gable’s blood on my knuckles and I swore I could taste whiskey surging out of my stomach into my throat, like an old friend who has come back in a time of need.

Through the sweat and water that dripped out of my hair I saw the governor and people from the crowd lifting Jim Gable to his feet. He was smiling at me, his teeth like pink tombstones in his mouth.

26

My hands still hurt the next morning. I ran cold water over them in the kitchen sink, then drank coffee out on the picnic table in the blueness of the dawn and tried not to think about last night. I walked along the coulee that traversed the back of our property and looked at the periwinkles along the bank, the caladiums and elephant ears beaded with moisture, the willows swelling in the breeze. I wanted to stay in that spot forever and not go into the department on Monday morning, not look at the early edition of the Daily Iberian, not deal with the people who would speak politely to me on a sidewalk or in a courthouse corridor, then whisper to one another after they thought I was out of earshot.

I walked back up toward the house just as the sun rose behind the cypress trees and seemed to flatten like fire inside the swamp. The back of the house was still deep in shadow, but I could see a white envelope taped to Alafair’s screen. I pulled it loose and looked at her name written across the front in a flowing calligraphy. The flap was glued, with tiny felt-pen marks that transected both the flap and the body of the envelope so the dried glue could not be broken without the addressee knowing it.

I opened my pocketknife and slit the envelope all the way across the top and removed the folded sheet of stationery inside.

I went down to the bait shop and called Wally, our 275-pound dispatcher at the department, and told him I was taking a vacation day on Monday and not coming in.

“You axed the old man?” he said.

“I have a feeling he’ll get in touch,” I said.

“Hey, Dave, if I pass the detectives exam, can I hang around wit’ y’all, solve big cases, mop the shrimp tails off the floor with New Orleans cops?”

But as I went back on the dock, I wasn’t thinking about Wally’s sardonic humor or my eventual encounter with the sheriff. I sat at a spool table and read again the letter that was written with the symmetry and baroque curlicues of a self-absorbed artist or what a psychologist would simply call a megalomaniac.

It read:

Dear Alafair,

I had a harsh conversation with your father. But he has tried to destroy our friendship and has also been asking people about my private life, about things that are none of his business.

At first I could not believe your words when you said you couldn’t see me again. Did you really mean that? I would never betray you. Would you do that to me? I already know what the answer is.

Remember all our secret meeting places? Just be at any one of them and I’ll find you. You’re the best person I’ve ever known, Alafair. We’re like the soldier and the girl on the vase. Even though they lived long ago and have probably moldered in the grave, they’re still alive inside the arbor on the vase. Death can be beautiful, just like art, and once you’re inside either of them, you stay young forever and your love never dies.

See you soon.

As ever, Your loyal friend,

Johnny

I walked up the slope to the house and went into the bedroom with the letter and showed it to Bootsie.

“My God,” she said.

“I’m at a loss on this one.”

“Where is she?”

“Still asleep. I’d like to—”

“What?” Bootsie said. She was still in her nightgown, propped on one elbow.

“Nothing,” I said.

She sat up and took both my hands in hers. “We can’t solve all our problems with violence. Remeta’s a sick person,” she said.

“It sounds like we’re talking about last night instead of Remeta.”