But the Speaker’s gone too far. He’s turned on me, betrayed me. Just like Momma always did when Daddy … was in a mood. And before this is over, the Speaker will see me dying a slow death in Huntsville, or a fast one in the swamp. Ain’t no other way.
Unless. Jimmy Lee decided it was time. He took the Glock he had purchased at a traveling gun show from its lock box and made sure it was loaded. Not yet dawn, Saturday morning. He could be in Dallas by nine.
•
The town car pulled into the service entrance off the alley that wound along the creek behind the Duchamp home at 8:15. The Speaker got into the back seat wearing a dark suit and red tie—the old Congressional uniform. His shirt already felt sticky with the sweat from his body. The driver was anonymous through the tinted partition. A cell phone rang in a holder attached to the seat before him, as always. Unknown Caller. He answered, punched in the code, hung up, replaced the phone. The moistness from his palm left a dark smear on the hand set that faded little by little.
They entered the Tollway off Walnut Hill, heading south. Ten minutes later they took the final ramp and drove into downtown. The driver pulled into the garage of a dreary office building at the awkward age between prime commercial space and condo conversion. As they parked near an elevator, the phone chirped. A text: “Ste 1933.” Duchamp pocketed the phone and went up.
His black Oxfords clacked on the bare institutional tile of the empty florescent-lit corridor. The building’s frigid air conditioner dried the sweat on his body but his palms remained damp. His bowels felt loose. He found the suite. A key pad waited next to the double glass doors. Another text chirped through; the Congressman read the code: “8094. Conf. Rm C.”
In the conference room, the Group gathered—four men and one woman. The view was of glimmering glass office towers.
“Hello, son,” said the oldest of the men with a twangy Houston drawl. The Oilman. Friend of his father. Patron. Lord. “Sit.” He gestured to the head of the table. Duchamp sat.
A dapper man stood at the north window, back to the room. The Patrician. An even older friend of Duchamp’s family. Their grandfathers were rumrunners together in New England during prohibition. Their fathers had worked the danker Washington back channels for decades, scoring the occasional ambassadorship or White House gig. And the sons—as adults to be known in the Group only as the Congressman and the Patrician—had attended the same East Coast schools, earning gentlemen’s C’s and avoiding the draft.
Next to Duchamp sat an aging brute in a linen suit. White African. Former mercenary. The Rhodesian.
Across the table sat a tiny, weathered woman: the Dame. Widow of his own wife’s uncle. Ancient scion of one of the great South Texas ranching empires, able to trace her lineage to both the Spanish Conquistadores and the Old Three Hundred, the original Anglo settlers of Texas.
Beside her, as if she were a dying matriarch and he her charge, the loyal keeper of her patrimony, sat a youthful and stylish man. The Prince. He looked like a star of the Italian cinema. In fact, he was the favorite son of an oil-rich sheik. Eton and Oxford-educated, he had taken over his late father’s leadership role in the Group—second in command—upon the old man’s death a decade before.
The meeting came to order with a series of sideways glances.
After taking his seat, the Patrician in the finishing school diction of their youth, said, “Good to see you as always, Congressman.” Not even the old friends would address each other by name in this setting.
The others murmured and nodded, and then the Prince said, “You know why we’re here. The Doctor is concerned.”
“And I’ve already taken care of it. Y’all know that.” Duchamp resented the little twerp, the Group’s only link to its brilliant and visionary leader, the reclusive Doctor, for the past five years.
“No, son.” The Oilman’s look brought Duchamp a flashback of his father. Sad disappointment. “She—”
“She got inside, Congressman,” said the Prince.
At the interruption, the Oilman shut up and stared at his hands. Duchamp seethed with rage at the Arab’s petulance. This little prick’s not fit to lick the sand from his old man’s sandals. He said, “Now how could she have? That’s plain impossible; even we don’t know how to get inside.”
“It doesn’t matter how. She got in. And she wasn’t working alone. With the project imminently coming to fruition, we must staunch any potential for future leaks.”
The Dame said, “The Doctor’s life’s work.”
The Rhodesian said, “Humanity’s last great hope.”
“I get it,” Duchamp said, exasperated. “You tell me what’s going on, what needs to be done, and I’ll handle it.”
The Dame pounded her fist—overlarge for her slight and withered frame—on the table. “No, I don’t think you do get it, fool. The bitch stole one! One of them.”
•
The car dropped Duchamp off at the rear entrance before ten a.m. Kathleen sat in wait at the kitchen table. “That man’s here.”
Christ, now what? “What man?”
“Your man. Your old Jack-of-all-trades.”
Duchamp tried to hide his shock. “When did he get here?”
“About twenty minutes after you left. I made him pull around back. His truck is in the garage. He’s waiting in your study. And Robert—”
“Gotta take care of this, Blueberry.” He kissed Kathleen on the top of her head and turned to leave.
“Robert, look at me.”
He met her dark and angry gaze and his guts dropped.
“Darlin—”
“You swore to me. You swore it was finished.”
“It is.” He struggled to keep his voice steady. “I’m just going to kick the son-of-a-bitch out.”
•
Jimmy Lee sat in the Speaker’s study, sweaty and angry. He cradled the Glock. He could feel his heart beat fast like a rabbit’s. Son of a bitch son of a bitch son of a bitch. Don’t owe him shit. And don’t mind shooting his stuck up cunt of a wife if it comes to that, either.
He looked down and saw he still wore the faded black Pantera t-shirt he’d put on the morning before. His jeans were as greasy as his stringy black hair. Been up too long, gotta slow down there, son, gotta take it easy. He stood up and paced a quick, jerky path around the room and sat back down and bobbed his head.
The Speaker bounded in with his trademark perfect smile, arms outstretched. “Jimmy Lee! Am I glad to see you, boy. We ready to straighten up this little mess?”
Jimmy Lee felt a moment’s fear. A moment of pushback at the force of the Speaker’s power. A moment’s love. But he stood up and raised the gun, and he said: “Don’t come one step closer, Speaker.”
The Speaker bent his arms at the elbow to give a hands up gesture. “Now what’s this all about, Jimmy Lee? You high?”
“You know what it’s about. It’s about the Shadow People.”
“You’re sounding crazy now, son, so just—”
“And if I’m gonna die in jail, I’m taking you with me. So I reckon you’d better get me a million dollars and a ticket south of the border. Today.”
“Now calm down, son. You know it’s not that simple.”
“Yes, it is.” He gestured with the handgun. “And I can make it even simpler.”
The Speaker lowered his arms. His face fell to an expression of pity and sorrow. “Jimmy Lee. You know I love you. This isn’t the way to do this.”
Jimmy Lee felt another, stronger twinge of fear and doubt. The hand holding the Glock waivered. But when the Speaker stepped forward, he rediscovered his resolve and steadied the gun. “Stand back.”
“Okay, okay.” Duchamp half way raised his hands back up. “But Jimmy Lee. Nobody ever asked you to kill that girl.”
“Bull—”
“No, son. You’re delusional.” The Speaker paused and pursed his lips and shifted his tone to one of sad paternalism. “It’s okay; it’s not your fault.”
Jimmy Lee felt h
imself weakening. Am I really doing this? Oh good Lord, this is Speaker Duchamp. He fought it, leveled the gun. Tears threatened. “Now you stop that talk, Speaker. I know I’m right.”
The Speaker shook his head and walked toward him. Jimmy Lee couldn’t will himself to say anything. “How many people know you work for me? How many people who are more loyal to you than they are to me? Have I ever paid you in anything but cash? Have you ever been in a meeting with my colleagues or constituents? You don’t exist. And I’m all you’ve got.”
The Speaker stood right before him then. He saw the Speaker place his hand on his forearm and gently push down, pointing the gun to the floor. His arm felt a million miles away, in no way connected to his body. But the Speaker’s aura of power enveloped him. He smelled his musk. Felt his breath. The Speaker’s eyes locked him in. Then he put an arm around his shoulder. He whispered: “You’re my stealth-man, Jimmy Lee. I need you, son. I love you.”
Jimmy Lee cried into the Duchamp’s shoulder. “I’m sorry, Speaker. I screwed up. So stupid. So goddamn sorry.”
“Okay, son, okay.” Duchamp caressed his back, convulsing with sobs. “I’m going to tell you how to make this right.”
Chapter 11
Geoff stopped for gas just outside Opelousas. Marisol laughed at the daiquiris-to-go shop connected to the truck stop—she hadn’t spent much time in rural south Louisiana. While she poked around inside, Geoff called his client to deliver the good news about the arrests. With the murder investigation over, there would be no reason to stop and meet with Willie. He could be in Dallas by eight. Burger and a beer at the neighborhood dive—Tony would probably be there, they could share a few laughs. He owed Tony a thank you for introducing him to Marisol. Heck, maybe Marisol would even join them …
But best of all, the arrests should help put to bed Willie and the other plaintiffs’ conspiracy theories, their belief that Texronco would stoop to murder to cover something up. So there would be nothing to stop them accepting the company’s settlement offer.
Sally Kincaid, Willie’s daughter, answered the phone.
“I just saw it on TV,” she said. “We are so relieved, Geoff.”
“Yes. I’m glad it’s over, and we can get back to focusing on the lawsuit. You know, I hope it can be resolved soon.”
“Yeah, Willie told me about the settlement offer. It would be just wonderful for the lake.”
“Agreed. Willie around?”
“Just missed him—he and Joey went to get the mail. Want me to have him call your cell?”
“Nah. I’ll give him a call Monday. I mean, there’s no reason now for me to bother y’all this evening.”
“Oh, you’re still coming, aren’t you? We have quite feast planned. The sheriff and everybody will be here!”
Geoff hadn’t planned to stay for dinner and doubted that the sheriff had, either. He hadn’t planned for the two of them to be there at the same time. But Sally sounded like she had planned on all those things, like she had planned a party. He closed his eyes and rubbed his face and stifled a sigh. “Wait, the sheriff’s still coming?”
“Sure! I told him I’d bought all this food, so he agreed to come on out. Bringing his deputy. Just for fun—no business. I used to run with his daughter years ago. And anyway, Joey’s tickled that a real live sheriff is coming for supper. Add in a big city lawyer and a private detective, the boy will think he’s on a TV show!”
“Well, Sally—”
“Please do come. We might even get the sheriff to play us a little something on his guitar. What time y’all think you’ll get in?”
“We’re on track to be there about six.”
“The sheriff and Bobby—that’s the deputy, Bobby Henderson; you know he’s been all over the TV—they’ll be here about then so that’s perfect. We’ll see y’all tonight.”
She was gone before he had a chance say any more. He leaned against his car in the fuel island then started walking over to the truck stop store to find Marisol and let her know they’d be stopping off in East Texas after all. For a home cooked meal. With a crazy old codger and a guitar-picking sheriff. And Joey—that strange little boy with funny eyes.
Then, sensing something chilly on his periphery, he turned and caught the eye of the man at the next pump over, just screwing the gas cap back on his banged up old pickup. Texas plates. He wore a black t-shirt and ratty old jeans. Black greasy hair. Eyes rimmed red. At once nervous and angry. He looked like hell. Like a minor demon. He turned away and got in his truck. Geoff shivered in the warm Louisiana sun as he made his way to the store.
Chapter 12
Sheriff Seastrunk wished he had never had the little TV in his office wired for cable, so sick he had become of his deputy’s youthful and rugged visage, which every cable news outlet had come to broadcast as a symbol of all that remains wholesome and good in the American interior, which they packaged and presented and sold without irony as a vessel of churning sexuality. “Stud with a Star.” “Ripped Ranger.” “America’s Hottest Cop.” Though Bobby was neither a sheriff, a Texas Ranger, nor a policeman.
And ol’ Bobby hammed it up, brandishing his bandaged arm, giving the cameras his best Clint Eastwood squint on the courthouse square late the night before—”we got ‘em; they’re behind bars tonight and for the rest of their lives.” And today via satellite on a cable gossip show—smart enough not to discuss any details of the investigation but happy to issue platitudes about justice and racial harmony to the mantis-legged host in her swivel chair, who gushed over this young man, this wounded hero, from a county she would never know or visit as if he were not doomed to be discarded within the week to the dust bin of pop-media history.
Seastrunk switched off the television and looked outside at the little encampment set up on the courthouse lawn in the soft Saturday springtime light and felt glad, at least, that they would be gone soon. Back to Dallas and Austin and the main contingent back up to Chicago.
He owed a good man a telephone call.
“Reverend,” he said when Mose Carter picked up. “I reckon you’ve heard the good news?”
“That you think you’ve caught the men who murdered Miss Bordelon? Well, yes.” “I thought you’d be pleased.”
“Bless you Sheriff, I am. But what a jury or a judge might do in this town—”
“Okay, Reverend. But did your niece tell you they confessed?”
“She doesn’t talk to me about the investigation, John.”
“That’s fine.” Seastrunk did not know whether to interpret the Reverend’s sharp tone as defensiveness over the suggestion that Tasha might have shared confidential information with him, or as a manifestation of the ancient bad blood between the Reverend and the district attorney’s office. The sheriff considered the consternation the old minister might feel at his grand-niece’s chosen career path, felt no desire to probe into how those old enmities, spurred anew by the Bordelon killing, might impact the Rev’s family dynamics.
“Anyway, we do have a confession.”
“Well, I’m glad to hear it,” said the minister. “But sometimes, ‘round here, the arc of the moral universe bends extra slow. And sometime it bends backwards.”
Seastrunk felt his voice harden. “I’m not sure I catch your meaning, Reverend. They may have saved themselves from death row—”
“We’re not after blood, John.”
“—but I don’t think there’s much doubt a jury will be putting them away for life.”
“You’re a good man, John. Your father was a good man, too. But unlike you, he was calculating. Cunning and wise.” The sheriff waited through a long pause, sensing that the Reverend had more to say. “I see things you don’t see. Or can’t. I’m not sure this story ends with the Tatum brothers.”
Seastrunk did not ask, Do you have anything to base that on, Reverend? He did not ask because he knew that no satisfactory answer would be forthcoming, that Carter’s suspicions—as a spiritual matter—stemmed from his belief that evil swirled about th
e pines and the cypresses of this place in cold eddies visible only to a spiritual man like himself until manifested upon the flesh of an innocent like Dalia Bordelon, that such devilry forestalled the possibility of true justice. And—as an earthly matter—from a deep loathing of Robert Duchamp and his protégé, D.A. Ben Hargrave, dating back decades and based only upon mundane small town politics.
Instead, the sheriff said, “I’ve been impressed over how you and Congressman Duchamp have come together over the Bordelon murder.”
The icy silence that followed confirmed Seastrunk’s suppositions. Then the Reverend said, “Ex-Congressman Duchamp’s interest in Ms. Bordelon’s lynching extends only so far as how it may affect his business interests, the siting of a new automotive plant or some such. Ours was a temporary alliance of convenience. But do not for a moment believe that I trust that disgraced politician or his supplicant Ben Hargrave to put true justice above a quick fix to this community’s image problem. I fear that the Tatum brothers may represent no more than this quick fix, that baneful men with hate in their veins will walk among us still.”
Closing his eyes and tilting his head toward the ceiling, the sheriff said, “So what about your protestors? They sticking around awhile?”
“They’re hardly my protestors—consider them protestors for the Lord. But a large contingent has returned to Chicago. Many other Christian soldiers remain. Not to mention the white kids from Austin, business leaders from Dallas. I expect many will stay here until justice is served.”
After the two town fathers rung off, Seastrunk returned his gaze to the window and fumed for a bit in the wake of the Reverend’s rage and paranoia. But then his mind drifted to his and Bobby’s arrival at the scene of Dalia Bordelon’s mutilation—to the deceptive peacefulness of that bayou, the over-large (metallic—they look metallic this year) dragonflies that swirled about as he interviewed Willie Kincaid, and the strange kid Joey, whose mind and heart and soul had seemed to scream with pain at the desecration before him. And Seastrunk believed, just for a moment, that beneath the skin of this crime—and the Tatum twins’ undeniable guilt—a layer of wickedness might lie that he could not begin to fathom.
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