Between workshops at the broadcast convention, Clarence Menard had given Rob further details of his “showbiz” credentials. In 2002, Clarence had released a regional hit record — "The Cajun Crunk" — an up-tempo record with a heavy bassline and a hip hop beat. He admitted that the song was probably even worse than the title indicated.
But the Cajun Crunk had taken on a life of its own. For a couple of seasons, it had been played after every touchdown at a New Orleans Saints home football game. The words were modified to “Geaux Saints Crunk” by rowdy fans, and Menard made a second version of the song available for download. It made almost as much money as the original.
Back in that brief period of regional fame, Menard had made the requisite promotional tour of radio stations all across south Louisiana. Most of the time he found stations staffed by greasy deejays with blood-shot eyes, cute receptionists in short dresses, and crusty managers who took two-hour highball lunches.
“Man, how hard could this business be?” Again the booming laugh.
Since then, both men had always enjoyed comparing notes on their respective operations, even if mostly by phone.
After a few more moments of small talk, Menard got down to business.
“So what’s up with the Tropical Treasures folks?”
“What do you mean, Clar’?”
“Have they asked you for some more original invoices?” It was strange for Baldwin to hear Menard take such a serious tone.
“Yeah, they did. You too, huh?”
“Us and every radio and television in the state, cher.” Menard’s Cajun-French was starting to show. Cher was French for “friend.” Sha’.
“And I thought we were just mailing the invoices to the wrong address,” Rob said. Emma, the station’s office manager and resident junk-food fiend, had trouble with some of the simplest office tasks, so Rob was pleasantly surprised to learn it wasn’t her fault, after all.
“It’s the same story as a few months ago, they need duplicate originals, not copies, and they need them now,” Menard continued. “Somethin’s just not right, my man.”
“What do you mean?” Rob didn’t really want to know.
“Well, hell! Think about it. These guys just can’t lose hundreds of media invoices every few months, Rob. Hot damn! Think of the dollars we’re talking about here!”
Rob had to admit, Clarence Menard had a point. It was strange.
“And besides, we’re not talking about the Boy Scouts here, my man.” Menard was alluding to the suspected criminal influence that pervaded the gambling industry, from the nickel and dime video poker industry, to the high stakes river boats.
“Got any theories?” Rob’s curiosity was piqued, but only slightly.
“Not yet, cher,” Menard replied. “But my brother-in-law’s got some connections in Baton Rouge, some ‘cousins,’” he chuckled at the diversity of the family tree, “and I’m gonna get him to check into it. Hey, we have to protect those broadcast licenses, cher!”
“Let me know if you come up with anything, Clarence.”
Rob hoped he wouldn’t hear back.
FIVE
As often as it rains in Louisiana, most visitors to the state probably wouldn’t expect simple thunderstorms to be big news, but the frequency of such storms doesn’t diminish their severity. The wet, wool blanket of thick air that smothers the state in humidity, regularly wrings itself out in a thunderous fashion. When the clouds darken the afternoon sky so much that street lights come on, an uneasiness grips even the most jaded native.
Rob Baldwin was in the small, cluttered KLOM newsroom, checking the latest thunderstorm warning on a battered PC. Every phone line was ringing. Emma was doing the best she could to answer the calls, give the barest of details on the approaching severe weather — encouraging people to “tune-in for further details” — all while nibbling on a pack of Cheese Nips and sipping a Diet Coke. The freshness date on the cheese crackers had expired over a week ago, but Emma hadn’t noticed — and probably wouldn’t have cared if she had.
She finished a call and yelled down the hall to Rob.
“When are you going to get another update on? These people are driving me crazy!”
“Right now, right now!” Amidst the noise of the PC’s printer, the police scanner, the phone and Emma’s yelling, he was trying his best to decipher the weather statement — so that it would sound like he knew what he was talking about on the air.
A line of severe thunderstorms, fifty miles wide, stretching from twenty miles either side of a line, extending from just west of Magnolia, Louisiana to north of Winn Parish, and thirty miles south of a line extending from near Mansfield, Louisiana to the state line.
It would be hell to be lost and ask those guys at the National Weather Service for directions.
He folded a long sheet of paper, grabbed a pen and ran from the newsroom into the studio across the hall. A one-man show. As hectic as it was, he loved it. People were listening. They were counting on him to get this information on the air.
Now, if the station would just stay on the air.
He sat down in front of the control console and adjusted the position of a computer screen showing the current weather radar. It was a free-form canvas of giant green blotches, with hints of yellow and red. That was the really heavy stuff. Rob cleared his throat, positioned the microphone and began throwing switches. The automation control went into a standby mode, and within seconds he was on the air.
Minutes later, he had conveyed as much detail on the weather situation as he possibly could. Rob had even boiled down the geographic triangulations from the National Weather Service into terms the average listener could understand. When finished, he leaned back and pushed the microphone away.
Emma yelled again.
Thank goodness she had stopped yelling for a moment while he was on the air. In his rush he had left the studio door slightly open. With her lung power, even from down the hall, people would have heard her as well as Baldwin speaking from six inches in front of the microphone.
“Robbbb! Line two!”
Geez. I just did the weather. Now I’ve got to do it on the phone, too?
“Hello, Rob Baldwin.” He answered the phone by introducing himself, trying to sound cheerful. He wasn’t quite sure he had pulled it off.
“Yeah, cher’. What’s the forecast?” Clarence Menard couldn’t say the words without laughing.
“Clarence! Hey, at least I’m still on the air,” Rob returned the laugh.
“Yeah, man. A little lightning can be hazardous to a transmitter, for sure.”
“Not only that, but get a little breeze around here and Red River Electric’s grid goes down — then I’m sitting in a quiet, dark room just talking to myself!” Rob enjoyed hearing from his old Cajun buddy again, but this wasn’t a great time to chat. He tried to move the conversation along. “What’s up?”
“You know that little matter we talked about a few days ago, concerning the Tropical Treasures invoices that keep getting lost?” Menard’s usual resounding voice seemed to be even more vibrant than usual.
“Yeah, you said you were going to check on it.” Rob’s interest was minimal. He took another look at the weather radar.
“Well, I’ve been checking with some “cousins” of mine down in Baton Rouge, and I’m about to break a story so big that those newspapers in Baton Rouge and New Orleans will wonder what hit ‘em!” Menard was practically yelling by now.
“Is it really that big?” Rob was tracking a thunderstorm’s progress on the radar.
“Yeah, our little radio stations will be breaking this story wide open — I’m talking a statewide exclusive — hell, this thing could go national!”
“Our stations?” Rob stopped looking at the radar.
“You bet! I’m sending you the file, and you can break the story with me! Us little radio stations gotta stick together! I’ll send you the details and we’ll figure out when we’re gonna break this thing.”
A sudden
clap of thunder and flickering lights cut the conversation short.
“Whooo boy! Get under the desk, a big blow’s comin’!” Menard’s laugh barely cut through the crackling phone line.
“No doubt!” Rob took another look at the weather radar, noting the spreading and rapidly moving storms. “You’ve got some action heading your way, too.”
“I thought it was getting dark a little early!” Menard’s voice faded slightly. Rob figured he must be looking out the window. “I’ll call you tomorrow, cher’.”
Rob hung up the phone and for a moment forgot the severe weather. What was Menard on to? And how had Rob gotten pulled into the middle of it? Menard was sending “a file?”
Well, he could always just ignore it and let Clarence Menard’s station break the “big story.”
Emma was yelling from down the hall again.
“Rob! A lady on line three wants to know if a tornado warning has been issued!”
Let the big city media break the news and be the center of controversy. Rob would rather just cover the weather.
SIX
At first, there’s an almost imperceptible break in the humidity. It’s only slight relief, but welcome nonetheless. A whisper of a breeze stirs through the trees, causing the Spanish moss to sway ever so slowly, as if performing a synchronized, slow motion underwater dance. Then the wind, with a metallic, yet fresh smell, produces a growing chorus of rustling branches and applauding leaves. A distant growl of thunder sends an early warning.
A Louisiana thunderstorm is lumbering ever closer.
A single rain drop ends its kamikaze flight with a loud splat, almost sizzling on the hot concrete. Then another. And another. Large rain drops at first, falling with such force they nearly bounce off the ground. Then smaller and faster drops fall, each leaving a splattered signature on the ground, until one covers the other, and all become a wet sheet of water, quenching the cracked earth’s parched thirst.
Lightning. Jagged and sharp. So close you feel the tingling of electricity raise the hair on your arms.
Thunder. A low, rolling timpani drum at first — then cannon-blast loud.
The thunderstorms had sauntered through Texas, sucking in great breaths of moisture in one county, only to spit them out as a pounding rain in the next. The charcoal underbelly of the clouds gathered static electricity from the ground as easily as rubber soled shoes on a dry, wiry carpet. Across Toledo Bend the storms gathered intensity, rain surfing on waves of clouds, crashing across the state line into the Bayou State, swaggering from one parish line to the next. Through Sabine Parish, on to Magnolia, side-swiping Winnfield, and southeastward, finally leaving Moss Point dripping wet from the excitement.
But these storms were no more fierce than most. They were quick to arrive, anxious to depart. Loud and arrogant storms, born in the plains of West Texas — living out their wild-life in Louisiana — only to retire quietly in Mississippi, leaving behind twisted trees, snapped power lines, darkened homes and powerless businesses.
In the aftermath, a small Louisiana radio station went off the air. Its owner, Clarence Menard, mumbled as he trudged through the mud of the station’s transmitter site for what would be the last time.
Sheriff Dub Perot drove Clay Parish Sheriff Department Unit Number One only halfway down the muddy path to his destination. The two-year-old Ford Crown Victoria’s tires had started spinning uselessly in the muck and Perot didn’t want to have to call out a tow truck to winch the vehicle out of the mud. That would be too embarrassing. Instead, he stopped the car as it began to lose traction, got out, slammed the door shut and walked the remaining fifty yards.
“Get that damn thing out of the mud and have it waiting for me back on the road.” The sheriff barked the order to the young deputy that had been waiting at the front door of the KAGN transmitter shack. The deputy nodded and trotted off, his boots sinking into the mud above his ankles as he ran.
In a few moments the deputy was behind the wheel of the unit, shouting directions to two other deputies who had taken positions at both ends of the rear bumper, knee deep in the muck, pushing the vehicle through the mud, struggling to get it safely back to dry pavement.
Perot took his time to enter the small building. Instead of walking right in, he paused by the door, wiped his forehead with a stained handkerchief, surveyed the boggy field and the mud covered deputies, then turned and cocked his head back — squinting to see the radio station’s antenna tower rising 328 feet into the air.
He was not anxious to enter the building.
Perot had grown up with Clarence Menard. Hell, they had been half of the offensive line for the state champion class 4-AAAA Moss Point High School Tigers. Went to LSU and were Tiger football players there, too. Married within a year of each other, left Baton Rouge after graduation and returned home, raising their families together in the small town of Moss Point.
He didn’t want to see Clarence Menard now. Not like this.
Finally, the sheriff entered the cramped transmitter shack, tapping another deputy on the shoulder to step aside.
"Morning, Sheriff." The muffled greeting came from behind the equipment rack, uttered with little enthusiasm from elderly Clay Parish Coroner Dr. Buddy Mouton. The Sheriff had found few coroners with much enthusiasm for anything, especially small talk, and that suited him fine.
"Hey, Buddy. Man, this damn mud stinks to high heaven." The Sheriff’s deep voice bounced off the walls of the little building. He stomped his boots on the cement floor as he talked. The Sheriff walked around to the back of the transmitter rack where the elderly coroner was kneeling over Clarence Menard's body. There was less than a five-foot clearance between the back of the equipment rack and the rear wall of the building and the old man who served as parish Medical Examiner (he preferred the outdated term ‘coroner’) moved gingerly in the small space.
The sight of Menard's frozen face made the Sheriff forget the mud. Dub Perot was used to seeing that face covered with a broad smile, hearing Clarence's booming voice tell the latest joke picked up from his “cousin” in Baton Rouge. It had been a face full of life and joy — but it was now a face hardened by death.
"What happened to Clarence, Doc?" The sheriff's voice was softer now.
"Well, apparently the station went off the air last night and Clarence came out here to fix it.” Mouton rose slowly from kneeling over the body. The sheriff took the coroner’s arm and helped him to a standing position. “I guess he took the panel here off the back of the transmitter, and was poking around with this screwdriver." The coroner pointed to the objects with a trembling, white finger. It was difficult to determine who had more color in their face: the doctor, or the deceased.
"He must've poked in the wrong place. Looks like he's been electrocuted," the coroner concluded.
"Clarence should never have worked on this thing by himself, Doc."
Dr. Mouton nodded. "He took such a hit that he was thrown back against the wall over here. Suffered a hell of a blow to the back of the head — not to mention all that voltage."
"My God." The sheriff shook his head, then repeated: "He just should've known better than to come out here and work on this damn thing by himself."
SEVEN
Dr. Henry Bellemont slept in. After all, it wasn't as if he was a medical doctor and lives were at stake, he rationalized. Hell, he was a just a damn professor of economics at LSU. He didn't have a class until one in the afternoon. The students would love it if he canceled class, anyway.
So, Bellemont rolled over on his hairy, barrel of a belly and tried to sleep off the morning-after headache, the result of the numerous Crown and Sevens consumed during another wasted weekend.
The phone rang. It seemed very loud.
Bellemont’s head felt as if it might crack open. He slapped the telephone to the floor, at the same time knocking the clock off the bedside table. The alarm went off.
"Damn it! What the hell—"
Bellemont rubbed his nearly bald head — ther
e was just enough gray hair to half-circle his perfectly round head — then grabbed the alarm clock off the floor and threw it across the room. He heard it shatter on the tile floor of the bathroom. Now he would have to clean up the glass before he could even use the john.
"Hello? Hello?" It was a tiny voice. "Hello? Mr. Bellemont?"
The barely perceptible little voice was coming from the phone on the floor. Bellemont tried to ignore it.
"Hello? Mr. Bellemont, are you there?"
He threw the sheets back and seized the phone off the floor.
"It's Doctor Bellemont, dammit — yes, I'm here! Who the hell are you and what the hell do you want?"
"Sir — Dr. Bellemont, I'm with the Greater Baton Rouge Credit Bureau and I need to speak with you concerning some past due bills—"
"What? You woke me up for this?"
"Sir, it's past nine o'clock and we've been leaving messages for days, and you haven't returned our calls. Now, if we can just—"
"Go to hell."
Bellemont slammed the phone down and fell back on the bed. He'd gotten their messages. And the messages from American Express and Visa and Ford Credit and everyone-the-hell-else who'd called to collect past due bills. What good would it do to call them back? Could he tell them the sad story of just how little money a professor of economics made at LSU? It was funny, wasn't it? A professor of economics who couldn't pay his bills? Would they just laugh it off and call it even? Hell, he even taught seminars and wrote a damn business column for the Louisiana Business Weekly to earn a little more money. And, he made a little extra for being on the Louisiana State Gaming Commission, for all the good it did. Of course, what he made from the Gaming Commission wasn't always just the meager salary, and it wasn't always reported to the IRS, but hell — a guy had to have a little fun, right?
He had been divorced for nearly ten years now, and it could get just a little lonely for the scholarly. He chuckled to himself. Lonely for the scholarly. That was pretty good.
The Kingfish Commission: A suspense novel about politics, gambling — and murder. (Kingfish Corruption Series Book 1) Page 3