Night Watchman (The Tubby Dubonnet Series Book 8)

by Tony Dunbar

  Which Tubby did.

  He heard a chair scraping the floor inside, but no one answered the knock.

  “Open up, Jason!” Tubby yelled and pounded louder.

  “Is that you?” a voice inside asked.

  “Of course, it’s me. Let me in.”

  The door swung open displaying Jason in a bathrobe. He looked like he hadn’t shaved in a couple of days.

  Tubby pushed past him and went into the living room with all of its orange and lime aluminum furniture. Tubby was packing a pistol this time, stuck in his belt by the small of his back and concealed by his jacket.

  “Jeez, Tubby! This is a relief. I thought you might be dead.”

  “You tried hard enough to kill me, and you almost took out Raisin and a whole crowd of people parading in the street.”

  “No, I don’t think the phone had sufficient range to take out a crowd. Three feet circumference, max.”

  “What are you talking about?” Tubby got in his face. “You’ve attempted murder.”

  Boaz cracked a little and collapsed back into a purple chair, almost tipping over backwards. “I tried to stop it, Tubby. I called you but you didn’t answer. I tried to disconnect it remotely, but I just wasn’t smart enough to figure out how to do it. I admit my offense. And here you are. My friend. I am so happy. How can you forgive me?”

  “I can’t forgive you, you crazy nutcase. We’ve known each other for years. I’m turning you over to the police. Really, you ought to be locked up in a padded cell.”

  “Tubby, please. Think of all the good times. All the winners I tipped you to at the Fairgrounds.”

  “Who were you afraid of enough to make you do this, this crazy thing?”

  Boaz buried his head in his hands. “I can’t tell you,” he moaned. He recovered enough to pat his new beard.

  “Last chance, Jason. I’m not fooling around, not with a maniac like you on the loose. Who was it? Pancera?”

  At that name, Boaz hid his eyes behind the crook of an elbow and started to sob.

  “This dude is stranger than a ‘610 Stomper,’ ” Tubby thought. Yet, strangely, his heart was starting to melt.

  “This is all about something that happened when you were young, isn’t it, Jason? Were you the one who shot the boy, the peace demonstrator? That day when all the traffic was stopped on Canal Street because Kissinger was in town. It’s understandable. Back then there were only two worlds right? The Oakies from Muskogee and the hippies from San Francisco. You had to pick a side, right?”

  “No,” Jason whispered. His voice was almost inaudible. “None of that made sense to me. It was the ‘Night Watchman.’ ”

  Tubby wasn’t sure he had heard right. “The Night Watchman?” he repeated.

  “I didn’t say that,” Boaz whispered.

  “Yes, you did. Who is that?”

  “Forget that. It was just a title. We all had some dumb title. I was the Viper.” Short for vice-president. The Night Watchman, I made that up. He was in charge of the mission. Makes no sense, right?”

  “So? What was his name?”

  “That I can’t say.”

  “Why not?”

  “I took an oath, and they would kill me.”

  “That’s ridiculous,” Tubby said. “Was Pancera involved in all this?”

  “He was the Recorder.”

  “What’s that mean?”

  “He kept the records. I don’t know. I made it up.”

  “Who was the Leader?”

  “I can’t say his name.”

  “Nuts. What was the name of your group?”

  “The ‘Boys’ Club.’ I don’t know. I can’t say.”

  “Who was in it?”

  “I can’t say.”

  “You’d better say!” Tubby pulled the .45 out of his pants and pushed it into Boaz’s forehead just below his bushy hairline.

  “Go ahead and pull the trigger, Tubby. I deserve it. I’ve led a miserable life. I have sinned. Oh yes, I have…”

  “Oh, shut up,” Tubby cursed him. He holstered his automatic and yanked open the door to let in some fresh air. “Just look out for Raisin,” he said in parting. Raisin had it in him to be mean, and sometimes he was cold enough to leave you holding a handful of your own teeth.

  The ‘Night Watchman,’ ” Boaz had said. So, the shooter hadn’t been Pancera.

  But Pancera knew who it was.

  XXV

  In the morning Tubby met Flowers for a cup of coffee at the Trolley Stop, a busy 24-hour joint on St. Charles Avenue where no one ever bothered you. Tubby had his coffee with half-and-half. Flowers had his coffee with the “Southern Special,” consisting of three eggs over easy, hot biscuits and sausage gravy, four pieces of bacon, grits and butter, a slice of ham, and God knows what else.

  “Very hungry,” he said. “I was up all night.”

  He had gotten inside Pancera’s house when the old man went out to nighttime mass. Then after Pancera went home, Flowers got inside the church.

  “This was not exactly legal.” He mentioned the obvious. “But I wasn’t observed.”

  At the house Flowers had encountered, unfortunately, a housekeeper puttering about in the kitchen. Nevertheless, without being noticed, the detective was able to snoop around in Pancera’s den, or office. The room held a worn brown leather couch piled high with papers, a matching leather chair pulled up to a desk also covered with same, lots of books and no computer. Undoubtedly Pancera had a safe somewhere, but Flowers didn’t have time to look for it. Aside from bank statements and bills, there was unopened junk mail from dozens of political non-profits with names like the American Society for Tradition, Family and Property and the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights; in short, nothing very enlightening.

  There were two intriguing items, however. At the very bottom of one of the ceiling-high bookcases was a box of yellowing newspapers from Father Charles Coughlin’s Little Flower Church in Detroit.

  “I don’t know what that is,” Flowers admitted, “but the Father obviously hated Roosevelt and the Communists.”

  “Pancera must be a collector,” Tubby said. “Those are from the 1930s. Coughlin was competing with Huey Long for the protest vote.”

  “Okay, so then it’s way too dated to matter, but I thought maybe it was relevant.”

  “What else?”

  “A plaque on the wall from ‘The Marti Patriotic League’ with the inscription, ‘For Faithful Service’, and below that the initials ‘ACNI.’ ”

  “So?”

  “It had a date on it of June, 1977. I just thought, since it was from your time period, that I would mention it.”

  “I see. That’s good. What about the church?”

  “De nada. Pancera does have an office there, but it hasn’t got a thing in it except bulletins and old orange peels. There is a safe on the floor and I popped it. Inside was a pile of little bills, maybe a thousand dollars, and a jelly jar full of loose change.”

  “Lots of dead ends.”

  Flowers was mildly crestfallen.

  “Crossing possibilities off the list is important, too,” he said. “At least that’s what they teach us in detective school.”

  “I didn’t mean to suggest it wasn’t,” Tubby said contritely. “That ‘patriotic league’ thing may be worth something. Let’s call Cherrylynn.”

  Flowers didn’t appear to be entirely pleased with this course of action, but Tubby dialed her up anyway. She was at the office, of course, and he gave her the name.

  “Add it to your list,” he said.

  * * *

  Cherrylynn was fully engrossed in her list. She was coming up with a lot of information about Cuban-American youth groups in the 1960s and 70s, but most of them were centered around Miami. There was not much on the web about the Cubans of New Orleans, except for a brief mention in a footnote to a Wikipedia article and some references to the Special Collections material at Tulane University. Maybe it would be worth a trip uptown to see what the Tulane campu
s library had to offer. That, however, would probably require coordinating with Mr. Dubonnet and his alumni ID card to get access.

  But this last name, ACNI, struck a small but rich vein. It stood for Association for Cuban Nationalist Infantry, and there was an extensive write-up about it in something called the “CIA Counter-Revolutionary Handbook, Second Edition, 1985.” She couldn’t find any explanation of what this so-called CIA document actually was or how it had found its way onto the Internet, but sure enough, it identified the founders of ACNI as one Hector Boaz (b. 1932) and Pablo Pancera (b. 1930) in Santiago, Cuba. Were these the fathers of two currently suspicious characters? She’d bet her paycheck that Tubby would think so.

  A major find! It told her that she was looking at the right group. But, of course, it didn’t actually prove anything. The cryptic “CIA Handbook” entry described the mission of ACNI as “raising funds for anti-Castro military endeavors.” That was about it. The CIA helpfully provided the Spanish spelling of the group’s name, which was La Asociación para la Infantería Nacionalista Cubano. As an afterthought, Cherrylynn Googled that.

  And here she found a link to a 1977 article in the New Orleans Times-Picayune headlined “Benefit Honors Rich Heritage.” Click.

  It had appeared on the newspaper’s Society Page, where New Orleans’ daily gatherings of the glamorous and significant were described and where photographs of attendees, often clutching glasses of white wine, were displayed. The ACNI party at the Marriott Hotel Grand Ballroom had been one of the events highlighted in the Sunday edition of the paper, and it was described as a “Cultural Celebration of our Caribbean Character.” The honoree was ACNI founder Pablo Pancera, who received the Premio a la Libertad. Other participants’ names were also listed in bold. What jumped off the page at her was a picture of Pablo’s son, Carlos Pancera, standing beside his wife, Maria. Scrolling over to the photographs of the event she found a picture of the elder Pancera standing between his son and his daughter-in-law. The men all wore tuxedos, the woman was in a blue gown. They all had very un-partylike expressions, and there were no wine glasses to be seen.

  Below this somber family scene, another photo caught Cherrylynn’s attention. Once again, an older man was featured with a younger man by his side. The older man was vaguely familiar, and when she enlarged the page she saw his name, Patron Sandoval. To his right was his son, Ricardo Sandoval. Gee whiz! The Rick Sandoval she knew today looked just like his old man did in 1977.

  Suddenly Tubby barged through the office doors trailed by a bearded stranger whose black shirt was unbuttoned to display his hairless sculpted chest. Another man in jeans, wearing a cowboy hat and carrying a camera on his shoulder, was in hot pursuit.

  “Boss, I’ve got something big!” Cherrylynn shouted.

  “Cherrylynn, this is Dinky Bacon. I know you’ve heard a lot about him. The great visual and physical display artist? We’re going to be here for just a few minutes.”

  “But this is something…” The secretary paused when the camera swung toward her and resumed with, “Come right on in. We have a really important case breaking right now, but we are also deeply committed to the arts of New Orleans.” She gave the camera her big smile.

  Tubby beamed at her and waved his guests ahead and into his office.

  The cameraman immediately zoomed in on the view from the window, which pretty much encompassed everything in the Crescent City from the river to the Lake.

  “I could do wonders with a space like this,” Dinky Bacon glowed.

  “We could use some more art in here, that’s for sure,” Tubby chimed in, “but fully dressed, you understand.”

  The camera caught the artist laughing.

  “It’s a grave injustice,” Tubby said, apropos of nothing. The camera again swung his way. “This city has traditions of free expression going back hundreds of years, whether it’s political rhetoric, fine literature, grand architectural monuments like the Superdome, or just plain eccentric behavior. Dinky Bacon deserves international recognition, not persecution, and we will see that he gets his day in court.”

  “Cut,” the cameraman said.

  “Thanks a bunch, Mister Dubonnet.” His client pumped his hand.

  “Don’t forget your court date next Wednesday,” Tubby reminded him.

  “I’ll be there,” the cameraman and Dinky said in unison.

  The lawyer showed them out.

  * * *

  “What was that, boss?” Cherrylynn asked.

  “Pro bono,” Tubby said innocently. “Whatcha got for me?”

  “I’ve got you Police Officer Rick Sandoval,” she said proudly, and showed Tubby what she had printed off the net.

  XXVI

  The plan had Cherrylynn calling Sandoval, following up on her new request for records. She would invite the policeman downtown to Tubby’s office, using her charms, where he could be confronted by both Tubby and Flowers. The plan, however, went immediately awry.

  “I found another file on this Pancera guy you asked about,” Sandoval said. “But this is all irregular. I’m not handing it over to you. I’ve got to watch my ass. If your boss wants it, I’ll give it to him.”

  “Oh, that’s fine, Officer,” Cherrylynn said. Tubby was listening in on his line and making thumbs up signs to his secretary. “You can bring it here to the office. I’ll make a copy and hand the file back to you.”

  “No, thanks. Tell him I’ll meet him the same place we talked last time.”

  “Let me see…”

  Tubby broke in. “Meet you at the same place? You mean at Le Bon Temps?”

  “Right. I’ll be in the parking lot out back. I get off at four. You can be there at four-thirty.”

  Tubby agreed. Then he lined up Flowers. They would do this together.

  “He doesn’t know we suspect him of anything,” Tubby said, “so I wouldn’t expect any trouble. We’ll show him the newspaper picture Cherrylynn found and see if he opens up about the shooting of a peace demonstrator.”

  “I’m in, Tubby, but he’s not going to say much” was Flowers’ opinion. “You’ve got nothing on him, and he wears a badge.”

  * * *

  Their plan went awry again. Flowers and Tubby, in separate cars pulled into the gravel parking lot across the street from the Bon Temps bar. The sun was still out, still hot, and the only other car in the lot was a police cruiser.

  “I thought he’d be off-duty,” Tubby said into his phone, which was communicating with Flowers. “I wasn’t expecting the car.”

  “Hmmmm” was what he got in response.

  They each got out, and Sandoval got out. Unlike at their last meeting at the bar, the policeman was fully uniformed and wearing his intimidating belt with its gun, radio, night stick, handcuffs, and Taser.

  “Hey,” Tubby said, extending his hand. Sandoval looked at it for a second before he shook it. The two men were almost eye-to-eye. Tubby was heavier across the middle. Sandoval was squared off like a solid block of wood.

  “Who’s this guy?” Sandoval asked.

  “He’s Sanré Fueres, a private detective. He worked some with Ireanous Babineaux.”

  “Hi,” Flowers said. They didn’t shake hands.

  “I’ve got one file. It’s in the back seat.” The cop opened the rear door of his NOPD Crown Vic. “Get in and we can talk.”

  Flowers was shaking his head, but Tubby slid into the seat and reached for the manila folder.

  Sandoval slammed the door.

  “Beat it!” he told Flowers.

  “No way! Let him out of there!”

  Tubby had found that the folder contained blank sheets of paper. He was beating on the window.

  Sandoval pulled out his badge and shoved it into Flowers’ face.

  “He’s a suspect. Illegal possession of records. You are, too. Bend it over!” He pushed Flowers over the trunk of his police car. “I’m going to arrest you,” he said. “Spread those legs.” He had a hand on his Taser.

  This wasn’t Flower
s’ first rodeo. Tubby watched as Flowers complied, grim-faced, but without protest. Sandoval efficiently patted him down, then yanked the detective’s arms back and slapped cuffs on his wrists.

  “Now,” the cop said. “We’re going back to your car.” Tubby was trying to kick out the glass.

  “Keep it up and you’re in the hospital,” Sandoval yelled over his shoulder. He pushed Flowers into the back seat of the detective’s big GMC Yukon.

  “Your PI license is on the line, dude,” Sandoval told him. “And there’s a special place in the Mississippi River for private dicks who get in my way.” He slammed the door.

  Returning to his police car, Sandoval straightened his shirt and gave his backseat passenger a glare. He checked the vicinity to see if anyone was watching, which apparently they were not, then got in and started up.

  “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Tubby demanded from behind him, imprisoned by the mesh shield. “I’m a lawyer!”

  “I don’t care what you are,” Sandoval told him. “Shut up or I’ll tase your pecker.”

  Tubby swallowed the several paragraphs about Constitutional rights he was about to deliver and shut up. Squirming around to look, he saw Flowers’ parked car recede in the distance. Sandoval took a right on Magazine and headed toward Audubon Park.

  They got to River Road, up near Cooter Brown’s, and Sandoval slowed down. Right before Carrollton Avenue, he entered a cramped parking lot outside a small concrete block building badly in need of paint. There was a sign outside that read, “For Rent,” with a suggestion after that: “Mardi Gras Floats?”

  Sandoval pulled Tubby out of the cruiser at gunpoint, used a key to unlock the solid steel door, and pushed Tubby inside. It was dark, but the cop popped a switch, and the dingy space was brightened with fluorescent ceiling lights that hissed. There were no Mardi Gras floats there. Tubby’s focus was on a single chair in the middle on the concrete floor.