I pressed myself against the side of the building and waited until they were safely inside before I crept over to my car and drove away.
It was not my intention to get Deuce dragged into all of this, but the longer I involved myself in the Laveau case, the more convinced I became that I was a black hole, destined to drag everyone I knew into the void with me.
* * *
Trailer parks are not as prevalent in small towns as people think, though a disproportionate amount of violence, drug abuse, and poverty occur in them. The people rarely form any lasting bonds, and the parks themselves come together almost out of a blind sort of coincidence. They are featureless, the general rectangular shape notwithstanding, and The Wagon Circle was no different. Tenants sold or binged on drugs, and those who didn't were in recovery and bound to relapse.
Laina Donaldson's piss-yellow single wide occupied a stamp-sized area in the back corner, on the other side of two particularly depressing excuses for housing, which had rusted and abandoned tricycles overturned in the yard. Laina's was not quite as repulsive, but only when speaking in relative terms.
I had modest intentions: I just wanted to test the waters with H.W., see what I could draw out of him without spooking him. For that reason, I parked way back by the road and walked in.
The impossibility of my mission became evident once I saw him. He appeared in the doorway for just a moment and then vanished into the darkness of the trailer. Moments later, Laina stumbled through the front door and walked barefoot to meet me.
"Hey there," she said, forcing a smile. "Something I can do you for?"
Years of drug- and physical-abuse had left her scarred and withered. Misshapen, in a way. She still had the leanish look of a younger woman, but the proportions were out of whack, as if gravity was pulling her in all directions at once. She might have been pretty in an alternate universe, one where she wasn't locked in closets during childhood or raped in adolescence. Her deep blue eyes showed signs of having glittered once, but now they only seemed dull and speculative, distrustful.
"I need a word with H.W.," I said. "I saw him inside. Just send him on out so we can talk. I'm not in the mood for a routine."
She showed mock bewilderment. "Don't know who you're talkin' 'bout. Just me here. I would invite you in, but the house ain't decent for company. You understand. I’ve been trying to kick, and I just ain’t been in the mood."
Her smile returned, revealing cigarette-stained teeth. Remnants of makeup cracked on her face, leftover from the night before.
"All right," I said. "Guess I was mistaken. If you see him, will you relay a message?"
"Sure," she said, adding, "if I see him and all."
"Great," I said, raising my voice so that everyone at the park could hear me. "Tell him I'm going to personally look into whether or not he has any outstanding warrants. If he does, then, well, he knows what happens from there."
Her face grew flush, and she reached out with both hands in an attempt to push me away, trying to yell me down by saying, "Stop it! Stop it!," but in her stupor she telegraphed her intentions, and I only had to step aside to keep her from assaulting me.
I kept talking, this time to Laina. "And you don't want the authorities digging around out here, do you? Last time I took you in, it was for drugs, wasn't it? That's an awfully small living space in there. Not many hiding places, I suspect. The longer you go without an arrest, the longer you can say you've been clean. Am I wrong?"
"Stop it," she slurred, her face tight with anger and frustration. "Get out of here, you dickhead. He don't want to see you."
I gave it another moment, dodging a swipe from her bony hand, before backing away. "All right," I said. "Just know I'll be back."
I turned to leave, just as the screen door rattled uncomfortably against its hinges. I turned to see H.W. standing on the top of the makeshift staircase. "Let's go on and get this over with," he said.
His skin was the color of breakfast ham in light syrup, brought on by years of working in the sun. He wasn't so much barrel-chested as he was just plain enormous. He had country bulk and was nearly two of me. His eyes remained perpetually narrowed, and his hands constantly searched for purpose during conversation, scratching and picking and rubbing to keep from being completely still.
He waited for his lady friend to go inside, and for a time he gave only half-answers to my questions. I tired quickly with his routine. He sounded like he'd been coached to avoid answers, so I said, in a voice halfway between whisper and growl, "Since you're doing your damnedest to avoid saying anything, I'll go ahead and speculate for you. I think you and your brother are involved in Emmitt Laveau's murder, and I know I don't have evidence, but my hunches have proven pretty accurate lately."
H.W. seemed unfazed. "Hmm. Yeah, I don't know what in the hell you're talking about. Maybe Ron's involved, but I don't have the slightest idea."
"What else you got going on in the Junction?" I nodded in the direction of the house. "Other'n her, what's got you coming down here?"
The big man turned toward the house, placed his hands on his hips. When he turned back, his lips were oddly parted, and I sensed he was on the verge of saying something. Dark, wet circles had formed under his armpits, and he picked at the front of his shirt, trying to fan himself off.
"It ain't got nothing to do with Ron," he said, finally. "I ain't even talked to him.”
I nodded as though I understood. “Random question: what happened to your brother’s foot?”
He gave me a curious look but didn’t seem angry. “What do you mean?”
I tapped one leg. “Right leg. Never noticed it before, but it seems like he carries it a little bit. Doesn’t look like a limp, but I’d bet that’s exactly what it is.”
“Oh, that? He’s had that his whole life.” All of a sudden, his face brightened a little, like he had been let off the hook. He laughed mockingly. “You ain’t never noticed that, McKane? And you a cop, Jesus.”
“How’d he get it?”
At that question, his eyes darkened somewhat. “Accident when we was kids. Never healed up right, and he just never thought to try and get it fixed once he got grown.”
“You do it? You give him a bum foot?”
He stared but didn’t answer. That wasn’t why I had come out here anyway, so I didn’t pursue it any further.
“If you’re not plotting something with your brother, then what in the hell are you doing in the Junction? I thought you were off setting fires underwater.”
He scratched the back of his neck. “I, well, I'm down here cooling off."
"Going south? Not your best idea."
"I tried to stomp a fella's guts into the dirt at a bar up in Oregon. I'd have turned his lights out for good if some of my buddies hadn't pulled me off him. He lived, from what I heard, but his plumbing's all frigged up now. It ain't exactly attempted murder, but it ain't far from it, either."
"And you think I won't turn you over?"
"You won't, McKane. You're not a cop anymore. You don't have a reason to be flipping over rocks and taking the magnifying glass to the cockroaches, do you?"
I didn't want to tell him, but it was exactly what I was doing.
"I'm not interested in your bar fights, H.W. It's completely off the radar, so your secret's safe with me. If, and I sincerely mean it, you can help me out."
H.W. ran his fingers through a greasy patch of hair, staring right into me. "Why don't you go and talk to him about all of this?"
I said, "You know Ron isn't going to admit anything."
"And you think I will, you hittin' the bottle like a demon's on your back? Why would I help?"
I gave the question a minute to sink in. "Because it wasn't your brother out there in the Boogie House, was it? It was you, and you saw the same thing I did. That's why."
H.W. wasn't as hard as his older brother. He was a big guy, sure, but not nearly the poker player he pretended to be. He stiffened, and he stood across from me, his eyes searching me
. He didn't answer.
"I don't know what I saw out there, either, H.W.," I said. "I really don't. And nobody knows that was me out there. Just you and me."
A flash in his eyes. H.W. sniffed and ran one forearm under his nose. He thrust his tongue between his gums and his lower lip. He laughed and said, "I'm the one with the problem? Are you even listening to yourself?"
"Do the right thing," I said. "Give up what you know. Your brother will be in hell before the devil knows he's dead; there is no doubt about that. If there is a line between order and chaos, he can't find it. He’s real messed up."
He produced a look of mock confusion. I didn't care. I stared him right in his cavernous eyes. "But you still have an opportunity. You just have to make that decision."
"I think you ought to leave, partner. Yeah, I don't like any of the things you're saying. My brother deserves better than what you're giving him." Even though the words were harsh, there was no conviction in them.
"No he doesn't, and you know that. You both have reason to punish Brickmeyer. Had he taken my family's land from me, the only thing of worth ever attached to the Bullen name, I'd want to mess him and his family up, maybe create a scandal."
"You best get on out of here."
"Did it take murdering a young man and dumping him on that land to teach him that lesson?" I asked, watching H.W.'s expression tighten. It might as well have been a stone carving.
"You don't have the authority to come here and fuck with me like this. I ought to whoop your ass just because."
"All right," I said. "All right. You win. I shouldn't have come out here and harassed you. I'm out of line. You can go on back in there with her, if you like. I just hope you have a prescription for penicillin."
"Come on, man. You're coming up here, accusing me of all kinds of heinous shit. I'm a victim."
"No offense, H.W., but Emmitt Laveau is the victim. I hope you don't have trouble seeing that."
H.W. hit the side of a junker Thunderbird with a wad of phlegm. He used bodily fluids like projectiles. Each conveyed a different emotion. Without a doubt, this one was hatred. "Jesus, McKane. How in the hell do you think I'm gonna answer these questions?"
"Truthfully."
"You got me on the defensive. I can already feel my hackles rising, man. I ain't even on the stand yet, I can hear the rope swinging in the wind."
"Okay, H.W. One more question and I'm out of here."
"This better be good, McKane. I'm gettin' real tired of the road we're treading on."
I leaned against the Thunderbird, freshly minted with H.W.'s spit, and crossed my arms, one hand holding each elbow. "Does he visit you in your dreams, too, or was it just the one time at the Boogie House?"
I made sure not to blink. It wasn't his answer that mattered, but his response. Guys like him have pat answers for everything. The lie wasn't what mattered. What mattered was how he reacted. If I was going to get anything on the big heifer, I'd have to outsmart him.
But he must have seen it coming, because he gave me nothing. His eyes shifted ever-so-slightly, almost imperceptibly, and they didn't blink. He stuck his tongue between his teeth and smiled. "Goddamn, man, it's a wonder you ain't a lawyer, asking all these crazy-ass questions. It must be true what they say, that the bottle's starting to pull you under the water with it. No wonder Vanessa split on you, son."
I smiled because I didn't want to let him think he'd won. But he sort of had. While I stood here, something real could be happening to my ex-wife, and H.W. had an alibi if he needed one, but not me.
He seemed to notice that, too, because he winked. "Yeah, that girl's a little too trusting for her own good. Why she's so fucked-up in the first place, don't you think? She just, you know, lets anybody walk into her life with something to offer her, no matter what it is. She keeps on like that, somebody's gonna take real advantage of her."
I flinched, swallowing the urge to punch him. "Don't think your brother's going to be loyal once things go downhill. He'll burn down your world around you, leaving you no choice but to dive in the fire. I promise you that. If I figure it out before you get the sense to speak up, you might not even have the luxury to save your own ass."
And with that, I walked away, hands shoved into my pockets. It took every shred of composure to keep from looking behind me. I listened for the sound of approaching footsteps, but all I ended up hearing was Molly Hatchet threatening to break an adjacent trailer's windows.
* * *
On my way out, I saw the rear bumper of a truck poking out from the side of the half-assed garage. When H.W. disappeared inside, I doubled around behind the trailer park, winding through a small field dotted with trees and covered in brier bushes.
Once Laina's place became visible from the field, I ducked behind a tree on the other side of a rusted barbed wire fence, and that's when I saw it. There it was. The truck. The goddamned truck I had been looking for. White. Diesel. Gently-used. Same stolen license number as the one in my memory.
A thought struck me then, one related to the night the cop chased me. He had tried to pull me over, not the truck. It didn't prove that the force was in Brickmeyer's pocket - or the opposite, that it was in Bullen's debt - but it showed me definitively that trusting the LJPD was out of the question.
It had to be a solo effort from here on in, even if it meant dismantling the entire police department, cop by cop, to do it.
* * *
I called the pulpers to thank them, but no one answered. I let the phone ring enough times for my ear to sweat from pressing the receiver to it, but I got nothing.
Odd.
Next, I tried the bar, but the guy who answered told me he hadn't seen them. That definitely was out of character.
Maybe they’re hiding out, I thought.
When my mind shifted toward other, darker thoughts, I slipped my phone into my pocket and tried to think of it no more. They had done a serviceable job, and I'd hear from them soon enough.
At least I tried to convince myself of that.
* * *
I made an unannounced trip out to the Laveau residence directly after that, my head cloudy with the implications of what I’d found.
Janita appeared in the door in a sleeveless sundress. Her mouth opened, somewhere between a smile and a question, but she let me into the house without actually speaking a word.
The door slammed behind us, and I circled a small recliner before resting my hands on its back. I groaned quietly to myself. The anxiety of returning here was instantaneous. My stomach burned, my mouth filling almost instantly with the taste of the cure-all her uncle had given me.
If the exterior of the house conveyed darkness, the interior magnified it, a dank, bitter, sorrowful place. The air was heavy with death, smelled strongly of it, simultaneously sweet and tart and flowery.
"I 'pologize about the smell," she said, adding, as she walked toward the kitchen, "I don't know what's happened. Something must've crawled under the house and passed on."
"It's all right," I managed, despite the pain in my gut. "I can barely tell it's there."
"Rolson McKane, I know that's a lie.”
“Maybe it’s your uncle’s cooking.”
“Ha! Maybe. You get used to it, after a spell. You want something to drink? I just made a pitcher of sweet tea."
"I thought I'd make this a quick visit. I don't want to impose."
She went into the kitchen. "Nonsense. Have some tea. There's something I want to show you. And you don't have to hurry. It ain't going nowhere. 'Sides, I'm bored out my mind out here. Attention's been heaped on me to the point that I'm going through withdrawals."
The sound of cabinet doors opening and closing and glasses clinking on the counter echoed through the house.
She said, "As a matter of fact, I'm so lonely I damn near miss having that crazy uncle of mine around."
"Where's he gone?"
“What’s that?” she asked. She was busily stirring something.
“I asked where
your uncle had run off to,” I replied.
“Oh, who knows. Sometimes he just up and splits for a few days. Full moon makes him jittery, I reckon.”
I stole a glance at her uncle's collection of assorted voodoo knickknacks, which did not look sinister and disgusting anymore. It now looked pedestrian, like the herbs and spices a hippie practicing alternative medicine might keep in the pantry.
Perhaps because I had paid so much attention to the abnormal trinkets and potions on my last visit, I had not noticed the abundance of photos of Emmitt smiling roguishly at the camera. Emmitt leaning against a wall, wearing shades entirely too big for his face. Emmitt sitting in the middle of this very living room, holding matchbox cars toward the camera like treasure. Emmitt staring straight ahead, unsmiling and seemingly looking at something in the distance beyond the camera.
In the kitchen I heard the tinkle of spoon tapping glass. "Don't worry. K’s not going to do anything drastic. Yet. I think I got him reeled in pretty good for now. That's not an easy thing, you know."
"I bet," I said absently, staring at the battered cup the old man had forced me to drink from. "He's got quite a collection of...antiques."
"None of that is worth bunk to anybody but him. Had it all his life. Made half of it."
Her footsteps were surprisingly light for a robust woman, and she appeared in the doorway with two pint glasses and handed me one. The limp seemed to be leaving her, and though I was pleased to see it, I said nothing.
I tilted it back and savored the rush of sweet and cold. The tea was delicious, maybe too sweet, but just right for the circumstances. It almost seemed to wash away the oppressive heat of the afternoon, and I was incapable of not drinking it. My stomach needed something on it, because the rumbling was making me sick.
"Delicious," I said, placing the glass on a table stacked with gossip magazines.
"K taught me to make tea that way, or rather he trained me. He cooks spicy food, and nothing calms the heat from his jerk chicken better than tea. But it has to be so sweet that the sugar dang near won't dissolve. First time I made it, he complained. 'It's too bitter,' he said. ‘Needs more sugar.’ I kept adding a little bit more every time, and of course he kept on complaining. Finally, I dumped a whole mess of sugar in there, thinking I'd show him, but he drank down a whole glass, gulped it like he'd spent a week in the desert, and he smiled at me and said, 'Now it's just right.' That man, I swear."
Boogie House: A Rolson McKane Mystery Page 25