talked enough, now. I will leave, and you will sit here for exacdy ten minutes. If you leave before then, it will be taken the wrong way and you will be killed. I am sorry to be rude in this way, but there we are."
"Of course." I imagined the man with the rifle. I imagined him watching for the sign, and I wondered what the sign might've been. A yawn, perhaps. Perhaps wiping the brow. The sign, the trigger, history.
Ramon del Reyo said, "If the man who is with you approaches, have him sit beside you and he will not be harmed."
I said, "What man?"
Ramon del Reyo laughed, then patted my leg and moved away, del Reyo and the guy with the Ray-Bans, then the others, and finally the Haitian. The Haitian made a pistol of his right hand, pointed it at me, and dropped the hammer. Then he smiled and disappeared into the crowd. What a way to live.
I sat on the lip of the bench in the damp heat and waited. My shirt was wet and clinging, and my skin felt hot and beginning to burn. Joe Pike came through the crowd and sat beside me. He said, "Look across the square, corner building, third floor, third window in."
I didn't bother looking. "Guy widi a rifle."
"Not now, but was. Did you make him?"
"They told me. They made you, Joe. They knew you were there."
Pike didn't move for a while, but you could tell he didn't like it, or didn't believe it. Finally he made a little shrug. "Did we learn anything?"
"I think."
"Is there a way out for the Boudreauxs?"
I stared off at the river, at the steady brown water flowing toward the Gulf, at the great ships headed north, up into the heart of America. I said, "Yes. Yes, I think there is. They won't like it, but I think there is." I thought about it for a time, and then I looked back at Joe Pike. "These are dangerous people, Joe. These are very dangerous people."
Pike nodded and watched/the river with me. "Yes," he said. "But so are we."
CHAPTER 29
A hot wind blew in off Lake Pontchartrain. The last of the clouds had vanished, leaving the sky a great azure dome above us, the afternoon sun a disk of white and undeniable heat. We drove with the windows down, the hot air roaring over and around us, smelling not unlike an aquarium that has been too long un-cleaned. We reached Baton Rouge, but we did not stop; we crested the bridge and continued west toward the Evangeline Parish Sheriff's Substation in Eunice, and Jo-el Boudreaux. He wouldn't be happy to see us, but I wasn't so happy about seeing him, either.
It was late afternoon when Pike and I parked in the dappled shade of a black-trunked oak and walked into the substation. A thin African-American woman with very red lips and too much rouge sat at a desk and, behind her, a tall rawboned cop with leathery skin stood at a coffee machine. The cop looked over when we walked in and watched us cross to the receptionist. Staring. I gave the receptionist one of my business cards. "We'd like to see Sheriff Boudreaux, please. He knows what it's about."
She looked at the card. "Do you have an appointment?"
"No, ma'am. But he'll see us."
The rawboned cop came closer, first looking at Pike and then looking at me, as if we had put in a couple of job applications and he was about to turn us down. "The sheriff's a busy man. You got a problem, you can talk to me." His name tag said WILLETS.
"Thanks, but it's business for the sheriff."
Willets didn't let it go. "If you're talkin' crime, it's my business, too." He squinted. "You boys aren't local, are you?"
Pike said, "Does it matter?"
Willets clicked the cop eyes on Pike. "You look familiar. I ever lock you down?"
The receptionist said, "Oh, relax, Tommy," and took the card down a short hall.
Willets stood there with his fists on his hips, staring at us. The receptionist came back with Jo-el Boudreaux and returned to her desk. Boudreaux looked nervous. "I thought you were gone."
"There's something we need to talk about."
Willets said, "They wouldn't talk with me, Jo-el."
Boudreaux said, "I've got it now, Tommy. Thanks."
Willets went back to the coffee machine, but he wasn't happy about it. Boudreaux was holding my business card and bending it back and forth. He looked at Joe. "Who's that?"
"Joe Pike. He works with