Mr. Clarinet

"I see," Max said, patting himself down for a notebook. He couldn't find one. "What happened to them? Are they still there?"

"I don't know. Some of them I suppose stayed on. These were dirt-poor people living as close to the ground as rats. No one cared about them," Chantale replied as Max picked up the small army knapsack lying at his feet, where he'd put his camera and tape recorder. He'd packed a pen but no paper.

Chantale opened her breast pocket and handed him her small notebook.

"Never forget the fundamentals." She laughed.

Max scribbled down the details.

"Have you heard of Ton Ton Clarinet?"

"You say 'tonton,' Max, not 'tonnn-tonnn.' You sound like you're imitating an elephant walking." She laughed again. "Tonton Clarinette's an urban legend, a spook story parents tell their kids: be good or Tonton Clarinette will come for you. He's like the Pied Piper, hypnotizing children with his music and stealing them away forever."

"Do they say Tonton Clarinet took Charlie?"

"Yes, of course. When we were putting up the posters the street people would come up and say: 'You'll never find that child—Tonton Clarinette's got him—just like he's been taking our children.'"

Max nodded as he thought of Claudine Thodore.

"See that over there?" Chantale said, pointing to a shabby-looking street of stunted buildings with fading signs painted on their roofs and walls. People were jumping out of a dump truck that had just parked itself in the middle of the road. "That was once the red-light district. Lots of gay bars and brothels and clubs. Really wild carefree place. Every night was party night here. People may not have had much but they knew how to have fun. Now you can't even drive through here at night, unless you're in a military vehicle."

"What happened to the bars?"

"Jean-Claude closed them all down when AIDS hit in 1983. Most of the rich American gays who used to come here for dirty weekends stayed away because your media said Haiti was the birthplace of the disease. Jean-Claude rounded up all the gays too."

"Did he send them to La Gonâve?"

"No. No one knows what happened to them."

"In other words they were killed?"

"Probably. No one's sure. No one followed it up—not publicly anyway. Didn't want to start any whispering. Homosexuality's a big no-no here. They call gays massissi and lesbians madivine in Kreyol. There's a saying now: 'There are no gays in Haiti: they're all married with children.' It's a secret society," Chantale said. "But Jean-Claude was known to be bisexual for a time. I think it was all the coke he was doing, and the fact that he'd screwed every woman he wanted in Haiti. He was supposed to have had this high-society boyfriend, René Sylvestre. Big fat guy, drove around in a gold-plated Rolls-Royce and wore dresses."

"Sounds like Liberace."

"They called him 'Le Mighty Real'—after that gay disco singer."

"As in 'You Make Me Feel Mighty Real'?"

"You know it?"

"Sure do. I have the twelve-inch in my attic."

"You?!!?" Chantale laughed.

"Yeah."

"For real?"

"Yeah. What's the big deal? I'm the original Tony Manero. 'You Make Me Feel Mighty Real'—that's my song!"

"I can't see it." She laughed her laugh again.

"Look a little closer," Max said.

"We'll see."

Chapter 17

THEY DROVE DOWN Boulevard Harry Truman, a wide, palm tree–lined, and surprisingly smooth stretch of road that ran alongside the coast. To the left, Max could see a tanker and a warship on the horizon, while ahead of him, some distance away, he could make out the port, with its rusted and half-sunk ships clogging up the waters. A procession of blue-helmeted UN troops passed them by, heading along on the other side of the road.

The Banque Populaire d'Haďti, the Carver family's business nucleus, was an imposing, cream-colored cube that might have been better suited for a library or a courthouse. It vaguely reminded Max of pictures he'd seen of the Arc de Triomphe in Paris.

The bank was set back from the road, built on top of a gentle slope, and surrounded by an expanse of lush green grass. A sandstone wall ran around the building, topped with bright pink and white flowers half-hiding stiletto spikes and razor wire. A high metal gate stood between the bank and the street. Two armed guards sat on either side of it. One of them spoke into a radio when Chantale drew up, and the gate opened back from the inside.

"This is the special entrance," Chantale said as they drove in and started up a short path that split the surrounding grass into two squares. "Only the family, certain staff, and special customers are allowed to use it."

"Which are you?" Max asked, noticing a silver Mercedes SUV with tinted windows following them in.

They followed the path around to a half-empty parking lot. A steady stream of people were entering and exiting the bank through a revolving door.

As they got out, Max saw the Merc parked a few spaces behind them. Max glanced over, long enough to take in the scene and break it down, but not long enough for someone to notice him staring. Four men got out—heavy Hispanic types. They walked around to the open hatch.

Max had seen all he needed to. He knew what would come next, even before they overtook him and Chantale on the way to the bank, run-walking two very heavy suitcases apiece toward the entrance.

"Special customers?" Max asked.

"Money doesn't know where it came from. And neither do my employers," she said without a hint of embarrassment or surprise or worry, like she'd had to deal with this sort of remark before—or been trained to deal with it.

Max said nothing. He expected plenty of drug money had gone through the Banque Populaire. Since the early eighties, at least ten to fifteen percent of the world's cocaine was being distributed via Haiti and most of the major players in the South American cartels had built up strong links with the country, many using it as a place to lie low for a year or two. He was sure the Carvers never actively solicited drug business—Gustav was way too shrewd an operator for that—but they didn't refuse the custom when it came knocking, either.

Max had wanted to start his investigation at the bank, on the Carvers' home turf. It was the way he'd always worked, from the client outwards: the more he knew about the people who were paying him, the more he knew how their enemies thought; he saw what they hated and coveted and wanted to take away and destroy. He'd first establish motive, then he'd throw a net around the likely suspects and haul it in. He'd eliminate them one by one until he found the culprit.