Sunday morning, I asked Alafair for the names of the ten worst, most mean-spirited, corrupt movie producers or directors in the industry.
“What are you doing, Dave?”
“Stirring up things. Know a few guys out there who are off the wall?”
“Enough to fill the Hollywood Bowl.”
“Could you type them up, please?”
After she went on her jog, I called Tony Nemo’s office. The office was closed because it was Sunday, but I knew he monitored his voicemail day and night. Sundays, Thanksgiving, and Christmas might be days of rest or gratitude or celebration for some, but Tony’s deity had a dollar sign for a face and gave no days off to his adherents. “Tony, this is Dave Robicheaux,” I said. “I think I might have a breakthrough in your movie situation. I need your fax number.” I poured a cup of coffee and hot milk, sat at the kitchen table, and outlined the general story of Levon Broussard’s Civil War novel. The phone rang seventeen minutes later.
“What’s this crap about?” Tony said.
“I knew you were interested in getting together with Levon Broussard, so I thought I’d pass on some info.”
“You’re a movie agent now?”
“I know a few people out there, Tony. I’ve heard talk. Your name came up.”
“Take the shit out of your mouth.”
“I know you’re frustrated about not putting a deal together with Levon. But there’s a way around that.”
“What’s the trade-off?”
“Trade-off?”
“Yeah, what are you getting out of it?”
“I want you to give Clete Purcel some slack and quit this bullshit about buying his markers. I paid off those markers, Tony. When you jam him, you’re jamming me. I also don’t like you sending those two shitheads after him.”
“Too fucking bad.”
“You want to hear what I have to say or should I bugger off?”
“Should you what?”
“Yes or no?”
There was a pause. “So what breakthrough are we talking about?”
I looked at my outline. “You don’t have to pay for the rights to the story line in Levon’s novel. The story is based on a real account. His ancestor came home from Shiloh shot to pieces in mind and body, and taught a slave girl how to read and write. The slave girl was the illegitimate daughter of the man who founded Angola Prison. In the meantime, the Confederate soldier fell in love with an abolitionist who nursed him back to health and restored his humanity.”
“So I don’t got to pay for any of this?”
“Nobody can copyright history.”
“Just go make the picture?”
“I’ve got a list of the names. These are big guys. If you do the pitch yourself, they’ll listen.”
“Why?”
“You scare the shit out of them.”
I could hear him take a hit from his oxygen tank. “They know my name? My work?”
“You bet.”
“I’m gonna give you my fax number. You better not be taking me over the hurdles.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it. Stomp ass and take names, big guy.”
The list included a producer who washed heroin money; another who hung prostitutes from ropes and beat them with his fists; and one who put LSD in the food of his Puerto Rican maid and videoed her stumbling around his Beverly Hills home and showed the video to his employees. These were the kind who would be terrified of Tony the Squid and too afraid to ignore his call or put down the receiver once they were on the line. I hoped all of them enjoyed the ride.
Helen was waiting outside City Hall when I got to work Monday morning, something she had never done before.
“Any problem?” I said.
Two uniformed deputies walked past us and went inside.
“Depends on how you read it,” she said. “We’ve got a witness.”
“To the Dartez homicide?”
“A young black guy. He says he was parked in the trees with a girl and saw it.”
“Why’d he wait to come forward?” I said.
“The girl is married. But not to him. Also, the girl may not be a girl.”
I couldn’t get her words straight in my head. “What gave him the change of heart?”
“The minister at his church told him he’d better tell us what he saw or he’s going to hell.”
I was hardly listening. My heart was gelatin. Sometimes witnesses who come out of the woodwork have had too much time to think and give a distorted account. Minority witnesses are often intimidated and seek to please, particularly when questioned by someone like Spade Labiche. But last and foremost, I might have to accept an unpleasant truth, namely, that I was a murderer.
“Why’d you stop me out here?”
“Because I haven’t told Labiche yet. I’m going to interview the kid at his home. I’m taking Labiche with me. I’m giving you the option to come along.”
“You’ll taint the investigation.”
“Hear me out,” she said. “You have to stay in the vehicle. The witness will not see you.”
“Why are you doing this?”
“Professionally, you don’t have the right to be there,” she said. “Ethically, you do. I have a photo lineup.”
“I’m in it?”
“Big-time,” she replied.
Helen drove the cruiser out to a small frame house by Bayou Benoit, with me in the back and Labiche in the passenger seat. Labiche gazed out the window at the new cane bending in the fields. “What’s this guy’s name again?”
“Baby Cakes Babineau,” Helen said.
“He takes it in the ass?” Labiche said.
“Lose those kinds of references, Detective,” she said.
“Excuse me,” he said.
We pulled in to the dirt driveway. Helen and Labiche got out, Labiche tightening the tuck in his shirt with his thumbs. His badge holder and a holstered .38 hung from his belt. “Not coming?” he said to me.
“I know I’m in good hands,” I said.
He leaned down to the window. “Maybe you and me will have a private talk about all this, Robicheaux. I think you’ve had a free pass too long.”
“Do your job and get out of my face,” I said.
“Fuck you,” he replied.
I got out on the opposite side of the cruiser and walked into the yard, under a pecan tree, and picked up a handful of pecans, still in the husks, and chunked them at the tree trunk, a tuning fork trembling in my chest.
A heavyset older woman with enormous calves and hips came out the back door and began hanging wash. I walked up behind her. “Are you Ms. Babineau?”
She had blue eyes and skin the color of a new penny and features that were Indian and Afro-American. “Who you?”
“Dave Robicheaux.”
“Don’t y’all be hurting my grandson, no.”
“Why would we do that?”
“The one wit’ the badge. I seen the look in his face.”
“Detective Labiche?”
“Call him what you want.”
She picked up her basket and waddled back inside. I could hear voices through the window screen.
“So why were you parked in the trees?” Labiche said.
“To drink a couple of beers wit’ my friend,” a young male voice said. “I got out to take a leak and seed the truck crash t’rew the fence. Then this guy come running from the road and was fighting wit’ the guy in the truck.”
“Inside the truck?” Helen said.
“He was messing with the glass, then got mad and busted it and was fighting wit’ the guy inside. He pulled him t’rew the window. That’s when this other guy come running up. It was dark except for the lightning in the clouds.”
“Which guy came running up?” Labiche said.
“Some guy from the road. Maybe all t’ree of them was fighting. I couldn’t tell what was going on.”
“What’s the name of the person who was with you?” Labiche said.
“I cain’t tell you that.”