Winter shouldn't have told Manseur what he had, but he had to warn him off. Winter knew better than anybody alive that the people in Adams's sphere had few rules, didn't want to be found out, didn't give warnings, and never left any loose ends. If Adams wasn't Paulus Styer-a target of the cutouts-he was almost certainly a cutout himself. Why Adams decided to kill Nicky was a mystery, but maybe he was making his move on Winter and didn't want Nicky in his way. So, if Adams was Styer, the cutouts would deal with him. If he was a cutout, they would cover for him. Winter couldn't afford to care, especially when the differences didn't matter.
Winter finally said, “What happened to Hank and Millie was about year-old business between me and the person who sent Adams, or Styer, after me.”
“How do I leave Mrs. Trammel's murder unsolved?”
“Say Arturo and Marta did it. It'll stick. Look, Michael, I blundered into Adams's world and it's still costing me. I've got a life to get back to. My wife is going to have a baby. You have your family to think of. Let all of this bury itself.”
“But if someone sent Styer after you, why won't they send someone else?”
Winter saw flashing lights, and an ambulance rolled past the cruiser and up the ramp to the doors of the emergency room.
“That's probably my date,” Winter said. “See you around, Michael Manseur.”
When she saw Winter running up the ramp, Faith Ann dropped the blanket and launched herself into his open arms.
“God,” he said, “I thought you drowned.”
“Well, I almost did. When I came up, I saw her getting pulled up into that police boat.”
“You should have yelled. I was there.”
“I didn't see you.”
“I was underwater looking for you. Why didn't you holler at the boat?”
She looked up at Winter with disbelief in her eyes. “How could I know if they were good or bad policemen in the boat? They were helping her. I swam to a dock ladder and it wasn't easy. I didn't see you. I didn't know what the police would do, so I told the reporters who I was, about what happened, and I showed the pictures to the TV so the bad police couldn't steal them. Is Mr. Pond all right now?” she asked anxiously.
“He sure is,” Winter said. “Thanks to you.”
“That's good.” She smiled. “So do you think we could go see Uncle Hank and then maybe go get something to eat?”
“Anything you want, kiddo. Anything at all.”
Manseur came running up to Winter.
Winter introduced Faith Ann to him.
“We got Jerry Bennett,” Manseur told him. “He was at his lake place, dragging Suggs to his boat for disposal. I have to go to H.Q. for the interview. We'll get your and Nicky's official statements tomorrow. I'll do it personally.”
“You can do that?”
“Sure I can. This is New Orleans, remember?”
“The back-scratching capital of America,” Winter said.
102
The emergency room doctor gave Faith Ann two shots of antibiotics and a bottle of more antibiotics he wanted her to take for a few days. Winter received the same treatment. It was going on midnight, and even though she was yawning and fighting to keep her eyes open, she told Winter that she wanted to see Uncle Hank. She really needed to see for herself that he was alive.
When Winter and Faith Ann walked into the reception area on the ICU floor, a man Winter said was Hank's doctor was writing on a chart. When he saw Winter he smiled. “You got my message.”
“No, I didn't,” Winter said. “What was it?”
“Hank Trammel's conscious. He's been in and out since we reversed the coma drugs. A nurse was at the bedside and he asked her for a scotch on the rocks, that he was thirsty. She said she'd get him water and he told her, not that kind of thirsty.”
They followed the doctor to a cubicle where he drew back a curtain before hurrying off.
Faith Ann clenched Winter's hand and took a deep breath as they drew closer to Hank's bed. She stood there for long seconds, silent and white-faced. Her uncle's face was horribly swollen, the trademark handlebar mustache gone, and bandages covered the familiar gray hair. Both of his arms and his legs were encased in plaster.
“Uncle Hank?” she said softly. “You awake?”
There was no response from the man on the bed.
“The doctor said he was awake,” she told Winter. “How can he still be asleep?”
“Beats me.”
“Why can't he hear me?”
Winter shrugged.
“I'd give anything to hear him ask for a drink of whiskey,” Faith Ann said. She saw a slight shiver run through her uncle. She leaned in closer.
“Uncle Hank?” she repeated, praying. “It's me, Faith Ann.”
Her uncle's eyelids fluttered.
“Faith Anna-banana pants,” he murmured. “Did I hear you talking about whiskey?” he asked her.
“They said you can't drink whiskey in the rooms,” she said. She had never felt so absolutely thrilled.
“Faith Ann, you know what?”
“No, what?” she said.
“Of all the Porter women I've ever seen, you are the most beautiful. Nice haircut.”
103
Michael Manseur stared through the two-way glass at Jerry Bennett. The nightclub owner was sound asleep, his head rocked back, his mouth wide open. Bennett's toupee looked like it was made from straw, his makeup was smeared. There was blood on his face and his shirt from using a baseball bat on Suggs.
“Looks like a man without a care in the world,” Manseur said to his partner, Larry Bond.
“He said killing Suggs was self-defense. Says he didn't hire any killers. Doesn't know yet that we have the negatives. Let's wake him up and show them to him.”
“Killing Suggs probably was self-defense. Get Ellen Caesar-you two handle it.”
“You serious?” Larry asked him.
“As a heart attack.”
“This is your case, Michael. It's a big fat juicy one.”
“Yeah. Well, it's just a case. And I'm about done in from doing everything myself while you were off lazing about. Ellen's good with self-deluded fools like Bennett.”
Manseur enjoyed the perplexed expression pasted on his partner's face. It was nice to surprise people sometimes.
Manseur accepted the congratulations from the other detectives as he moved through the bull pen. He stopped at his desk to get his coat. He probably would have spent the night with Larry interviewing Bennett, but for three things: first, Bennett was toast; second, he really needed to see, kiss his daughters and his wife; and third, the superintendent of police had told him that morning that he was going to get the slot Suggs's death had left empty.
He slipped on his coat and looked at Suggs's open office door. Inside, two detectives were searching files, paper by paper. Michael took one last look at his desk and saw a white envelope from the print lab in his in-box. The corpse in the Rover. He opened the envelope, pulled out the paper, and put on his reading glasses.
He read the name of the owner of the two partial prints three times, trying to figure how he had could have contaminated the request. Obviously he was looking at the wrong inquiry. Some technician must have put two things together somehow. It was simply impossible. The burned corpse in the Rover couldn't be who the FBI claimed it was. Somebody had to be playing a joke on him.
He read the name one more time, still thinking he was reading it wrong, that it would become something close to what it said, but not the same name at all.
Nicholas Green
101 Bobcat Lane
Houston, Texas
Licensed private investigator
Nicky Green.
Even though it wasn't possible, Manseur grabbed the computer keyboard and typed in a request for the Texas driver's license and P.I. license picture of Nicholas Green.
The screen showed two images of his Nicky Green. He stared into the eyes, studied the shape of the head, the jaw, and realized that, although the man he knew as Nicky Green was a dead ringer for the corpse Nicky Green, he wasn't him.