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“You’re going to give us the tour. If I think you’re concealing evidence in a homicide investigation, I’m going to turn your life into a toilet,” Joe said.
“What’s your problem, man?” the kid said.
“You are. I don’t like your tats. If you ask me, they
really suck. Where’d you get them?” Joe said.
“In Houston.”
“You should get your money back. These guys using you for queer-bait?” Joe said.
“Queer-bait? What’s going—”
“Shut your mouth. Where are the baseball bats?” Joe said.
“There’s some shit out in the garage. You want to look through it, be my fucking guest,” the kid said.
“Thanks for your help. Now, sit down and don’t move until I tell you,” Joe said.
Just then Joe’s cell phone vibrated on his hip. He glanced at the incoming number on the digital display and took the call while Top and I went into the garage. The heat was stifling, the tin roof ventilated by rust against a white sun, nests of mud daubers caked on the rafters.
“There it is,” Top said, pointing to a canvas duffel bag stuffed with baseball bats.
“Take them out to the car, will you, Top? I want to have a talk with the kid on the porch,” I said.
“You believe he’s really a college student?” he asked.
“Sure, why not?”
“I joined the Crotch because I didn’t think a university would accept a guy like me,” he said, hefting the duffel by its strap onto his shoulder. “I ended up at Khe Sanh. I think I screwed myself.”
“It could have been worse.”
“How?”
“You could be an alumnus of a fraternity like this one,” I said.
His eyes crinkled at the corners, the collection of aluminum and wood bats rattling against his back.
I walked back into the yard. The sun had gone behind a cloud and the wind was blowing in the trees. The kid reading the magazine glanced up at me. His eyes had the tint and complexity of clear blue water, devoid of thought or moral sentiment.
“Show me around the inside, will you, Sonny?” I said.
He tossed his magazine aside and walked ahead of me. But before I entered the house, Joe Dupree stopped me. He had just put away his cell phone and seemed to be puzzling through the conversation he’d just had. He gestured for me to follow him back into the yard, out of earshot of Sonny Williamson. “That was a friend of mine at the courthouse. Trish Klein just pleaded no contest on the shoplifting charge, paid a fine, and went back on the street,” he said.
“Have you gotten any reports of crimes committed against Bruxal or his interests?” I said.
“None,” he said.
“Maybe she wasn’t using the jail as an alibi after all.”
“I’m still convinced her people were the ones who creeped Bruxal’s house,” he said.
“You hear anything from the Feds?” I asked.
“A couple of calls from this Mossbacher woman. She seems on the square, but she doesn’t know any more than we do.”
“You got anybody tailing Trish Klein?”
