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“That shack or whatever full of hay bales where we got into the shoot-out?” Clete said. “There was a rusted-out tractor next to it. You think that’s the place where the girls were?”
“Maybe,” I said.
Above us on the road, someone was setting up a generator-powered bank of flood lamps. Sud
denly, the coulee was lit by an eye-watering white brilliance. The state trooper in charge of the accident scene was silhouetted against the glare, the rain blowing like bits of crystal in the wind. “We got the Jaws,” he called down. “You guys find out anything?”
“The guy’s name was Andy Swan,” Clete hollered up the slope. “He worked with the execution team that fried Bundy. He’s probably checking in with him about now.”
But Clete’s cynical remark served as a poor disguise for our mood and the hopelessness of our situation. Our investigation into the accident by the coulee had eaten up time that Alafair may not have had. While we dithered, she suffered. We got back on Interstate 10 and headed west toward Jeff Davis Parish while I tried to get through to someone in the sheriff’s department there. Finally the 911 operator patched me through to a plainclothes detective who was working an extra duty shift that night. His name was Huffinton. At first the name didn’t register. Then I remembered him. “What is it this time?” he said.
This time? “You responded to the ‘shots fired’ at the river?” I said.
“I’m the guy,” he replied, sucking on a tooth or a mint. “What do you need?”
He was the same detective who had gotten into it with Clete and who had made a remark about my history with alcohol. “Down by the river, at the same location where I had to pop those guys, there’s an old Acadian cottage. It’s stacked with bales of hay. There’s a tractor not far from it.”
“What about it?”
“My daughter has been abducted. I’m not sure where she’s being held, but one of the perps in the abduction described a house or cabin just like the one by the river. I’m on I-Ten west of Crowley, but I need you guys to jump on the place right now. You copy on that?”
“No, I don’t copy anything. A kidnap victim is being held in a shack full of hay?”
“I think it was a barracoon.”
“A what?”
“A place where slaves were kept. We have video that came from—”
“Is this a put-on?”
“I’m talking about an underground jail. It may be underneath that old Acadian house. It’s the place where Bernadette Latiolais may have been murdered.”
There was a pause. “I tell you what. I’ll drive out there. I’ll look around, just so everybody is happy. Then I’m going to forget our conversation. But I think you need to get some help, Robicheaux.”
“Did you hear me? My daughter was abducted.”
“Yeah, I heard you. That doesn’t change anything. Every time you and your fat friend come here, you leave shit prints all over the place.”
“Call me when you get to the river.”
“No, I’ll call you when I have something to report. In the meantime, don’t patch in to my radio again. Out.”
I handed my cell phone to Clete as the truck veered toward the shoulder. “Get the state police,” I said.
“Take it easy, Dave.”
“You didn’t hear that idiot.”
“Which idiot?”
“Huffinton, that Jeff Davis plainclothes who got in your face. If this goes south for Alafair—” My throat was closing on my words, and I couldn’t finish the statement.
Clete was dialing 911 with his thumb, looking at me in the dash glow, his eyes full of pity. “We’re going to get her back, big mon. Andy Swan was working for old man Abelard. I suspect Weingart took over control of the old man’s affairs, then decided to do some payback on Alafair. But he’s a survivor, Dave. He’s not going down in flames just to get revenge against you and me.”
“What if Weingart isn’t pulling the strings?”
The 911 operator picked up before Clete could answer. He handed me the cell phone, and I made the same request to the state police that I had made to the Jefferson Davis Sheriff’s Department.
