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I propped my elbows on his breakfast table and rested my head on the heels of my hands. I felt that something had torn loose behind my eyes and that I couldn’t see Clete or the room correctly. “Who’s playing that song?”
“What song?” he said.
“Jimmy Clanton’s ‘Just a Dream.’ You don’t hear it?”
“No, I don’t hear anything except that workboat deepening the channel in the bayou. You coming down with something?”
VARINA LEBOEUF WAS good at whatever she did, whether in love, war, or deception. Her suitors had never been unintelligent men, yet most of them, no matter how bad they got hurt, came back for more, and I never heard one of them say he regretted his choice. When the phone rang on my kitchen counter at eleven-ten that night, she was at her best. “You have to help me,” she said. “I know this is outrageous, but I also know your capacity for forgiveness, and I know you never turn away a person who genuinely needs your help and understanding.”
I tried to think of an adequate response.
“Hello? Are you there?” she said.
“Yeah, I’m here, and it’s really late,” I said.
“My father is drunk and believes you sent the Horowitz woman to our house. He says he saw her parked down the road this afternoon.”
“Why would I send Gretchen Horowitz to your house?”
“He’s getting more and more irrational. He resents you because you’re educated and you were given advancements at the department that he thought should be his. He believes you and the black female deputy conspired to degrade him in front of his peers.”
“Where is he now?”
“I don’t know. He has a gun. I don’t want him hurt. He called you a nigger-lover before he left. I’m afraid of what he’s going to do.”
“Call 911 and make a report.”
“Dave, if he gets into it with a black deputy, somebody is going to be killed.”
“Frankly, I don’t care what happens to your father, Varina. He’s an ignorant, stupid man, a racist, and a bully who molested black women and jailed and beat their men. His sin lies not in his ignorance and stupidity but in his choice to stay ignorant and stupid. I’m going to hang up now so you can call 911. Take my number out of your Rolodex.”
“He’s a sick old man. What’s the matter with you?”
“Nothing. Thanks for asking, though.”
I was lowering the telephone receiver to the cradle when I heard her voice again, as though her intentions, whatever they were, had taken on a new direction and were shifting into overdrive. “Clete Purcel betrayed my trust and stole something from my home and my apartment. I think you know what that is.”
I put the receiver back to my ear. “Clete doesn’t always confide in me.”
“Stop lying. I had some things on video I’m not proud of. But I never used that material against anyone. I’ve had two men try to extort me. One man named me as the third party in a divorce suit. So I decided to get some insurance. That’s all.”
“You had someone burglarize Clete’s office.”
“That’s ridiculous.”
“Your father carries a key chain with a fob on it that resembles a sawfish. I think Alexis Dupree gave the fob to him. I also think Alexis Dupree is a Nazi war criminal and your father admired him as a kindred spirit. Except your father finally realized that in Dupree’s eyes, he was a throwback walking around with a Styrofoam spit cup in his hand. Where is Tee Jolie Melton, Varina? Why did y’all have to murder Blue?”
“I’d get mad at you, Dave, but objectively speaking, you’re not worth the effort. Good God, what did I ever see in you?”
I CALLED CLETE at six A.M. and woke him up. “Where’s Gretchen?” I said.
“I think she flew to Miami,” he replied.
“Varina Leboeuf claims her father saw her at Cypremort Point yesterday.”
“That’s possible.”
“What’s she up to, Clete?”
