the drink glasses. Segura wore yellow golf slacks, polished brown loafers, and a flowered white shirt unbuttoned to his stomach. His peculiar triangular face, with the tiny balls of purple skin in the furrows of his forehead, looked up at me in the slanting sunlight.
“What the fuck you think you’re doing now, Robicheaux?” he asked.
“Teaching you what a real bad day can be,” I said.
“What do you want? Some kind of action? A piece of something downtown?”
“You’re going to give me Philip Murphy, Bobby Joe Starkweather, and the little Israeli.”
“I don’t know none of these people. You keep coming around my house talking about things I don’t know nothing about.”
“Ole Streak’s in a bad mood today, Julio,” Clete said. “Your friends messed it up the other night and did some real bad things. They’re not around now, but you are. You and Paco the barfer here.” He blew his cigarette smoke into the gatekeeper’s face.
“You trying to squeeze me? Okay, I’m a realist. I got business arrangements with policemen,” Segura said.
“You don’t fly this time, Julio,” I said. “All the doors are closed. It’s just me and you.”
“Call Wineburger,” he said to the gatekeeper.
The other man reached for the telephone that was in a mahogany box inset in the back of the front seat.
“You touch that telephone and I’ll stuff it crossways down your throat,” Clete said.
The man sat back in the deep leather of the seat, his face tight, his hands flat on his knees.
“You don’t have anything, you don’t know anything, you’re just a noise like a fart in somebody’s pants,” Segura said.
“Try this, my friend,” I said. “Lovelace Deshotels was a little black girl from the country who had big aspirations for herself and her family. She thought she’d made the big score, but you don’t like broads that slop down your booze and throw up in your pool, so you eighty-sixed her back to the geek circuit. Except you had a badass black girl on your hands that wouldn’t eighty-six. On top of it, she developed this fixation about elephants.” I watched his face. It twitched like a rubber band. “So what does a macho guy like you do when one of his whores gets in his face? He has a couple of his lowlifes take her out on a boat and launch her into the next world with the same stuff she’d already sold her soul for.
“Right now you’re wondering how I know all this, aren’t you, Julio? It’s because the guys that work for you have diarrhea of the mouth. It’s information you can get across a lunch table. There are probably only several dozen people we can march by a grand jury right now.”
“Then do it, smart guy.”
“Let me give you the rest of it, just so you’ll be fully informed when Wineburger tries to bond you out this afternoon. I’m going to have your car towed in, vacuumed, and torn apart with crowbars. Possession in Louisiana is fifteen years, and all we need is the carbon ash, either off that cigarette lighter or the upholstery.
“Any way you cut it, your ass is busted.”
Then Cletus committed what was probably the stupidest and most senseless act of his career.
“And this little piggy is busted, too,” he said, and reached in the window and caught the gatekeeper’s nose between his fingers and twisted.
The gatekeeper’s eyes filled with tears; his hand slapped at Clete’s, then his hairy, tattooed arm dipped into the leather pouch on the side door.
” No lo hagas! No lo hagas !” Segura screamed.
But it was forever too late for all of us. The gatekeeper’s hand came up with a nickel-plated automatic and let off one round that hit the window frame and blew glass all over Clete’s shirt. It was very fast after that. Just as I pulled the .45 from the back of my trousers, I saw Clete rip his nine-millimeter from his belt holster, crouch, and begin firing. I stepped back a foot, to clear the angle away from Segura, and fired simultaneously with my left
“What the fuck you think you’re doing now, Robicheaux?” he asked.
“Teaching you what a real bad day can be,” I said.
“What do you want? Some kind of action? A piece of something downtown?”
“You’re going to give me Philip Murphy, Bobby Joe Starkweather, and the little Israeli.”
“I don’t know none of these people. You keep coming around my house talking about things I don’t know nothing about.”
“Ole Streak’s in a bad mood today, Julio,” Clete said. “Your friends messed it up the other night and did some real bad things. They’re not around now, but you are. You and Paco the barfer here.” He blew his cigarette smoke into the gatekeeper’s face.
“You trying to squeeze me? Okay, I’m a realist. I got business arrangements with policemen,” Segura said.
“You don’t fly this time, Julio,” I said. “All the doors are closed. It’s just me and you.”
“Call Wineburger,” he said to the gatekeeper.
The other man reached for the telephone that was in a mahogany box inset in the back of the front seat.
“You touch that telephone and I’ll stuff it crossways down your throat,” Clete said.
The man sat back in the deep leather of the seat, his face tight, his hands flat on his knees.
“You don’t have anything, you don’t know anything, you’re just a noise like a fart in somebody’s pants,” Segura said.
“Try this, my friend,” I said. “Lovelace Deshotels was a little black girl from the country who had big aspirations for herself and her family. She thought she’d made the big score, but you don’t like broads that slop down your booze and throw up in your pool, so you eighty-sixed her back to the geek circuit. Except you had a badass black girl on your hands that wouldn’t eighty-six. On top of it, she developed this fixation about elephants.” I watched his face. It twitched like a rubber band. “So what does a macho guy like you do when one of his whores gets in his face? He has a couple of his lowlifes take her out on a boat and launch her into the next world with the same stuff she’d already sold her soul for.
“Right now you’re wondering how I know all this, aren’t you, Julio? It’s because the guys that work for you have diarrhea of the mouth. It’s information you can get across a lunch table. There are probably only several dozen people we can march by a grand jury right now.”
“Then do it, smart guy.”
“Let me give you the rest of it, just so you’ll be fully informed when Wineburger tries to bond you out this afternoon. I’m going to have your car towed in, vacuumed, and torn apart with crowbars. Possession in Louisiana is fifteen years, and all we need is the carbon ash, either off that cigarette lighter or the upholstery.
“Any way you cut it, your ass is busted.”
Then Cletus committed what was probably the stupidest and most senseless act of his career.
“And this little piggy is busted, too,” he said, and reached in the window and caught the gatekeeper’s nose between his fingers and twisted.
The gatekeeper’s eyes filled with tears; his hand slapped at Clete’s, then his hairy, tattooed arm dipped into the leather pouch on the side door.
” No lo hagas! No lo hagas !” Segura screamed.
But it was forever too late for all of us. The gatekeeper’s hand came up with a nickel-plated automatic and let off one round that hit the window frame and blew glass all over Clete’s shirt. It was very fast after that. Just as I pulled the .45 from the back of my trousers, I saw Clete rip his nine-millimeter from his belt holster, crouch, and begin firing. I stepped back a foot, to clear the angle away from Segura, and fired simultaneously with my left
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