Duplicity Dogged the Dachshund

22

The photograph was of Stevie, before her surgery,” I said. “The person who killed her wanted to remind her of the unhappy young man she once was. Who else except Denton Ferrelli would know about the monkey’s broken legs and also know about Stevie’s past?”

Guidry said, “The fact that you and I don’t know of somebody else doesn’t mean there isn’t somebody else.”

I considered sticking my fork in his eye, but the waitress chose that moment to bring our food. My salad was nicely chilled, with plenty of gloppy Roquefort dressing. Guidry’s bacon was stretched out like thin brown slats, a little black on the tips the way I like it, with no icky white bubbles.

He cut a bite of omelet, looked up, and caught me eyeing his bacon. He put his fork down and used his fingers to transfer half the bacon to my plate.

I said, “Oh, I never eat bacon.”

“Menteuse.”

I felt a little gotcha! smirk because I’d caught him being Italian, but I was distracted by the fried fat odor that makes all my little pleasure receptors fall on their backs and writhe in ecstasy.

“What did you just call me?”

“Liar. You eat bacon all the time, you just don’t order it.”

I nibbled at a slice of bacon while I considered that in one day I’d been called a cunt and a liar. But on Guidry’s lips the word hadn’t come out as an assault the way Gabe’s had. It had been more like a silky caress.

Nevertheless, that’s what irritated me about Guidry—he kept saying things that were true. This was just the first time he’d done it in a foreign language.

“That’s an Italian word, right?”

“French.”

Aha! He was probably one of those Europeans he’d mentioned who speak English without an accent.

“Where did you come from, Guidry?”

He grinned as if he’d expected the question. “New Orleans. Born and bred.”

“You’re not Italian?”

“Actually, that’s one of the few things I’m not.”

“You have a first name?”

“I do, but most people call me Guidry.”

“Hunh.”

Before I could follow that line, he said, “I was with the New Orleans Police Department for several years. Decided I’d like a place with a little less excitement.”

I ate some more bacon. “So has Siesta Key been less exciting?”

“It was until I met a cantankerous pet-sitter. It’s been pretty exciting since then.”

My heart did a stupid little leap, and a slice of tomato fell off my fork back onto my salad plate. I wouldn’t have touched that sentence with a forty-foot pole.

I said, “I went to Mardi Gras once. I loved the jazz places.”

“You like jazz?”

“Just old bluesy jazz. I have this fantasy where I’m in a crowded nightclub and a famous jazz band is onstage. The leader of the band steps to the microphone and says, ‘Ladies and gentlemen, the best jazz singer in the world is in the audience tonight.’ Then a big spotlight shines on me, and the audience gives me a standing ovation. I go up on the stage and sing like Billie Holiday or Peggy Lee, one of those. It just knocks everybody out.”

He was grinning. “I didn’t know you sang.”

“Can’t sing a lick. When Michael and I used to go to church with our grandparents, I’d throw the whole congregation off when we sang hymns.”

He laughed. “It’s a nice fantasy anyway.”

“You have a fantasy, Guidry?”

“Yeah, I’d like to live on an island, just white sand and palm trees and tropical birds, plenty of fish to eat, a thatched hut with sea breezes wafting through, a beloved woman with me.”

“Wafting?”

“You know, slowly blowing.”

“Isn’t that pretty much how you live?”

He took a bite of omelet and chewed it thoughtfully.

“My hut isn’t thatched, and sometimes the breeze doesn’t waft. Not to mention the lack of a woman.”

My heart did that jiggle-dance thing again, and I changed the subject.

I said, “I think the killer used darts, and I think I know who he is.”

“You’ve told me.”

“I’m not talking about Denton Ferrelli. His name is Gabe Marks. He drives a pickup raised up on tall tires, and he makes a living capturing poisonous snakes and alligators. He paralyzes the alligators with a drug that he shoots into them with a dart gun.”

“How do you know all this?”

“He’s Priscilla’s boyfriend. Priscilla works for Josephine Metzger making clown costumes. She lives in Pete Madeira’s garage apartment. Pete’s the—”

“The clown who told you about the monkey with the broken legs.”

I was surprised he remembered.

“Pete also told me that Leo Brossi owned some casino boats, and that Denton Ferrelli’s trust gave him the money to buy them. Pete thinks Brossi had a man killed who was giving his boats competition. That all ties in with what Ethan Crane said about Denton getting the land here to use for a casino boat dock. The land Conrad took for the circus retirement home.”

Guidry closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “I don’t know how you do it. People look up and see you coming, and some reflex action makes them start spilling everything they know. Christ, they should use you for national espionage.”

It’s true. I can be standing in line at the supermarket or the bank or the post office and people will inevitably start telling me the most intimate details of their lives. It’s as if they’ve been waiting for me to show up so they can unload all their secrets. I don’t know why that happens. I don’t invite it. I don’t even want to know other people’s secrets. It’s just something I’m stuck with, like skin that burns easily.

I said, “Gabe Marks does some kind of work for Leo Brossi. That’s where Priscilla met him, at the call center Brossi owns.”

“All-Call.”

Once again, I was surprised.

Guidry saw it on my face and lowered his eyebrows. “You’re not the only one getting information, Dixie.”

“They’re all connected, Guidry—Denton Ferrelli, Leo Brossi, Gabe Marks.”

“Leo Brossi and Denton Ferrelli are an odd combination. Denton Ferrelli is a champagne criminal, smooth, college-educated, well-connected. His contacts are lobbyists and politicians and mob bosses. He’s kept his hands clean, always had somebody else do his dirty work. Leo Brossi came up through the streets, served time for pimping, drug dealing, extortion.”

“He’s the one who does Denton’s dirty work?”

“More like Denton is the silent partner, so Leo takes the hit. He’s the one indicted, the one fined, the one with a record. It adds to his gangster charisma, and Denton undoubtedly greases his palm liberally to keep him quiet. With Denton’s political connections, he’s able to keep Leo’s fines and sentences to a minimum, so it’s a good deal for both of them.”

My fork was suddenly too heavy to hold. “I think it’s pretty clear what happened. Conrad pulled the plug on Denton’s casino boat, and he was getting ready to look deeper into Denton’s other schemes, so Denton got Brossi’s snake-catching boy Gabe to kill him. He used one of the darts he uses to capture alligators. Then they had to kill Stevie, because she was going to take Conrad’s place heading the trusts. And Gabe’s trying to kill me because he thinks I saw him driving Conrad’s car.”

I hadn’t really known all that until I’d started saying it, and then it had all come together. What I didn’t say was that Gabe now had another reason for wanting to kill me. I had humiliated him in front of Priscilla, and Gabe wasn’t the kind of man to let humiliation go unpunished, especially humiliation from a woman. Inside my flesh, my bones suddenly felt thin and brittle. I reached for my coffee cup, but my hand was shaking so much that I changed my mind and put it in my lap.

Guidry’s eyes were bleak. I knew what he was thinking. Denton Ferrelli had important business and political friends ready to vouch for his character and his whereabouts when Conrad and Stevie were killed. Furthermore, not a scintilla of evidence had come to light that put Denton Ferrelli or Gabe Marks at either murder scene. Everything that pointed to Denton as the one who had planned the murders, if not the one who had done the actual killing, was based on conjecture, not on actual evidence. The only person who could implicate him would be Gabe Marks, and there wasn’t a chance in hell he would do that because it would put him in the electric chair. Without hard evidence, neither Denton Ferrelli nor Gabe Marks would ever be indicted.

Guidry said, “I know you’re not going to like hearing this, but would you consider leaving town for a while?”

“I’m not running away, Guidry. Gabe may kill me, but he won’t make me run away.”

He didn’t look surprised.

Now that I’d laid out the reasons why Gabe Marks was probably going to kill me, I went speechless. Guidry didn’t say anything else either. He slipped a hand inside his jacket, pulled out a slim wallet, and laid bills on the table. I gathered myself to stand up, but he leaned across the table toward me.

“About the newspaper photograph in your floor safe.”

The old sick feeling of shame and fury began to roil in my stomach.

Guidry said, “Forensics didn’t get any prints from it.”

“I didn’t think they would.”

“You know what your problem is, Dixie?”

“Plenty of people have told me what my problem is, Guidry. Spare me your opinion.”

“You never got to finish the howl. You had a good one going, and they stopped it. They had to, seeing you probably would have done serious damage to that fool reporter if they hadn’t grabbed you. But that stopped the howl coming up from your guts. It’s still down there, and you need to finish it. You won’t be well until you do.”

Nobody had used the word well about me before, as if I weren’t well now, as if I were sick. I looked up at Guidry and checked the expression in his eyes, looking for the slightest sign of ridicule. His gray eyes were clear and direct. Not pitying, not condescending, not even sympathetic. Maybe not even kind. Just direct. Guidry said what he thought, and he thought I needed to finish the howl that had been stopped three years ago.

I didn’t answer him, and he didn’t seem to expect me to. Wordlessly, we walked across the street to the hospital parking lot and got into our respective cars.

Afternoon rain clouds had rolled in while we were in the restaurant, putting everything into shadow and stirring up a breeze that fluttered palm fronds and bougainvillea branches. Thunder growled in the distance and thin traces of lightning flitted in outlying purple clouds. We were in for a storm for sure.

Before he drove away, Guidry gave me a wave that looked a bit like a soldier’s salute. I started the engine and sat for a moment letting the AC cool the car. It was early for my afternoon rounds, but if I hurried I might get them over before the thunderstorm hit. Besides Mame, I had three other dogs on my list. I could get away with a short run with two of them, but the third was Billy Elliot, and Billy would be a quivering mass of nerves if he didn’t get his usual long race. I pulled into a side street that would take me back to the key and Billy Elliot. Sometimes you have to put aside the possibility that somebody will kill you and just get on with life.

I called Michael while I was in the elevator in Tom Hale’s building and explained where I was and what I was doing. I promised I’d cut all my visits short and get home early. He didn’t lecture me, just promised he’d have dinner waiting. Grateful for not having to hear his worry, I didn’t tell him I’d just eaten a late lunch.

Billy Elliot and I ran like banshees in the parking lot, both of us looking up now and then at the encroaching dark clouds. Back in his apartment, I handed him off to Tom and scooted out without taking time for chitchat. My two other dogs were nervous about the thunder and willing to make their runs just long enough to squat and do their business and then head back home. I didn’t plan on walking Mame at all, so I made quick stops at the cats’ and birds’ houses. They were all slightly on edge with the instinctive knowledge that animals have when the earth is about to let rip with a quake or a big storm. I gave them fresh water and food and a little conversation and then went to Secret Cove.

I found Mame in Judge Powell’s study, lying morosely with her nose on her front paws. I carried her outside to use the bathroom and invited her to play fetch on the lanai, but she wasn’t interested. In the kitchen, most of the kibble I’d put out for her that morning was still in her bowl. I took a Jubilee Wafer into the study and held it in the palm of my hand so she could take it in her mouth. Mame loved Jubilee Wafers the way I love bacon. She gave me a patient look and took it, but she didn’t chew it, and I had the distinct impression that she was waiting for me to leave so she could spit it out.

Thunder cracked overhead, and I gave Mame a quick kiss and left her. I told myself she was safe and dry. The Powells had been adamant that I was not to have anybody stay with her in their house, but I didn’t feel good about leaving her. I didn’t feel good at all.

I felt even worse when I swung around the circle to check on Reggie and a deputy on guard duty told me Denton Ferrelli had taken him away.

The wind was up by now, bending saplings and whipping palm fronds like flapping flags. Through the thick trees and foliage, it sounded much worse than it was, like a hurricane gale. Ominous thunder was rumbling all around too, so that standing listening to the deputy I felt as if I were in a dark cave with a bass drum’s endless echoes bouncing off the walls.

Angry, I said, “You let Denton Ferrelli take Reggie?”

“He’s the next of kin, ma’am. Who are you?”

I didn’t answer, just got back in the Bronco and headed home. I was nobody. I had no right to Reggie, and Denton Ferrelli did. But the truth was that Reggie going off with Denton Ferrelli was almost surely Reggie going off to his death. I didn’t know how I could save him, but I knew I had to try.

When I got home, a rain-colored car was parked beside the carport, and a man in a white short-sleeved dress shirt and dark polyester pants was standing beside it talking to Paco. When I drove up they both looked around with almost stealthy expressions. Paco backed away with a dismissive wave, and the man opened his car door and got in. His shoes were dull dark leather with thick rubber soles. He wore white socks. Somebody should tell those federal guys that white socks are a dead giveaway.

He made a sharp U-turn and headed down the lane toward Midnight Pass Road, and I sprinted through quickening rain to my stairs, pushing the remote to raise the shutters as I ran. Inside my dark apartment, I switched on lights and hurried to the bathroom to clean up before dinner. By the time I was out of the shower and dressed in threadbare old jeans and a stretchy T, the rain was coming down hard and fast.

My answering machine was blinking, so I stabbed the PLAY button and skipped through the messages. I stopped when I heard Pete’s voice and let it play to the end.

“Dixie, Priscilla and I talked on the way to the airport, and I learned something … maybe it’s … she said Gabe spent Sunday night with her, and he had a little kitten with him … she thought he’d brought it to her, but when he left Monday morning he took it with him … she said he left a little before five, but I saw him leaving in his truck about seven that morning … I don’t know where he’d been between the time he left her and the time I saw him, but I thought it might be something you should know … may not be relevant.”

I stood looking at the machine while pictures flashed like a montage in my head. The box of free kittens I’d seen Monday morning on Midnight Pass Road could have been put out Sunday evening. Maybe the box of kittens had activated Denton’s need to inflict emotional pain. Gabe could have walked to Secret Cove from Priscilla’s apartment, killed Conrad, and driven Reggie to Crescent Beach. From there, it would have been an easy walk back to Priscilla’s for his truck. But Denton Ferrelli had to have been present when Conrad was killed. Denton had to have been the one who got Conrad to stop his car and step into the woods where the kitten lay.

I backed away from the answering machine as if it were a ticking bomb. I’d had about all I could take for the day. I couldn’t absorb anything else. On the porch, I lowered the shutters and pulled a yellow slicker over my head before I ran down the steps and across the deck. A golden light glowed through the kitchen’s bay window, and I could see Michael and Paco moving around inside. That was my beacon, my safe harbor.