Blood Game: A Jock Boucher Thriller (16 page)

“Then I guess we start with his old neighborhood,” Boucher said.

“I don’t know how much help I can be on this venture. The homeless have their own radar when it comes to police. You’d stand out less walking through a homeless camp than I would, and there aren’t too many other ways to get close to those people. Of course, you’d have to get some
old clothes, wear a hat, disguise yourself so he doesn’t shoot you again. But like I said, not now; when you’re feeling better. You ready to get out of this dump?”

“Yes. This place gives me the creeps.”

“For me, it brings back memories of a time I’d just as soon forget,” Fitch said.

•  •  •

Boucher’s home had a study facing the street. Its custom-built shelves held a respectable collection of rare editions, but he wasn’t in the mood for reading. He sat in the dark looking out over Chartres Street, staring at the parade of pedestrians passing by. There were tourists, the rich men. There were those who sold trinkets in the street, the poor men. There were shaved heads and purple-haired panhandlers the local landowners called gutter punks—the beggar men; and though he couldn’t spot any as he sat brooding in the dark, he knew there were thieves in the vicinity of his castle; knew from personal experience. The walls of his antebellum home were not all that separated his world from the privation that surrounded him. The difference between him and those less fortunate added up to a lifetime of choices made. He’d come from poverty too. He’d known discrimination and the way it stripped away one’s thin veneer of pride and achievement. Unlike those lost souls out there in the dark, he had overcome. But maybe—the thought seemed to crawl through his brain like some parasitic worm—maybe
it was just good fortune. Maybe he’d just gotten lucky. He dismissed the thought. He knew better.

Boucher stood and moved to the back of the house and his master suite, feeling tenderness in his ribs as he walked. In this one respect, he could count himself blessed. The bullet had missed by the width of a finger, and instead of death, he had little more than a nagging bruise. It was not enough of an injury to postpone the search he knew he must begin. He would start now, this very night.

•  •  •

Esplanade Avenue was the eastern border of the Seventh Ward, the former neighborhood of Pip Manley. Boucher was taking Fitch’s advice and beginning his search near where the twins’ old house once stood. Boucher drove to the area, parked his truck near St. Louis Cemetery Number 3, and got out to walk. Those in the cemetery could be envied one thing—they had their homes: eviction-proof. If it had been daylight, Boucher would have been walking in the shadow of the 610 overpass. In the darkness, he knew its presence by the sound of cars rushing overhead. It wasn’t long before he came to a derelict building, someone’s former home. The doorway was open—if there was a door. He stepped inside and onto debris—splintered wood, broken glass—and thanked his choice of shoes, the pair of thick-soled chukka boots worn on his Katrina cleanup missions. They walked well
over destruction. A pair of old jeans, a faded flannel shirt, and a beat-up windbreaker, and he had his basic outfit. A faux-fur hunting hat with earflaps topped it all off and helped hide his face, though his cover didn’t seem much of a concern for the moment. The inside of the building was black.

“If you got nothin’ to eat, you can turn yo’ sorry ass around an’ keep goin’,” a raspy female voice said.

He pictured a toothless old hag but knew it could have been a young woman. “How many in here?” he asked, hoping for an honest answer.

“Me an’ my dog. That enough for you?”

He heard a low growl. Animals weren’t common among the homeless; they competed for food. But this one was real.

“I’m going. Sorry I disturbed you.” He backed out, retracing his footsteps as best he could.

He walked toward the sound of traffic. He shuffled under the raised highway just like the hobos of the thirties had followed railway tracks during that earlier chapter in America’s history of periodic financial disorder. The cement roof of the overpass was noisy, but it was shelter, and groups seemed to congregate every few hundred yards, small fires providing not only warmth but a communal meeting center. He passed a fire flaming from a metal drum. The sleepless hunched close to the flames. Behind them was a second tier of dark lumps: bodies lying prone on the asphalt with sour-smelling blankets covering them and whatever possessions
they had. They looked like headless corpses. The bodies on the ground, the fires—the scene had an Armageddon feel. He stopped to warm himself. They made room for him but didn’t say a word. These were old people, he saw from their faces. Their demographic caused them to stick together. After a few silent minutes, he left. The space they had allowed him was quickly filled in.

A short distance away, he came upon a real bonfire, wood most likely ripped from an abandoned home. There were more people gathered around this blaze, sitting on the ground, many hunched over as they passed a crack pipe. He sat on the opposite side of the circle from the drug users, but the pipe was making its way toward him. A woman sat on his left, cross-legged. She turned to him. She sniffed. She drew her face closer and sniffed again, like a dog on the scent. “You just leave the mission,” she asked, “or prison?”

He was too clean. Dire poverty had its smell.

“Mission,” he said, and hunched over, lowering his head, pulling his chin to his chest.

The crack pipe was making its way to him, hand to hand, mouth to mouth. There was no concern for germs passed by its communal use, but then hygiene was nowhere in evidence in this subculture. It looked like a regular pipe with the stem either cut down or broken. It was short, which meant the smoke inhaled was hotter. Intense heat burned the mouth upon inhalation, and the blistered
lips of most of those in the circle attested to frequent use. All were smoking. If he refused, he was a marked man. It was enough searching for one night. He stood up and shuffled away.

Boucher returned to his truck and drove home. Though he had almost been discovered, revealed for the fraud that he was by his cleanliness, he felt dirty. He stripped off his clothes, throwing them into a pile on the bathroom floor, and took a scalding shower. In bed, he lay awake, staring into the dark, asking himself,
At what point does life become no longer worth living?
Could he endure a life of squalor as did the unfortunates whose company he had just shared? Was there some kind of perverse courage in those downtrodden homeless, or did their attitude of defeat and acceptance of privation numb the senses? Had they simply succumbed to a fate that was little more than a death sentence? He fell asleep as the phrase rolled over and over in his brain.
Dead men walking.
It seemed applicable to the wretched homeless.

•  •  •

“I almost got caught.” Boucher sat in his courtyard the next morning, his first call to Fitch. “Soap,” he said. “It’s a dead giveaway.”

“So you didn’t find him.”

“I’m going back out tonight—that is, unless your esteemed colleagues are hot on the trail.”

“Not a chance. But don’t get me started on that, okay?
I don’t like what you’re doing, but if you find the guy, you just might be saving your own skin. Just don’t go Rambo on me. Don’t even open your mouth.”

“Fitch, I’m only there to observe.”

Boucher passed the day attending to the files Mildred had brought over. She came to collect finished work that afternoon, and they had a pleasant cup of tea together. It was rare for him; he was a coffee man, and enjoying the weaker brew unnerved him a bit. He poured himself a shot of bourbon after she left, just to reassert his Cajun contrariness. The evening passed with little to do but watch shadows lengthen as the early Seth Thomas clock on his mantelpiece ticked away the seconds. He sat in the dark and waited until ten. Social activities would be winding down among the micro-communities encamped under the interstate. He would mingle unnoticed before they bedded down for the night.

He parked in the same place as the night before and again passed the cemetery. There was little use in poking his head in other abandoned houses; not even candlelight came from the dark hulks. He passed the same groups, sitting down in almost the same place amid the circle. There was no woman beside him; no one sniffed. He’d not showered today, and his clothes had lain where he’d left them the night before. It wasn’t much but was all he could do. The scent of despair was rarely acquired in a day.

Again a crack pipe was being passed. Again it was coming his way.

“Hey, Pip,” a voice called out, “this thing’s gone out. You got some more of this shit?”

Boucher hunched over as the man approached the circle from the rear, took the pipe, filled its bowl, then passed it back, saying something about it being the last freebie. Then he returned to the shadows. Boucher had caught a glimpse. It was his man. He rose slowly from the asphalt, watching where Pip had gone.

“Leavin’ so soon?” a woman in the circle asked.

Boucher nodded, then slipped away, leaving the overpass. When he was far enough from the group, he retrieved his cell phone, turned it on, and punched numbers. “Fitch,” he whispered, “I found him.”

Fitch yawned. “Where are you?”

Boucher read the road sign by the light of a passing car. “I’m standing between Humanity and Benefit streets, near a group of homeless under the 610 overpass.”

“Humanity and Benefit? You like irony, don’t you?”

“Whoever named these streets had a flair. Anyway, he’s here. I can’t take him on my own, but you and I can. If we’re lucky, he’ll be sleeping when you get here. Just don’t come in like the cavalry, please.”

The detective joined him in under half an hour.

“That was quick,” Boucher said.

“I didn’t have to spruce up for this occasion, did I? Where is he?”

“Over there. Under the expressway.”

The fire was dying; only a few remained of the earlier circle. Boucher led Fitch to where he had seen the man go. He stopped. Bodies had moved and shifted in sleep. He couldn’t be sure which one was Pip. Fitch whispered, “Be careful. We go kicking over the wrong people, they’ll gang up on us. This is their turf and they’re very territorial.”

Boucher nodded, then whispered loudly, “Hey, Pip. I need some shit. I got money.”

“Go away, motherfucker. I’m sleepin’. ”

The voice came from a covered-up lump. Fitch approached, bent over, and pulled down the blanket. He shone his flashlight in the man’s face, blinding him. “You’re under arrest,” he whispered low. “My gun is pointed right at your head. I want you to stand up slowly and put your hands behind your back.”

“Aw, shit,” Pip said, but there was no resistance and no stirring from those slumbering nearby.

Fitch whipped out the flex-tie he’d stuck in his belt and bound the prisoner’s hands. Boucher knelt down and bundled up the blanket, feeling for the gun that had been used to shoot him. “Got it,” he said. “Let’s go.”

Pip Manley was hustled away in the dark. Not a single head was raised, not even out of curiosity. Though these people congregated for support and security, the fundamental law of the street was supreme. It was every man for himself.

•  •  •

Fitch shoved the assailant into the backseat of his unmarked patrol car. Boucher slid in next to him. “Do we have to take him straight in?” he asked the detective.

“You want to find a deserted spot and work him over a little first?”

“I was thinking about getting him something to eat. He must be hungry.”

“You’re kidding, right? Why don’t we just get him a room at the Royal Orleans for the night? He can order room service, then clean up in the morning so he’ll be fresh as a daisy when we book him for attempted murder.”

“You killed my brother,” Pip said.

“No, he didn’t, you dumb shit,” Fitch said. “Your brother died of kidney failure from drug and alcohol abuse. My guess is you won’t be far behind.”

“I don’t use the stuff, I just sell it.”

“You were giving it away earlier,” Boucher said.

“I get charitable impulses sometimes.”

“Yeah,” Fitch said, “give ’em a taste so they’ll come back for more.”

“Those folks don’t have money for more. I help them.”

“You’re a regular Saint Francis,” Fitch said.

“Stop there,” Boucher said. They were passing a Denny’s, open all night.

“You gotta be kidding me,” Fitch said.

“No, I’m not, Detective. We’re going to get something to eat and have a nice civil conversation.”

Fitch grumbled but pulled into the parking lot. He parked, then turned around and glared at Pip Manley. “We’re going to get a booth. You’re going to slide over against the wall, and Judge Boucher is going to sit next to you. I’ll be sitting right across from you, staring at your ugly face. Under the table, I will have my gun pointed at the same gut you will be filling with pancakes, grits, eggs, and sausages. It would be a pity to waste all that food, so you behave yourself when we get in there. Got it?”

“I can eat all I want?”

“Let’s see how our ‘civil conversation’ goes.”

They got out of the car, and Fitch cut the flex-tie with his pocketknife. They entered, and a waitress led them to a booth. Too harried by her late-night hours to question appearances, she didn’t get close enough to catch the younger man’s street scent. She seated them in a far corner and took their order. When she left, Boucher spoke. “We want to know where you got the guns you and your brother used. The ones you both tried to kill me with.”

“Why you want to know that?”

“We ask the questions here,” Fitch said.

“I’m not sure I remember.”

Steaming hot coffee was served, the aroma tantalizing. Pip inhaled. Boucher slid Pip’s cup to the far edge of the table. “Try to remember.”

Fitch and Boucher drank their coffee while Pip’s cup sat out of reach. They removed even his glass of water. He sat, stoically defiant. Then the food came: pancakes with a caddy of six different flavors of syrup; fried eggs and sausage; grits; toast and butter, lots of butter. Pip’s plate was removed from his reach. He swallowed hard and blinked rapidly. Boucher and Fitch began to eat. It didn’t take long before he caved. “We stole ’em.”