Natchez Burning (21 page)

“Go on,” Henry said, wishing to God he could tape the cell conversation.

“Around this time, Forrest Knox got wind that Ed Schott was being investigated on the sly.”

“Frank Knox’s son?”

“That’s right. Forrest is a CIB officer in the state police. So Forrest looks into it, finds out about the girls, and passes the word to Brody.”

“Oh, God. What did Brody do?”

Morehouse took several wheezing breaths. “One day those gals left work for lunch and didn’t come back. Snake and Sonny hogtied ’em, hustled ’em into a Cessna, and flew ’em down to a hunting camp in South Louisiana, close to where Frank used to train Cubans in sixty-one. Brody and Randall were waiting. Claude Devereux was down there, too, for the legal end of things. Those gals started screaming and sobbing the second they saw Randall and the old man, because they thought they knew what was coming. But they didn’t have a clue, son.”

Henry felt his stomach clench, but he had to know. “What happened?”

“Snake sat ’em down at a table and tied ’em both to chairs. They were facing each other, but he left their hands free. Randall cussed ’em for about five minutes, and one actually had the balls to cuss back. Then Brody asked what they’d told the feds. The girls wouldn’t talk. So Brody gave the word, and Randall pinned one woman’s arms to the table. Then Brody took out a knife and cut her face up a little. She started talking quick after that. They couldn’t shut her up. She was bleeding and slobbering all over the table, and the other girl was sobbing. In about three minutes, they’d spilled everything. Brody went into the next room and talked to Devereux. Claude said it was pretty clear the feds had been told a lot, but without the gals as witnesses, they’d never make a case stick.”

Henry knew what must follow, as surely as the feast follows the kill, and it sickened him. But he did what years of experience had taught him he must. “What happened then?”

“Brody told them gals they were going to play a game.”

“A game?”

“Yessir. That’s Brody, right down to the ground. The winner would get to go back to her kids, but the loser had to die.”

“What kind of game was it?”

“Brody’s favorite kind. He tells the gals he’s gonna give each of ’em a pistol with one bullet in it. Whichever one shoots the other can go home, back to her life. But he’s gonna keep a videotape of her killing the other one, to use if she ever tries to tell her FBI friends any of what happened. And if the winner tries to go into witness protection, something like that, he’ll do the same thing to a family member or friend. These gals can’t believe it at first, right? But then they see old Brody is serious—they see the two pistols—and they freak out. One asks how Randall can let this happen after he’s made love to her, to both of them. He just laughs and says he’s planning to screw the winner for old times’ sake.”

Henry felt dizzy. He blew out a lungful of air. “Glenn … this is some sick shit. They didn’t really do this?”

“You think I could make this up? Brody
gets off
on this kind of thing. He’s too old to fuck anymore, so he takes his fun where he can get it. While Snake covered them with a shotgun, Randall gave each woman a .38 revolver. Then the men backed up about twenty feet and told them they could fire when ready.”

“Did you see this happen?”

There was a long silence, punctuated by wet breaths. “I ain’t sayin’. But I know what happened. Both women were crying, white as death, makeup running down their faces. One put down her pistol, then picked it up again. Pretty soon they’re pointing the guns at each other, but real nervous like. The secretary begs Brody to stop the game, to think about their kids. The accountant says the guns probably only have blanks in them. But deep down, they know. They’ve betrayed the Royal family, and somebody’s gonna die for it. Brody says if one or the other don’t fire in the next sixty seconds, Snake’ll shoot ’em both with the shotgun.”

“And Royal was filming this?”

“Yessir. But strictly for pleasure, not leverage. Anyway, as the clock ticked down, the secretary put down her pistol and said she couldn’t do it. Or
wouldn’t
. She told the other girl, the accountant, that they were going to be killed anyway, and they shouldn’t give the bastards the satisfaction. The accountant started shaking like she was trying to pass a kidney stone. But after a few seconds, she shot the secretary right in the face. Hollow-point bullet. Half her head was on the wall, the other half on her blouse, and the rest of her just slumped in the chair. The accountant jumped up with the chair still tied to her and tried to run out of the room.”

“Christ, Glenn. Where’s this woman now? Don’t tell me she still works for Royal Insurance?”

“Nope. Randall took her in the other room and did just what he’d said he would. Then he told Snake to kill her and dump ’em both in the swamp. And that’s what Snake did. After Brody and Randall left, Snake cut up the bodies with a chain saw, bagged the parts, flew ’em to a dark hole in the Atchafalaya, and sunk ’em. They were gar crap by the next day.”

For a several moments, Henry couldn’t find his voice. Obviously Snake had not performed the cleanup duties on his own. But what was the point in pushing Morehouse on this question? Finally, Henry cleared his throat and asked, “What about Commissioner Schott? Why didn’t he talk rather than go to prison?”

Morehouse laughed hoarsely. “Is that a joke? Ed Schott knew exactly what Brody was capable of. Seven years in a minimum-security federal prison is a cakewalk compared to what you get for ratting on Brody Royal.”

Henry grunted as if in agreement, but inside, his nausea had begun to recede. Filling its place was a familiar emotion, the same one he’d felt for decades at any mention of Brody Royal—an anger almost impossible to contain. “Why did you tell me that story, Glenn?”

“Because it’s Brody you’re after. But son, if you ever get close to him, you’re gonna find yourself playing the same game those girls did, or one like it. And that’s no way to die.”

Henry heard real concern in the old Double Eagle’s voice.

“Shit, my sister just texted me,” Morehouse said anxiously. “She’s in Waterproof. We ain’t got but twenty-five minutes left. I didn’t hear your engine. You still out there?”

“Yeah. I’m coming back in.”

“You sure you want to, after what I told you?”

Henry knew this was his personal Rubicon. If he walked back into that house, he was putting his life on the line. “I’ll bring in a log for the fire.”

WHEN HENRY ENTERED MOREHOUSE’S
sickroom for the second time, the old man was pissing in the plastic urinal. Henry turned away and set the red oak log on the dying fire, then stirred the coals. Groaning in discomfort, the old man set the jug beside his chair.

“Last case,” Henry said, sitting down beside the La-Z-Boy and flipping open his notebook. “March twenty-seventh, 1968. Jimmy Revels and Luther Davis disappeared from Natchez. Neither man was ever seen again. Were they murdered?”

Morehouse nodded reluctantly.

Henry felt a rush of euphoria. He was about to get a truth that had been buried for thirty-seven years. “Before we go any further, would you clear up one thing for me?”

“If I can.”

“Between the bombing of George Metcalfe in August of sixty-five and Jimmy Revels disappearing in March of sixty-eight, there were no major Eagle operations that I know about. Snake Knox ran over an old black man who’d registered to vote down in Lusahatcha County, and killed him, but no charges were filed. That seemed more like a crime of passion. Big John DeLillo shot a black man in Babineau’s Barbecue, but you told me DeLillo was never an Eagle. So … why the time gap?”

Morehouse sighed heavily. “Simple. Frank’s boy got killed in Vietnam in July of sixty-six. Friendly-fire incident. A short artillery round blew him to pieces in the shadow of the Rockpile, near the DMZ. Losing his oldest boy messed Frank up something terrible. He stayed drunk for two years, day and night. He didn’t snap out of it till right before he died, and even then … aw, hell. I don’t want to think about that.”

Henry felt like an imbecile. How could he have overlooked this? Sometimes you studied a thing so hard for hidden significance that you missed the neon-lit truth staring you in the face. “Frank died just one day after Jimmy and Luther disappeared,” he thought aloud. “Was Frank drunk when that pallet of batteries fell on him?”

Morehouse nodded slowly.

“Okay. Why did you guys target Jimmy Revels? Because he was registering blacks to vote?”

“Did you know that boy?” Morehouse asked softly, staring into the fire.

The question prodded Henry like a finger. “No,” he lied. “But I know he spent a lot of time in Albert’s store, just like Pooky Wilson. I’ve wondered whether that connection had something to do with why the Eagles targeted him.”

Morehouse shook his head. “Ferriday was a small town. All the nigras knew each other.”

Henry didn’t buy this. He decided to leap off the cliff he’d been avoiding since the interview started. “Jimmy Revels was also Viola Turner’s brother. The nurse who worked for Dr. Cage?”

Morehouse just kept staring into the fire.

“You must have met her when you worked for Triton Battery,” Henry continued, watching Morehouse in profile. “Wasn’t Tom Cage the company doctor?”

The old man nodded, but he seemed a thousand miles away. Henry kept talking, trying to prod him. “Viola’s husband was killed in Vietnam, just like Frank’s older son. She got real close to her brother after that. She worried about the work Jimmy was doing. In February, Jimmy and Luther were attacked by the Double Eagles outside a drive-in. But then you know about that, don’t you?”

Morehouse gave a sideways inclination of his head, but still he said nothing.

“People thought Jimmy and Luther had been killed that night, because they vanished for so long. But they were actually hiding out at a place called Freewoods, way out in the county.” Henry started to mention the rumor he’d heard about how the Eagles lured Jimmy and Luther out of hiding, but he didn’t want to risk alienating the old man further by bringing up a gang rape. “Six weeks later—one day before Frank was killed in that accident—they returned to Natchez. They were seen cruising the parking lots of the redneck bars, and then they disappeared. Viola’s convinced that both Jimmy and Luther were kidnapped that night—a Wednesday—and murdered by the end of the week, probably out of revenge or rage over Frank’s death. She swore to me that if Jimmy had been alive after that, he’d have contacted her. I believe that.”

Morehouse looked at him, suddenly alert. “You talked to Viola?”

“I did.” Henry thought of the old nurse, somehow retaining her dignity as she lay in her sister’s house with scarcely enough flesh left on her bones to make an indentation on the mattress. “Twice, in fact.”

“You flew up to Chicago?”

This question took Henry aback. Would Morehouse have asked that question if he knew Viola had been in Natchez for the last six weeks? “I didn’t have to,” Henry replied. “Viola was right here in Natchez.”

The old man’s eyes snapped to Henry, looking more alive than they had all day. “Say
what
?”

“Viola spent the past six weeks in Natchez. Lung cancer.”

Morehouse was staring a hole through him. “Viola Turner came back to
Natchez
?”

“That’s right.” Henry paused before going on, trying to understand the surreal turn the conversation had taken.

Morehouse was staring in disbelief. “She was warned never to come back here!”

“Warned by whom, Glenn?”

“Who do you think?
Us.
If Viola ever came back, she’d be killed. That was the deal. Like a postponed death sentence. Commuted, or whatever.”

At some level, Henry realized, he hadn’t taken the force of the old death threat seriously enough. He recalled how quickly Shad Johnson had dismissed the idea of Double Eagle involvement in Viola’s death, and he felt guilty. “Considering her cancer, Viola probably didn’t much care about forty-year-old threats.”

“Then she’s lost her mind,” Morehouse said, plainly speaking in the present tense. “I’ve got cancer myself, but I ain’t
crazy
.”

Henry kept silent, afraid of saying the wrong thing. Morehouse seemed to have no idea Viola was dead. Before Henry revealed that fact, he would draw out what information he could. “
Why
was Viola threatened, Glenn? Did she know who killed her brother?”

But Morehouse seemed to have sunk into himself again.

“If she’d known who killed Jimmy,” Henry reasoned aloud, “she wouldn’t have made it out of Natchez alive. Would she?”

“She damn near didn’t,” the old man muttered. “If it hadn’t been for Ray Presley and Dr. Cage, she wouldn’t have.”

Henry raced through his mental files: Ray Presley had been a dirty cop in both Natchez and New Orleans. He had strong ties to the Marcello mob and was feared by everyone on both sides of the law. Stranger still, he’d been killed during Penn Cage’s effort to solve Natchez’s most famous civil rights murder, which had also happened in 1968.

“What did Ray Presley and Dr. Cage have to do with saving Viola?”

The old man touched a knuckle to his forehead as though to ward off some evil spirit. “Ray’s dead, Henry. Best to pass over that bastard in silence.” A strange urgency came into his eyes. “Are you going to talk to Viola again?”

Henry thought of the emaciated corpse from the video. “I don’t know. Why?”

“If you do … you tell her I’m sorry. Okay? Tell her I didn’t mean her no harm.”

Morehouse had to be thinking about the rape. “What did you do to her, Glenn?”

Seeing dread in the old man’s eyes, Henry decided to press ahead. “Did you rape her?”

Morehouse winced.

“On March twenty-seventh of sixty-eight,” Henry said, “a rumor spread that Viola had been gang-raped by the Klan. I think you guys knew Jimmy and Luther wouldn’t be able to keep hiding if they thought Viola was suffering in their place. Was that just a story, Glenn? Or did you guys really rape her?”

Morehouse struck out with one arm, as though to ward off a blow.