Fat Tuesday(72)

Although Pat realized that he was gazing into the eyes of a monster without a conscience, the monster was grinning. Duvall's voice was cool, silky, and sinister."Careful, Pat. You don't want me to get upset, do you?"

He pushed aside Pat's hand."I know how well you like your present position with the N.O.P.D. I also know you have your heart set on a deputy superintendent's position. Therefore, I suggest that you start looking for your boy Basile immediately, and that you not stop looking until he's found, or your career prospects end here."

Pat's world revolved around his career. He'd decided early on that his aspirations were incompatible with a successful home life, so he had sacrificed having a marriage and children to living singly and devoting himself wholeheartedly to his work. With no regrets, he'd made his career the center of his life. He sure as hell didn't want to lose it.

Knowing how well connected Duvall was, he couldn't laugh off his threats. He also knew that for every threat Duvall uttered, there were a dozen more implied, and it was those unspoken warnings that worried him most."If I can find them," Pat said slowly, "and if Basile agrees to end this insane vendetta here and now, you've got to give me your word that you won't touch him."

Duvall thought about it for a moment, then reached across the desk and shook Pat's hand, as though they had struck a bargain. But he said, "No f*cking way, Pat. The bastard took my wife. He dies."

"Everything's ready," Burke said, ignoring the silent reproach of his two companions. Remy Duvall was sitting in a rusty metal lawn chair on the galerie. The exterior wall behind her was armored with ancient license plates.

Dredd was baiting a fishing pole, a cigarette anchored in the corner of his mouth. The smoke curling from it mingled with the mist rising off the surface of the swamp."If you go through with this, you're a damn fool," he mumbled as he skewered a live crawfish onto his fishhook.

"So you've told me about a thousand times." Burke motioned Remy out onto the pier and toward the small boat, which he had loaded with supplies from Dredd' wstore.

"Can't you see she's weak as a kitten?" Dredd dropped his fishing apparatus and went over to her, placing his knotty hand beneath her arm and assisting her to her feet. He guided her around the white porcelain commode that served as a planter in the summertime but which now was used as a receptacle for trash and cigarette butts. Together they made their way along the pier to the piling where the boat was tied up.

Burke got into the boat first and offered his hand up to her. He noticed that she hesitated before placing her hand in his, but she did, and gingerly stepped into the wobbly craft. Burke steadied her as she lowered herself onto the rough plank that spanned the shallow metal hull to form a crude, uncomfortable seat. She placed her hands on either side of her hips and gripped the board hard while staring into the swirling mist and the murky water beneath it.

"In a day or two, I'll come around for more supplies," Burke said as he unwound the line from the short piling.

"You're sure you won't get lost?"

"I'm sure."

"If you do "

"I won't!"

"Okay, okay." Looking down at Remy, Dredd said, "See that he takes care of you, cher'. If he doesn't, he'll have me to answer to."

"You've been very kind, Dredd. Thank you."

The softness of her voice made Burke feel like he was the fifth wheel in a very tender tableau.

Dredd said to him, "If any of her wounds open up "

"You already told me what to do," he interrupted impatiently.

The older man muttered something beneath his breath that Burke didn't catch, and he figured it was just as well that he hadn't. He'd heard it all, chapter and verse, until he could recite Dredd' wsermon by memory.

Dredd was practically a recluse. He didn't form attachments to anyone.

But he had developed a dim-witted devotion to Remy Duvall that Burke would have considered amusing if it wasn't so damned irritating.

She seemed to have an effect on every man she met, a different effect for each man, but an effect that was similar in degree.

However, not wanting to leave Dredd on bad terms, he called up to him, "Thanks for everything, Dredd."

The old man spat into the water, missing Burke by mere inches.

"Keep your hands inside the boat. It's a little early for em yet, but they'll be good and hungry in a week or two."

Burke had heard of the two old alligators that Dredd was too fond of to kill and which he in fact treated like pets. Whether it was fact or fiction created by Dredd to keep intruders away, Burke wasn't sure, but he waved acknowledgment of the warning as he shoved off.

Giving the trolling motor more gas, he angled the rudder and the craft cut through the fog. Just before rounding a bend in the bayou, he glanced back. Dredd was seated on the edge of the pier, fishing, his gray braid reposing in the groove of his spine, bare feet dangling above the water invisible in the fog, the mist swirling around his calves.

"Doesn't he get cold?" Remy Duvall was also looking back at the old man.

"His skin's too tough. Since he moved out here, that's all the clothes I've seen him in. Are you cold?"

"No."

'"Let me know. I'll get you a blanket." Swaddled as she was in some of Dredd's castoffs and draped in a vinyl poncho, he didn't see how she could be cold, but something was wrong with her. She sat as rigid as a post, gripping the board beneath her as though her life depended on it.