The Midnight House

going home. And that was it. He left the Pearl and turned to smoke.”

“So, you called the cops?”

“They said Jerry was a grown man and that if he didn’t turn up in a couple of days I could file a missing- persons report. Which I did, soon as I was allowed. The detectives talked to the bartender down there for about five minutes and then forgot it. I begged The Times-Picayune to write something, and after a month they finally did, some little thing that didn’t even have his picture.”

“Too bad he wasn’t an eighteen-year-old girl.”

“You mean a white girl. With blond hair and a big smile. CNN would have been all over it then. But I don’t think it matters, Mr. Wells. I think he died that night.”

“Why?”

“My husband, you know how big he was. I don’t think anybody would take a chance keeping him alive. Too easy for him to mess you up.”

Wells couldn’t disagree.

“Something else, too,” she said. “I think he knew whoever did this. I don’t think it was Al Qaeda or any of them rats.”

“Why?”

“Nobody would go at him straight up, see? Look at the man. And Jerry wouldn’t just be getting in a car. Come on, even little kids know better. So, no, it had to be somebody he knew, make him drop his guard.”

“The others, they were shot with a silencer,” Wells said, thinking out loud. “Somebody could have done it on the street and then taken his body. Not a lot of lights out there.”

“They were killed all different ways, though. The woman, the doctor, somebody snuck into her house, made it look like a suicide,” Noemie said. “Somebody been creeping.”

“Last question.”

“You already got your last question.”

“I promise. I don’t want to upset you again, but—” Wells hesitated. She nodded to him. “Is there any chance that Jerry’s the one behind this? That he’s faked his own death. You said he was upset—”

“I said he was in a mood. Come on, Mr. Wells. You knew my husband. You cannot be serious. He was angry that he didn’t get a promotion, angry that they made him retire. He wasn’t a killer.”

You’re wrong, Wells didn’t say. He was a soldier. A Ranger. He was nothing more or less than a trained, professional killer.

Just like me.

“And now I have to put this boy in his bed,” Noemie said. She picked up Jeffrey, put him over her shoulder. His eyes blinked open, and he looked suspiciously at Wells.

“Thank you, Noemie. If I have more questions, can I call you?”

“Uh-huh. And if you check out the Pearl, keep your back to the wall. They don’t like white people much in there.”

“I don’t blame them.”

THE PEARL WAS CHEAP and flashy, Hennessy posters on the walls, faded red vinyl booths, and a half- dozen Mercedes hood ornaments hanging from the ceiling. Wells didn’t get any smiles when he walked in. Not from the bartender, a tall, skinny man with a Saints cap pulled low on his forehead. Not from the three boys in the corner booth who wore identical gold studs. Not from the two old heads deep in conversation at the bar. And not from the woman in the silver bikini dancing listlessly on the back counter to the heavy slow sounds of rap that sounded like it was being played at half speed.

Whatever had happened in Poland had upset Jerry Williams more than a bit, Wells thought. The Pearl wasn’t a place Jerry would have favored when Wells knew him. Wells debated staying, forcing the issue, maybe taking a seat with the boys in the booth. But what was he trying to prove? He would come back tomorrow and get the same stiff non-answers about Jerry Williams as the New Orleans cops.

“You lost?”the bartender said.

Wells shook his head. “Thanks.”

“Thanks for what?” the bartender said. Then, under his breath, “Dummy.”

Wells knew he ought to walk away. But after Cairo, he was in no mood to get pushed around. “I’ll take a Bud,” he said.

“We’re all out.”

“Miller.”

“Out of that, too.”

“Then a gin and tonic. Tanqueray.” A half-full bottle of Tanqueray sat on the back counter directly across from Wells.

The bartender turned down the music. “You dumb or just playing that way?”

“There’s no call for this.”

“Go back to the Quarter where you belong.” He took two steps toward Wells, his hands loose at his sides.

Wells turned toward the door, as if he were leaving. Then he spun back and with his right hand grabbed the bartender’s skinny left arm and pulled him down onto the scarred wood of the bar and knocked off his glasses. Wells stepped forward and with his left hand reached down the bartender’s back for the pistol that he knew would be tucked into the man’s jeans. He grabbed the pistol, a Beretta knockoff that fit snugly in his hand. Still holding the bartender down, he turned to cover the room. The action had taken less than three seconds, and the kids in the corner hadn’t moved. Yet.

“You are either a cop or a damn fool,” the bartender mumbled. “And I know you ain’t no cop.”

Wells let go of the bartender’s arm, stepped back from the bar. “Slowly. Put your hands on top of your heads. All of you.”

They complied. Wells knew he didn’t have long. Soon enough, one of the bangers would do something stupid, and then he’d have blood on his hands for this stunt.

“Quicker you answer my questions, the quicker I’m gone. I’m trying to find a friend of mine. He came in here for a beer a couple months back. Been missing ever since. Named Jerry Williams. Big guy. Ring any bells?”

“That what you hassling me for? I told the cops, I don’t know nothing about it,” said the bartender.

“Jerry and I were Rangers together. Now he’s missing. This is the last place anybody saw him. Do me a favor, answer my questions, I get out of here.”

Unwillingly: “Ask what you gotta ask.”

Wells tucked the pistol into his jeans. “Ever see anybody with Jerry?”

“Not hardly. He drank quiet. Put a twenty on the bar, nod when he wanted a hit. He put out two twenties, then I knew he needed some relaxation. Once or twice, late night, we got to talking; he told me he was a vet. Said nobody understood what it was like over there, you had to be there. Nothing more.”

“He ever say anything about disappearing, getting out of New Orleans?”

“Not to me.”

“He seem nervous ever? Like somebody was after him?”

The bartender shook his head.

“Ever talk about his wife?”

“Men don’t come in here to talk about their wives.”

“And you’re sure nobody ever struck up a conversation with him?”

The bartender hesitated. “There was a guy, came in once or twice around that time Jerry was here. Never saw him since. It struck me, ’cause he was white.”

“Could you recognize him?”

“I reckon not. Like I said, he was here twice at most. I think he was tall.”

The kids in the corner booth were grumbling at one another, waggling their heads. Time to go. “You have a nice night,” Wells said.

“Gimme back my gun.” Wells backed away. “Come on, man. I answered what you asked.”

“It’ll be in the river. Hope you can swim.”