different.”
“If Casey had just left this alone, we wouldn’t have your second front to deal with, but there it is,” Dr. LePointe said. “If she had just left this alone. No second front.” Dr. LePointe had the annoying habit of repeating himself, perhaps just to hear the sound of his own voice, but maybe because he doubted an ex-cop could keep his mind wrapped around the facts LePointe thought worth remembering. “You’re a miracle worker and I need a miracle right about now.”
“I won’t let you down, Dr. LePointe,” Decell promised. “You can count on that.”
“I believe it’s time to let the authorities know about this letter.” LePointe lifted an envelope and then tossed it onto the desk in front of Decell, who removed the letter and read it slowly.
Refolding it, Decell said, “It’s probably better to let Manseur and Keen chase their tails for a few hours, until I can put things in order.”
“Inarguably you are expert at what you do, Decell. Cop-think works well enough situation-by-situation as in working with individual criminal cases. But this game is far bigger than the simple elements you’re concerned with. Dealing with complex situations and looking far into the future is something I have to do with accuracy every day. I intend to hold on to what my ancestors built brick-by-brick over three hundred years of hard work, learning from mistakes, and strategic planning. Naturally they suffered the occasional setback, but without receiving a lethal blow. That’s not going to change on my watch. During my tenure, the worth of the family’s assets has increased dramatically, and not merely due, as some might claim, to the economy’s performance.
“What I do,” LePointe said, opening his hands expansively, “is like playing several chess games at once. It’s a blessing that you don’t have to think on the level I do, Ken.” LePointe spoke in the manner of a patient parent explaining something to his child. “Failure is not an option, whatever the cost. Do we understand each other here?”
Decell stared across the desk at LePointe, knowing the man was just starting his Mr. Superior song and dance. Decell was accustomed to having to sit and be lectured to while trying to seem impressed, interested, and in agreement.
“Naturally, you are the only person I trust to handle this, Ken. And for doing so in a satisfactory manner, you will be rewarded most handsomely.”
“You’ve always been more than generous, Dr. LePointe.”
LePointe took a slip of paper from his desk, for a long ten seconds seemed to be considering what he was going to write down, then scribbled a figure on the paper before pushing it across the desktop.
Decell made a show of leaning forward to read the figure and prepared himself to act astounded by LePointe’s beneficence. LePointe had always paid him well, which considering the mundane nature and low effort level that most of LePointe’s requests required was indeed generous. But the figure Decell saw written there stunned him, because it represented the kind of money you’d expect to pay to have a senator killed.
“Is the amount adequate to ensure that this problem is going to be solved to my satisfaction?”
“I guarantee it.”
“That figure will be paid to you upon completion. Wherever and however you choose.”
Decell nodded, and realized he was holding his breath.
LePointe snatched the paper and put it into his desk drawer, stood up, and walked Decell all the way to the front door, which was unusual and-although Decell seriously doubted it was more than a ploy to make him feel appreciated-seemed to signify a change in Decell’s status from servant to trusted associate. It wasn’t the first time, but it was rare. LePointe didn’t want to know details, and Decell wouldn’t spell out the particulars of his mission.
If violent means were required, such measures would be forthcoming, with animal swiftness and absolute certainty. When it came to conducting the symphony of ending threats to his clients, Decell was willing, if not eager, to get his hands dirty.
For what LePointe was paying, ex-detective Kenneth Decell would have dressed up in the vestments of a cardinal, pulled a hammer from underneath his robe, and beat the Pope to death as he addressed the faithful gathered below the papal balcony.
34
Deep in thought, Alexa stared out the passenger window. She was thinking about how things appeared, and wondering how those things might be connected to Gary West’s vanishing. As director of psychiatry, LePointe had been in the perfect position to influence what treatment Sibby received, how that treatment was applied, and probably who administered it. Although it was hard to imagine him doing so, it certainly appeared that he could have been torturing Sibby for years. Unless something untoward had been going on, why would Decell, most likely acting on LePointe’s behalf, have offered Veronica a reward for warning him if anybody came asking after Sibby, LePointe, or this Nurse Fugate. How Fugate fit in with LePointe and Danielson was a mystery Alexa needed to solve. That anybody could imagine they could make a notorious inmate vanish without someone discovering it and reporting it was a mystery worthy of New Orleans.
“Didn’t Sibby have a family?” Alexa asked Manseur.
“Her family was so scandalized that she’d killed the LePointes that they left New Orleans shortly after the killings. I believe her father was some kind of big dog with the Whitney Bank and they lived Uptown in a nice house on Napoleon. Her mother killed herself, I heard. I went to school with her brother at St. Barts. He was a squirrelly little kid who dressed in starched shirts and pressed slacks and had his belt so tight that he looked like he was wearing a lace-up corset from one of those Storyville portraits. He was redheaded and pretty as a girl and held his hand up so it sort of flopped off his wrist, so we all thought he was a little light in the loafers. His name was something odd like Cyrus, or Cecil, which didn’t help.” Manseur shook his head slowly, remembering. “He had a hard time before his sister chopped up the LePointes. I think there was another brother, who was sort of nutty and mean as a snake if you pissed him off, but it’s fuzzy. Not like I hung with him or anything. He didn’t fit in and I didn’t care. Hell, I didn’t fit in either, but I didn’t fit in with a better crowd. So, how do we talk to this nurse without setting off dynamite? I don’t imagine Dr. LePointe is going to sit still when she calls Decell, or him, and you know damn well she will.”
“I won’t know until we talk to her. We’ll just tell her we’re following up on our visit to the hospital, and since she knew Sibby Danielson, we’re wondering what she can tell us about her.”
“Sounds lame,” Manseur said.
“That’s only because it is. I’ll know when I see her and can watch her reactions to our presence and questions. We don’t have to tell her why we’re asking questions. We only need to know where Sibby is and that she isn’t connected to West’s disappearance. Maybe Gary found out about Sibby’s vanishing act. Somebody out at the hospital might have ratted LePointe out to Gary because there was no love lost between them. That could be a connection. Decell could see any threat against LePointe as marching orders.”
“If that’s the case, Dr. LePointe may not even be aware of it. Maybe Decell just does what he thinks needs doing. Maybe he spirited Sibby out and LePointe doesn’t even know it. Decell is capable of who knows what. He could do whatever he thinks is in his employer’s best interest.”
“A spin doctor who carries a gun instead of a pen,” Alexa said. “His relationship with LePointe might go back to Sibby’s murders. And she cut him pretty good. I suppose LePointe may be unaware of Decell’s work on his behalf, but I doubt it.”
Manseur said, “Makes perfect sense to me.”
“In that New Orleans sort of way?”
Alexa was not sure how to take the fact that Manseur hadn’t seemed outraged or even particularly surprised by the LePointe/River Run bombshell. Alexa wondered, if she hadn’t taken him to the hospital, would he have even gone, or just called the director and been told Sibby was there and let it go at that. And it seemed to her that Manseur considered This is New Orleans a phrase that explained anything that was out of line, bordering on illegal behavior in the same way that After all, this is Mars might.
Maybe he was burned-out by the grinding down the job did to a man, the terrible pay, the complex political minefield, the embedded corruption of the city, the endless line of corpses, the guilty being set free in astounding
