The cop eyes clicked my way. 'You wanna push for the prize, podnuh?'
I said, 'How'd a guy like Jimmie Ray Rebenack get you so scared?'
The big sheriff looked at me, and a single tic started beneath his left eye. The blocky hands flexed, and Edith Boudreaux touched her husband's arm, and it was suddenly still in the little room. Outside, the doorbell tinkled, and I wondered if it was Lucy leaving. Edith said, 'Joel?'
Boudreaux went to the curtained door and pulled the curtain aside and held it for me. 'You'd better leave now, podnuh. That'd be best for you. That'd be best for everyone.'
I wished Edith a good day and then I walked out past the blond clerk. She smiled brightly and told me to have a good day. I told her I'd try. When I got to the door I looked back, but the curtain was drawn again and Joel Boudreaux and his wife were still in the stockroom. I thought I heard a woman crying, but I could have imagined it.
It was supposed to be a simple case, but cases, like life, are rarely what they seem. I walked out of Edie's Fashion Boutique wondering at the pain I'd seen in their eyes.
CHAPTER 10
L ucy was waiting on the sidewalk, her arms crossed and her face set. A couple of teenagers were behind her, looking at the sheriff's shotgun through the driver's side window of his highway car, the older of the two sneaking glances at Lucy's rear end. He cut it out when he saw me approach. Lucy said, 'I've been doing this for almost eight years and I've never had a reaction even close to that. Something's wrong.' 'They're scared. Him, maybe more than her.' As we walked back to our cars, I told her about Jim-mie Ray Rebenack and the two goons who'd come to his office. 'I followed them to a place called Rossier's Crawfish Farm. Boudreaux was there, and some older guy with a Panama hat who was probably Milt Rossier. Boudreaux didn't look thrilled to be there, but he and Rebenack are connected.'
'Do you think that Rebenack has seen these people about Jodi Taylor?'
'Looks that way.'
'Maybe he's working for them, just like we're working for Jodi.'
'Maybe.'
When we reached the cars, Lucy leaned against her Lexus and shook her head. 'I don't believe it, but even if he were, so what? All we're talking about is a child who was given away for adoption. It's a simple matter to unseal the files and confirm the biological link. It's done all the time.'
I looked at her. 'Maybe the problem is coming from an altogether different place.'
She squinted at Edith Boudreaux's dress shop, thinking about it. Frustrated. 'Well, it can't just end here. They say no, thanks, so that's the end of it. Jodi still has a right to find out about herself, and I'm still going to help her do that.'
'All right.'
Jo-el Boudreaux came out of his wife's store, got into his highway car, and roared away. He didn't look at us, but perhaps he didn't know that we were across the square. I said, 'Does Sonnier, Melancon practice criminal law?'
'Yes.'
'Have someone run a check on Rebenack and also on that guy LeRoy Bennett. I don't know Renes last name, but he might be listed as a known associate if Bennett has a sheet. And run the paper on Milt Rossier, too.' I thought about it. 'And Edith Johnson.'
Lucy said, 'I guess you're serious.'
'While you're doing that, I'll look up Jimmie Ray again.'
She crossed her arms at me. 'What does that mean?'
'We were interrupted last time, and Jimmie didn't have a chance to answer my questions. Maybe I'll go see him again and see if he's more forthcoming.'
She held up a hand. 'If you do anything illegal I don't want to know about it.'
I grinned. 'You won't.'
Lucy made a big deal out of sighing, then got into her car and drove away.
The trip from Eunice to Jimmie Ray's office in Ville Platte took thirty-six minutes, but when I got there Jimmie Ray's Mustang was not in evidence and neither was Jimmie Ray. I double-parked behind the fish market and ran up to see, but the office was empty. I could have rifled his files again, but I didn't expect that there would be anything different in them from yesterday.
I drove to Jimmie Ray's duplex, circled the block, then eased to a stop. No Mustang here, either.
Jimmie's duplex was a shotgun with two doors coming off a common porch and the whole thing sandwiched on a long, narrow lot that was overgrown and kind of crummy beneath a dense oak canopy. I went to Jimmie Ray's door and pressed the bell. I pressed the bell again and knocked loudly, and again no one answered. No sounds came from the adjoining apartment. I went around the side of Jimmie Ray Rebenack's house as if I had been doing it every day for the past ten years and let myself in through his kitchen door. I called, 'Hey, Jimmie, what's going on, man?'
Silence. Just think of all the fun Lucy Chenier was missing. And I couldn't even tell her about it.
Jimmie Ray's home smelled of fried food and dust. The kitchen was small. There were dishes piled in the sink and on the tile counter, and the grout between the tiles looked like it hadn't been scrubbed since 1947. A Formica dinette set with mismatched chairs filled the dining area, and a monstrously large overstuffed couch took up most of the living room. The couch was upholstered in a kind of black and white cowhide fabric, and there was a single matching chair and a square glass coffee table. The couch and the chair and the coffee table were too big for the room and ended up jammed together. A Sony home entertainment unit was stacked in the corner, and there wasn't enough room for that, either. Everything except the Sony looked low-end and cheesy, as if the local discount store had run a clearance sale: COMPLETE BACHELOR PAD – ON SALE NOW.!! 'Taste,' I said. 'You can't develop it; you have to be born with it.'
There were two rooms on the second floor, along with a bath and a linen closet. Jimmie Ray Rebenack was using the front room for his bedroom and the back room for a study. I went into the back room first. Two cardboard cartons sat against one wall, and a flimsy red card table with a single folding chair stood in the center of the room. A poster of the Bud Light models was pinned to the wall along with a couple of posters of bikinied women dressed up like commandos and holding machine guns. Ah, the bachelor life. One of the cardboard cartons held old copies of
There were Visa card bills going back eight months, and receipts for his office rent and the rent he paid on the duplex. The Visa charges were incidental. Most of the paperwork in the box had to do with buying the Mustang. He had purchased it used for $29,000 three months ago from an outfit called High Performance Motors in Alexandria, Louisiana. It had 8200 miles on the odometer at the time of purchase, and he had made the purchase for cash with a check drawn on his personal account. Three months ago, exactly two days before he bought the Mustang, he deposited $30,000 into his checking. Prior to that he held a balance of $416.12. Makes you wonder, doesn't it? Further on in the box there was warranty information and auto insurance papers and phone and utility bills. I didn't bother with the utilities. The phone bills went back five months, and during that time he had made seven phone calls to Los Angeles, California, at two different numbers. Two of the calls were lengthy.
I went out past the bathroom and into the front room and looked out at the street. Still clear. The front bedroom was as well appointed as the rest of the place, with an unmade oversized futon against the wall opposite a yard-sale dresser and a couple of lamps. Two thin pillows had been used as a backrest at the head of the futon, and a black sheet and a quilted spread were kicked to the side. The black sheet highlighted the hair and the lint and the crud in the bed nicely. That Jimmie Ray.
