Tishomingo Blues

“Mr Lenahan?”

It was the CIB man, John Rau, it had to be, getting up from a table, his hand extended. Dennis walked over and they shook hands. John Rau, in his shirtsleeves but wearing a tie, his navy-blue suitcoat on the back of his chair, gave Dennis his card and asked in a pleasant voice if he'd like a cold beverage. Dennis said no thanks, feeling the grass laying him back now just enough. Good stuff.

John Rau had a Coca-Cola and a dish of mixed nuts on the table. They sat down and Dennis let him explain who he was and what he was investigating, John Rau saying it shouldn't take too long, he understood Dennis was getting ready to do a show.

Dennis was staring at John Rau 's tie, blue, with an American flag in the center of it. He said, 'It's more of a warm-up than a show. I haven't gone off the top in more than a month.' He looked at the mixed nuts now and wanted some. 'Of course anybody who'd like to watch is more than welcome.' He said, 'Do you mind?' reaching for the nuts.

'Help yourself.' John Rau gestured and looked out at Dennis' setup. 'I was telling Mr. Darwin the investigation could help your show.'

Now Dennis turned enough to look over his shoulder. Billy Darwin was still out there with the electrician.

'He seemed to agree. He sees the local people as your main audience.' He waited for Dennis to turn to the table again. 'What time was it you left here last night?'

'Going on seven.'

'Showers was still working.'

'Checking the pressure on the guy wires.'

'You trusted him to do that? Wasn't Showers a rummy?'

'He knew what he was doing,' Dennis said, looking at the American flag on John Rau 's necktie. There was something wrong with it.

'He tell you he was a confidential informant?'

'No, he didn't. He barely spoke to me.'

Dennis reached for the mixed nuts and John Rau pushed the dish closer. He looked in it to see cashews, peanuts, almonds, one pecan… Dennis came away with a fistful of nuts.

John Rau saying, 'You know about his background?'

'I know he was in prison. And from what I've heard, talking to people, Floyd was in the Dixie

Mafia and they didn't trust him.'

'Who were you talking to?' ' Charlie Hoke and our landlady.' 'They said he was in the Dixie Mafia?'

Dennis watched John Rau pick out a single nut, the pecan, and put it in his mouth. 'I guess I just assumed it.'

'What do you know about this Dixie Mafia?'

'Nothing. The first time I heard of them was in Panama City, Florida. Maybe a couple years ago.'

John Rau took a little round hazelnut. 'They're not like the organized crime families. There's a bunch right here that deals drugs. There's a bunch that hijack trucks and commit armed robberies. A bunch in prison who extort money from homosexuals on the outside. There're moonshiners, bootleggers, methamphetamine manufacturers… they're not associated with each other. The only thing they have in common, they're all violent criminals.'

'Was Floyd one of them?'

'You saw the type of person he was. Can you see him pulling any kind of rough stuff? Showers said if we'd reduce his sentence to time served he'd work for us, keep us informed.'

Dennis said, 'I wouldn't think he was that smart.'

'He wasn't. I had him down as an idiot. It turned out he wasn't even close to what was going on. He'd tell us things were already common knowledge, in the newspaper, or he'd make something up. I don't know why they shot him. Five times, as a matter of fact. The medical examiner said, `This man was harder to kill than a cockroach.' '

Dennis was staring at John Rau 's tie again. He said, 'I think there's something wrong with your flag but I don't know what it is.'

John Rau smiled. 'You count the stars?'

'I tried, they're too small.'

John Rau picked up the wide part of the tie and looked down at it. 'There are only thirty-five stars, the number of states in the Union by 1863. Even though we were now at war with the states that seceded, Lincoln would not allow the stars representing those states to be removed.'

There was something wrong with that, too.

Dennis scooped another handful of nuts, craving them, but held off stuffing them in his mouth. 'You said the states we were at war with, sounding like a Yankee.'

John Rau said, 'You know what it is? Whenever a reenactment's coming up I begin to assume the attitude of the side I'll be on. This first Tunica Muster won't be a major one, Yankees'll be in short supply. Since I can go either way, I'll wear Federal blue this time. Probably represent the Second New Jersey Mounted Infantry. They were at Brice's.'

'Brice's Cross Roads,' Dennis said.

And John Rau 's eyebrows raised. 'You're taking part?'

'No, but Charlie Hoke is, and I hear Mr. Kirkbride 's gonna be Nathan Bedford Forrest.'

John Rau was smiling again. 'Walter loves old Bedford. Yeah, it was Walter and I put this one together. I happened to mention there's terrain east of here reminds me of Brice's, full of that scrub oak they call blackjack. I'd see it driving up from Batesville. Walter) umped on it. He said, `You want to do Brice's?' I hesitated because we have the Battle of Corinth coming up in September, one we do over there. Usually we feature the assault of Battery Robinett, which most every Southerner knows about. You've heard of it?'

Dennis said, 'Battery Robinett?'

'It was a Confederate assault on a Federal gun position. One of the heroes was a colonel of the Second Texas, William Rogers, KIA, shot seven times as he stormed the redan.'

'Who won?'

'The Federals pushed them back. I reminded Walter of Corinth. Also the fact that Brice 's Cross Roads was two years after Shiloh and Corinth. Not that it matters, but I felt I should mention it. Well, then Billy Darwin heard about it. Right away he saw it as a promotion, a minor reenactment but a major annual tourist attraction. The crowd gets tired of standing in the hot sun and comes in the casinos to play the slots.'

John Rau stopped, his gaze raising, squinting as he said, 'Is that Darwin up there?'

Dennis looked around and the next moment was on his feet because it was, Billy Darwin standing on the top perch of the ladder. Dennis watched the way he was holding on with both hands looking up at the sky. 'I think he froze,' Dennis said. 'I'll have to bring him down.'

'That fella by the tank,' John Rau said, 'he's shining the spotlight on him, but you can't see it.'

'I gotta go,' Dennis said.

'Mr. Lenahan, one more question.'

Dennis stopped and looked back. 'Yeah?'

'If you were to think of Floyd Showers as an animal, what kind would he be?'

Was he serious? Dennis said, 'I don't know,' and took off across the lawn, a picture popping into his mind now, too late to tell the CIB man: some kind of roadkill out on a highway, brown fur that looked like Floyd's suitcoat.

He kept his gaze on Billy Darwin up there in shorts and a T-shirt, holding on to the ladder with one hand now, looking down, waving. Dennis reached the hotel electrician hunched over a spotlight mounted on the ground, aiming it toward Billy Darwin.

'The hell you doing?'

The electrician, bib overalls and a hunk of snuff behind his lower lip, said, 'You tell me and I'll know.'

'I told you I set the spots.'

'You the boss or him?'

'You think he's gonna place the ones up on the ladder, forty feet and at the top?'

'What do you want 'em up there for?'

'To light the pool. So I can see the goddamn water. I told him, I light the show. And I do it when it's dark, not in bright sunlight.'