birds’ eggs and alligators’ feet. On the back wall was a garish painting of Marie Laveau, the voodoo queen of New Orleans.
“You know anything about Bix Golightly getting capped, Jimmy?” I said.
“There’s not a lot of mourning going on about that,” he replied. He was drinking a bottle of soda behind the counter, next to a beautiful antique brass cash register, his face florid, his hair as white as meringue, his stomach draped over his belt. “Remember that Louis Prima song, how’s it go, ‘I’ll be standing on the corner plastered when they bring your body by’?”
“Any rumors about why he got capped?”
“He was in the AB. The AB is for life. Maybe he made the wrong guys mad about something.”
“Waylon Grimes got popped the same night, probably by the same hitter. Grimes wasn’t in the AB.”
“The word was Bix was into a new racket, something that was more uptown. Also that he was out of his depth, that him and Frankie Giacano and Waylon Grimes decided they were gonna get even with Clete Purcel and make a few bucks at the same time. You talk to Purcel?”
“Clete didn’t do it, Jimmy.”
“Who filled up a guy’s convertible with concrete? Or packed a cue ball into a guy’s mouth? Or dragged a guy’s mobile home onto a drawbridge and set it on fire? Let me think.”
“Have you heard of a new button man in town, somebody named Caruso?”
“There’s always new talent floating around. You read vampire books? I just bought a shitload of them. Vampire lit is in, muff-diver lit is out. I’m ahead of the curve.”
“Where’s the new talent from?” I asked.
“Someplace that begins with M. Miami or Memphis. Maybe Minneapolis. I don’t remember. This is stuff I don’t need to know about.”
I looked toward the back of the store. The Count was sweeping a cloud of dust through the door into a courtyard that was green and dark with mold and cluttered with junk.
“He’s on his meds and doing good. Leave him alone, Dave,” Jimmy said.
“The Count is what is called an autistic savant, Jimmy. Everything he hears and sees goes onto a computer chip.”
“Yeah, I know all that, and I don’t like people giving him names like ‘autistic savant.’ He did too many drugs, but that don’t mean he’s retarded.”
“You want to ask him, or do you want me to?” I said.
Jimmy poured the rest of his soda into a sink and put a matchstick in his mouth. “Hey, Count, you hear anything about a new mechanic in town?” he said.
The Count stopped sweeping and stared downward at his broom. Rain was swirling inside the courtyard, blowing in a fine mist across his cape and small pale hands. He lifted his eyes to mine, puzzled about either the question or my identity.
“It’s Dave Robicheaux, Count,” I said. “I need your help. I’m looking for a hitter by the name of Caruso.”
“Caruso? Yes. I know that name,” said the Count. He smiled.
“In New Orleans?”
“I think so.”
“Where?” I asked.
The Count shook his head.
“Who’s he work for?” I asked.
He didn’t speak and instead continued to look into my face, his irises tinged with the colors you expect to see only in a hawk’s eyes.
“How about the name Caruso? Is that an alias?” I said.
“It means something.”
I waited for him to go on, but he didn’t. “It means what?” I asked.
“Like the opera singer.”
“I know who the opera singer is. But why is this guy called by that name?”
“When Caruso sings, everybody in the theater gets quiet. When he leaves, they stay in their seats.”
“Where do you think I might find him? This is real important, Count.”
“They say he finds you. I heard what you said about me. I’m the way I am because I’m smart. People say things in front of me that they won’t say in front of anyone else. They don’t know I’m smart. That’s why they make fun of me and call me names.”
He swept a cloud of dust out into the rain, then followed it into the courtyard and shut the door behind him.
I deserved his rebuke.
T HE HOUR WAS three P.M., and I had time to make another stop before returning to New Iberia, which was only a two-hour drive if you went through Morgan City. The old office of Didi Giacano, the one where he kept an aquarium full of piranha, was on South Rampart, outside the Quarter, just across Canal. The building was two stories and constructed of soft, variegated brick and had an iron balcony and a colonnade, but one of the side walls had been scorched by fire and the building had a singed, used look that the potted bougainvillea and caladium and philodendron on the balcony did little to dispel.
The inside of the office had been completely redone. The beige carpet was two inches thick, the off-white plastered walls hung with paintings of Mediterranean villages and steel-framed aerial color photos of offshore oil platforms, one of them flaring against a night sky. The receptionist told me that Pierre Dupree was at his home in Jeanerette but that his grandfather was in his office and perhaps could help me.
“Actually, I was interested in a safe that used to be here,” I said. “I collect all kinds of historical memorabilia. It was a huge box of a thing right over there in the corner.”
“I know the one you mean. It’s not here anymore. Mr. Pierre took it out when we installed the new carpets.”
“Where is it?” I asked.
She was an attractive blond woman in her early twenties, with an earnest face and eyes that seemed full of goodwill. Her forehead wrinkled. “I’m sorry, I don’t remember. I think some movers took it out.”
“How long ago was that?”
“About five or six months ago, I think. Did you want to buy it?”
“I doubt that I could afford it. I just wanted to look at it.”
“What’s your name again?”
“Dave Robicheaux, with the Iberia Parish Sheriff’s Department.”
“I’ll tell Mr. Alexis you’re here. That’s Mr. Pierre’s grandfather. I’ll bet he can tell you all about the safe.”
Before I could stop her, she went into the back of the building and returned with a man I had seen once or twice in New Iberia or Jeanerette. For his age, he was remarkable in his posture and his bearing. He was even more remarkable for the story associated with his name. I couldn’t remember the specific details, but people who knew him said he had been a member of the French Resistance during World War II and had been sent to an extermination camp in Germany. I couldn’t recall the name of the camp or the circumstances that had spared his life. Was it Ravensbruck? He was dressed in slacks and a long-sleeve white shirt rolled to the elbows. When he shook my hand, the bones in his fingers felt hollow, like a bird’s. A chain of numbers was tattooed in faded blue ink on the underside of his left forearm. “You were asking about an old safe?” he said.
“I collect old things. Antiques and Civil War artifacts and that sort of thing,” I replied.
“There was a safe here that came with the building, but it was taken out a long time ago, I think.”
His face was narrow, his eyes as gray as lead, his hair still black, with a few strands of white. There was a pronounced dimple in his chin. On his left cheek were two welted scars. “Would you like coffee or perhaps a drink?”
“No, thank you. I didn’t mean to disturb you. Do you know a fellow by the name of Frankie Giacano or his friend Bix Golightly?”
“Those names aren’t familiar. Are they antique dealers?” He was smiling when he spoke, the way an older man might when he’s showing tolerance of his listener.
“No, they’re bad guys, Mr. Dupree. Pardon me, the use of the present tense isn’t quite accurate. Frankie Giacano is still around, but somebody over in Algiers parked three rounds from a semi-auto in Bix Golightly’s
