"What's the trouble, Felix?" the man in the suit said.

"No trouble, Mr. Earl. We want a few minutes of your time. I don't think your man here was passing on the information very well," Clete said.

"I'm Detective Dave Robicheaux of the Iberia Parish sheriff's office," I said, and opened my badge in my palm.

"I'm sorry for the late hour, but I'm in town only for today. I'd like to talk with you about Mr. Raintree."

"Mr. Raintree? Yes. Well, I'm having someone for dinner, but-" His thick brown hair was styled and grew slightly over his collar, giving him a rugged and casual look. His skin was fine-grained, his jaws cleanly shaved, and his smile was easy and good-natured. The only strange characteristic about him was his right eye, whose pupil was larger than the one in his left eye, which gave it a monocular look.

"Well, we can take a minute or two, can't we? Would you like to sit down by the pool? I'm not sure that I can help you, but I'll try."

"I appreciate your time, sir," I said, and followed him up the drive.

"Hey, Lefty, I forgot to tell you," Clete said, winking at the gateman. "When you were in the ring, I always heard they tried to match you up with cerebral-palsy victims."

We sat on canvas deck chairs by a swimming pool that was shaped in the form of a cross. The underwater lights were on, and the turquoise surface glistened with a thin sheen of suntan oil. On the flagstone patio a linen-covered table was set with candelabra and service for two. Bobby Earl walked to the side door of his house and spoke to his chauffeur, who had changed into a white butler's jacket.

Then a young blonde woman in a pink bathing suit, terrycloth robe, and high heels came out the door and began arguing with Bobby Earl. His back was to us, but I could see him raise his long, slender hands in a placating gesture.

Then she slammed the screen and went back inside.

"I told you he was a gash hound," Clete said.

"Clete, will you ease up? I mean it."

"I'm mellow, I'm extremely serene. Don't sweat it. Hey, I didn't mention something else about the gateman back there. He was a coke mule for Joey Gouza and the Giacano family. It's funny he's out here with the white man's hope."

"We'll run him later. Now stop shaking the screen on the zoo cage."

"You've got no sense of humor, Streak. The sonofabitch is scared. Watch the corner of his mouth. Now's the time to squeeze his peaches."

Bobby Earl came back to the pool, with his butler behind him. The butler set a bowl of popcorn crawfish down on a folding table between me and Clete.

"Would you gentlemen like something from the bar?" he said. His face was flat, with a small nose, close-set eyes, and a chin beard.

"Nothing for me, thanks," I said.

"How about a double Black Jack, no ice, with a 7 on the side?" Clete said.

"I'll have a vodka collins, Ralph," Bobby Earl said, sat down across from us, and folded one leg across his knee. I studied his handsome face and tried to relate it to the 1970s newspaper photograph I had seen of him in silken Klan robes when he had been imperial wizard of the Louisiana Grand Knights of the Invisible Empire.

"Does Mr. Raintree work for you?" I asked. I opened a small notebook in my hand and clicked my ballpoint pen with my thumb.

"No."

"He doesn't work for you?" I said.

"You mean Eddy?"

"Yes, Eddy Raintree."

"He did at one time. Not now. I don't know where he is now."

Then I saw what Clete had meant. The skin at the corner of his mouth wrinkled, like fingernail impressions in putty.

"When's the last time you saw him?" I asked.

"It's been a while. I tried to help him a couple of times when he was out of work. Has Eddy done something wrong? I don't understand."

"I'm investigating the murder of a police officer. I thought Eddy might be able to help us. Do you know if Eddy has ever been up the road?"

"What?"

"Has he ever done time?"

"I don't know." Then his peculiar, mismatched eyes focused on me thoughtfully, "Why do you ask me if he's been in prison? As a police officer, wouldn't you know that?"

"I didn't know his first name until you told me," I said, and smiled at him.

The butler brought the drinks from the poolside bar and served them to Clete and Bobby Earl. Earl took a deep drink from his without his eyes ever leaving my face. When he lowered his glass his mouth looked cold and red, like a girl's.

"When was the last time you talked to him?" I asked.

"It was a while back. I don't remember."

I nodded and smiled again while I wrote in my notebook.

Clete put a handful of popcorn crawfish in his mouth, drank out of his glass of 7 Up and cracked the ice between his molars.

"This is a great place," he said. "You own it?"

"I lease it."

"I hear you're going to run for the U.S. Senate," Clete said.

"Perhaps."

"Say, you ever see Jewel Fluck around?" Clete said.

"Who?"

"He's a little sawed-off guy. Hangs around with Eddy. He's in the AB."

"I'm not sure what you're saying."

"The Aryan Brotherhood," Clete said. "They're jailhouse Nazis."

"Well…" Bobby Earl began.

"You really don't know Fluck, huh?" Clete said.

"No."

"Streak would really like to talk with him and Eddy. They almost blew out his light. You get Streak mad and he'll throw elephant shit through your window fan."

Clete held up his glass for the butler to fill it again.

"I think we don't need to talk anymore," Bobby Earl said. "I'm not sure why you're here anyway. I have the feeling you'd like to provoke something."

"Here's my business card, Mr. Earl," I said. "But I'll be back in touch one way or another. How's Eddy's face?"

"What?"

"He had a lot of splinters in it the last time I saw him. Do you know why he'd want to tear up your brother-in-law's house?"

"Now, you listen-"

"He and two others executed a policeman. They blew his brains all over a basement floor at pointblank range," I said. "You'd better think up some better bullshit the next time cops come out to your house."

The blood had drained out of his cheeks. Then a strange transformation took place in his face. The skin grew taut against the bone, and there was a flat, green-yellow venomous glaze in his eyes, the kind you see only in people who have successfully worked for years to hide the propensity for cruelty that lives inside them.

"You got in here when you shouldn't have. Now you're on your way out," he said.

"That sounds serious. No J.D. refills?" Clete said.

The butler rested his hand on the back of Clete's chair.

Through the banana trees I saw the gateman walking across the lawn toward us. I stood up to go. Clete lit a cigarette and flipped the match into the swimming pool. It was deep dusk now, and the trees were swimming with fireflies.

"Don't crowd the plate," he said, his eyes looking straight ahead.

The butler looked at Bobby Earl, who nodded his head negatively and rose from his chair.

"I get it," Clete said, rising also, his grin back in place. "You're cutting us some slack. Otherwise the hired help might just stomp the shit out of us. But this ain't niggertown. And it's no time for bad press, right? I've changed my mind about you, Mr. Earl. You've got real Kool-Aid. I dig it." He blew cigarette smoke at an upward angle into the violet air and gazed approvingly about the grounds. "What a place. I've been in the wrong line of work."

Then the butler fitted his hand around Clete's biceps to point him toward the driveway.

Clete pivoted and lifted his huge fist into the butler's stomach. It was a deep, unexpected blow, in the soft place right under the sternum, and the butler's face went white with shock. His mouth gasped, and his eyes locked open as big as half dollars.