Jeff Abbott - Black Joint Point

‘Did you approve of them dating?’ he asked.

‘Usually it’s the other way around,’ Dat said, his voice tense. ‘The Anglo disapproves of the Vietnamese.’

‘I’m not asking from a racial standpoint,’ Whit said. ‘I’m just asking what you thought of them seeing each other.’

Dat flicked his cigarette into the harbor. It fizzed for a moment, was gone. ‘Patch was a nice man. But not a serious man. Everything a joke, everything a party. My mother was a teacher, very serious about life. She took his interest seriously. I expected her to be hurt by him.’ He lit another cigarette, his hands shaking. ‘You’re dating his niece, right? So I heard.’

‘Yes.’

‘Maybe Patch’s family didn’t like him dating a Vietnamese.’

‘They’ve said nothing but fond and respectful words about your mother.’

Dat glared at him through the veil of smoke. ‘Of course. She’s dead now. Being nice costs nothing.’ He stared out for a moment over the flat of the harbor. ‘That investigator, Mr Power, he said maybe it was a racial killing.’

Whit chewed his lip. Of course David would like the racial angle. He was politically minded, hungry for the sheriff’s office, and solving a racially motivated crime would stick him firmly on the white steed of morals and justice. But there was no reason yet to think that race played a role, and he felt annoyed with David, perhaps needlessly putting the Trans through this subtle mental torture. Their mother dead was horrible enough. Their mother dead simply because of the color of her skin and the shape of her eyes seemed far worse.

‘I don’t believe they were killed because they were dating.’

‘I can. Why not? Most people are blind-stupid. No other reason yet. You give us another reason and I’ll listen to it.’ His faith in humanity seemed badly shaken, another by-product of violent death.

‘Did your mom ever mention Patch needing money, Dat?’ Whit asked. ‘A large amount of money, raised quietly?’

Dat looked surprised. ‘No. Never. My mother was a very discreet woman, Judge. If Patch needed money and told her, she never would have betrayed his confidence. Was he in some sort of trouble?’

‘I don’t know. Perhaps.’

‘He wasn’t good enough for her.’ Dat’s voice trailed off and for an instant the mask of polite calm fell and Whit saw the man’s grief, naked and cruel in its intensity. ‘Sorry. I know you like the Gilberts. But that family. Their charms escape me. My mother made a poor choice.’

There was nothing to say to that, but Whit tried. ‘We’re all so sorry for your loss. I know Lucy and Suzanne grieve for your mother, too.’

Dat thumbed his second cigarette into the water. ‘That’s just so enormously comforting to me.’ He stared at Whit. ‘Why does a woman nearly seventy need to date, huh? Why couldn’t she just stay home and watch TV like other old ladies?’

‘I suppose, having survived so much hardship,’ Whit said carefully, ‘She valued life. Each day of it.’

‘Yeah, well, look where that got her. People said we were lucky to have survived the fall of Saigon, survived the boats, gotten to Texas. Lucky. Lucky. That’s us.’ He turned away from Whit, heading back to the restaurant, his luck all gone.

‘This is the plan,’ Whit said. ‘Can you go to New Orleans, find this Alex that Jimmy Bird was calling?’

‘I can leave tonight. Be back tomorrow or the next day,’ Gooch said. He and Whit stood in the shade of the courthouse, Whit waiting for David to come out so they could go to Corpus Christi.

‘I tried the number,’ Whit said. ‘It’s a motel. Bayou Mee. I also gave the number to the sheriff’s office. Hollis or David will probably call the motel but they’re not going to send someone to check it out.’

‘Ooh, let me,’ Gooch said. He stretched, popped his knuckles. ‘It’s been a boring summer.’

‘Because David is targeting Lucy, and I want to find out where Jimmy Bird is. He’s a disgruntled employee of Patch’s.’

‘So this is actually more about protecting Lucy than about justice.’

‘Don’t go if you don’t want,’ Whit said.

‘No need to snap,’ Gooch said.

‘Sorry, Gooch. Be careful.’

‘I almost hope Jimmy Boy’s hiding out there,’ Gooch said. ‘The flip side of hiding is that someone might find you and keep you where you’re at.’

‘You don’t hurt him, Gooch.’

‘I can’t arrest him. Can’t bring him home. I just dispense justice as I see fit?’

That was a scary thought. ‘No. You make another anonymous tip,’ Whit said. ‘No vigilante shit, Gooch.’

‘How’m I ever supposed to have interesting memoirs someday, you keep cramping my style?’

Gooch turned and left and a moment later David emerged from the courthouse. He straightened his Stetson, watched Gooch’s retreating back.

‘Your friend always looks guilty of something,’ David said.

‘So do you,’ Whit said. They walked along the grass of the courthouse yard. Two news vans, from Corpus Christi affiliates, sat like squat little vultures on the opposite side of the square. Whit hardly gave them a glance, grateful that his ever-casual attire made him look more like a latecomer paying an overdue fine than the county’s JP/coroner. David slowed, as though wanting to stop and linger and talk to them. Already baking in the heat were two competing journalists, electrifying their audiences with overwrought prose: Port Leo remains rocked by the brutal double homicide… A tragic end for elderly lovers… leaves unanswered questions. Horror neatly filed into worn phrases to boost ratings. Those reporters had never heard Patch’s booming laugh, watched Thuy’s delicate hands move while she told a story, smelled the soft jasmine of her perfume.

‘Big story,’ David said as he started the engine. ‘What we do is going to be watched. Carefully.’

‘You should bone up on your preening,’ Whit said.

‘You might want to get a white shirt and tie,’ David said. He pulled the car past the reporters, giving them a friendly little wave. Whit saw him wince as he powered up the window, favoring the shoulder that had been shot months ago, as he always did. Whit wondered if the shoulder still troubled him or if David used it as a merit badge.

‘You’re not going to ask me about how my questioning of your girlfriend went?’ David asked as they headed out of Port Leo, along Highway 35.

‘No,’ Whit said. ‘I’m not worried.’

‘Did you know she inherits the whole shebang?’ David changed lanes, whipped around a slow-moving pickup. He said it as easily as asking if Whit wanted the radio on.

Whit was silent a moment too long.

‘All of Patch’s money, land, all of it. He cut out his other niece. I just talked with his attorney in Corpus. Patch made the changes less than a month ago.’

‘I don’t think Lucy knows. She told me they’d each get half.’

‘So she said. She looked like she pissed her pants when I told her,’ David said. ‘Man, I love driving. Even in this traffic. Wish I had a BMW, something sweet to point down the road. Lucy can afford one now. That estate, with the land, it’s gonna be many pretty pennies.’ He glanced over at Whit. ‘Maybe she can spring for that shirt and tie, Your Honor.’

‘All right, here’s the skinny on your bones.’ Dr Parker sat across from David and Whit in a borrowed office at the morgue, where the forensic anthropology team had set up temporary shop. ‘When I’m looking at bones I can only tell you so much. I don’t have a way, from visual inspection, to tell you this man died in 1800 or 1900 or what have you unless maybe it was in the past three years. And these boys been dead way longer than three years. You want more specific, you call UT and get in the long line for carbon-14 dating, but that’s real expensive and you don’t need it.’