The ring of a telephone on the hall table shattered the silence.
Maurice looked toward it, startled. As it continued to ring he made his way toward it, one veined and knotted hand plucking the handset from its cradle.
"Yes?" he said.
"Maurice?" It was Pendergast's voice. There was a faint but steady background noise, a thrumming like the rush of wind.
"Yes?" Maurice said again.
"I wanted to let you know that we won't be home this evening, after all. You may secure the deadbolt on the kitchen door."
"Very good, sir."
"You can expect us sometime tomorrow evening. If we are delayed further, I'll let you know."
"I understand." Maurice paused a moment. "Where are you going, sir?"
"Malfourche. A tiny town on Black Brake swamp."
"Very good, sir. Have a safe trip."
"Thank you, Maurice. We'll see you tomorrow."
The line went dead, and Maurice replaced the receiver. He paused a moment, staring at it, thinking. Then he picked it up again and dialed.
The phone rang several times before a man's voice answered.
"Hello?" Maurice said. "Mr. Judson, sir?"
The voice on the other end answered in the affirmative.
"This is Maurice at Penumbra Plantation. I'm fine, thank you. Yes. Yes, I just heard from him. They're heading to Black Brake swamp. A town called Malfourche. Given your concern for him, I thought you'd want to know. No, he didn't say why. Yes. Very well, sir. You're welcome. Good night."
He hung up the phone again, then walked to the back of the house and secured the kitchen door as ordered. After a final look around, he returned to the main hallway and climbed the stairs to the second floor. There were no further interruptions.
62
Malfourche, Mississippi
MIKE VENTURA PULLED UP TO THE ROTTING docks outside Tiny's Bait 'n' Bar. It was a crooked, ramshackle wooden building perched on pilings, and Ventura could hear the sounds of country music, whoops, and raucous laughter drifting across the water.
He brought his shallow-draft bass boat into one of the few empty slips, cut the engine, hopped out, and tied up. It was midnight and Tiny's was rocking, the docks packed with boats, from loaded BassCats to crappy plywood skiffs. Malfourche, he thought, might be a hard-luck town, but they still knew what a good time was. He licked his lips, thinking that a frosty one and a shot of JD would be the first order of business--before the real business began.
Pushing through the doors, he was assaulted by the sounds and smells of Tiny's: the loud music, the beer, neon, sawdust, humidity, and the scent of the swamp lapping on the pilings below. The bait shop on the left and the bar on the right were all part of the same barn-like space. Given the late hour, the lights were off in the bait-shop area, where large refrigerators and tubs contained the assortment of the live bait that Tiny's was so famous for: nightcrawlers, crawfish, leeches, waxworms, Georgia jumpers, spawn, and mousees.
Ventura bellied up to the bar and right away Tiny himself, the bartender and proprietor--an immense, jiggling, adipose mountain of a man--smacked down a can of Coors, ice chips adhering to its sides, followed immediately by a double shot of JD.
Ventura nodded his thanks and raised the Jack Daniel's, downed it, and chased it with a pull of Coors.
Damn if that wasn't just what the doctor ordered. He'd been in the swamp too long. As he drank his beer, he looked around the old joint with a welling feeling of affection. It was one of the last places where you didn't have to look at jigaboos or faggots or Yankees. It was all white and nobody had to say anything, everyone around knew it, and that's the way it was and always would be, amen.
The wall behind the bar was festooned with hundreds of cards, photos of loggers with axes, more recent photos of prize fish and boats, mounted fish, signed dollar bills, an aerial view of Malfourche from the days when it was a thriving center for everything from cypress loggers to gator hunters. Back when everyone had a decent boat and a pickup truck and house that was actually worth something. Before they turned half the swamp into a wilderness area.
Fucking wilderness area.
Ventura polished off the beer and even before he could ask, another was plunked down in front of him, along with a single shot of JD. Tiny knew him well. But instead of going for it right away, Ventura considered the pressing business at hand. He was going to enjoy this, and he was going to make some big money from it--while at the same time keeping his own hands clean. His eye strayed to the many anti-environmental slogans tacked to the wall, SIERRA CLUB GO HIKE TO HELL, and SUPPORT WILDLIFE--FEED AN ENVIRONMENTALIST TO THE GATORS, and so on. For sure, this was a good plan.
He leaned over the bar, gestured to the proprietor. "Tiny, I got an important announcement to make. Mind cutting the music?"
"Sure thing, Mike." Tiny went over to the sound system and turned it down. Almost immediately the place fell silent, everyone's attention turning to the bar.
Ventura slid off his stool and sauntered into the middle of the bar, his cowboy boots thumping on the worn boards.
"Yo Mike!" someone yelled, and there was some drunken clapping and whistling. Ventura took no notice. He was a well-known personage, former county sheriff, a man of means but never uppity. On the other hand, he'd always made a point not to mix too much with the crackers and rednecks, kept up a certain formality. They respected that.
He hooked his thumbs into his belt and gave a slow look around the place. Everyone was waiting. It wasn't every day that Mike Ventura spoke to the people. Amazing how the place had quieted down. It gave him a certain satisfaction, a feeling that he had reached a point in his life of respect and accomplishment.
"We got a problem," he said. He let that sink in for a few seconds, then went on. "A problem in the shape of two people. Environmentalists. They're coming down here undercoverto take a gander at this end of Black Brake. Looking to expand that wilderness area over the rest of Black Brake andthe Lake End."
He glared around at the crowd. There were murmurs, hisses, inarticulate shouts of disapproval. "The Lake End?" someone shouted, "the hell with that!"
"That's right. No more bass fishing. No more hunting. Nothing. Just a wilderness area so those Wilderness Society sons of bitches can come down here with their kayakslooking at the birds." He spat the words out.
A loud chorus of boos and catcalls, and Ventura held up his hand for silence. "First they took the logging. Then they took half the Brake. Now they're talking about taking the rest, along with the lake. There won't be nothingleft. You remember last time, when we did things their way? We went to the hearings, we protested, we wrote letters? Remember all that? What happened?"
Another clamor of disapproval.
"That's right. They bent us over and you know what!"
A roar. People were up off their stools. Ventura held up his hands again. "Now, listen up. They're gonna be here tomorrow. Not sure when, but probably early. A tall, skinny fellow in a black suit--and a woman. They're going into the swamp on a reconnaissance."
"Reconnay-sance?" somebody echoed.
"A look-see. Real scientific-like. Just the two of them. But they're coming undercover--those cowardly sons of bitches know they don't dare show their real faces around here."