“That old jailhouse reeled and rocked all night long!” the congregation shouted.
“Hebrew children in the fiery furnace all night long!” the preacher shouted.
“Lord, who will deliver poor me?” the congregation shouted back.
“There’s worse bondage than the jail. It’s bondage of the spirit,” the preacher said. He pointed his finger into the crowd. “There’s a man here gonna give witness to that, too. A man who had to be struck dumb in order to speak, and by heavens, each of you knows who I’m talking about. Come on up here, Wyatt.”
“These people vote in elections,” Clete whispered.
“Be quiet,” I said.
Dixon faced the crowd, his eyes close-set, the sleeves of his cowboy shirt rolled above his elbows, the veins in his forearms pumped with blood. Then I witnessed the strangest transformation I had ever seen take place in a human being. He looked briefly at the canopy rippling and snapping in the wind, then his mouth went slack and his eyes rolled up into his head. He began to speak in a language I had never heard. The syllables came from deep down in the throat and sounded like wood blocks knocking. He held his arms straight out from his sides, as though about to levitate. I would like to be able to say his performance was fraudulent, nothing more than a manifestation of tent-show religious traditions that go back to colonial times. Except the glaze in his face was not self-manufactured, nor was the energy that seemed to surge through his body as though he had laid his hand on a threadbare power line. Had I been a neurologist, I probably would have concluded he was having a seizure. I was not alone in my reaction. The congregation was transfixed, some pressing their hands to their mouths in fear. When Dixon finished his testimony, if that’s what it could be called, there was dead silence except for the wind popping the canopy.
Dixon balanced himself on the side of the podium, his pupils once again visible, a crooked smile on his face, like a man who was sexually exhausted and trying to recover perspective. Clete screwed a cigarette into the corner of his mouth and flipped open his Zippo.
“Are you crazy?” I said under my breath.
“You think these guys are paying any attention to us?” he replied.
“I don’t care. Show some respect.”
He slipped the cigarette back into his shirt pocket. “Check out the broad in the last row.”
She was wearing a hat and dark glasses, but there was no mistaking the creamy white skin and the mole by her mouth and the demure posture. “What is Felicity Louviere doing here?” I said.
“Maybe she thinks Dixon was mixed up in her daughter’s death.”
“You see the husband anywhere?”
“He’s probably getting laid.”
“We don’t even know the guy. Why be so critical?” I said.
“He’s a piece of shit, and you know it.”
We were standing at the back of the crowd. A fat woman in a print dress with lace on the sleeves turned around and stared at us. “Sorry,” I said.
“Here comes our man,” Clete said. “I hope you’re up to dealing with this crazy bastard.”
“Clete, will you stop it?” I said.
Dixon worked his way through the congregants while they folded and stacked their chairs, returning congratulations, shaking hands, even though his eyes never left our faces.
“I declare, it’s Mr. Robicheaux, fresh up from the bayou,” he said. “Or is it a swamp or a cesspool and such as that where you live at?”
“More like an open-air mental asylum. Is that Aramaic you were speaking?” I said.
“Some people say it’s Syriac. Some says Aramaic and Syriac is the same thing. I couldn’t comment, ’cause when it’s over, I don’t have no memory of it.”
“I really dug it,” Clete said. “It put me in mind of one of those Cecil B. DeMille films. You know, Charlton Heston up on the mountain shouting at the people down below in the middle of an electrical storm.”
Dixon was standing six inches from my face, his head tilted to one side; he seemed to take no heed of Clete. “You been bird-dogging me, Mr. Robicheaux? You still think I’m out to hurt your daughter?”
“That’s one reason I came out here. I think you got a bad rap on that.”
“I declare. I’m overwhelmed.”
“We have the same objective. We want to find the man who killed the Indian girl,” I said.
“Who says I’m trying to find anyone?”
“Gretchen Horowitz.”
“She was talking about me?”
“She said she thought you were a decent guy. Does that bother you?” I said, my control starting to slip.
“Nothing bothers me. Not when I’m in the spirit.”
“That brings up an interesting question,” Clete said. “If you’re giving witness in a language no one can understand, and you have no memory of what you said, what’s the point of giving witness?”
“Who says nobody understands it?” Dixon said.
“I got it. These guys are international linguists,” Clete replied.
This time Dixon looked directly at him. “Is that your Cadillac out yonder?”
“It was when I drove it here.”
“Nice ride. I hope the people driving the junkers next to it don’t skin it up. Maybe that’s the price of slumming.”
I saw the crow’s-feet at the corner of Clete’s eyes flatten, the color in his face change. “Maybe you and I should walk over in those trees and talk about it,” he said.
“Mr. Dixon?” I said, edging into his line of vision.
“What?” he replied, his eyes locked on Clete’s.
“Why is Felicity Louviere here?”
“Who?”
“Angel Deer Heart’s mother.”
“How the fuck should I know?” He turned his gaze on me. “Y’all don’t have no business here. This is our place. When we’re here, we do things our way. I don’t like people looking down their noses at my friends.”
“Clete grew up in the Irish Channel, Wyatt,” I said. “I got this white patch in my hair from malnutrition. When I started first grade, I couldn’t speak English. I respect you and your friends, and I think Clete does, too.”
“What you don’t seem to understand, Mr. Robicheaux, is I ain’t bothered y’all or put my nose in your business. I didn’t bother your daughter, and I didn’t bother them cops that drug me out to Albert Hollister’s place. But every time I turn around, one of y’all is in my face. It’s Sunday, and we’re fixing to have a community meal. All we want is to be left alone.”
Clete lit his cigarette and snapped the cap closed on his Zippo. “Why don’t you peddle your douche rinse somewhere else and let these poor bastards alone?” he said.
How’s that for diplomacy? I gave up and walked away. “Dave, where you going?” I heard Clete say.
I was so irritated with Clete that I kept walking toward the Caddy and didn’t turn around. I heard somebody walking fast behind me.
“Mr. Robicheaux,” said a woman’s voice.
She was a tank in her late forties, dressed in a frilly blouse and a suit with big buttons, her hair piled on her head, her face flushed and as round as a muskmelon. She had a notebook in one hand and a ballpoint in the other. For whatever reason, she seemed to be wearing amounts of perfume that could knock down a rhino. “Talk to me, please,” she said.
I tried to smile. “What can I help you with?”
“I’m doing an article on the Indians and the spread of fundamentalist religion. Also on the death of that young girl,” she said.
She told me her name was Bertha Phelps. She seemed agitated and breathless and out of her element. She started to write something on her notepad, then realized her pen was out of ink. “I hate these. Do you mind?” she said, looking at the Uni-ball in my shirt pocket.