Longarm didn't argue. He let her continue with the French lesson--appropriate enough name for it, he considered, since she was descended from those Acadian settlers who had once called France home--and after a few minutes he felt his climax nearing again. Claudette seemed to sense it too, because she gripped his stalk firmly with one hand and tightened her lips around it, as if to make sure that he didn't get away from her.
That was the last thing he had in mind. He poured out his seed into her mouth as she swallowed eagerly. She had reached down between her legs to rub herself, and her hips were pumping back and forth in a frenzy as she drained him, using her hand to squeeze out the last drops so that she could lap them up. Longarm flopped back on the bunk and reflected that if he didn't get back to New Orleans pretty soon, this lusty Cajun gal was liable to just about love him to death.
After that she fed him breakfast, showed him the road she had mentioned the night before, and gave him a sweet kiss of farewell. He had walked along the road only about a mile when a farmer came along with a wagon loaded with produce, and now here he was standing in front of the Brass Pelican, lifting his hand to knock once more on the door.
Before he could do so, the panel swung open, and a man with a narrow, pasty face peered out at him, blinking from the mid-morning glare. The man looked like the sort who didn't often actually see the sun. Longarm recognized him as one of the bartenders he had seen in the club a couple of nights earlier.
"Yeah?" growled the man. "What the hell do you want?"
"You must not recognize me, old son." Longarm put his shoulder against the door and easily shoved it open, stepping inside as the bartender stumbled back a couple of steps. "Is Millard here?"
"Mr. Millard!" yelled the man as he reached behind him to jerk something from behind his belt. Longarm was expecting the little pistol he saw in the bartender's hand, and he reached out to close his own hand over the cylinder so that the gun couldn't fire. With a quick wrench, Longarm plucked the pistol from the bartender's fingers, twisting one of them in the process. The man yelped and jumped back again, sticking the injured digit in his mouth to suck on it.
Jasper Millard appeared in the doorway at the end of the bar, a shotgun in his hands. He had the greener cocked and ready for trouble, no doubt thinking that Royale might be staging another attack on the club. Longarm held up his hand, palm out, and said hurriedly, "Hold on, Mr. Millard. It's just me, Custis Parker."
"Parker!" exclaimed Millard in surprise. He pointed the double barrels of the greener at the floor and carefully lowered the hammers. "Damn it, I didn't expect to see you again. I was afraid that if Royale's men didn't get you, the swamp would."
Longarm shook his head. He tossed the pocket pistol back to the bartender, who glared at him even though it was obvious Longarm wasn't one of the enemy. Longarm ignored the man and strolled along the bar to join Millard.
"Reckon I was lucky. I see you were too."
"I know my way around those marshes. I grew up down there."
"You don't sound like a Cajun," Longarm pointed out.
Millard shrugged his brawny shoulders. "I was gone for a long time before I came back to New Orleans. Suppose I lost the accent somewhere along the way. But I never forgot how easy it is to bring in goods through the Delta." He turned and inclined his head to indicate that Longarm was to follow him. "Let's go back to the office."
Longarm followed the bald-headed man down the hall, and once they were in the office, Millard waved at the chair in front of the desk. Longarm sat down and cocked his right ankle on his left knee. He was still wearing the mud-stained clothes he had worn the day before.
"You look like you've been through the wringer," said Millard as he sat down behind the desk. "Help yourself to one of those cigars." He nodded toward the humidor.
Longarm reached into his pocket for a cheroot. "Reckon I'll smoke my own."
Millard frowned across the desk at him. "What's the matter, Parker?" he asked. "You're acting like somebody shoved a burr up your ass."
Longarm flicked a lucifer into life with an iron-hard thumbnail and held the flame to the end of his cheroot. When he had it burning to suit him, he shook the match out and dropped it on the floor beside the chair. "You sort of disappeared yesterday after we ran into Royale's boys."
The frown on Millard's face deepened. "What the hell is this?" he snapped. "You're mad because I didn't stay around to pull your fat out of the fire?"
"I got the notion we were working together."
"Well, you got the wrong notion!" Millard said with a snort. "You're working for me, Parker. We ain't partners." His eyes narrowed. "I warned you about getting too ambitious."
Longarm sighed. He had pushed this mock resentment about as far as he was going to. But he had figured that a man as tough and amoral as he was supposed to be ought to say something about being left behind to face a pack of vicious killers.
"You're right, Boss," he muttered. "Sorry. To tell you the truth, I'm just glad we both got out of there with our hides in one piece."
Millard grunted, seeming to accept Longarm's apology. "Yeah, so am I. The way things are going, I expect Royale to pull something else any time now."
"Maybe since his boys failed the last couple of times, he'll think twice about starting more trouble."
Millard shook his head. "I'd like to think so, but I doubt it. I got a feeling Royale's not going to let up until either him or me is dead." He looked curiously at Longarm. "How'd you get away from his men anyway?"
"Pure dumb luck," said Longarm with a grin. He wasn't going to mention Claudette. "My horse got sucked down by quicksand, and I knew I couldn't take off across those marshes on foot without winding up the same way. But I found an old pirogue and started paddling around those bayous, and that kept me from getting sucked under. Royale's men were hollering at each other while they looked for us, so I just steered clear of them as much as I could. Didn't hear any more shots, so I was hoping you'd gotten away too."
"How did you get back here to New Orleans?"
Longarm puffed on his cheroot, then blew out the smoke and said, "First I found me a tree to climb up into so I wouldn't have to spend the night on the ground. Then when the sun came up this morning, I paddled on some more until I came across a road. Figured it had to lead me back to town sooner or later, so I started walking. Wasn't long before a farmer came along heading to market and gave me a ride on his wagon. Fella brought me practically right to your door."
As stories went, it was a little far-fetched, Longarm knew, but it was certainly possible that everything could have happened that way. And Millard had no reason to doubt him either. In fact, the club owner began nodding his bald head even as Longarm finished the concoction of lies and half-truths.
"You're lucky, all right," said Millard. "Damn lucky. Fella like you who doesn't know the bayou country ought to be in some gator's belly after spending a night out in the open like that."
The mention of alligators reminded Longarm of Douglas Ramsey. He shuddered and said, "Don't talk about gators. I never have liked those critters."
A humorless grin plucked at Millard's mouth. "They come in handy sometimes," he said cryptically.
Longarm kept the reaction he felt hidden, but his heart began to slug a little harder. Was Millard talking about how Marshal Ramsey's body had been disposed of? Or did he have something else in mind? Given the line of work Millard was in, he might have had plenty of other bodies to get rid of. Millard's comment still wasn't the proof Longarm needed to feel certain he was responsible for Ramsey's death.
But there was another angle Longarm had yet to explore. Maybe it was time for that, he thought.
"What do you intend to do about Royale?" he asked. "Reckon you could put one of those voodoo curses or something like that on him?"