EQMM, November 2006

by Dell Magazine Authors

  Beau thought “Death by Stupidity” would be more appropriate. That evening as the pathologists, Sumner and two others, examined the bloated bodies of these latest Katrina victims, Beau exchanged stories with them. Stories of weird deaths, morons playing chicken with trains, idiots playing Russian roulette, one particular cretin who told his buddies he was going into the house next-door to investigate a bad smell and lit a match in a house with a gas leak.

  Cruz gave Beau a pained expression when the stories stopped and he had to explain. “The more of this you see, the more you need to laugh. Release the pressure. You should know that."

  Just before dawn, Copeland brought in a third body with a bullet wound in the forehead. He looked at Beau and said with a sly grin, “You been sneaking out and popping these dudes?"

  Beau gave him a long, withering stare, the stare of the plains warrior, unsmiling, unemotional. Copeland shuddered, maybe teasing, maybe not, and stepped away. John Raven Beau had a reputation. He was a killer, plain and simple. Since joining NOPD he'd gunned down five men, the most infamous in the Bayou Sauvage National Wildlife Refuge, the only living swamp within the city limits of a major American city, 23,000 acres’ worth. Beau tracked a cop killer through the swamp through the night and left his body next to a railroad trestle.

  In the eyes of every rookie he met, once they realized who he was, Beau saw the recognition, the morbid fascination, and the distancing, because Beau was a dangerous man, no doubt. It kept Beau on the outside, kept him separate from the brotherhood of cops, kept him isolated and alienated as he'd been his entire life from his first day in kindergarten when the kids stared at him as if he came from an alien world.

  Beau moved to the body bag and waited for Dr. Sumner. Cruz came out of the office, carrying her CD player, the taller of the Oregon cops in tow. His name was Al and he seemed smitten with Juanita Cruz or was just simply on the make, big-time. He spent a lot of time schmoozing with her and Beau couldn't think of a better way to distract her.

  She turned on the CD and the wailing guitars and driving beat of the levee-breaking song echoed through the hangar. Dr. Sumner shook his head as he unzipped the body bag, which held a dark-skinned man with long black hair and a bullet wound in his forehead.

  "This one's older."

  Up closer, Beau saw the man had some gray in his hair and obvious age lines on a face flaccid in death. The man was wet, but hadn't been in the water long. Sumner found a wallet with three Louisiana driver's licenses with three different names but the same face on them. The oldest license had the man's real name, one familiar to everyone in the NOPD. Abdon Jeffries, listed as an AA—African American—by NOPD, although Abdon was a mulatto with a white mother. Some things never changed in the South. If you were part African, you were African. A convicted felon with thirteen arrests, Jeffries was number three on NOPD's Most Wanted list.

  "Wound's perforated, right?” Cruz asked as she stepped closer.

  Sumner lifted the head, felt under it, and said, “Yep."

  Through-and-through, like the others, round, neat, clean. “Straight path,” Beau added. “How do you do that?"

  "Sniper?” said Cruz.

  "Have to be dead-on perfect."

  Beau stepped over to where Copeland sat with one of the triage nurses from the next hangar, where they worked on the injured, and asked the sergeant, “Where?"

  "South Shore Harbor. Next to the capsized casino."

  Cops didn't believe in coincidences, even if the word was in the dictionary.

  "I didn't recognize him,” Copeland said. “Abdon Jeffries, right? That's the bastard who shot that Seventh District cop. Crippled him, remember?"

  Beau closed his eyes for a second. Yeah, he remembered. Jeffries hired a sharp lawyer and then the D.A. went in unprepared and Jeffries walked. He'd seen the crippled cop in a wheelchair getting into the “police only” elevator at headquarters, going up to the radio room where he worked as an operator. A desk job for a paraplegic.

  Beau let out a long breath, opened his eyes, and spotted his lieutenant entering the hangar. He went straight to him, about to tell him about the three men with holes in their heads, but Merten shook him off, heading over to a pair of men standing in the far doorway.

  Merten came back with the men and introduced them, a third pair of detectives who would work with them examining the bodies. From Philadelphia, these guys were older, both Italian-Americans, both grizzled veterans of the homicide wars. They asked for the midnight shift and Beau quickly gave it up to them. The Oregon guys wanted the evening watch, so Beau and Cruz would take the day watch.

  Merten took Beau and Cruz aside. The big man's eyes were red-rimmed. “It's bad out there. People on roofs, starving dogs everywhere. Thirty people died in an old-folks home in St. Bernard. The employees left them to drown. We got a full-scale riot at the Convention Center but I gotta go over to the First District. We're raiding the Iberville Projects in boats. Snipers been shooting at the district station since the storm.” He took in a long breath and let it out, wheezing in fatigue. He gave Beau a long look and said, “No. You know I need you here."

  "You want to hear what we've come up with?” asked Cruz.

  "Not now."

  Beau went back to Copeland for details and got, “The body was right on top of the levee. Like I told you, South Shore Harbor."

  Beau put it in his notes.

  Copeland also said, “It wasn't Notre Dame that burned. It was the big place across the street.” Beau knew the area well. There were lots of big places but he wasn't in the mood to ask.

  Later, as their shift ended and Beau was in his portioned cubicle, Cruz stepped in from her shower with a towel wrapped around her head. She had on a terry-cloth robe and carried clothes in her hand.

  "Why do we want to work the freakin’ day shift?” she asked, leaning her head forward to rub the towel through her hair. Her hair was shiny from the bright overhead light, traces of reddish brown mixed in with dark brown. Juanita was naturally pretty, looking younger now without makeup.

  "I want to be free at night,” he said.

  "Night? You found some action? Some nurse?"

  He almost smiled.

  "We've been sleeping through the steamiest part of the day, you silly Cajun. Why work in the heat?"

  She dropped the towel on the small table next to Beau's cot where he sat with his notepad. He'd finished consolidating his notes on the killings. Homicide cases were built with paperwork. He was closely examining a city map, checking out the South Shore Harbor area.

  "What's with the map?” Cruz asked. When he looked up, she dropped her robe and picked up a T-shirt. In her bra and panties, she was facing Beau, who blinked twice. She pulled on the T-shirt and climbed into a pair of lightweight gym shorts before looking back at him.

  "What the hell is this?” Beau sat up stiffly on the cot.

  "What?"

  "The little bra-and-panty show. I'm your partner, not your sister."

  She huffed, narrowing her eyes. “Maybe I'm just trying to get your attention."

  Beau tried to keep from getting aroused, an automatic physical response. He glared at her, turning the excitement into anger. “You never fool around with your partner. You know that. A partner's a partner. Closer than a friend. But not a freakin’ lover.” He stood and walked to the rear of his enclosure.

  He turned back to her and she snapped, “I don't know anything anymore.” She opened her arms. “Everything's changed. Everything! The whole damn world's changed!” She stormed out.

  Beau went out a few minutes later with her towel and found the Oregon cops sitting next to the empty examining table. Al was reading a Spiderman comic. He dropped the damp towel in Al's lap. “Go give this to Juanita."

  "Juanita?” Al stood up.

  "Yeah. She could use some company."

  "Okay.” Al took off for Cruz's room.

  The other Oregon cop said, “I thought you were her partner."

  Beau gave him a deadpan
look. “I said she needs company."

  The cop shrugged.

  Beau left. Over his shoulder he said, “I thought y'all were from Oregon. Not Disneyland."

  The next morning, Beau located the Wildlife and Fisheries agent who'd lent him the pirogue to visit Cruz's apartment and Sad Lisa and asked if he could use a pirogue that evening. The agent jotted Beau a note authorizing the use. The man's name was Prejean and he hailed from Abbeville, parish seat of Vermilion Parish, where Beau grew up.

  "Give this to the supervisor,” he said, passing the note to Beau.

  Six more drowning victims came in that afternoon and one murder victim shot three times in the back. No ID. Body pulled out of the Industrial Canal. Beau took a nap after their shift ended, setting his alarm for eleven P.M., and was surprised when Cruz, decked out as he was in all black, came into his cubicle and asked, “Where we going?"

  "Um, I've got something to check out."

  She pulled out her Beretta and checked its ammo. “You planning to go without me, Raven?"

  "How'd you find out about this?"

  "I'm a detective,” she said smugly, holstering her weapon. “We're headed for South Shore Harbor, or what?"

  Damn, he wanted to do this alone. Didn't want her anywhere near this. Not because she was a woman or even a rookie. He worked better alone. But as he looked at her, he knew if he dumped her it would tear her down and she'd been torn down enough. A partner was a partner and they'd face the danger together.

  He nodded and checked his weapon and ammo clips. They took radios, which didn't work, and their cell phones, working about as well. Beau secured three large flashlights from two National Guardsmen from St. Louis and talked two other National Guardsmen into taking them with their Humvee to the Bonnabel Boat Launch in Metairie, where Wildlife and Fisheries was set up.

  On the way, the guardsman riding shotgun kept looking back at Cruz. She tried discouraging him with a yawn but the guy asked question after question, about NOPD, the high crime rate, Bourbon Street, Mardi Gras. Beau read his nametag: Smith. The other was Jones. Jesus. Milquetoast Midwesterners.

  "I seen it on the Internet,” he said. “Women showing their boobs for carnival beads. We don't get that in South Dakota."

  Cruz gave Beau a smirk as she asked them, “Y'all from South Dakota?"

  "Sioux Falls."

  She pointed a thumb at Beau. “He's half Sioux. Oglala. His mother lives on the Pine Tree Reservation. That near Sioux Falls?"

  Pine Ridge Reservation, thought Beau, but correcting her would only encourage the conversation.

  Smith stared at Beau and answered, “It's on the other side of the state."

  Jones turned around and said, “You look half Sioux.” There was no malice in his voice but Beau knew his people and the white-eyes of both Dakotas didn't mix much.

  "Show them your knife,” Cruz said.

  Beau, who'd assumed a deadpan, blank expression as soon as he'd heard these guys were from Dakota, gave his partner an unresponsive look.

  "It's obsidian,” she went on, sitting up now, getting a kick out of it. “Sharp as a razor."

  Beau turned his gaze to Smith, who nodded and turned around, and thankfully, the questions stopped.

  The Wildlife and Fisheries supervisor read the note authorizing Beau to use a pirogue and said, “Y'all sure about this?"

  Beau nodded. The man shrugged and said, “We got no radio for y'all. All the towers are down."

  "We'll be fine."

  "We'll need it back before daybreak."

  "No problem.” Beau thanked the man and moved to the pirogue. This one was aluminum, the outboard looked new and started immediately.

  "You got a full tank,” the supervisor called out as they pulled away from the boat launch into Lake Pontchartrain, heading east to ride along the big levee that had protected most of Jefferson Parish. The levee had been topped by Katrina in Kenner and parts of Metairie, but most of JP had escaped the flood. Beau had heard eighty percent of New Orleans was now under water.

  Moonlight reflected off the tiny waves in the lake and starlight added a faint hue to the entire scene. The levee loomed as a dark shadow to their right. Beau was so used to the smell of the salty water, it didn't register until the scent changed as they approached the 17th Street Canal, where water from the city had mixed with the lake, giving the area an oily stench. Huge lights lit up the area around the canal entrance. Helicopters, lit up like Christmas trees, moved back and forth to the break in the levee to drop their sandbags.

  Looking to his right, Beau couldn't see the boatyard or Sad Lisa and wondered how Joe Boughten was getting along. Probably fine, so long as the beer held out. Veering to port, they skirted West End. It took awhile, moving carefully, to travel the next eleven miles to Lakefront Airport. There were some lights on there but the entire place was under water. South Shore Harbor, two miles beyond, was darker. Beau saw a cloud had moved in front of the moon.

  "Remember, when we go ashore, stay with me,” he told her. “Partners never split up. No matter what happens. Don't separate."

  "Okay, okay."

  "I'm serious.” Beau wasn't being overprotective. He'd learned years ago to stick with his partner. Whatever happens to one happens to both. Can't protect each other if you split up, like they did on TV. Hell, just about everything cops did on TV shows was flat-ass wrong.

  They reached the levee just beyond the harbor, the capsized casino looming overhead like a black mountain. Turning off the engine, they paddled along the levee. Thankfully the cloud moved and the moonlight came back. When he was studying the map, Beau figured there was one way to find out about this, one possible way.

  Not five minutes from the casino, he spotted a boat pulled up to the levee and his heart raced. He pointed to it and Cruz nodded. It was a boat made for speed, a huge outboard motor, all painted black. Beau was surprised they'd left no guard. They were that confident. The boat was tied up to a large chunk of concrete. The base of the earthen levee was littered with huge blocks of concrete all the way to the water's edge. He pulled the pirogue next to the speedboat.

  He unfastened the boat and handed Cruz the rope. She tied it to the pirogue's stern and they towed it about fifty yards, pulling it up on the levee between two larger concrete blocks. Then they paddled the pirogue an additional fifty yards to tie it up. They left the flashlights and walked the levee back to where the speedboat had been originally.

  Moving to the top of the levee, they looked at the eastern portion of the city. The moon and starlight gave a silvery pallor to the dark water and the roofs were black spots. As far as Beau could see, the city was under water.

  Beau and Cruz positioned themselves back down the levee, each behind chunks of concrete on either side of where the speedboat had been. Beau eased his weapon from its holster and rested it against his leg as he sat. He covered his right eye with his hand and used his left eye for five minutes, then switched. When he opened his right eye the light seemed brighter since his pupils had dilated in the blackness behind his hand. He focused his hearing away from the lake lapping against the levee and concentrated.

  He ran it all through his mind again. Someone was dumping these bodies where they would be found. No other way to get here except by boat. They probably had one on the other side of the levee to navigate canals that were once streets, but this was how they got in and this was their exit point. He knew he was lucky to find their boat.

  An hour later, a helicopter came from the direction of Lakefront Airport and flew out over the east, its running lights extra bright, two searchlights scanning back and forth. From the moonlight, Beau thought he caught a white sheen on the craft. Coast Guard chopper.

  He settled back and thought of the word describing where he and Cruz lay in wait. It was called a batture, a colloquial term indigenous to New Orleans. Possibly from the French battre: “to beat.” Here on the land between the top of the levee and the water's edge, along the lake and the river across town, was where the or
iginal French settlers beat their washing, against rocks that naturally dotted the area, long before the levees were built up. He could envision the women in long dresses leaning over with their wash as they chattered with one another to ease the boredom. His Cajun ancestors most likely did the same along Vermilion Bay and its bayous.

  Beau spent the hours keeping his breathing regular, keeping his senses tuned, keeping himself calm. The Sioux called it the battle calm, a relaxed state bordering on tranquility so when battle was joined a warrior maintained the cool hand and struck true, while his enemies, particularly the white-eyes, let their blood rise to levels that made their aim unreliable.

  Over the lapping of the waves, Beau heard the faint scrape of footsteps. He peeked around the concrete and eased off the safety of his .9mm Beretta model 92F. Its rubber grips were tacky from the humidity, providing extra grip, although Beau's hand was not sweaty in the least.

  A figure rose to the top of the levee from the other side, followed by a second, one carrying a rifle, the other a machine gun, and both wearing all black. When the first paused to glance up at the sky, Beau saw the man was wearing night-vision goggles. Damn! Who were these guys?

  More footfalls, faint and yet firm, revealed a total of five men now. Besides the one with the rifle, two carried what looked like Steyr machine guns. One started down the levee their way. Beau inched around so he could keep that man and the others in his line of vision.

  It didn't take long for the man to realize and call out, “The boat's missing!"

  "You sure we're at the right place?"

  "Look for the red marker."

  One of the men disappeared beyond the levee momentarily and came right back. “It's right here."

  "Dammit to hell!"

  Feet shuffled and a sharp voice said, “Someone's here!"