by Tom Barber
‘You drink enough water? It’s been hot.’
Bellefonte smiled, but then scrunched his eyes up and opened them again, looking at Archer and trying to focus. ‘Guess I could use a bit more.’ He passed Archer the bag, looking at a bar behind him. ‘Don’t go anywhere.’
‘Sure you’re good?’
‘Yeah. Just hang out here for a couple minutes.’ Bellefonte turned and walked unsteadily inside.
‘I got the number off Marco,’ Vincent said, calling Vargas back. ‘Told him I wanted a direct line to that asshole in case Stef needed it from me. He seemed to buy it.’
‘Text it to my phone.’
‘No way lady. No records. Write it down.’
She had barely moved in the standstill of traffic on the bridge, and it gave her a chance to quickly rummage around in her bag, finding a pen at the bottom. ‘OK, give it to me,’ she said. He did and she wrote it down on the back of a piece of card that had come with the rental.
‘I waited at your hotel. I’m gonna drive back to Baltimore, but start working on that protection.’
‘I told you, I’m on it.’ She hung up and stared at the sequence of digits.
McGuinness’ contact cell. As people around her sounded their horns and they made slow progress getting into D.C., she immediately called Shepherd at the Bureau instead.
The NYPD needed to locate McGuinness, and fast.
She couldn’t shake the feeling that for some reason, time was running out.
Outside the bar in New Orleans, Bellefonte still hadn’t come back onto the street and Archer was starting to feel strange too.
There was fatigue, there was dizziness and then there was this.
Like almost anyone who’d ever drunk alcohol, Archer had gotten loose and buzzed before and spent the following day when he’d overcorrected, nursing a hangover. He knew what drinking too much felt like.
But this wasn’t it, and he hadn’t had a drop of booze today anyway. No alcohol since he’d shared a beer with the carny called Dusty last night, outside Lafayette.
He blinked, shaking his head to try and clear it, and looked back down the street, which was swimming, the lights bleeding in his vision, the music sounding slightly strange. Distorted.
As he tried to focus, he thought he saw two people he recognised from somewhere, walking towards him.
Somewhere recent.
Knowing there was something wrong, instinct telling him to get off the street where he was more vulnerable, he turned and went into the bar where the NOPD detective had gone minutes ago. Stumbling as he tried to keep his balance, he went towards the men’s room.
He pushed open the door and found Bellefonte in a stall, retching into the bowl.
‘I think someon-’
Before he could finish, Archer was grabbed from behind and thrown shoulder first into a No Access door to his left, which flew open as he cannoned into it, dropping the six pack he was carrying to the floor. He went through the door hard, and as he went down, saw the two figures from the street coming in after him.
As he got back to his feet, Archer was grabbed and had his arms pulled behind him by one man, as the other now in front of him produced a knife. Archer instantly drove the man clamping his arms backwards into the wall, then using the guy as leverage, pushed the other away with his legs. The man holding the blade fell back but recovered quickly and came at Archer again, but this time the NYPD detective was ready, his boot connecting with the man’s jaw, sending the knife flying out of his attacker’s grip as the guy’s head whiplashed back.
Seeing him go down, Archer whacked his own head back a few times into the jaw of whoever was trapping his arms, but it didn’t free them. Working on autopilot, he stepped to the right, allowing his left leg to come around behind his assailant’s right. Using that as a bridge, he scooped up the legs of the guy holding him, twisting, and dropped him to the floor hard, breaking the grip and knocking all the wind out of the slighter man. As Archer rose, but before he could pull his Sig Sauer, the other guy who’d been holding the knife got back to his feet before driving him backwards through the door and over a table, smashing glasses and bottles, people who’d been sitting there moments before jumping back out of the way.
Half-winded, and still suffering from blurred vision, Archer focused enough to see the guy retrieve the knife, but as he turned towards Archer, ready to use it, the NYPD detective regained his balance long enough to follow through with another hard punt to the jaw, sending the guy crashing back to the floor. This time he hit his head on a table as he went down and slumped in a heap, unconscious.
The other man was getting back up again, but Archer had now had enough time to draw his Sig. As soon as the gun appeared, most of the customers started piling through the door, running out onto the street.
Despite his swimming vision, Archer had placed the faces of his assailants. Last he’d seen them, the pair had been looking his way before leering at passing teenage girls, the two men leaning against the back of a trailer outside Lafayette last night, smoking cigarettes.
Two workers from the Bilodeau Family Show.
The one still conscious tried to get to his feet but Archer stepped forward, turned him over and restrained him, a knee in his back just as officers from the street outside rushed into the luminescent back section of the bar, alerted by the sudden appearance of the bar’s customers in the street to trouble.
THIRTY SIX
Half an hour later, Archer felt his stomach revolt again, and bent in the alleyway behind the bar, retching into a bag-lined trash can. Bellefonte had recovered sooner than his NYPD counterpart, having been affected first and walked down to join him, waiting as Archer heaved again and the muffuletta he’d had for dinner re-joined the world.
‘Money…well spent,’ Archer said, between deep breaths. ‘What did they sneak us?’
‘Angel dust. PCP. Think they figured it would jack you up long enough for them to kill you.’
‘Yeah, well they’re not the first to try.’ Archer threw up again, then took a drink the detective offered, but saw it was a beer from the six pack Bellefonte had bought. He turned and gave him a look.
‘All I could find,’ Bellefonte told him. Archer opened the beer, swilled out his mouth, then spat out the fluid into the bag.
‘They must’ve got us at the sandwich place,’ Archer said. ‘But how? I didn’t see them in there and I’d have recognised them.’
‘I got distracted when I poured those two waters,’ Bellefonte replied. ‘Went back to the counter to get our order and remember someone else was standing by the water stand. You had your back to it so you wouldn’t have seen them. Must’ve been when they did it. You wanna talk to them?’
Archer nodded. ‘Definitely.’
A police officer was standing over the two Bilodeau Show carny workers, who were arguing with each other as they sat on the edge of the sidewalk, their feet on the street. The pair were both scrawny, one with a rat tail mullet, the other with eyes set deep in the dark hollows above his cheeks, his hair shaved short on the sides but worn longer on top. They were in the same clothes Archer had seen them in at the fair the previous night, the one Archer had kicked in the face wearing a Metallica t-shirt with the sleeves cut off, the other in a vest.
Bellefonte cautioned them then stepped back and let Archer take over. ‘How’d you find me down here?’ he asked, still feeling nauseous and slightly dizzy.
Neither carny spoke, both of them looking up at him sullenly. The cop standing over them answered instead. ‘One of ’em said he saw you talking with some basketball stall worker last night, at their show. Noticed you looking at them. Picked up when you flashed a badge and figured you were looking to bust people at the show. These two had the inspired idea of following you.’
Archer frowned. ‘That’s eight hours in the car.’
‘Members of the show drove here early last night. Bilodeau Show’s due to be in Lacombe for six days, starting tomorrow. These boys peeled off and eit
her one or the other’s been watching you most of the day. Garden District, Carousel Gardens. Metallica here saw you drive out to Six Flags and said he pulled off the highway and waited down a side road until he saw you leave again. Decided when you stepped out tonight to try and shut you up.’
‘Why? What did you think I was gonna bust you for?’ Archer asked.
‘Selling dust and H,’ Mullet said, after the cop nudged him. ‘We saw you lookin’ at us and talkin’ with Dusty. We both got priors. We go inside, we ain’t never gettin’ out.’
‘So your inspired idea was to try to kill a police detective?’
‘Never said we was gonna kill ya. Warn ya to back off. Stop ya messin.’
‘That why you pulled a knife?’
‘Shit escalated. Weren’t expecting you to fight back like that.’
‘And it didn’t occur to you that if I wanted to bust you, I’d have done it there and then at the carnival?’
The two men looked at each other, but said nothing.
‘So which one of you is the brains?’ Bellefonte asked.
‘Rat-piece of shit,’ Metallica T-shirt snarled at his friend, who swore back at him. ‘Learn how to take a punch.’
‘I’ll show you that shit, once they take these cuffs off.’
‘I didn’t come to the show looking for you two. I’m after someone else,’ Archer said, his head feeling like a small child was in there hitting a saucepan with a spoon. ‘How long have you worked for Bilodeau?’
‘We tell you, what’s in it for us?’ Metallica T-shirt asked.
‘Give me any worthwhile information on my guy, I could help PD here take it easy on you. Maybe even get you released without charge. You can go back to leering at teenage girls and fixing bumper cars. Sure they’ll be missing you two strapping, hard workers out at Lacombe.’
They glanced at each other. ‘I’ve been there twenty year,’ Mullet said. ‘On and off, though. Kyle here’s been there shorter.’
‘Why on and off?’ the officer standing beside them asked.
‘I told ya, dumbass, I got a record. It ain’t good. Been inside.’
‘You don’t say,’ Bellefonte said.
‘Who’s this guy y’after?’
‘Name’s Gerry McGuinness,’ Archer said, watching them closely. ‘He was born and grew up in your show, so your friend Dusty told me. We think he took a job at Six Flags here before Katrina, but I’m trying to confirm that’s true.’
‘I remember him,’ Metallica T-shirt said. ‘Yeah, he took a job at SF. You let us go and I’ll tell ya more.’
‘What did he look like?’ Archer asked, immediately suspicious.
‘Like any of us, you know.’
‘Short though, right?’
‘Sure. We used to joke he might not reach the height to make it on some of the rides.’
Archer glanced at Bellefonte and both men turned away. ‘What?’ the officer beside them asked.
‘They’re full of shit,’ Archer said. ‘Our man stands six foot seven, at least.’
‘He worked with Dwindel, our knife guy,’ Mullet said quickly. Archer and Bellefonte turned and looked back down at him.
‘Doing what?’ Archer asked, testing him.
‘He was target for him. Heard his momma did years back too, but she overdosed on brown sugar. She was using that shit when she was pregnant. People always said it jacked the kid up. Made him strange in the head. Sick, kinda.’
Archer nodded to Bellefonte, who turned to the officer. ‘Take Hetfield here to processing,’ he said, nodding at Metallica T-shirt as he was hauled up and led away swearing and cussing at them all.
‘How’d you know this guy went to Six Flags?’ Archer asked Mullet. ‘You look too young to remember him.’
‘My brother told me he saw him in the park. Remembered him from Bilodeau. Bro’s way older than me. Worked carnivals since ‘95, got me the job on the tour. Told me about the guy, and the knife shit his momma did before she OD’d. One of the most popular acts in the show. But Justin told me this kid was real strange. Warned me to keep outta his way if I ever came over there.’
‘That’s it?’ Bellefonte said. ‘Your brother saw him there once?’
‘He worked there too, asshole. He was a stunt performer when he was at Bilodeau. Rode dirt bikes around loops and shit. He got an offer from Six Flags when they took over the park and took it, said the money was good. They stole a few of our guys. Justin did a show for the kids every day in the comic book area. He was playing Batman, least, he was until the storm hit. Bet your ass he wished he’d stayed with us on tour.’
‘Is he still in New Orleans?’ Archer asked.
Mullet nodded. He twisted to show his cuffs. ‘Put the dust and assault on Kyle, and I’ll tell you where my brother works. Should be here in the city, right now.’
*
‘Don’t cause trouble for me, man,’ Mullet’s sibling said wearily forty minutes later, removing his bandanna and wiping his forehead with his forearm. ‘Please. I need this job. I don’t use anymore.’
He’d taken off his apron and was sitting to one side in a Cajun restaurant in the Garden District part of the city, back where Archer and Bellefonte had first met that morning. A woman running the register was counting the takings as another guy took out the trash and cleaned up before closing. The detectives had caught the guy before he left, and so far, Mullet’s story lined up. A call from Bellefonte to his Division during the journey confirmed the man worked where Mullet had said he did and had previous employment at Six Flags as a stunt bike rider.
‘He’s got priors for heroin possession,’ Bellefonte’s colleague at Division told him. ‘Four years. Served it over at Angola.’
‘Time inside a cell seems to be a family requirement,’ Archer had said as they arrived.
‘We’re not here to bust you for anything,’ Bellefonte told the former rider turned cook. The man shared a resemblance to his brother but was larger and much older, dark shadows under his eyes and a good fifty pounds overweight. Definitely not using the needle anymore, Archer thought, looking at the man. People on heroin didn’t carry weight like this guy. ‘We think you can help us with something.’
‘Your arrest report and brother said you worked at Six Flags,’ Archer said.
‘My brother? You spoke to Stevie?’
Both detectives nodded.
‘He being good?’
‘More or less,’ Archer said. ‘But you worked at the park?’
‘Yeah. I lived there too.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘After it was closed down. I had nowhere else to go. Lost my job and all my stuff back at my apartment in the hurricane. Water got some of it, looters and the girl I was seeing at the time took the rest.’
‘You started using while you were working at the park?’ Bellefonte asked.
He shook his head. ‘Few months after.’
‘Your job required talent. Sure you could’ve been rehired elsewhere?’
‘The storm, man. Never felt so low; got depressed bad, and I needed something. Bikes gimme a rush, but sticking a needle in my vein felt almost as good. Back then, at least. Friend from Bilodeau got me to try, just once.
‘Once I started, I couldn’t stop. After the floods drained, I knew out at SF I could shoot up without cops nudging around. Figured it’d be abandoned out there and I was right. Water was still up in some places, but it had gone down on my side, the west.’
‘How long did you live at the park?’ Archer asked.
‘Year and some change.’
‘A year?’
‘I wasn’t the only one. Some of us had nowhere else to go.’
‘You could survive out there, even in winter?’ Archer asked.
‘Don’t get that cold down here,’ the cook said. ‘Not like up north.’
‘What about food?’
‘The park had enough stores of canned food to feed an army. Tons of sweet shit. Know what peaches and syrup tastes like after you got
H running through you?’ He shook his head. ‘Course you don’t. You two are smart.’ The former stunt bike rider looked at the two men, his suspicion returning. ‘If you ain’t here to bust me, what’s the deal? I haven’t used since I went inside. I’m clean, pay my taxes. Stayin’ out of trouble.’
‘Do you remember this man?’ Archer said, unfolding the photo of McGuinness from Kemah’s employment records.
The moment he saw it, the former bike rider’s body language changed. Warily, he looked up from the photo at Archer, then at Bellefonte. ‘Yeah, he was at Bilodeau, back in the day. I saw him at Six Flags when I was there, too.’
‘Working?’ Archer asked.
The man nodded. ‘Yeah, but he was livin’ there too, after the storm.’
‘Shooting up?’
‘No, man,’ the guy said, looking at them both. ‘Knife guy was doing somethin’ else.’
THIRTY SEVEN
Hurricane Katrina had led to mass evacuations all over the State, with many Louisiana residents from danger-zone areas leaving for places further inland away from the storm. A considerable number never came back; others, like the then-Sergeant Leo Bellefonte, had returned to find their homes flooded or almost completely destroyed, many of the locations looted, which only added to the distress.
For the homeless or drug-addicted who were used to day-to-day hardship, the aftermath of the storm provided an unexpected opportunity for scavenging. And for those who’d quickly realised it had been abandoned, the Six Flags park just outside East New Orleans was an untapped goldmine. The site was huge, full of sellable items and at least to start with, was completely deserted. There were stores packed with non-perishable items such as cans of food and now the water had receded, the site offered many warm places to sleep. Police showed up occasionally to do rounds, but they were easy enough to avoid and never stuck around too long.
Inside the Jocco’s Mardi Gras Madness attraction, one which years later Sam Archer would stand in front of and see the cracked face of a jester leering down at him, two heroin addicts were working at pulling metal off some of the tracks from the ride inside. One of them, Laroy, was a former mechanic before he’d become hooked on the needle and was now using tools he’d stolen to take apart pieces of the track.
