DR09 - Cadillac Jukebox by James Lee Burke Read Free Book Online Page B

believe
in."
          "Why don't you
explain it to me?"
          "This is hardly
the place, sir."
          We showered,
then went into an enclosed, empty area off to one side of the main locker room
to dress. He dried himself with a towel, put on a pair of black nylon bikini
underwear and flipflops, and began combing his hair in the mirror. The muscles
in his back and sides looked like tea-colored water rippling over stone.
          "I've got some
serious trouble, Dave. These New York film people want to make a case for Aaron
Crown's innocence. They can blow my candidacy right into the toilet," he
said.
          "You think they
have a vested interest?"
          "Yeah, making
money . . . Wake up, buddy. The whole goddamn country is bashing liberals.
These guys ride the tide. A white man unjustly convicted of killing a black
civil rights leader? A story like that is made in heaven."
          I put on my shirt and
tucked it in my slacks, then sat on the bench and slipped on my loafers.
          "Nothing to
say?" Buford asked.
          "Your
explanations are too simple. The name Mingo Bloomberg keeps surfacing in the
middle of my mind."
          "This New Orleans
mobster?"
          "That's the
one."
          "I've got a
fund-raiser in Shreveport at six. Come on the plane with me," he said.
          "What for?"
          "Take leave from
your department. Work for me."
          "Not
interested."
          "Dave, I'm
running for governor while I teach school. I have no machine and little money.
The other side does. Now these sonsofbitches from New York come down here and
try to cripple the one chance we've had for decent government in decades. What
in God's name is wrong with you, man?"
     
     
    M aybe Buford was right, I thought as I drove down the old highway
through Broussard into New Iberia. I sometimes saw design where there was none,
and I had maintained a long and profound distrust of all forms of authority,
even the one I served, and the LaRose family had been vested with wealth and
power since antebellum days.
          But maybe it was also
time to have another talk with Mingo Bloomberg, provided I could find him.
          As irony would have
it, I found a message from Mingo's lawyer in my mailbox when I got back to the
department. Mingo would not be hard to find, after all. He was in New Orleans'
City Prison and wanted to see me.
     
     
    L ate Tuesday morning I was at the barred entrance to a long
corridor of individual cells where snitches and the violent and the
incorrigible were kept in twenty-three-hour lockdown. The turnkey opened
Mingo's cell, cuffed him to a waist chain, and led him down the corridor toward
me. While a second turnkey worked the levers to slide back the door on the
lockdown area, I could see handheld mirrors extended from bars all the way down
the series of cells, each reflecting a set of disembodied eyes.
          Both turnkeys
escorted us into a bare-walled interview room that contained a scarred wood
table and three folding chairs. They were powerful, heavyset men with the
top-heavy torsos of weight lifters.
          "Thanks," I
said.
          But they remained
where they were.
          "I want to be
alone with him. I'd appreciate your unhooking him, too," I said.
          The turnkeys looked
at each other. Then the older one used his key on each of the cuffs and said,
"Suit yourself. Bang on the door when you're finished. We won't be
far."
          After they went out,
I could still see them through the elongated, reinforced viewing glass in the
door.
          "It looks like
they're coming down pretty hard on you, Mingo. I thought you'd be sprung by
now," I said.
          "They say I'm a
flight risk."
          He was clean-shaved,
his jailhouse denims pressed neatly, his copper hair combed back on his scalp
like a 1930s leading man's. But his eyes looked wired, and a dry,
unwashed odor like sweat baked on the skin by a