The White Road

“We got an invite?”

“Has not having one ever stopped us before?”

“No, but sometimes I just like to be invited to shit, you know what I’m sayin’, instead of havin’ to bust in, get threatened, irritate the nice white folks, put the fear of the black man on them.”

He paused, seemed to think for a while about what he had just said, then brightened.

“Sounds good, doesn’t it?” I said.

“Real good,” he agreed.

We drove most of the way to the old Larousse plantation in separate vehicles, Louis parking his car about half a mile from the gates before joining me for the rest of the journey. I asked him about Angel.

“He workin’ on a job’.”

“Anything I should know about?”

He looked at me for a long time.

“I don’t know. Maybe, but not now.”

“Uh-huh. I see you made the news.”

He didn’t reply for a couple of seconds. “Angel tell you somethin’?”

“Just gave me the name of the town. You waited a long time to settle that score.”

He shrugged. “They was worth killin’, they just wasn’t worth travelin’ too far to kill.”

“And since you were on your way down here anyway…”

“I figured I’d stop by,” he finished. “Can I go now, Officer?”

I let it drop. At the entrance to the Larousse estate, a tall man in a flunky’s suit waved us down.

“Can I see your invitations, gentlemen?”

“We didn’t get invitations,” I said, “but I’m pretty sure somebody is expecting us.”

“The names?”

“Parker. Charlie Parker.”

“By two,” added Louis, helpfully.

The guard spoke into his walkie-talkie, out of earshot from us. We waited, two or three cars lining up behind us, until the guard finished talking.

“You can go ahead. Mr. Kittim will meet you at the parking area.”

“Surprise, surprise,” said Louis. I had told him about my encounter with Bowen and Kittim at the Antioch rally.

“Told you this would work,” I said. “That’s why I’m a detective.” It struck me then, my worries about the consequences of the Caina incident aside, that I was already feeling better since Louis had arrived. That wasn’t too surprising, since I now had a gun, thanks to him, and I was pretty certain that Louis had at least one more on his person.

We followed half a mile of live oaks, palmettos, and palms, much of it overhung with Spanish moss. Cicadas chirped in the trees and droplets from the morning’s now departed rain kept up a steady rhythmic patter on the roof and road until we emerged from the trees and onto an expanse of green lawn. Another white-gloved flunky directed us to park the car beneath one of a number of tarpaulins erected to shelter the vehicles from the sunlight, the canvas shifting slightly in the currents of cold air cast by one of a number of huge industrial air conditioners arrayed on the grass. Long tables had been arranged along three sides of a square and covered by starched linen tablecloths. Huge amounts of food had been arrayed upon them while black servants in pristine white shirts and trousers hovered anxiously, waiting to serve guests. Others moved through the crowds already gathered on the lawn, offering champagne and cocktails. I looked at Louis. He looked at me. Apart from the servants, he was the only person of color present. He was also the only guest dressed in black.

“You should have worn a white jacket,” I said. “You look like an exclamation mark. Plus, you might have picked up a few bucks in tips.”

“Look at them brothers,” he said, despairingly. “Ain’t nobody here heard of Denmark Vesey?”

A dragonfly glided across the grass by my feet, hunting for prey among the blades. There were no birds to prey on him in turn, at least none that I could see or hear. The only sign of life came from a single heron standing in a patch of marshland to the northeast of the house, the waters around it seemingly stilled by a carpet of algae. Beside it, amid rows of oak and pecans, stood the remains of small dwellings, equidistantly spaced, their tiled roofs now gone and the miscast and broken bricks used in their construction weathered by the elements over the century and a half that had probably passed since their original establishment. Even I could guess what it represented: the remains of a slave street.

“You’d think they’d have knocked them down,” I said.

“That’s heritage,” said Louis. “Right up there with flying the Confederate flag and keeping one pillowcase clean at all times. Y’know, for special wear.”

The Larousses’s old plantation house was pre-Revolutionary redbrick, a Georgian-Palladian villa dating back to the mid-eighteenth century. Limestone steps led up a set of twin staircases to a marble-floored portico. Four Doric pillars supported the gallery that ran across the front of the house, four windows on either side over two levels. Elegantly dressed couples crowded in the shade of the porch.

Our attention was distracted by a party of men moving quickly across the lawn. They were all white, all had earpieces, and all were sweating beneath their dark suits, despite the efforts of the air conditioners. The only exception was the man at the center of the group. Kittim wore a blue blazer over tan trousers and pe

Atys. That was why the T-bar cross had not been on his body when he was found.

Kittim stopped about five feet away from us and raised his hand. Instantly, the men around him paused, then spread out in a semicircle surrounding us. No words were spoken for a moment. His attention shifted from Louis to me, then back again. His smile remained fixed in place, even when Louis spoke to him for the first time.

“What. The fuck. Are you?” asked Louis.

Kittim didn’t respond to him.

“This is Kittim,” I explained.

“Ain’t he the pretty one?”

“Mr. Parker,” said Kittim, still ignoring Louis. “We weren’t expecting you.”

“It was a last-minute decision,” I replied. “Some sudden deaths cleared my schedule.”

“Mm-hmm,” said Kittim. “I can’t help but notice that you and your colleague appear to be armed.”

“Armed.” I looked disapprovingly at Louis. “Told you it wasn’t that kind of party.”

“Never hurts to come prepared. Folks don’t take us seriously otherwise,” said Louis.

“Oh, I take you very seriously,” said Kittim, acknowledging him properly for the first time. “So seriously that I’d be grateful if you would come with us to the basement, where we can dispose of your weapons without alarming the other guests.”

Already I could see people casting curious looks in our direction. As if on cue, a string quartet struck up from the far side of the lawn. They were playing a Strauss waltz. How quaint.

“No offense, man, but we ain’t goin’ to no basement with you.” It was Louis.

“Then you’ll force us to take action.”

Louis’s eyebrow rose about half an inch. “Yeah, what you go

The tension was perceptibly rising. The men around Kittim were waiting for an indication from him on how to proceed, but he wasn’t moving. His smile remained fixed in place as if he’d died with it and then been stuffed and mounted on the lawn. I felt something roll down my back and pool at the base of my spine, and realized that the security guards weren’t the only ones who were sweating.

The tension was broken by a voice from the porch.

“Mr. Kittim,” it said. “Don’t keep our guests on the grass. Bring them up here.”