The Devil’s Punchbowl

‘Uh-huh,’ I reply, my throat tightening.

‘We’ve got a situation down here, Penn. Bad.’

‘Okay.’ I look desperately around the cemetery for a sight of Tim.

‘We got what looks to me like a homicide. Or a suicide, I’m not sure which yet. Guy went over the fence and hit the cement’–Logan says ‘ see-ment’–‘and I was wondering if you might come down here and look at the scene.’

This request is unusual, but I have a lot of experience with homicide cases. Maybe the chief wants my opinion on some evidence. ‘What do you think I can do for you, Don?’

‘Couple of things, I figure. I don’t really want to say on a cell phone. But you knew the victim.’

As the chief finishes speaking, the last threads of Tim’s destiny are pulled into place. ‘Who is it?’

This time the silence lasts awhile. I suspect the chief wants to ask me if I already know. ‘Initials are T.J. That ring any bells for you?’

Logan probably mistakes the silent seconds I require to endure this blow as my trying to figure out whose initials those are. Only now do the squawks of police radios cut through the staticky silence of Logan waiting. ‘I’m too tired for guessing games, Don. Let me just get down there and see for myself.’

‘How long will it take you? We’ve got quite a crowd gathering here.’

‘Have you got Silver Street blocked off?’

‘Hell, I can’t block Silver Street. The casino would go crazy. I’ve got the runoff gutter where the victim landed blocked. But all the rubberneckers have to do is lean over the fence for front-row seats. Bowie’s Tavern was busting at the seams with tourists when this happened.’

‘Get a goddamn tent over the body!’

‘I’m working on it, but we’ve lent all our stuff out to the Katrina shelters.’

‘Well, grab something from the carnival up at Rosalie. Just take it.’

‘Good idea. I’d disperse this crowd, but some of them are witnesses. I have the people who were on the balcony at Bowie’s—’

‘Detain anybody who might have seen any part of what happened, whether it seems important to your men or not. And don’t let anyone contaminate that crime scene.’

‘You sound awful sure it’s a murder all of a sudden.’

‘Suicide’s a crime too. Common law, anyway. Is Jewel Washington there?’ Jewel is the county coroner.

‘She just got here.’

‘Good.’ The potential for collateral damage suddenly strikes me. ‘Has anybody told–Have you informed the next of kin?’

‘Not yet. I was kind of thinking you might want to do that.’ When I don’t reply, Logan says, ‘You figured out those initials yet?’

‘I’ve got a bad feeling that I might have. If I’m right, then I agree with you. I’d better do the telling.’

‘Works for me.’

‘Don’t let your men mention his name on the radio.’

‘It may be too late for that. Plus, we got sheriff’s deputies wandering around, and I’ve got no authority over them.’

For the thousandth time I curse the territorial problems caused by overlapping jurisdictions. ‘It’s your crime scene, Don. Don’t let anybody tell you different. And get that tent up over his body. Everybody on that bluff has a cell phone, and somebody’s going to recognize him.’

‘I doubt it. He’s facedown right now, and he’s busted up pretty bad.’

Jesus. ‘I’ll be there in three minutes, and I won’t be driving the speed limit. Let your cruisers know.’

‘Hell, all my guys are down here. Floor it, brother.’

10 (#ulink_e2c581e6-70f2-5bdd-93db-c0880df4053a)

The scene atop the bluff where Silver Street joins Broadway looks like Bourbon Street during Mardi Gras. More than two hundred people are milling over the broad expanse of grass and pavement between the fence where Caitlin and I walked a few hours ago and the tavern across Broadway. The buzz of recent tragedy is in the air, and as I shoulder through the crowd, I see that about a third of the people are carrying styrofoam go-cups or beer bottles.

I spent most of the ride from the cemetery trying to decide whether to phone Julia Jessup with news of her husband’s death. No one should get that kind of blow by telephone, but it will be worse if someone else calls her first, someone reveling in the thrill of passing on the ultimate gossip. With so many people near the crime scene, there’s a real danger this could happen before I can get to Julia’s home, but still I wait. I need to see Tim’s body before I talk to his wife. I know what kind of questions survivors ask, and the one at the top of the list is always ‘Did he suffer?’

Silver Street sweeps down at a precipitous arc from Broadway on the bluff to historic Natchez Under-the-Hill and the Mississippi River. I can’t imagine how the horses handled it in the 1840s, when they had to haul freight up from the landing and the slave market. When I was a boy, we used to ride skateboards down this street, taking our lives in our hands every time we descended the half-mile-long hill. Then, as now, there was no stopping place on the narrow road. But tonight, about thirty yards down the hill, the police have placed an aluminum extension ladder against the guardrail to provide restricted access to the concrete drainage ditch that follows the base of the colossal retaining wall built to stabilize the bluffs. This wall runs more than a mile from end to end and is held in place by steel anchors that reach a hundred feet back into the bluff. At some places the wall towers a hundred feet from top to bottom, but here it averages about forty, as Chief Logan estimated on the phone.

Two uniformed cops stand at the head of the ladder. They’re obviously expecting me, because one trots forward and escorts me to the ladder while the other marches up the hill to ward off an inquisitive drunk who has followed me. Mounting the ladder, I climb carefully down into a well of darkness, but at the bottom I see a hazy glow coming from beyond a bend in the wall. The air is thick with the scent of kudzu and backwater, but even with more light I could not see the river. A wall of treetops stands between me and the water, reminding me that I’m walking on an earthen ledge, a shallow step-down only halfway to the bottom of the bluff.

When I round the bend in the wall, two more uniforms confront me, but after shining a SureFire in my face, they wave me through. Thirty yards beyond them, a bubble of artificial light whites out the night. Men in uniforms and street clothes move deliberately through that light, and even from this distance I see the rumpled mess they are orbiting. I feel a rush of vertigo that could have been caused by the ladder climb, but I know better. A man I knew from the age of four is dead, and I am about to look into his empty eyes. I pause to gather myself, then walk forward.

As I get closer, Chief Logan notices me and breaks away from the others. Logan is thin and fit and looks more like an engineer than a cop. Tonight he’s wearing street clothes and carrying a small flashlight, which he aims just in front of his feet. A wise man. I’d hate to know how many venomous snakes are within a hundred feet of me right now.

‘That was quick.’ Logan gives my hand a quick but firm shake. ‘I didn’t want to say any more on the phone, but you’d better steel yourself. It’s bad.’

‘I’ve seen a lot of homicide victims,’ I say with more bravado than I feel. The truth is, I’ve seen a lot more crime-scene photos of victims than victims themselves, though I have seen my share of violent death. But when it’s someone you know, it’s different. Once the insulating barrier of professional detachment is breached, there’s no telling what emotions will come pouring out.

‘Did he have his wallet on him?’ I ask, moving closer to the scene. ‘Is that how you knew who he was?’

‘No sign of his wallet. A patrolmen recognized him. I doubted it at first, the face was so messed up by the fall, but my man seemed sure. Says he played blackjack at Jessup’s table some.’

I’m close enough now to see the dark blood pooled under Tim’s upper body. Turning away from the carnage, I look Logan in the eyes. ‘What made you call me?’

The chief stares straight back at me. ‘Jessup had a cell phone in his back pocket. He landed on his face and hands, so the phone was still working. I took a look at the call log, and the last call he placed before he died was to your cell phone.’

This revelation leaves me speechless. I haven’t spoken to Tim in the past twenty-four hours. But if he called my cell phone, it should have rung. I was standing on one of the highest points in the city.

‘I didn’t get any call from Jessup tonight.’

Logan chews on this for a few seconds. ‘He actually called you four times. Or tried to, anyway. Three times about twelve minutes before he died, and then once in the seconds right before he went over the fence. That’s the best I can figure anyway. Did you have your cell phone on?’

‘Yes.’

Logan doesn’t ask to see my phone. He doesn’t have to. He can easily check my records, and I’m sure he will. To save him the trouble, I call up the log on my Razr. It shows no incoming calls from Jessup. I move to Logan’s side so he can see this information.

‘Were you in a dead spot or something?’ he asks.

‘No.’