Brief Encounters With Che Guevara_ Stories - Ben Fountain [54]
Lulu seemed to soften at this. He was dabbing jots of red into the lurid night sky; since his beating he was using a lot of black and red.
“Where is it now?”
“I dug a pit in the Erzulie house, under the altar.”
“How much?”
“Three bags, like the first time.”
Lulu blew out his cheeks and reached for a different brush. Tiny human silhouettes took form inside the fire, either dancing or dying, it was hard to say which.
“Does Esther know?”
“She helped me hide it.”
Lulu painted for a minute, then sighed. “Okay, brother. I’m listening.”
“Well,” said Syto, “I was thinking we should get in touch with Nixon. He might know some people who could help us out.”
“Nixon? He’s just a kid!”
“He’s a grown man, Lulu, you’re forgetting. And he’s family. We need a guy we can trust.”
Lulu considered as he touched up Papa Gédé’s mouth, limning the teeth so that his smile took on the raucous leer of a skull. “Nixon. Okay.”
“But I can’t go myself, Michelet’s watching me. And I bet he’s watching you too.”
The brush froze in mid-stroke. “You mean he knows?”
“I think he’d take me if he knew for sure, but he’s suspicious. His guys keep driving by.”
“Shit, Syto. This is serious.”
“No kidding. So we better get somebody to Port-au-Prince quick.”
They sent word to Nixon through one of Lulu’s girlfriends, a marchand who traveled to Port-au-Prince every week with loads of oranges and limes to sell. In the meantime Syto put on his slackest Bouki face and went about his business, which at the moment involved dragging his boat up on the beach for caulking and repainting, a yearly chore that kept him near his house and also out in circulation among his neighbors. If Michelet wanted him, Syto reasoned, he’d do the snatching when Syto was alone. As it was Land Cruisers full of flunky cops eased through the village several times a day, a heightened presence that naturally made people talk. Working there on the village commons of the beach, Syto heard the rumors like everyone else, that a local had gotten hold of a load of contraband. And he noticed how pleased his neighbors seemed about this, how they laughed and jittered around in a hyper way whenever they talked about putting one over the cops.
When Michelet came it was in the full light of day, alone, pulling up to Syto’s house in his government-issue Nissan pickup. Syto and Esther were just finishing their midday meal under the almond tree; Esther looked at Syto with utter calm, her eyes more eloquent than years of talk. He can’t touch us, her face implied, and it was true, Syto realized—since their daughter died they had nothing to lose. He felt the fear snap off him like a hat snatched by the wind.
“M’sieu chef des gendarmes,” he said with goofy formality, walking over to the truck. “This is certainly an honor.”
“Hello, Charles,” Michelet said, politely enough. “I want to talk to you.” From his truck he surveyed Syto’s small lakou: the cleanswept yard, the one-room house with its neat kitchen garden, the crooked hut set back among the scrub trees. Syto had built the hut years ago as a devotion to the goddess Erzulie.
“Of course, m’sieu le chef.”
“I want you to tell me about the cocaine,” said Michelet.
“Of course, m’sieu le chef. Which cocaine, please?”
Michelet’s teeth did a slow, decalcifying grind. For all his power he looked whipped sitting there in his truck, like a man in serious trouble with his wife. “We heard that a load of contraband was dropped at Cayes Caiman last week. On Thursday. And you were seen there on Thursday.”
“Yeah? Hmmm, I don’t know, m’sieu le chef. Cayes Caiman, yeah, sure, I go over there sometimes, it’s a good place for sirik and chadwon. But you know I’m not so good with days. Thursday, you said?”
Michelet gave him a hooded, menacing look. “You were seen, okay? We know you were there. So if you know anything about that contraband, you better tell me.”
“M’sieu le chef, of course I will tell you about any drugs I see. Whenever I see anything I go straight to the police, just like the time me and