Pale Shadow by Robert Skinner Page B

somebody hungry. He musta sniffed out the house and killed her to let Luis know they wasn’t playin’ no game.”
    Daggett had been silent through most of Big Boy’s story, remembering what Paul Ewell had told them about the counterfeiting ring. The name Santiago Compasso was clearly something Ewell’s people didn’t know.
    He picked up his glass and drained the rest of the beer down his throat. “Thanks, Big Boy. We owe you one.”
    Big Boy turned up a big pale palm and shook it. “Just do me a favor and don’t go spreadin’ nothin’ with my name tacked on it, okay? I ain’t interested in gettin’ a reputation as no pigeon, you dig?”
    â€œOkay, brutha,” Andrews said. “We’ll be silent as the grave.”
    â€œThat ain’t funny, Sam.”
    â€œNo,” Andrews replied. “It sure ain’t.”

Chapter 4
    By the time Farrell reached the Algiers Point ferry it was nearing 3:00. His was almost the last car to board before deck hands raised the gangway and cast off lines.
    Farrell remained in his car as the ferry rumbled and vibrated beneath him. He had been on the prowl at this hour many times, but he recognized an unfamiliar fatigue tonight. His life was so full that he tended to ignore the passage of time, but lately there had been little reminders—fine lines at the corners of his eyes, stray gray hairs among the reddish brown ones on the backs of his hands, an unreadiness to jump out of bed first thing in the morning. It made him think of his father, whose own red hair was graying noticeably these days.
    Farrell wondered would he be so quick to venture into the night like this if he and Savanna were married and had children. He did not probe his motives as a rule but on this night, he recognized that he was putting himself in harm’s way out of boredom. The priest’s visit had set him in motion, but it was the murder of Luis’s girlfriend that had heightened Farrell’s resolve to find his old friend. He faintly recalled another priest reading from the Bible, “am I my brother’s keeper?” but it was too late to ponder that question.
    The ferry shuddered and groaned as they approached Algiers Point, slowing until the bow nudged the dock and bounced away. Deck hands hastily made the boat fast then let down the gangway with a clatter. A few minutes later, he drove across to dry land.
    This side of the river was almost rural in comparison to the New Orleans side. Most buildings he passed were shuttered and dark, and few cars shared the road with him.
    The village of Gretna’s Huey P. Long Boulevard was empty of all but shadows. Farrell continued to the eastern edge of the village, driving north to the brink of a bayou.
    There was a considerable Negro population on this side of the river, composed mainly of people who fished, crabbed, trapped, or did back-breaking labor in fish canneries, boat yards, or on farms. Roadhouses or juke joints along the rural roads outside Gretna offered such folks the only entertainments they could afford: white lightning, canned beer and the romantic laments of a lowdown bluesman.
    However, Negroes who worked in town for white people or had small businesses of their own craved a more genteel kind of enjoyment, and for them there was nothing to equal the opulence of Wisteria’s Riverboat Lounge. As Farrell came upon it, he saw the huge neon sign lighting up the area for a hundred yards around. The sign featured a Southern belle in layers of petticoats with an articulated coquette fan at each end. In between them a Mississippi sternwheeler huffed smoke from its stacks. Farrell had heard that even the white people on this side of the river viewed it with a mixture of envy and awe.
    Farrell parked at the edge of the lot and got out into the late night air. The sounds of tree frogs seemed to vie with the Dixieland coming from inside the lounge. Something made him pause, and