“Look here, boys,” says one of the white-haired men, a wiry old guy who reminds me of the deceased Sonny Thornfield. “We got the mayor of Natchez paying us a visit. To what do we owe the honor, Mayor?”

Earl Tarver, says the lawyer in my mind. Double Eagle, born 1936. Which makes him sixty-nine years old . . .

“Yeah,” says another man with a grin. My memory offers up a second name: Buddy Garland.

Will Devine says nothing. He’s staring down into his beer mug.

“I think he’s come over for an ass-whippin’,” says the blond kid, who is two inches shorter than I but has twenty years of youth to his advantage. With his light blue eyes, he looks like a recruiting poster for the Hitler Jugend.

Earl Tarver’s eyes travel up and down my body, then settle on my face. “Ease up, Alois. You don’t want to tangle with the mayor today. He’s got his dander up.”

“Like I give a fuck.”

“Look at his hands,” Tarver said.

I don’t look, but I can feel my hands quivering.

“Sit down, Alois,” Tarver commands.

The boy reluctantly obeys, his eyes electric with hatred.

“What you want, Mayor?” Tarver asks. “Where’s your buddy, the FBI agent?”

When I don’t answer, Tarver says, “That Kaiser got his nose rubbed in it by his boss, didn’t he? After that fuckup at the Concordia jail back in December, I ain’t surprised. I believe he told the Justice boys in Washington that Sonny was about to bust open every unsolved case left over from the Klan years. And then”—Tarver snaps his fingers with a pop—“Sonny went and hung hisself. Ain’t that somethin’? Couldn’t stand the guilt, I reckon. Turning traitor will do that to a man.”

I look slowly around the café. The only other patron is a thin, pale-skinned man in a booth in the back corner. He has black hair and he’s wearing a leather jacket with the letters VK visible on the arm I can see.

“I’m here because somebody threw acid in a young woman’s face today,” I say, my eyes still on the biker. “Blinded her.”

Nobody at the table looks surprised.

“Is that right?” asks Tarver. “What girl was that?”

“Nigger gal, I heard,” says Garland. “Nosy gal who worked for the Natchez paper.”

“That really why you’re here?” Tarver asked. “You running interference for the colored now? That what they pay the mayor for on your side of the river?”

I fix my eyes on Tarver’s. “Your old boss killed somebody that meant a lot to me.”

He sniffs and looks at his compatriots. “I think he’s talking about that newspaper publisher.”

Garland snorts a laugh and ducks his head in agreement, a grin on his face. “His old lady, Earl.”