A fillip of excitement went up Henry’s spine, but he patiently noted the answer in his book. Then, without the slightest change in tone, he said, “Five months later, on July eighteenth, Albert Norris’s music store was burned to the ground with Norris inside during the attack. He died four days later from his burns. Was that a Double Eagle operation?”

The old man sucked his teeth and studied Henry in silence.

Henry wondered whether his voice had given him away. He did not fidget. He did not breathe. He gave up nothing.

At length, the former Klansman nodded thoughtfully. “That was a damn shame, there. Albert was a good nigger. A mighty good nigger.”

Henry waited, hoping Morehouse would elaborate. But the old man held his silence.

“No mainstream Klan group ever claimed responsibility for Norris,” Henry went on. “The FBI thinks the killers used a flamethrower that night. A flamethrower is a pretty exotic weapon, but I’m guessing some World War Two vets might have been able to get hold of one.”

The sickly eye regarded Henry with an expression akin to disappointment. “Shit, man. With all the Cuban exiles training in Louisiana back then, my mama could have bought a flamethrower at a garage sale.”

Henry wondered why the old man was reluctant to claim responsibility for the Norris attack after he’d been so forthcoming about the other killings. He decided to try a different tack. “The day after the store was burned, an employee of Norris’s—a young black man named Pooky Wilson—disappeared.”

Morehouse shrugged. “I always thought Wilson robbed his boss’s store, then set it on fire and hightailed it out of town. Standard procedure for jungle bunnies. Especially hophead musicians. He’s prob’ly livin’ on welfare in L.A. right now, with ten kids suckin’ on the government tit.”

Henry squeezed his left hand into a fist. He’d played a lot of music with Pooky in the summer of 1964, and he’d never known a gentler soul, except Jimmy Revels.

“In 1966,” he said in a neutral voice, “a Klan informant told the FBI an interesting story. He was a member of the Brookhaven White Knights. The day after Norris’s store burned, his klavern got a call telling them to watch for a black boy who might be trying to make it to the train station over there, to catch the train to Chicago. They found the kid, snatched him right out of the station. A tall kid with one drooping shoulder. That was Pooky Wilson. I know, because Wilson had severe scoliosis. That drooping shoulder made him a natural bass player.”

Morehouse stared back at Henry with bovine indifference.

“The Brookhaven Klansmen handed Pooky over to three men they believed were Klansmen from Natchez. But I think those men were future Double Eagles.” Henry looked the old man straight in the eyes. “Were you one of those men, Mr. Morehouse?”