The silence stretched for a bit. Then Morehouse said, “You really don’t know what you’re dealing with, Henry. Brody Royal didn’t start out rich. His daddy was a bootlegger in St. Bernard Parish, and a partner with the Little Man before he ever took over New Orleans.”

“The Little Man?” Henry echoed, confused.

“Carlos Marcello, boss of the New Orleans syndicate. Carlos and Brody were in on all kinds of deals together later on. Real estate mostly, but other shit, too. Back in sixty-one, the CIA kidnapped Carlos and flew him down to Central America. They strapped a parachute on him and forced him to jump from the plane at night. That was Bobby Kennedy’s idea of a joke. Didn’t matter. Two weeks later, Carlos was back in New Orleans. Brody paid the Little Man’s hotel bill the whole time he was down there, then helped to fly him back north. That’s the kind of crowd Brody Royal ran with, okay? Meyer Lansky, Santo Trafficante, those guys. In 1960, Carlos and Brody gave Richard Nixon close to a million bucks through Hoffa and the Teamsters, trying to beat John Kennedy. That’s who you’re messing with, Henry. That’s who you want to go after with your little pissant newspaper.”

Henry looked up the long gravel road that led to Highway 84. The black Lab was gone. “All that was a long time ago, Glenn. And Marcello’s dead.”

“Brody ain’t dead. And I’ll tell you something that wasn’t so long ago. You remember when they jailed the state insurance commissioner a couple years back?”

Henry knew the case well. “Ed Schott? Sure. They found two hundred grand in cash in a deep freeze in his storeroom.”

“Right. The state claimed that Royal Insurance was paying Schott to rig a state contract. But no company employee was ever indicted.”

“A key witness disappeared,” Henry said in a casual voice. “Or something.”

“Two witnesses. Both women. Do you know who the president of Royal Insurance is?”

“One of Royal’s sons, right?”

“Yep. But the CFO is Royal’s son-in-law, Randall Regan.”

Henry knew all about Regan, who had blocked every attempt Henry had made to interview his wife, Katy. “I’ve seen him around.”