Brody took another pull of scotch, his eyes glinting. “You know what killed New Orleans? Not the housing projects or the welfare niggers or even the flood. Those rich bankers did it, with their exclusive clubs and krewes and secret societies. Every time a major corporation moved in there, those arrogant bastards refused to let the officers into the circle. They thought their Gilded Age was going to go on forever. They strangled that city. They married among themselves and shut everybody else out, until all the money and business in the South went to Atlanta and Houston and Birmingham and Nashville. And now their idiot descendants sit down there, eating étouffée in their seersucker suits while their trust funds dribble down to nothing. Katrina was just the final shock. The purge. The future belongs to me.”

To Claude Devereux’s surprise, Brody got to his feet and pointed at Forrest Knox with a steady hand. “I’ve been waiting fifty years for this day, boy. And if you think I’m going to let some bleeding-heart reporter screw it up, you need brain surgery. The sooner Henry Sexton and his files cease to exist, the better off we’ll all be. I make no apologies for my actions or Randall’s. I’ll do as I see fit, and you won’t say a word. Your job is to clean up the mess. Is that clear?”

Forrest stiffened and started to speak, but before he could, Royal added, “I know how bad you want to take over the state police. And you know I can blackball you from that post with one phone call.”

Forrest paled, but he held his tongue.

“Now,” said Brody, taking his seat again, “I believe we’re finished.”

Behind him, Randall Regan gestured toward the door.

Instead of leaving, Forrest stepped forward and lifted a letter opener from the old man’s desk, then held it up in the light. The little knife had a dark leather handle and an ivory-colored blade, and Claude shuddered when he recognized it.

“My daddy made this for you,” Forrest said. “He tanned the skin, just like he did the skins of those Japs on the islands back in forty-five. He carved this bone handle, too. He told me it came from that Wilson boy’s arm. The skin came from his cock.”

Royal nodded, his expression curious but unafraid.