“I never know why he does anything, ma’am,” Loomis says, “but he usually has a good reason.”

“How many people did Kaiser bring with him?” I ask.

“Four agents, plus some techs. But three more agents just left New Orleans. Oh, and his wife is with him.”

The effect of this statement on Caitlin is immediate. She looks like a musician after being told Bob Dylan is at a party she just declined an invitation to.

“Jordan Glass is here?” she asks.

“Yes, ma’am. Five minutes from where we stand. She’s taking pictures of everything we uncover.”

Even before Caitlin speaks, I know she’s decided she can afford a stop at the Jericho Hole. “Twenty minutes,” she says. “I don’t like playing catch-up.”

“You go on ahead,” I tell Loomis. “We know the way.”

The FBI agent looks uncertain, but after I wave him off, he heads for a parked Ford. As soon as he’s out of earshot, Caitlin says, “Penn, what the hell is Tom up to?”

“I have no idea. But if a cop spots him, and he resists arrest, they’ll kill him. I’m betting Forrest Knox has already given that order.”

Suspicion clouds her eyes. “Are you going to tell me what you know about Forrest?”

“On the way to the Jericho Hole.” Pulling her to me, I hug her tight, even though she stiffens at my touch. “You’ll have Henry’s files on your desk in under an hour.”

“A lot less than that,” she says into my chest. “I’m going to pick up right where he left off.” Drawing back her head, she reveals the wrath of a Fury behind her startlingly green eyes. “And whoever did that to him is going to suffer for it.”

CHAPTER 64

THE FASTEST WAY to the Jericho Hole is to ride the gravel road atop the Mississippi River levee—fifteen minutes if you drive seventy, and Caitlin is urging me to do just that. The great hole lies in the wooded margin between the north end of Lake St. John and the newer course of the Mississippi River. The oxbow lake is shaped like a C facing the river, about ten miles north of the Natchez-Vidalia bridge, and the Jericho Hole forms an equilateral triangle at the upper end of the C, each of its sides about a third of a mile long. The levee road should bring us directly between the lake and the hole.