She smiled pleasantly when she said it and I smiled pleasantly in return. I used her phone to call Mrs. Francine Lyons, who said she'd be happy to see me, but that she was on her way out and could I call later. I said that I could, but then she volunteered diat Mr. Parks had mentioned something about a child given for adoption and that she just didn't know anything about that, though, as she'd said, she'd be happy to see me later in the day. I told her diat that wouldn't be necessary and scratched her off my list. You either remember or you don't. Mrs. C. Thomas Berteaux, watching from her chair, said, "What's the matter, Jeffrey? You look disappointed."

I said, "Some days are more difficult than others, Mrs. Berteaux."

She nodded sagely. "Yes, Jeffrey. I know that to be true. However, I might suggest that you speak with Mrs. Martha Guidry."

"Yes?" Martha Guidry wasn't on my list.

"Martha was a midwife at that time and, if I remember correctly, quite a well-known busybody. Martha may know." Then she looked thoughtful. "Of course, Martha may be dead."

I let myself out.

Four up, four down, and nary a shred of evidence to show for it. I had three more women to see, and, if the results were the same, it was back to the drawing board. Not good. The key to all this seemed to be the sealed state documents. Maybe I should stop trying to investigate my way to Jodi Taylor's medical history and concentrate on unsealing those documents. I could shoulder my way into the appropriate state agency, pistol whip a couple of civil servants, and force them to hand over the documents. Of course, this method might get me shot or imprisoned, but wasn't that better than questioning women who called me Jeffrey? Of course, thirty-six-year-old documents would probably be buried under thirty-six years of more recent documents in an obscure state building long forgotten by any living person. You'd need Indiana Jones just to find the place.

I decided to think about it over lunch.

The Pig Stand was a white cinder block building with handwritten signs telling you what they offered and a couple of windows to order the food. The people on the sidewalk were mostly thin guys with cr+!pey skin and women with pale skin and loose upper arms from eating too much deep-fried food. Everybody was drinking Dixie beer and eating off paper plates and laughing a lot. Guess if you stand around eating barbecued ribs in this kind of heat you had to have a sense of humor.

An enormously wide black woman with brilliant white teeth looked out of the order window at me and said, "Take ya awdah, please?"

I said, "Do you have boudin?" I had wanted to try boudin for years.

She grinned. "Honey, we gots the best boudin in Evangeline Parish."

"That's not what they say in Mamou."