A Crying Shame (8 page)

Yes, sir.” Joe looked pained at the sheriff's use of
shit-canned.” But then, Joe always looked pained about something. He stood in front of Mike's desk, waiting.

Joe?”

Sheriff?”

I don't suppose there is anything in the Bible about New Orleans' society women, is there?”

Joe opened his mouth to say that statement was just slightly blasphemous. He decided against it. Sheriff Saucier was one of them Catholics. Funny people.
No, sir.”

Mike looked relieved.
Wonderful.”

 

Fountain Parish lies just a few miles east of being dead center in the state of Louisiana. The Fain River separates the first area of heavy Cajun country from central Louisiana. Laclede is the parish seat of Fountain. It is an old parish, and a rich one. The parish is owned, almost lock, stock, and alligators by only a few families. No industry; sparsely populated; farmland. The Crying Swamp and five thousand acres around the dark place are owned by the Breaux family of New Orleans. Claude Breaux won the swamp in a poker game on a river boat back in 1822. Back then the name was Benoit. It was changed shortly after Claude Benoit shot Herbert Gourrier in the stomach in a duel over a woman and all twelve of Monsieur Gourrier's brothers came after Claude, vowing to hang him. That prompted old Claude to haul his ass out of New Orleans and head for the wilds of central Louisiana—way up north. 'Bout a hundred and fifty miles up and inland. Protestant country. Savage and untamed. Old Claude changed his name and the name has been Breaux ever since.

Paul Breaux, bachelor, and his sister, Linda, bacheloress, came to Fountain Parish to take over the farming operation at Despair Plantation, and to renovate the old home to the glory of its magnificent past. They lived in the house, staying mostly to themselves, rarely socializing. When they did feel the need for social endeavors, they went back to New Orleans, where—the statement is attributed to Linda—
There is more than a mere modicum of culture, quite unlike the barbaric activities that pass for mentally stimulating entertainment in Fountain.”

Needless to say, that remark did not endear Ms. Breaux to the hearts and minds of the good folk of Fountain Parish.

Linda and Alma—the dispatcher, or dispatcheress, of the Fountain Parish Sheriff's Department, four
P.M.
to midnight, Monday through Saturday—have not spoken, socially, since the afternoon Linda referred to Booger, Alma's husband, who, at the time, worked for Despair Plantation, as a
dim-witted, crotch-scratching, tobacco-chewing, cretinous buffoon.”

Which he was; and is—sort of.

Alma then responded by telling Ms. Breaux,
You are a snooty, uppity bitch who thinks you carry the crown jewels between your legs. And what you really need, Ms. Breaux, is a good stiff dick shoved in you.”

Bad blood thus ensued between the two.

But one must come to Linda's defense: there is a distinct lack of culture in Fountain. As a matter of fact, there isn't any culture in the parish. The nightclubs feature three types of music: adenoidal howlings emanating from under ten-gallon hats; throbbing jungle rhythms of soul; and screaming, mind-boggling sounds of rock and roll, all presented at a decibel level guaranteed to produce migraines within thirty seconds of entering the room.

One misguided but well-intentioned matronly patron of fine arts once brought in a well-known (outside of Fountain Parish) soprano to warble a few arias at the local library (a place one redneck's wife once referred to as the most useless building in the parish).

Five people were in attendance: the matronly patron, the librarian, the soprano, her pianist, and Whacker Jolson, one of Laclede's more notorious drunks. It is said that Whacker staggered out much more quickly than he stumbled into the library. He made his way to the nearest saloon, where, it is reported, he told his fellow imbibers:
They's a bunch of them damned Pentecostals down there at the library ... speakin' in tongues. It was awful. Gimme another drink and turn up the jukebox.”