PI On A Hot Tin Roof

attention, but it turned out the man was talking about shrimp. “Hell, we believe in y’all,” Royce said. “Louisiana wild-caught shrimp’s the best in the world.”
    “That what they callin’ it now?”
    “Branding, Tom. It’s called branding. Only way to compete.”
    “Well, I leave that to you marketing geniuses. All I know, Mr. Brad and Judge Buddy take damn good care of us. What few of us we got left.”
    “Hey, Tom, we don’t want to see shrimping die out in this state any more than you do. How much product you figure you can supply us with?”
    “Oh, couple thousand pounds every three days or so. We stay out about that long. Maybe more, we get lucky.” Royce nodded and shook. “Done deal. We can use ’em.” He waved good-bye to Tom and got on his cell phone, looking out over the water, acting as if he were on vacation.
    “Hey, Randy, this is Royce Champagne—you know, from Jesse Partee’s? Well, I’m not working for Jesse any more. Yeah. Yeah, I’m over at my daddy’s place.”
    Talba was on the hosing part now, and it was harder to hear, but a phrase came through now and then. “We can afford it ’cause we’re doing a volume business. Lots of Jesse’s customers are coming over to us—that’s the reason I left.”
    And then, “Oh, come on, Randy, you don’t want to do that. Nice place like yours, you don’t want to serve that inferior chink stuff.” He listened a few minutes. “Well, I’m telling you you can’t afford
not
to.” Pause. “No, that’s not a threat. I’m talking quality here.”
    It went on like that for a while, but it didn’t sound to Talba as if he’d made a deal.
    Royce hung up, swore, and tried again, pacing up and down the dock, staring at pelicans and gulls, acting like he thought he was important. And striking out, Talba was pretty sure.
    His voice was getting louder and louder; nastier and nastier. Some salesman. And then suddenly, it sounded like he was talking to a woman. “Hey, there, darlin’, what are you doin’ here? You’re way too cute to be hangin’ around a place like this.”
    Oh, right, whoever she was, she was definitely going to go for that. Talba glanced his way, just to get an idea of what Royce’s idea of cute was, but she didn’t see anybody. He was down on his knees.
    “Come on now. Come on, don’t run away. Hey, Eddie, head him off!”
    Him?
Talba thought, and something jumped off the dock and disappeared in the bushes.
    “Damn! He’ll starve to death. You see him? Looked like he hadn’t eaten in a week.”
    “Did I see what?”
    “Little calico kitten. Cutest thing you ever saw—tiny black nose in a snow white face. Wonder where his mother is?”
    This was a side of Royce she hadn’t suspected.
    “I’m gonna leave some shrimp out for him. Anybody’s got enough, it’s us.”
    She left to find a place to dump the trash, then spent two more hours downstairs at the Champagne house, trying to make it presentable for a party. She wasn’t doing too badly as a maid, she thought on the way home, but detecting was another matter—she was no closer than ever to finding any evidence connecting Buddy to Angie’s drugs.
    That night Miz Clara taught her how to make shrimp étoufée. Talba figured that was appropriate.
    And something good happened the next day. Judge Champagne didn’t go to work—simply played truant, to all appearances. Stayed in his office and talked on the phone. She couldn’t wait to get home and listen to her tapes. Adele was out doing errands again, Kristin and Royce were working, and Suzanne had a yoga class followed by a massage.
    It was a good day to impress Buddy with her étoufée, and she didn’t even have to make it—she’d brought in the sample batch she’d made with Miz Clara, after first saving some for their dinner Friday. But she did make bread pudding for dessert, one of her own specialties.
    Before lunch, though, she had to get Adele’s and Lucy’s rooms in shape. She’d been slowly working on Adele’s, but she’d barely been in Lucy’s except to make the bed. She might as well try to sort out some of the clothes strewn all over the floor. Most of them went into the hamper in the bathroom, but there were a couple of jackets that needed hanging up.
    On a shelf in the closet, she noticed a box marked with a skull and crossbones and a simple, enticing legend: lucy’s. keep out. Maybe there was a diary in it. For all she knew, Lucy’d overheard a conversation she