The smoldering remains of the roadside motel reflected in the silvery shades of Sheriff DuPont. Under the early morning hours, as the sun slowly crept towards its high zenith and the dew blanketed the greenery, the air reeked of putrified swamp and charred wood. The lawman stood with fists to his waist and slight gut poking over his trousers. He sniffled a bit. Then scratched his cheek. The fire department was wrapping up and was fixin to depart. The old man was milking the medical attention and police investigation for all it’s worth. “I’m tellin ya, the man was a monk! Or a ninja! I’ve seen this before! In Okinawa, ya see!” he explained to Deputy Chaz.
Chaz was understandably skeptical. “Uh huh. And what about those other two fellas?”
“Goddamn those two fellas. A couple of queers. Either that or brothers.”
“So you’re telling me a couple of queers checked in, got into a firefight with a ninja. Then a car exploded which is what caused the fire. And you managed to chase these fellas off by cutting loose your M16?”
“Yessir! That’s exactly what happened!”
“Now Earl, just how the hell did you get your hands on an M16?” The Sheriff butted in.
“By god, I’ve kept it since my fightin days!”
“This is an M16A2 model,” the sheriff continued. “The Marine Corps only started using it this year! You and I both know that when you was in Iwo Jima, you used an M1!”
“Hell!” the old man brushed off.
“Hellfire, Earl. The recoil on these things are really something. You need to be more careful in your advanced age!”
“Sheriff, I can still shoot the pecker off a buck from 500 yards!”
“Get your ass outta here!” DuPont shouted, handing him back his weapon.
The old man stumbled off and Chaz pulled a lighter and a cigarette from his shirt pocket and offered one to the sheriff. DuPont declined, opting for a wad of Copenhagen in his lower lip. They spat and smoked as they considered the blackened rubble laid before them. “That old man is full of shit,” Chaz said. “I personally think it’s a good thing this rat trap finally got burnt to hell.”
“Yup.”
“What have you found out?”
“Welp, they reckon it was two fires instead of one that caused this mess.”
“Two fires?”
“Yessir. One in the room on the far end and another from the car explosion.”
“The old man said nuthin about a room fire.”
“Yup. That one appeared to have been caused by gasoline. The other un, under that car, that was probably C4.”
“C4?! Jesus sheriff!”
DuPont nodded and spat. He gnawed a little on the tobacco and thought. “Say Chaz, do you remember those fires off in Moorhouse Parish in about ‘67 or ‘68? They all seemed to have been centered around the house of that judge they have out there in Mer Rouge.”
“Hell, I was still in grade school then.”
“Yeah. I seem to recall the old folks staying away from that town. They called it a lake of fire. Maybe they were kidding, but I always reckoned that’s why they called it Mer Rouge.”
The deputy shrugged. “Do you want me to contact the Moorhouse Sheriff? Tell em we might have some bad dudes on the loose?”
“No. Leave that to me.”
TO BE CONTINUED…