Sinners and Saints Outtake:

Yes, this is the outtake that is based on a story I heard in New Orleans. No porpoises were injured in the writing of this scene, although poor Bobby Lamartino himself was a victim of the editor’s ruthless pencil....

* * *

Jefferson Parish borders Orleans Parish to the west and south. Where Orleans Parish is comprised mostly of the meat of the city of New Orleans and Algiers, Jefferson Parish takes in not only its western suburbs like Metairie and Kenner, where the airport sits, but the west bank of the Mississippi from suburban Gretna all the way down the bayous and swamps to Grand Isle at the mouth of the river, about a two hour drive away.

The police of the two jurisdictions communicate well. There is the usual sense of superiority on both sides, as in any good police jurisdiction, but too much crime crosses parish boundaries for them to maintain a sense of separatism. Besides, many of the Jefferson Parish detectives once worked over in the districts just to the east.

There are official channels for sharing information: bulletins, meetings, official phone calls. But no channel is more efficient than hunting and fishing season.

It was how the New Orleans police found out about the body in the bayou.

Bobby Lamartino and his friend Francis Xavier Dulane went sea trout fishing. Bobby and Francis had a set ritual for sea trout fishing. They met in the parking lot of the Jefferson Parish detective bureau before dawn with a cooler of Black Voodoo beer and mufellatas and drove  Bobby's battered and muddied up old Ford Ranger down to Grand Isle where Francis kept his boat. And there they spent the day away from beepers and cell phones and bosses and democrats.

Bobby hated democrats. Democrats were the reason Bobby had a job. They were the ones who upped the ante on the kill count every season in his city. They took up almost all the space in the jail cells Bobby patrolled, and they fouled the back seat of his unit when he was transporting them. And since Bobby had to be all politically correct now, he couldn't call them anything but democrats. Bobby spent the first half hour of fishing just hollering about democrats.

Francis Xavier, a beer in hand and pole in the other, listened and nodded, even though the crime rate in Jefferson Parish, no more than a street separated from Orleans, was a tenth of what Bobby faced. Francis, after all, had run the vice department over at New Orleans for ten years before taking his retirement and signing up in the softer climes of Jefferson Parish. Francis knew all about democrats.

Then, when Bobby finally ran down, Francis would get in a word edgewise. It was the way the day worked.

Of course, when the recipient of the information Francis needed to impart was Bobby Lamartino and it was a fishing trip, the chance that the news would make it across parish lines was directly related to whether or not Bobby was trying to shoot a porpoise.

Bobby hated porpoises almost as much as he hated democrats. Democrats usually only shot other democrats. But porpoises tried to eat Bobby's sea trout. Usually right after Bobby had managed to get it secured to his line.

"You son of a bitch!" Bobby howled, expending all that bile he'd been saving up at work all week. "You see that, Francis? That bad boy is tryin' to eat my fish! Lazy bastard, get your own dinner!"

The porpoise seemed distinctly uninterested in Bobby's threats.

"So, it's over on Bayou Segnette," Francis drawled, sipping at his beer and watching Bobby go all mottled over the porpoise  that was stalking his fish. "One o' them swamp tours. Guide's showin' his passengers one o' them crosses in the water, how it was put there for his cousin Emile "Mudpuppy" Dufrene who met his doom late one night in the bayou when he made the unhappy mistake of mixing alcohol and alligators, and what do those people see but a rotting white hand floating up right by the cross. Damn near tipped the boat over taking photos." He shook his head mournfully. "I thought people went out there to see the wildlife."

"That is the wildlife," Bobby informed him, then jumped to his feet. The porpoise had made his move. "I have to execute that bad boy, Francis Xavier. Where's my piece?"

He was patting himself down like a suspect and hollering at the porpoise, who seemed to be grinning at him, which Francis thought was possible. It had been Francis himself who had locked Bobby's piece away in his glove compartment before they'd loaded the boat.

"Look at him! He laughin' at me, Francis! He doin' that damn porpoise dance! Look at him, singing, 'Bobby don' have his gun. Bobby don' have his gun.'"

Francis nodded complaisantly. "Probably a democrat porpoise."

"That's it!" Bobby howled, pulling up his empty line as the porpoise flashed a fin and disappeared. "Good thing I don't have my piece, you asshole! I'd put one right through your blowhole, see how happy you dance about that!"

He plopped back on his chair and sighed. "So you went to get that body?"

Francis nodded, perfectly used to how information was passed in this manner. "Probably the unluckiest murderer in the state. He shoot a young woman in the face and then dump her in the swamp thinkin' the gators'd take care of the rest, and there she gets stuck on a cross for the tour groups to find."

"Stupid democrat."

But Francis gave his head a slow shake. "Well, now, here's the thing. I don' think it was a democrat."

Bobby stopped retying his hook. "Why?"

"Cause he left this old girl's wedding set on. Big old emerald and diamond ring set. Right there on that white, fish-bitten hand."

That did get Bobby's attention. "No shit. A real emerald?"

"That's what they say."

"What do you think?"

Francis shrugged his democratic shoulders. "I think I wish the fish had left us fingerprints. The murderer sure didn't leave us a face."

Bobby was just about to return to his fishing line, when the information Francis had imparted finally sunk in past his outrage and alcohol.

A woman with no face and an emerald ring.

"Oh, Francis," he said, looking up. "Was she dressed like a nun, that body?"

"Was she what?"

Bobby knew that the minute he got back from fishing, he'd have to share this information with not only the Jefferson Parish detectives, but the Cold Case Detectives who handled any murders in the Eight District. Then he'd have to try and explain how he might have coded out this emerald-totin' dead woman when she was still dressed like a nun at a gay party in town. But first, he had to tell his friend Francis Xavier Dulane, who was in charge of homicide for Jefferson Parish.