Mr. Clarinet

"Yes, sort of, but not quite," Eloise said. "Monsieur Carver didn't know anything about bauxite mining, so he brought the Dominicans in as partners anyway."

"And, seeing the success he'd had, and probably working out that pedophiles are an elite little group who tend to know each other, he started providing the Dominican or his 'friends' with fresh 'supplies'?" Max followed on.

"That's correct."

"And these 'friends' were either businessmen who Carver could cut deals with or connected to the kinds of people who could help him expand his empire?"

"That's it."

"So, he got them children and they gave him contracts and money in exchange?" Max asked.

"And—most importantly—more connections—others like them, or others not like them—very very powerful people. Monsieur Carver acquires people. It's how he built his business empire into what it is—and not just here, in Haiti. He has interests all over the world."

She stopped talking and opened up the handkerchief in her lap and folded it, very neatly, from left to right, into a triangle, which she doubled up to make another. She smoothed out the surface of the shape, admired it, and undid it, working backwards.

"But there's more to it than just money and clout, isn't there?" he resumed. "The sweet dirt he has on them, these high-up, powerful people? He must have enough to bury them ten times over. He owns them. He has power over them. They're his slaves. He tells them to jump, they ask 'how high?' Right?"

Eloise nodded.

"What about Allain Carver?" Paul looked at Eloise. "Is he involved in this?"

"Allain? No. Never!" She smirked and then sniggered.

"What's so funny?" Max stared at her. Her smirk was irritating the hell out of him—it was the I-know-better look teachers had.

"Monsieur Carver called Allain his 'dickter'—daughter with a dick. He said if he'd known Allain would turn out a faggot, he would have given him away to one of his clients—for free." She laughed.

"Fancy that," Paul cut her off. "He thinks gays are perverts but pedophiles aren't."

She tried and failed to hold his look. She went back to her handkerchief, which she rolled, like pastry, into a cylinder.

"So Allain didn't know anything?" Max picked up again.

"I didn't know anything about it, Max," Paul said. "I believe her. I know Allain. He doesn't even know about most of his father's legitimate businesses. I've got the inside track, remember? Gustav kept this one really secret. To be doing something like that in a place this small—and still keep it secret. That takes some doing. And to keep it so hidden that even I haven't heard about it…"

"Everyone was implicated," Eloise said. "That's why no one spoke about it. And with his connections, if something ever did look like it was going to get out…"

"He'd crush it into nothing," Paul finished.

Max thought about Allain. Unless he found evidence that completely exonerated him, Max decided he'd interrogate him about what he did and didn't know, all the same, just to be sure.

"Tell me about Noah's Ark."

"No one suspected a thing. Everyone thought it was just a simple charity—and it was, for the wrong children."

"What do you mean by 'wrong children'?"

"The surplus—and the ones that didn't get sold."

"Where did they end up?"

"Monsieur Carver found jobs for them."

"Nothing wasted." Max looked at Paul. Paul's face was rigid, his jaws clamped shut, his lips pressed tightly together. From the way he was standing, six-fingered hands half-formed into fists, Max knew he was getting ready to blow. He hoped he'd have time to get everything out of Eloise before Paul tore her head off.

"When did you start 'grooming' the children?"

"I must have been fifteen or sixteen. Monsieur Carver was very proud of me. He called me. I was his favorite." She smiled, her eyes tearing up and at the same time glowing with a cold, burning pride.

"Monsieur Carver already knew something about vodou potions, the ingredients that go into making the serum they give to people to turn them into zombies. He'd studied up on all that kind of stuff. He's a trained hypnotist, you know. He told me he'd always worked on children—poor slum kids."

"How? Sexually?"

"He taught them manners."

"So was it Carver's idea to take these rough kids and shape them—'groom them'—into obedient sex slaves with perfect table manners, so they'd pass in those upper circles?"

"Yes. No one buys a half-finished car."

"Is he still doing it? Hypnotizing kids?"

"Once in a while, yes, but he's passed his skills on to people in La Gonâve."