The Trinity Game

to Tim and look for my hat. Can’t see you, but I’m guessing I’m somewhere around your two o’clock.”
    Daniel got around a woman pushing a stroller, worked his way forward, looking slightly to his right. It was wall-to-wall people, the entire width of Esplanade, covering sidewalks, roadway, and neutral ground.
    And here, on the edge of the French Quarter, the crowd had to navigate around the huge old oaks in the center of the road and the thinner trees planted at regular intervals along the sidewalks. The oaks provided a much-needed umbrella for shade—many in the crowd were verging on sunstroke as they arrived—but the same umbrella of branches and leaves also blocked Daniel’s view of the second-floor balconies, packed with people, many leaning out over the wrought iron railings to cheer the parade on and shower the revelers with colorful plastic beads.
    Lucien Drapeau could lob a grenade down from above and there’d be nothing anyone could do. But that didn’t sound like the kind of precision Pat had talked about. Daniel hoped Pat was right.
    He spotted the plastic green bowler and worked his way through the chaos up to Pat, walking a dozen feet ahead of Trinity, who had several men from Priestess Ory’s congregation and the angry man with the dreadlocks walking in formation, forming a protective box around him.
    Pat put a hand on Daniel’s shoulder and spoke directly into his ear as they walked. “Need to change tactics. Drapeau wouldn’t try to get up close in this crowd. He’s a professional, not a kamikaze.” He gestured toward the men surrounding Trinity and Ory. “We gonna have to take the chance that these guys will protect him from any crazies and focus on where Drapeau is most likely to be.”
    Daniel nodded. “Fine. You said Drapeau was a sniper.” He started walking faster.
    “Used to be.”
    “What’s the range? How far are we talking about?” Daniel broke into a jog, leaving the parade behind, and Pat stayed with him.
    “He could make the shot from twelve, fifteen-hundred meters, maybe more.”
    “We gotta get out from under the trees.” Daniel pointed at the sidewalk on the uptown side. “You take the buildings on that side.” He jogged over to the sidewalk on the left and continued toward the end of the road, toward the Mississippi River.
    The sidewalk was still crowded with spectators, but not packed the way it was in the midst of the parade, and Daniel could maintain a quick walk, weaving around people, keeping his eyes up, scanning the balconies as best he could.
    He pressed the talk button. “Got nothing here, almost at the last block—”
    His gaze stopped on the profile of a man, about six-four, wearing running shoes, jogging shorts, and a red mesh muscle shirt,terrycloth wristbands and headband. Bald head. He quickened his pace, lost sight of the jogger, pushed his way around a fat man and through a group of college kids…and found the jogger again, a little farther down the street.
    Daniel broke into a fast walk. “Pat, I think I see Drapeau. Head my way.” Closer now, he could see the man’s head had that distinctive bullet shape and his ears were small. The man turned his way. No eyebrows.
    They locked eyes. Lucien Drapeau’s expression remained dispassionate, not even a twitch of emotion, but Daniel could see the spark of recognition, and then something in Drapeau’s eyes went out, like a switch had been flipped in his head, and he took off at a dead run.
    Daniel took off after him. His earpiece came alive and Pat said, “I see him! Hauling ass down Barry Street, away from the Quarter, red tank top!”
    “I know,” yelled Daniel, not bothering with the radio. They converged at Barry Street and got past the spectators and ran flat out, down the center of the street.
    Drapeau’s lead was just half a block, but he darted right, disappearing from view, into the courtyard of the Melrose Housing Project.
    Two rectangular redbrick apartment buildings, each four stories tall, faced each other across the courtyard, and a third formed a back wall to the compound. The buildings had never reopened after Katrina and were awaiting demolition. The government had installed metal shutters over all the ground-floor windows and padlocked the doors.
    In the center of the courtyard, four old men sat on crates, listening to a portable radio and passing a bottle in a paper bag.One of the old men turned his bleary gaze toward Daniel and, without saying a word, pointed