How many other surprises would the bare-all book reveal?
Luigi refitted his hearing aid. Red splotches the size of Glenda’s leopard spots covered his face and neck. “My late cousin’s kid, Nicky, used to hang out at that club.” He pulled a picture from his suit pocket. “You know him?”
Glenda eyed the photo. “I don’t remember him. But I’m semi-retired, and I have so many fans it’s hard to keep track.”
I rolled my eyes.
“Too bad, because he could use a head doctor.” He pocketed the picture. “If we find him, I’ll hire you to talk to him.”
I collapsed onto the couch. It was all really too much.
Veronica cleared her throat. “Luigi, we saw the article about Nick in this morning’s paper. Would you like to move to a conference room to talk in private?”
He scrunched his wide, flat nose and waved off the notion. “Nah, Nicky’s troubles are common knowledge.” He paused, and his small, dark eyes watered. “He lost his mom when he was young and got mixed up with a bunch of hooligans who introduced him to booze and drugs. He’s been in and out of jail ever since. Petty crime stuff.”
I looked at my lap. Losing a mother was a tough break, and not one that every kid could process. “When did you last see him?”
“At my cousin’s funeral five years ago. But I’m all he’s got left, so he calls me from time to time, usually when he needs money. Four days ago, he sent me this text.” He pulled a cell phone from his suit pocket and tapped the screen.
I took the phone and looked pointedly at Nonna, silently reprimanding her for not owning one of her own. “Galliano gold.” I handed the phone to Veronica and looked at Luigi. “Does that phrase mean anything to you?”
“At first, I thought it was drunken rambling, maybe a drink name. You know, like Galliano with gold tequila or Goldschläger.”
It was plausible.
“Then I searched on the Google and found the steamboat.”
I shot my nonna another silent reprimand. Luigi also knew how to use the internet, although he wasn’t as savvy with the terminology.
Veronica returned the phone to Luigi. “I see you didn’t reply to his text. Did you try to call him?”
“I’ve been trying to reach him since I got it. Yesterday I went to the steamboat, but no one was there, so I showed his picture to a guy at the ticket pavilion.” He pressed his fingers to his forehead. “I can’t think of his name, but Carmela and I talked to him again today.”
I looked at Nonna, who stuck to the statue routine. “Was he eating a po’ boy?”
Luigi nodded. “You know him?”
“Yeah, Marv.”
He snapped knobby fingers. “That’s right. Anyways, he saw Nicky board the Galliano the same day I got the text, but he never saw him get off. That’s when I called the police.”
Veronica reached for a pad of paper and a pen on the coffee table. “And what have they done to find him?”
“Not a damn thing. They think he’s on a bender.”
It was a fair conclusion given Nick’s background. “Then how did the newspaper learn about his disappearance?”
“I called a reporter to get the word out.”
The office door flew open, and David entered. His eyes darted from Nonna to me as his foot hung suspended in mid-air.
I lowered my lids and jerked forward, and he pivoted on the one leg and ran out.
Veronica glowered at me.
But I settled into the cushions, satisfied. David was free to investigate me for Nonna, just as I was free to torment him for it. “Luigi, was Nick a gambler?”
“Yeah, and he had a lot of gambling debts. Why?”
“The current owner and captain of the Galliano is a gambler named Rex Vandergrift. Maybe Nick went to the boat to see him.”
He shook his head. “If you ask me, this has something to do with the original captain, Giacomo Galliano.”
“Isn’t he long dead?”
“Yes, in ’25. But legend has it that he stole some of the missing Civil War gold and hid it on the steamboat.”
I looked at Veronica. The case had gotten a lot more interesting. “There’s missing Civil War gold?”
“Sure. Coins and bullion from the Confederate Treasury. And there were silver coins and jewelry too. It was all loaded onto a train in Richmond in 1865, the day before the Union Army forced General Lee’s surrender at Appomattox, and then it disappeared.”
The incident reminded me of a case I’d worked that was linked to the Nazi theft of the Amber Room. “How would a steamboat captain get Civil War gold?”
“Galliano fought for the Army of the Two Sicilies against Giuseppe Garibaldi and his thousand men, and he was one of several Sicilian troops who were transported to New Orleans to fight for the Confederacy. Search it on the Google.”
My head was spinning from all the G names—and from the image of gold that I visualized myself finding on the steamboat. “I’ll take your word for it.”
Veronica tapped a pen against her lip. “Besides the Confederate treasure, is there anything else Nick might’ve meant by the gold reference?”
Luigi held up his palms. “It’s got to be that missing gold. A couple of weeks ago I told Nicky that I wasn’t going to give him any more money to support his habits. My guess is he got stoned on alcohol or drugs and got the cockamamie idea to go to the Galliano to look for it.” His eyes met mine. “I owe it to my cousin to find him, and I need your help.”
Veronica turned to me, and Nonna gave me her do-it-or-else-a glare.
“Whaddaya say, Franki?” Luigi pulled out his wallet. “I’ll make it worth your while.”
It felt awkward taking money from my nonna’s sitting-and-staring partner. Then again, he did have a Lambo. “Of course I’ll help. Can I have that picture of Nick?”
“It’s yours.”
I rose to retrieve the photo. “Just to cover all the bases, did Nick have any enemies that you know of?”
Luigi’s jaw set. “Maybe the mob.”
I stumbled backwards and bounced onto the couch. That not-so-minor detail should have been disclosed before I’d accepted the case. “What makes you say that?”
“Those gambling debts I mentioned.”
Veronica’s eyes had gone wide and stayed that way. “Did he gamble at a Mafia-run establishment? Or did he borrow from them to cover debts he’d accrued somewhere else?”
“I couldn’t tell ya.” Luigi rubbed his chin. “But Marv got uneasy when I told him Nicky was missing. He said it might not be related, but he wanted me to know that the Galliano’s chef is a shady character.”
Veronica frowned. “I don’t understand.”
After a run-in with a crazed, knife-wielding chef at Christmas, I did. “He’s not French, is he?”
“It’s a Sicilian. Alfredo Scalino.”
The tense quiet that fell over the room was on par with omertà, the Mafia code of silence.
My head spun again with another G name—Gigi “The G-Man” Scalino, brother to Alfredo and one of the most vicious crime bosses ever to darken the streets of New Orleans.
“Well, if it ain’t my second-favorite PI.” Marv leaned close to the purchase window of the Where Dat Tours ticket pavilion, his pudgy face and bald scalp reminiscent of Danny DeVito. “No offense or nothin’, but Jim Rockford will always be first.”
I half-smiled. “I used to watch The Rockford Files with my parents, so I’m okay with taking a backseat to James Garner.”
“Speakin’ o’ backseats, you oughta trade your Mustang for a real muscle car like his Pontiac Firebird. You gotta get that gold.”
Get that gold. Is that what Nick had tried to do?
Marv bit into a fried shrimp po’ boy dripping brown gravy and tucked the bite into a cheek. “Hey, you need tickets? You’ve got time to catch the three o’clock torture tour or the one at the Museum of Death.”
My stomach wobbled like I was on the boat. The fried seafood and tar odors didn’t mix with t
he gruesome nature of New Orleans tours. “I’m on the clock. My client is Luigi Pescatore, the elderly man who showed you a picture of his missing relative, Nick.”
“Ah, yeah.” He dropped his sandwich. “I saw him out here again this morning with some dame.”
My head retracted. I told Veronica that Nonna’s gray dress was scandalous.
“I wish I coulda helped him more, but I only saw Nick go on the boat.”
“About what time was that?”
“Six p.m. on the nose. I remember because that’s when my po’ boy was supposed to be delivered.” He gave a sly smile. “Fried catfish.”
My eyes narrowed at the smile and catfish reference. Did he know I was the so-called bag lady at the river this morning?
“I closed at midnight that night, and I never saw him get off.”
I understood why the police hadn’t looked for Nick. He could have gotten off the Galliano when Marv wasn’t looking or after he’d left. “Luigi said you mentioned an employee meeting that same day?”
“At seven that night.”
“Nick could’ve still been on the boat at that time.” I leaned against the counter. “Is there any chance he was an employee?”
“I asked the captain about that, but he said he’s never heard of the guy.”
I glanced at the Galliano. “Is Captain Vandergrift here now?”
“He’s out of town until tomorrow, but you’re not going to get any information out of him.” He tapped his temple. “That one’s a real screwball. Dresses and talks like he’s from another time.”
I had a bad flashback to Pam, Marv’s aging hippie tour guide who’d helped me with the vampire case.
“Your best bet’s to go undercover like Rockford. I can get you a job on the boat.”
I imagined myself holding a clipboard like Julie, the cruise director from The Love Boat. “Thanks, but I don’t even know if there’s been a crime yet. What I need is to find a way to get onboard so I can look around.”
“Why didn’t you say so? We’re going to offer tours, so I’ve got a spare key.”
Apparently, The Rockford Files hadn’t taught Marv much about investigations. “Can you let me on now?”
“Sure, but I doubt you’ll find that missing guy.” He pulled a set of keys from a drawer. “He’s probably sleeping with the catfishes.”
Again with the catfish. “What did you mean by that?”
“It’s a mob sayin’, but I added a river theme on account o’ Gigi Scalino. You heard o’ him?”
“Yeah, his clan’s into everything from drugs to prostitution.”
“Know why they call him the G-Man?”
I shrugged. “Because the G stands for money?”
“No, and it don’t stand for government, neither.” Marv leaned so close to the ticket slot that his lips almost protruded. “It’s for gutter, as in he rips out the guts of his enemies.”
My entrails clung to one another.
“Everyone knows that his brother Alfredo, who just happens to be a chef, helps him butcher his victims.” He raised a bushy brow. “And guess who the captain hired to work the galley?”
Alfredo was certainly a suspicious hire, but I didn’t have any evidence that Nick was dead, much less that the Scalinos had killed him. “If Nick is missing, it might not be mob related. My client thinks he was looking for some gold that Giacomo Galliano stole during the Civil War.”
He grimaced. “Nothin’ but a legend. Talk to the folks at the Confederate Memorial Hall; they’ll tell you.”
“I will.”
Marv exited the pavilion.
I followed him up the sidewalk to the Galliano. “When was the last time you saw anyone on the boat?”
“Apart from the captain yesterday morning, not since the employee meetin’.” Marv stepped on the gangplank and bounce-walked across.
I followed behind, grasping the railing and looking at the Mississippi ten feet or so below. Was Nick Pescatore down in the brown water? Or had he left the Galliano some other way? “Marv, did you see the captain carry anything off the boat?”
He pointed the keys at me. “Ooh, you mean with a body inside. He had an overnight bag, but that was too small to carry a dead guy. Maybe he chopped it up into pieces and fed it to the catfishes.” He laughed and put a hand on his belly. “Like how I did that?”
My eyes narrowed again. Marv was lucky he’d already crossed the gangplank, or I might’ve pushed him off.
He unlocked the door to the main deck cabin. “Let me know when you’re done, and I’ll lock up.”
“You’re not going to show me around?”
“I ain’t going in there.”
“C’mon, Marv. It’s huge.”
He headed for the gangplank. “Two hundred and sixty feet long with three decks and forty-four staterooms. And every one of them’s haunted.”
“Don’t tell me you believe your own ghost tours.”
“They’re a bunch o’ hooey.” He turned and met my gaze. “But twice when I stayed late for the midnight vampire tour, I heard a guy scream and then a smacking sound, like a body hitting somethin’ hard and wet. Same thing both times, and it came from the boat.”
I thought of the sailor who’d been thrown into the stern by the paddlewheel, and then I shook him out of my head. “Someone’s obviously pranking you.”
“Yeah, a ghost. Now I gotta get back to the booth, so be careful. Who knows what’s lurking in that thing?” He shot a sideways look at the steamboat and hurried across the gangplank.
On that forbidding note, I stepped inside the Galliano.
“The Love Boat this is not,” I muttered as I took in the décor. Instead of a fun cruise-ship interior, the steamboat looked like a combination of a low-rent Titanic and a rundown Vegas casino—complete with the odors of mildew, stale sweat, and broken dreams.
Grimy windows lined wood-paneled walls with tarnished brass fixtures. Above each window was a panel of Tiffany-style glass in brown, green, and peach that matched the worn floral carpeting. In the center of the room, a dusty crystal chandelier hung above a grand staircase. On either side of the staircase were rows of gambling tables—poker, blackjack, craps, and a couple of roulette wheels. In the back of the room was an old wooden bar.
Because of what Marv had told me about Chef Alfredo Scalino’s Mafia ties, I decided to search the galley. Assuming it was on the main deck, I made my way to double doors beside the bar. A plaque on the wall read Huck Finn Dining Hall, an inauspicious moniker that evoked foods with corn in the name, like corned beef, corn pone, and corn dodgers.
The dining room was brighter, but no less sad and spooky. The wood paneling had been painted a dingy yellow, as had the tin ceiling, and the windows were covered in faded floral chintz drapes. Oddly, the tables had full place settings of glassware, silverware, and gold-rimmed china, as though a phantom dinner were taking place.
The wood floor creaked behind me.
I did a 180. “Marv?”
Silence.
“The boat’s old, and it’s on the water. Of course it creaks.” But my self-reassurance did little to help because I couldn’t shake the image of tables full of ghost diners. When it came to spirits, I was a non-believer—until those suckers started acting up.
With my nerves jumping like that catfish I’d caught, I jogged across the dining hall and peered behind a door marked Staff Only.
I’d found the galley. It was a gray room with a few portholes, a brown tile floor, and a large chopping block in the center. Stainless steel stoves and ovens were on the left, and shelves for pots and pans were on the right, as was an unmarked door next to a hallway. Along the back wall were three commercial-sized refrigerator-freezers and a first aid kit.
Foreboding spread throughout my body like an oil spill.
I knew what I had to do.
Without giving myself time to change my mind, I walked over to the refrigerators and yanked open the first one.
Then the next.
And
the one after.
All empty.
I let out the breath I’d been holding.
My gaze drifted to the unmarked door. I turned toward it, and a rush of air propelled me forward.
I did a full 360, paddlewheel style. “If that’s you, Marv, it’s not funny.”
No one was in the room.
I thought about those ghosts again but came up with a more convincing, not to mention more comforting, explanation. “Old boats are drafty.”
The foreboding turned to fear when I gripped the door handle. I turned the knob and kicked open the door.
It was a pantry.
I switched on the light and stiffened. A long white chest freezer was against the back wall.
Transfixed, I went to the freezer and lifted the lid.
Nick Pescatore smiled up at me from a seated position with a queen of spades playing card in his hand. He’d been frozen long enough for a thin layer of frost to form on his face.
4
The gangplank buckled with each pounding footstep, but I didn’t stop running. I wanted to get off the Galliano and get to a payphone to make an anonymous tip. To find out who killed Nick Pescatore, I was going to have to take Marv up on the job offer and go undercover, so no one on the steamboat could know I’d found the body.
My feet landed on the riverbank, and I veered toward the ticket pavilion, which had a few customers. “Marv!”
He looked up.
“Lock the boat!” I made a neck-slicing motion.
The muscles in his face went slack as though they’d been cut.
And I kept running.
There was no urgency. Nick was subzero. He wasn’t going to defrost and come back to life. But the horror of what I’d seen had made my feet flee, and the rest of my body tried to keep up.
I ran through Washington Artillery Park to Jackson Square and downshifted to a jog for the two blocks to Bourbon Street. My feet might’ve been afraid, but I was no athlete, and the quasi death rattle coming from my chest confirmed my assessment.
Weaving through the minefield of beaded and boa-ed partiers carrying drinks in plastic cups, I made my way to the Tropical Isle bar to use one of the city’s few remaining payphones.
Galliano Gold (Franki Amato Mysteries Book 5) Page 4