“For kickin’ him out, and causin’ people to think he was more of a charlatan than an actual priest, he cursed all her chickens dead. They just up and died the same night. The next mornin’, da maggots already had ‘em and da meat couldn’t be saved. So, in return, she cursed his mule to come up lame and it tripped and fell on his favorite dog and killed it.”
“Fascinating,” Armand said.
“Yeah, well it wasn’t so fascinatin’ when da children got killed.”
“Oh my. I had no idea.”
“Yeah, that’s when it got really bad. John was so mad about his dog and mule, he up and cursed her oldest boy with consumption and he died right in Marie’s arms; wasted away in under a month I heard, despite everything she tried to do. He thought he’d knocked her off her throne with that—he was none too happy with people sayin’ she was da Queen of Voodoo anyway, you see. But all he did was call up da black streak in her.”
“The black streak?”
“Yeah, she did good to hide it most times—control it really—but she just couldn’t hold it back when he cursed her son dead.
“She waited, month after month, thinkin’ about what to do. All da time, John crowin’ like da Cock a da Rock, sayin’ how he’d taught her a lesson. That was, until she sent the Pox down on his oldest daughter and him, but it wasn’t—“
“Smallpox? But wasn’t that very common at the time?”
“I didn’t say it was da smallpox, Frenchy. John’s oldest thought she was da Daisy of da Field. Mean damn girl the way I heard it. Always tellin’ people her daddy was gonna curse ‘em and such. Threatenin’ all da boys—especially Marie’s oldest. Anyway, Marie finally fixed ‘em both. She cursed ‘em with horse pox.”
Frank whistled his chagrin as Armand searched for a reference.
“Horse herpes, Frenchy,” she finally said. “Big ol’ pus-filled blisters that just kept comin’ back. On both of ‘em. Town folks were sure there was only one way you could get horse herpes, and teased that poor girl to no end. It finally drove her mad, and she couldn’t even look at herself in the mirror. Wandered off into da swamp and could be heard wailin’ of a lonesome night. Some say that John would leave food out for her, but she never came back to da house, only wandered da swamp until she just disappeared one day. Left John to think about her every time he looked in his own mirror and saw the pox on himself.
“So, after that, they stayed out of each other’s way. That is until he got bound to da spirit, then he couldn’t control himself anymore. He was less man then, and more spirit, but it was da spirit controllin’ him. Marie da one had to put him down.”
Mama Dedé stopped and sipped her coffee. The others sat silently as they absorbed the fascinating story.
Armand said, “Pardon me for asking, but there are some things that are… confusing me. So, I had heard about the feud, and several other details, but most of this came from the historical research I’ve done on the topic. However, you refer to most of your story as something you have heard. John and Marie lived over a hundred years ago. Surely there is no one around claiming to have firsthand knowledge of these stories.”
“No, I doubt there’d be anyone still alive what saw these things.”
“Then how—”
“People don’t have to be livin’ to talk.”
“You mean…” Armand started. His mind spun from the realization of what Mama Dedé was saying.
“Yeah, I hear from Marie from time to time, when I’m trancin’, you know. Been a long time, though. She been quiet a long time now. But that how I know she da one put him down when he got bound.”
“That’s another thing,” Armand said. “You said he got bound. Bound to what? Then, you said she had to put him down. What does that mean?”
A hard gust of wind rattled the house and the candle flames cowered. Agitated shadows emerged from deep corners, then retreated.
“Da way I hear, John thought he had da spirit under control—that da spirit that taught him how to shape—and John thinkin’ he was so tricky, he was gonna make that spirit do his biddin’, and fix Marie once and for all. But it was da spirit that was trickier than John. I guess it liked it when John shaped into a gator, and one day just bound him tight, only da shapin’ hadn’t gone all da way, you see. John was part man and part gator, and had already bound himself to the spirit, and da spirit just stuck him tight. In that form, havin’ da mind of a man and animal, he just went mad. People say you could hear him howlin’ crazy in the swamps at night; growlin’ and gnashin’ about. Lots of people got et up during that time. They said if you only got your head et up, then it was ol’ John trying to get himself back right.”
“Get himself back right?”
“Yeah, he was tryin’ to become more man than animal, by eatin’ up people’s brains.”
“Jesus, Mary and Joseph,” Frank groaned as he stared at Armand.
Del sat in quiet disbelief as she rubbed her forehead where a dull pain had settled behind her eye.
“So how exactly did Marie put him down?” Armand asked.
“Well, after da killin’ and eatin’ of heads got so bad, people was comin’ to Marie askin’ for gris to keep da damn thing away. See, they used to call him da Gris-gris man, but he wasn’t a man anymore, really. At least not in the sense that we think. When you’re doin’ that black business, da old magic seeps into your soul and changes you. After a while, you just become something different and can’t go back to how you started.
“So, when it got bad like that, she called up some men to set about trappin’ him. Kinda like they do wild hogs. They figured if they couldn’t catch him when he was in spirit form, maybe they could catch him in his physical shape, assumin’ he was still stuck tight. Sure enough, one day they all come a runnin’, yellin’ they’d trapped him. Marie had been—“
“Excuse me for interrupting again,” Armand said, “but what did he look like?”
She deftly balanced her coffee cup onto its edge with a thick finger and looked at him. “Frenchy, you got an unhealthy fixation with this story, if you ask me.”
A flash of alarm went through his eyes as he looked from her face to the cup and back.
“Purely academic, I assure you,” he said.
She watched the look of concern slowly leave his face. The sparkling eyes of the enigmatic professor returned.
“By da point they trapped him, I hear he was part man, part gator, and part boar. He never gave up tryin’ to get unstuck from da one form and damn near got out of it. Don’t ask me how. Maybe by eatin’ up brains that weren’t human, but he had turned into an abomination.
“Anyway, Marie had been trancin’ off and on for days and somehow, she figured out the unbinding spell. She went down to da swamp edge and unbound him right in da cage. When the spirit got unbound from the body, it flew off in the swamp in a flash of blue light. But he had been bound for so long, there wasn’t much of da man left and he kinda… fell apart right in the cage. I hear they took the parts of him that was man and gave him a proper burial. The other parts that fell off, they threw ‘em back in da swamp.”
With a pale look Frank asked, “They threw ‘em in da swamp? What were da gator parts dat fell off?”
“Skin and teeth mostly.”
The group sat in silence once again as the wind moaned its opinion. The house seemed to remember the story, and its windowpanes rattled like nervous teeth.
“I don’t know what to think,” Del said, breaking the silence. “I… I just don’t know.”
“You feelin’ OK?” Frank said. “You been rubbin’ on your head a lot.”
“Just a headache is all. This whole idea gives me a headache.”
“So, are we now saying,” Armand began, “that we believe he has come back? The Gris-gris man? Are we saying he’s been reanimated?”
“Don’t know about reanimated,” Mama Dedé said, “’cause there was nothin’ left of him. Maybe he got called back and rebound somehow—I mean the spirit. Maybe someone c
alled that hellish spirit back and bound it again.”
“Hellish spirit, indeed,” Armand said, tapping a grimoire. “But which spirit are we speaking of? The original that John called up? Or the spirit of John himself?”
“Don’t know. Maybe they got mixed up with all da bindin’ John was doin’. But don’t think we only talkin’ ‘bout one spirit. Before John got stuck, people say he had created some bad things, and those spirits—sort of like a fifolet I guess—would hang around and follow him of a night. Ghostly lights floatin’ off around him. They say he could talk to ‘em, even when he wasn’t shapin’.
Del sat straight up in her chair. The candlelight cast harsh lines of fear upon her face.
“What is it, honey?” Frank asked.
“My dream,” she said slowly, “from last night. After we read the grimoires, I had this really strange dream and—”
“Oh lawd! You read da books!” Mama Dedé exclaimed. “What’s wrong with you two?” She glared at Frank and Armand. “Lettin’ her read these books! Now listen, you got to know, da Gris-gris man is as bad as they come. I don’t know if John started off like that, but after he raised that spirit, and got changed, he was all evil. You cain’t be readin’ things you don’t understand! Now, what about this dream?”
Del quickly explained the dream of the fifolets, the woman, the snake and the abominations.
Mama Dedé made the sign of the cross, then put her hands flat on the table. “Oh lawd, we got to work fast now. And Del honey, you got to stay in this house ‘til we figure out what we’re gonna do.”
“What do you mean?” she asked. “I still don’t understand how this has anything to do with me!”
“He knows who you are,” Mama Dedé said. “Or at least, he knows where you came from. Somehow, he’s come back, and I’m afraid he knows you’re here. He may not know where you’re at exactly, but he can sense you. Them damn spirits of his can sense you.”
“I’m sorry, but I don’t believe any of this! And even if I did, why would he know about me?”
“Because of who you are honey! There’s lots in your past you don’t know, but I’m afraid he can sense you ‘cause of who you are.”
“And who would that be?” Del asked. “An orphan girl who—”
“You a Laveau, honey. Your momma and daddy tried to hide it, tried to keep other people from knowin’ it so you could decide on your own what you want to do with it, but it’s true. Marie Laveau was your way-back great-grandmomma.”
Chapter 34
Sister Eulalie stalked the corridors of the orphanage barking sharp, quick orders. Her hope of ridding herself of the foul boy was to be delayed. Complications due to his condition required additional paperwork, but it would get done eventually. Besides that annoyance, the rash she’d noticed this morning had gotten worse. Her stomach and inner thighs itched with a maddening fire that consumed her mind. The Sin Washing couldn’t start soon enough.
As she walked past the girls’ shower room, she heard the distinctive sound of a mop bucket being put away. She entered the shower room and the choice was made. Josephine was just finishing her chores.
“Come with me, girl,” the Sister said quietly.
Josephine turned and saw Eulalie standing before her; heavy breaths betrayed her intentions. Small tears sprang to Josephine’s eyes as her stomach turned to acid. She quietly followed the nun.
Inside the Sister’s room, Josephine set to making a bowl of warm soapy water as the nun adjusted the folds of clothing beneath her habit and settled herself in a chair, propping her feet on two short footstools. After the customary short sermon about washing our sins away, she simply said, “Begin.”
Kneeling at the side of the chair, Josephine closed her eyes and slowly lifted the wet washcloth beneath the folds of her habit and between her legs.
Several minutes later the nun’s arm came around her shoulders and pulled her close against her rough habit, burying Jo’s face into the fold of her arm and torso. “Faster. Wash faster girl,” the nun said.
Josephine, struggling to breathe against the heavy material, did as she was told and washed faster. She was now sweaty and itchy herself but knew not to stop. She heard the nun’s breathing change and felt a sudden jerk as the nun reached across with her other hand, grabbed her hair and pulled her head against her clothed breast as her legs clamped around her hand. Several more minutes of direction and she was finished.
If the nun ever looked at Josephine during this time, she didn’t know. Josephine kept her eyes shut tight.
“Get out,” the nun said flatly, ending the session.
Josephine, forgetting to drop the washcloth into the bucket, left the room without thinking. She walked quickly through the dark hallway to the shower room, stripping her clothes as she went. She tossed the Crow’s washcloth down with her pile of clothes. Crying, she threw herself into the shower before the water could heat up, gasping as the cold water shocked her. The sensation numbed her body to match her mind. She stood for several minutes staring blankly at the wall, then fumbled for the soap. She scrubbed herself furiously. She couldn’t get the smell of Sister Eulalie off her fast enough.
The cat-beast sauntered out of the swamp toward its nest. Its stomach distended from its latest gorged meal and its teats swollen with nursing milk, it was ready to feed its young abominations again. They were ravenous.
The strange man held an abomination in his hands, caressed it and was pleased. He smiled at the sauntering beast as it reflected in his blue mirrored glasses. Patting its head, the man said, “Well done, Mr. Sandgrove, well done.” And at that moment, both man and beast vibrated, causing wisps and streams of faint blue light to cascade around them. The streams mixed together in the air, exchanging energy, then flowed back into their bodies like a sharp intake of breath; man and beast were of the same essence.
The man inspected the abomination in his hands. The translucent beak was already tough and sharp, as his bloody fingers indicated. The three-toed claws flexed and clinched with a strong grip. The long weasel body felt smooth to his touch, but would toughen to a leathery hide over time. And the split-tail twitched in the air, always sensing.
The man dropped the weasel-thing back into the large mud nest where the others snapped at it in anticipation of eating. The thing mewled loudly for its size, snapped back blindly at the others, then settled into a unified sniffing of the air, smelling food nearby.
“And what of our guest?” the man asked lightly.
The beast turned toward a large mound between two cypress trees and snorted. There, buried beneath the rotting vegetation, Sharon lay motionless.
The man walked over and peered down into her face. To others she would appear dead, but she was not. Her breathing was non-existent, and her blood did not flow, but neither was it dead. One eye was stuck shut while the other stuck open, staring blindly out, like a broken doll. He was unclear on her sense of being, at least the mental state of what was left, but could feel it reach out to him; it was a pleading thing. The man reached down into the mud and felt for a toe. He wondered if the weasels would like them. They would be but a morsel. His family was growing, and he would do anything for his family. Before he left, he lay his palm against the woman’s forehead. He could feel her essence settling there, concentrating. It would only be a matter of time now. Sharon didn’t know it, but she was getting smaller.
Chapter 35
Curled up tight, Del sat by herself in a large chair next to a window. After hearing everything Mama Dedé had to say, she felt very tired. Related to Marie Laveau. What did this mean for her? Her head laid listlessly on the thick chair back as she stared silently out the window. The window looked onto the inner courtyard at the back of the house and framed the dark night. Why had this ridiculous story of Voodoo landed on her? How was she to ever build a normal life for herself and Jimmy with this stigma hanging over her? She pulled an afghan around her shoulders and wiped her eyes. The wind outside, moaning, mocked her despair.
She stood up and walked to a bookshelf against the wall. She looked blankly over the various volumes, not really reading the titles, but trying to think of what to do. The others watched her closely; she knew they were there but ignored them. They weren’t allowed in her space of despair. She imagined a cold wall of solitude surround her, blocking them out.
She was deep in thought and barely noticed when Mama Dedé pulled a book from a shelf and placed it in her hands. Del didn’t acknowledge her, only held the book until she went away. Turning back to the chair by the window, she curled up under the afghan, adjusted the small lamp on the table and opened the book.
It appeared to be a scrapbook of some kind, but also detailed the ancestors of Marie Laveau. A lot of people she had never heard of, nor cared to learn about.
She absently flipped the pages. After several minutes of scanning notes, she turned to an old newspaper clipping and began to read:
* * *
Daily Picayune, August 11th, 1866
* * *
The Strange Case of Mr. Sandgrove
* * *
On July 24th of this year, a missing person’s report was filed for one Mr. Alphonse Sandgrove of 111 Bayou Rd., having last been seen on or about July the 18th in the vicinity of said road. According to witnesses, Mr. Sandgrove was last seen riding his horse towards the residence of Jean Montanee (aka Dr. John, aka Devil John), a reported Voodoo priest of the highest order, who holds a respectable estate bordering Bayou Road.
A Grimoire Dark Page 15