by Katie Penryn
“I need to ask you about Thursday,” I began.
“Thursday? You mean the day Jonny died?”
“Yes, Can you tell me what you did that morning?”
She splashed water over her shoulders while she thought back.
I prompted her. “Do you have an international driving permit?”
She looked surprised at the question but nodded.
“Have you driven the tour bus?”
“I drove it to the nightclub and back when Jonny was here so that the guys could drink.”
“What about Thursday?”
“I was going to visit Jonny, but I got half way to the hospital and had to pull into the side of the road. I couldn’t face seeing him again lying there unable to do anything.”
She began to sob. “So I turned round and went for a drive up the coast to think about things. If only I’d carried on, I might have seen him again before he died.”
“Or stopped or delayed the murderer.”
“Don’t say that. You’ll make me cry. Jonny played around, but I loved him and he always came back to me. Those other girls — they were just passing fancies.”
“If you think of anything that could help, you’ll let me know?”
“Of course.”
I leaned over to take the towel off the side. “By the way, what about Zach and Petey? Did they go out on Thursday morning?”
“They were still here when I left and they were here when I came back. So I don’t know. You’ll have to ask them. They would have had to double up on Jonny’s bike if they’d gone out together. That reminds me. The bike had moved when I returned so I felt the engine and it was hot.”
“So at least one of them went out.”
She nodded. “I guess so.”
“Do you want to get out of the bath now? Can you manage on your own?”
“Yes. I drank a glass of water while you were away.”
“I’ll stay just outside the door in case you need me.”
As soon as I saw she was on her feet and steady, I left to find Felix and the two guys.
Chapter 27
“How’s she doing?” Zack asked as I walked back into the sitting room.
“Much better. You know it doesn’t do you guys much good getting stoned and drunk first thing in the morning in your present circumstances.”
“What do you suggest we do?” asked Petey staggering to his feet. “We’ve got no money. We don’t know anyone.”
I walked to the sofa and picked up my purse. I took out several notes and handed them to Petey. “Here’s a loan until you get your money from the Consulate. Spend some of it on fuel for the bus. Go out and look at the historical buildings, do a tour of the vineyards, spend time on the beach. Anything except molder away in here feeling sorry for yourselves. Look after Joliette, for Jonny’s sake.”
Petey had the grace to look sheepish as he pocketed the money. “Thanks, Penzi. I’ll not forget.”
“Do you feel up to answering some questions?”
Zack and Petey looked at each other.
Zack spoke for both of them. “We don’t know anything. We’ve already told the police that.”
“I insist,” I said. “Call it a condition of the loan I’ve just made you.”
“Okay. Go ahead,” said Zack.
“No, separately. I’ll take you first, Zack. Give Petey a few more minutes to sober up. We’ll go in the kitchen.”
I stood aside waiting for him to pass through before me and followed him down to the kitchen. The coffee Felix had made stood on the kitchen counter. I poured him a cup and handed it to him black. “Drink that.”
Now that I’d got him alone in the kitchen all the fight left him. He drank his coffee and put the cup down.
“So, what do you want to ask me then?”
“What about your relationship with Jonny?”
“Oh, you want to find out if I killed him; if I had a motive. That’s clever, that is.”
“Did you have a reason to kill him?”
Zack snorted. “Of course not. We didn’t always see eye to eye, but nothing that desperate.”
“I noticed that at the rehearsals. Something about Jonny always stealing the limelight and not giving you a chance to shine.”
Zack tossed his head at the memory.
“Yeah. Jonny was selfish. Okay, he was the front man, the star. People came to see him, not me or Petey. But still. He could have given me a solo from time to time. Jonny didn’t rate the drums. A necessity he called them, not an art form, not a real musical instrument as such.”
“Did that annoy you?”
“Of course it did. Got right up my nose. I’m a good drummer. A band’s as good as its drummer you know. And Jonny didn’t give me any kudos.”
“You’re right. He should have given credit where it was due.”
Zack blinked. He hadn’t expected me to agree with him.
“Right on,” he said. “I’ve known Jonny all my life. We grew up in the same children’s home in New Orleans. I’m Cajun like he was. It gave us a special bond, being Cajun and both being musical. We started playing together when we were kids. The Salvation Army gave us some kids’ instruments for Christmas, and the two of us used to busk on Bourbon Street. We were cute. We made a lot of money. Saved up until Jonny could buy a real guitar and I got my first drum set.”
“He was like a brother to you?”
“Absolutely. Neither of us had any relations that we knew of. It wasn’t the same with Petey. Petey joined us later when we were all fifteen or so. And Petey isn’t Cajun.”
“And you’ve stuck together all that time?”
Zack nodded. “Through good times and bad times.”
“So you were all together when you had your big hit, Mon P’tit Oiseau?”
“That’s right. It was just after we came here the first time. Over ten years ago now. Hurricane Katrina caused havoc in so many people’s lives, but it brought us good luck, indirectly, of course. Our trip here inspired Jonny to write the song. We’ve been living on our reputation for that song ever since.”
“Did Jonny write all your songs?”
“He was a talented songwriter and musician. We play many covers, but all our original work is Jonny’s. I don’t know what we’re going to do without him.”
“Did you ever get mad with him, or he with you?”
“Penzi, you don’t want to take what you saw at rehearsals seriously. We really were like brothers.”
With a good dose of sibling rivalry, by the sound of it.
“What about Thursday? Did you go out at all?” I asked him.
He fidgeted about before replying. “No, I didn’t. I was too tired.”
“And Petey? Did he?”
“You’ll have to ask him.”
I pushed him. “Wouldn’t you have heard the motor bike?”
“Not if I was asleep.”
I decided to leave it there until I’d spoken to Petey. According to Joliette, one of them had ridden the bike.
I asked Zack to fetch Petey.
Petey slopped into the kitchen with the heels of his shoes bent down, flung himself into a chair and sprawled out legs wide. It hadn’t taken him long to forget I’d helped them out with a loan. I ignored his lack of respect and sat up straighter myself hoping he would mirror my body language.
“Well?” he asked in a truculent tone. “Well?”
I studied my nails and didn’t answer him until he got the message and pulled himself up to sit properly in his chair.
He picked his teeth with his finger nail darting quick glances at me like a naughty kid waiting for a ticking off.
I waited until he wiped his finger on his pants and put his hands in his pockets.
“Petey, you need to change your attitude if I’m to help you out here,” I said.
“What about yours? You sit there like a head teacher about to scold me for bunking off. What gives you the right?”
I flattened my palms on the table. “T
he three of you do not get to go home until this case is closed and Jonny’s murderer is brought to justice. It’s in your interests to help me by answering my questions sensibly and truthfully.”
“But you think I had something to do with Jonny’s murder, and I’m innocent. I don’t have to answer your questions. You’re not the police.”
“Don’t you want the man or woman responsible to be found out and locked up? Don’t you owe it to Jonny?”
“That cheap skate. Oh yes, he was a charmer. I saw you crushing on him. But you didn’t have to live and work with him. He cheated us left, right and center. Never paid us on time. Got to admire his musical talent and all, worse luck, but that’s it. Look how he’s left Joliette. All that talk about wills.”
“Petey, the sooner we get the whole thing sorted out the better it will be for all of you. If you are all innocent, as you say, isn’t it better if I prove it? I have to be able to eliminate you from our list of suspects.”
He harrumphed and flopped back in his chair. I thought he was dozing off again.
“Petey?” I shouted and thumped on the table.
“What’s wrong?” asked Felix opening the door and looking in.
“Nothing,” I replied. “Just trying to keep Petey awake.”
“He probably needs a beer,” said Felix leaving the room and returning with another six-pack. “We all do. It’s darned hot in here.”
Felix handed us both a beer and left to take the others to Joliette and Zack.
Petey flicked his can open and took a swig.
“That’s better,” he said. “That Felix knows what a guy needs.”
I said a silent vote of thanks to Felix and asked Petey about his movements on the Thursday.
“You looking to see if I have an alibi,” he said.
“Well, do you?”
“I do. I was here all day. I heard Joliette go out in the bus but I stayed in.”
“You didn’t take Jonny’s bike out for a spin?”
“No, not me,” he said shaking his head.
“What about Zack?”
“Didn’t you ask him?”
“Of course, I did, and he said he didn’t go out either. Are you telling me that you can vouch for each other that neither of you left the house?”
“I suppose so when you come down to it.”
I waited a couple of seconds and then asked him who had ridden the motor bike that morning if it wasn’t him and it wasn’t Zack.
The beer on top of the vodka hadn’t livened up his thought processes. He sat blinking like an owl as he computed the ramifications of what I’d said.
“Who says the bike was used?” he asked at last.
“Joliette saw it had changed position when she returned from her drive and the engine was hot.”
He gave me a sly look. “So she says.”
I pushed back my chair and walked to the door. “Let’s get Zack back in here. Zack?” I called out.
When Zack had sat down Felix, positioned himself against the door as if to say they weren’t leaving until we got the truth.
“Right. You both say you didn’t leave the house on Thursday yet Joliette says someone used the bike. What’s your explanation?”
They looked at each other and Zack gave a slight nod to Petey.
“All right. We both left the house together on Jonny’s bike. And yes, we went to the hospital.”
Zack jumped in. “We wanted to see the miserable SOB. Give him our support. When we arrived and parked, Petey got cold feet.”
Petey hunched down in his chair. “I couldn’t bring myself to visiting what Jonny had become, a vegetable lying in a coma in a hospital bed. I just couldn’t.”
“So what did you do?” I asked him.
“Zack and I agreed to meet in the hospital café in half an hour. I walked round to the side of the buildings where there were gardens for the use of the patients. I spent the time sitting by a fountain and wondering what the hell had happened to Jonny because the coma stuff didn’t make any sense.”
“And you, Zack?”
“I’d scoffed at Petey, but once I was inside the hospital with all that white and all those chemical smells, I couldn’t face seeing Jonny like that — a lump in a bed with nobody home. I ducked into the café and stayed there until Petey joined me.”
Petey cuffed Zack on the head. “And you called me a coward.”
“When it comes down to it,” I broke in, “you were both at the hospital at the crucial time and you can’t alibi each other for while you were there?”
“Well, no. That’s why we said we hadn’t been out,” said Zack after a pause.
“Did you tell Inspector Dubois this?” I asked them.
“No, he wasn’t as persuasive as you are, Penzi,” said Petey.
“Now what do we do?” asked Zack.
I rose from the table and Felix opened the door for me. “The best I can say is Don’t leave town.”
I stopped to tell Joliette I’d given Petey some money to tide them over until their Consulate came through with the promised funds and we left.
*
“Where does all that leave us?” Felix asked as I drove us home for lunch.
“What did you find out while I was talking to the boys?”
“Nothing we didn’t already know: that they both had a problem with Jonny, but they were careful not to make too much of it. They may have been drunk but they’re not stupid. They weren’t going to give me a cast iron motive for killing Jonny. How about you?”
“Much the same, but I did get all three of them to admit they left the house on Thursday morning. Joliette took the bus out, and the two guys actually went to the hospital. They were vague on times, but they could have been there at when Jonny died. They can’t alibi each other for the time of the murder because they split up when they reached the hospital.”
“So we still have all three of them down with possible motives and available transport to the hospital outside the city walls.”
We passed through the city gates and I turned down towards the Esplanade.
“Talking of motives. There was all that about a will. All three of them believed Jonny had written one, but no one had seen it or knew where it is or was. If it exists, it can’t be here in France because we’ve searched all Jonny’s belongings and the house. And anyway, who travels with a will. The Consulate hasn’t turned up anything in Louisiana.”
“But, boss, surely the important thing is that Joliette believes there’s a will and that she is the beneficiary? That gives her a stronger motive than the boys.”
“Possibly. Who do we have left on our list for a preliminary sounding out?”
“The nurse. The other unmarried mother of one of Jonny’s children.”
“We’d better try to see her this afternoon.”
Chapter 28
After lunch Felix called the number Natalie had given me for Francine, the mother of Jonny’s other unacknowledged son, Marc, and handed my phone back to me.
She answered immediately, so I guessed she wasn’t at work as she wouldn’t have been allowed to have her phone on in the hospital.
“Why do you want to see me and who are you exactly?” she asked.
“I’m a friend of Audrey’s. Her friend Natalie gave me your number.”
“You mean Audrey Malan? You’re the Englishwoman who took her in when she escaped from that brute of a husband?”
“Yes, that’s me.”
“If you’re that good a friend to Audrey you must be all right. You could come round now. I’m at home today. You’re lucky you caught me. Monday’s my day off. I work at the hospital the rest of the week.”
I nearly said that’s what we wanted to talk to her about but stopped in the nick of time. No point putting her on guard before we met her.
“Can you give me your address?”
I repeated what she said aloud so Felix could write it down and arranged to call on her within twenty minutes.
As I rang off
Audrey said, “I didn’t know she lived there. That’s a dreadful place, a run-down tenement building where everyone’s on social security. That’s not a good place to be bringing up a kid.”
“She’s working and must be earning a decent salary as a nurse.”
“I couldn’t say,” said Audrey. “She’s Natalie’s friend. I hardly know her.”
“Do you have something I could take for the boy?” I asked her.
Audrey stopped drying up the saucepans for a moment. “Like what?”
“Like those chocolate cookies you baked this morning. The aroma of baking hit me as I walked through the front door.”
“Penzi, you’re so kind. I should have thought of that,” Audrey said.
That made me feel bad because I’d suggested the cookies to smooth my way into the questioning of Francine.
Audrey bagged up the total of the day’s baking keeping back two each for Jimbo, Simone and Wilfred when Jimbo complained.
Cookies in hand, Felix and I left for the poor area of Beaucoup-sur-mer, far back from the sea and crammed up against the city walls.
We parked in a street dotted with garbage bags oozing household rubbish and broken toys. Francine’s block of flats towered high above us, built sometime in the sixties I guessed and overdue for demolition.
Her apartment on the fifteenth floor cost us a healthy hike up the stairs because the stinky elevator was broken. Even here in beautiful Beaucoup-sur-mer all the signs of poverty marked what had once been an adequate housing solution. Evidence of the underworld of drugs and petty crime lay scattered about on the stairs, used syringes, old condoms and the ubiquitous polystyrene carcasses of take-away meals long ago gone moldy. Graffiti spoke of the resentment and problems of the disadvantaged. My stomach heaved at the stench of urine and the occasional dump. There but for the grace of God.…
How did Francine bridge the gulf between the sterile environment of the hospital and her infernal living conditions?
I found out soon enough when she opened her door to us.
“I’m so sorry you had to climb up that filthy stairway. It’s bad enough living here when the elevator’s working. Come in, please.”