"Got yourself a dinner date?" Warren said dryly as he lowered himself on to the bench and handed Carole Ann one of the beers.
"Would have, if it weren't for you," Carole Ann answered in an even drier tone.
"What did I do?" he said with such exaggerated innocence that Carole Ann had to work to retain her chastising composure.
"Since I neither know where I am, where I'm going, or when I might be returned to where I came from, I couldn't very well tell him when to pick me up," Carole Ann retorted with a sniff and a toss of her head, and Warren laughed out loud. A full, healthy, hearty laugh that was infectious. Carole Ann could not suppress the giggle that began, so she drowned it in a gulp of ice cold beer.
"Ooh! What is this?" She struggled to catch her breath and suppress a burp while she scrutinized the label on the beer bottle.
"You like it?" Warren asked, wiping his mouth and trying to stifle a burp of his own.
"It's wonderful," Carole Ann said, still looking for something recognizable on the bottle's label.
"An indigenous brew," he said, opening the popcorn and offering it to her. "We got lots of good beer in Louisiana."
She took a fist-full and sat chewing and drinking beer and no longer minding that the sweat was pouring off her as if she were running a marathon. Warren propped the popcorn bag against her and went into the store. He emerged again in seconds with a map of Louisiana which he spread out on their laps. It was a very detailed map, and he pointed out to her route they'd taken away from New Orleans, while she slept; pointed out the ghost town that on the map was called Parishville; located their present position at the intersection of two tiny country roads; and their eventual destination, Eldon Warmsley's place, twelve miles deeper into the woods. "We're not expected 'til six, and it won't take but a few minutes to get there. You've even got time for another brew," he said. "But I'd go easy on the popcorn. Eldon invited us to dinner, and he's a serious man when it comes to food."
"I'm pretty serious myself in that regard." Carole Ann chewed and swallowed and studied the map, confusion wrinkling her brow. "Why did we come such a round-about way?" she asked, running her finger along the route they'd taken. "Why not the most direct route?" She felt him stiffen even before she completed her question.
"People are dead, Miss Gibson. I shouldn't think you'd need to be reminded of that fact." He sighed deeply and drank the last of his beer, touching her knee and shaking his head in a silent apology. Then he told her about Eldon Warmsley, who owned the general store where they currently were sitting and another one on the water, and who had owned and managed a similar facility twenty-five years ago within the Parish Petroleum compound.
Close to three hundred people lived in the compound in its heyday, including Eldon Warmsley, who slept on a cot in a small room adjacent to the store four nights a week, and who went home to his wife on Thursday nights and returned on Sunday. But for the others, Parish Petroleum literally was a way of life. In addition to the general store, there was a cafeteria that served breakfast, lunch, and dinner to workers on shift at those times; a combination barber shop/beauty salon that operated three days a week; a meeting hall that also served as church, movie theatre, and indoor recreation center; a clinic with a full time nurse and a part-time doctor; and a nursery school for the youngest children. School-age children were bussed to a public school six miles away. Although he was never employed by Parish Petroleum, Eldon, by virtue of his status as shopkeeper, was considered part of the management team. Which meant that he was privy to secrets and information not available to the general population—a circumstance that was both blessing and curse since Eldon was the only Colored person who enjoyed such status. All the Parish Petroleum workers and their families were Black; all of the plant managers and other officials were white, except the barber, the beautician, the cooks, and the nurse.
Eldon and the plant doctor, who spent Tuesdays and Thursdays at the plant, became friends, in large part because Eldon kept for the doctor his own private supply of roasted, salted peanuts. Such a popular item very often sold out by the middle of the week, so that by Thursday, the good doctor would have had to munch on pork rinds or potato chips like everybody else, had not Eldon kindly put aside a couple of bags of the nuts for him. That small courtesy, along with keeping a couple of Coca Colas near the fan so they'd be extra cold, endeared Eldon to the doctor, until the doctor began to think of the shopkeeper as a friend. And began to confide in him, began to tell him of his puzzlement and concern over the number of workers having trouble breathing, having trouble keeping their food down, having trouble with loose bowels. Then there were the stillborn babies, and the babies whose mothers the doctor told were stillborn because they'd been born so hideously deformed that the good doctor could not, in good conscience, have allowed them to live. Then there was the strange anemia becoming almost epidemic among the toddlers; something weakening the blood, causing once strong, healthy children to succumb to a slow, deathly lethargy.
Unknown to the doctor, Eldon himself had been a witness to the strange sicknesses in an equally clinical manner, for it was Eldon who sold the ancient African and Indian remedies to the already dying when the white man's medicine failed them. It was Eldon who led the spirit doctors and conjure women on their nocturnal visits to cure those whom the white doctor had failed. It was Eldon who sent or, more often than he cared to, personally delivered the message to the relatives of a Parish Petroleum worker hovering at death's door that it was time to make arrangements. And it was Eldon whom the doctor told, in a choking whisper, that the plant manager had destroyed all the doctor's files and records and then fired him on the spot, taking his key to the clinic and locking him out.
Parish Petroleum gave the plant nurse a fifty dollar a week raise and put her in charge of the clinic, where she took temperatures and blood pressures, dispensed antacid and aspirin, and where she collapsed and died one night after being bitten by a rattlesnake that had curled itself up to rest in the drawer where the cotton balls were kept. Health care services were not provided by Parish Petroleum after that. Unwell workers would need to drive twenty miles to the nearest town to see a doctor, an expensive and time consuming journey, and one not often made by many workers.
Eldon Warmsley closed his store on the day Parish Petroleum closed the plant, opening his current establishment on that same day. And he never mentioned what he knew about the strange sicknesses of Parish Petroleum until asked all those years later by Al Crandall. Eldon had never before told anybody what he knew because nobody had ever before asked him. But Eldon also told Al Crandall quite a bit more, and not because Al asked, but because Eldon liked him. Now Eldon literally was sickened by the fact that what he told Al Crandall had gotten him killed. Al and at least three other people, and maybe even four, since nobody had seen the good doctor since Al paid him a visit back in February.
"Now Eldon wants to see you, Miss Gibson, which is why I drove fifty miles out of the way to get you here. And I'll tell you up front that he hopes to convince you to give up the notion of looking for husband's murderer and go home. But his main reason for wanting to see you is to apologize for what happened. That old man really liked Al Crandall."
"And what did you think of him, Mr. Forchette?" she asked coldly. He looked hard at her and she saw part of him retreat and close down. She didn't care because her annoyance had returned. Why the hell hadn't he told her he'd known Al?
"He was a courageous and honorable man and it shames me to face you knowing that I hold some responsibility for his death. I almost passed out when Dave Crandall called to ask me to meet with you. I'd met Dave exactly twice, and liked him, but I never once connected him with Al Crandall."
"What makes you think you own some responsibility for Al's murder?" Like Warren, Carole Ann had retreated and was now cold and distant. Warren Forchette did not respond well to the change.
"I'll let Eldon tell you," he said, standing. He folded the map and returned it and the empty beer bottles to the st
ore. She closed and folded the popcorn bag, brushed the crumbs from her hands and pants, and went to wait for him in the truck. Neither spoke on the short ride deep into the woods on a barely visible path to Eldon Warmsley's place.
Estate would have been more like it, though Carole Ann had to admit she'd have found the term presumptuous prior to seeing it. But Eldon Warmsley had himself an estate, no doubt about it. The three-story sparkling brick and wood structure sat atop a gentle rise of lush, manicured green edged on all sides by orderly rows of blooming things in various color patterns. Ancient, towering trees—magnolias?—surrounded the house at a respectful distance. The house was a flawless jewel in a perfect setting, each worthy of the other. The contrast between this paradise and the wasteland that once was Parish Petroleum defied understanding. She wanted to say something to Warren; wanted him to say something to her that would help make it make sense. She wanted that assurance at the same time she understood that she was on her own now, and if sense were to be made of the things she was learning and feeling, she'd have to be her own facilitator.
Warren parked in the circular drive in front of the house and they exited the truck simultaneously. Carole Ann suddenly felt too dirty and sweaty to be joining strangers for dinner, but that feeling, like so many others lately, wound up on the back burner as the front door opened and Eldon Warmsley came out to greet them. He looked like a Gene Hackman/Clint Eastwood merger—attractive and appealing and clearly a man to be taken on his own terms. He wore a white cotton shirt with the sleeves cut out to reveal lean, sinewy biceps, khaki slacks, and nothing on his feet. Carole Ann opened her mouth to greet him when she realized that she'd been expecting to meet a Black man. The only person of color in what was considered a management position at Parish Petroleum, Warren had said. But this was not a Black man, and that was not the kind of thing people made mistakes about. Not in America. One did not call a white man Black by mistake. Yet Carole Ann was standing as close as good manners permitted to Eldon Warmsley and what she saw was a white man. He took her hands and held both of them in both of his.
"I can't tell you how bad I feel about what happened to your husband, Miz Crandall." Lil Gailliard's reference to cooking and eating notwithstanding, Eldon Warmsley proved himself to be a swamp baby by the sound of the words that came from his mouth. Creole or Cajun, Carole Ann didn't know, but she did know that this was pure Louisiana and it was fascinating and beautiful to hear. The meaning of the words also came to her in some form of delayed transmission: She saw his mouth move, heard him speak. The sound traveled to her ears, and some time later, the meaning registered. So it seemed that considerable time had elapsed when she responded.
"I wish you wouldn't feel badly at all, Mr. Warmsley. I believe that you were a friend to Al, and that you will be to me, and I'm very grateful."
He smiled at her. A warm, generous smile that crinkled his hazel eyes and revealed a set of strong, white teeth. "You and your husband are two halves of the same nut, Miz. Crandall. I like you as quick as I liked him. And I'd like the chance to get to know you a lot better, which means we got to do a better job keepin' you healthy. Ain't that right, Boy?" He kept Carole Ann's two hands enclosed in his left one, and reached around her with his right hand to clap Warren on the shoulder. But he was still looking at Carole Ann. "I known this Boy since before he knew hisself. They don't come no better." And with that, Eldon Warmsley released them both and re-entered his house. "We gon' eat in the kitchen. Merle got everything ready. Y'all come on." He led them through four rooms of such simple, understated elegance that Carole Ann had to resist the urge to pinch herself in a reality check.
The kitchen was made for cooking and eating. There were three ovens along one wall, an indoor bar-be-que pit, a six-burner range, a three-bowl sink, and a refrigerator the size of Texas. The table, of worn, highly polished pine, was nestled in a bay window that looked out over a broad expanse of yard. But Carole Ann's attention was on Merle Warmsley, who was taking a loaf of freshly baked bread from the oven. She was almost as tall as her husband, and as brown as he was not. Her hair was softly, purely white, and, when she turned, she greeted them with eyes the color of the Caribbean Ocean—blue and/or green, depending on the position of the light. She wiped her hands on her jeans and came quickly to Carole Ann and, like Lil, wrapped her in a warm embrace. She whispered condolences in her ear, then released her and held her at arms' length.
"You look to be holdin' up real well, Dahlin," Merle Warmsley said in an Eartha Kitt voice.
"I'm fine as long I keep busy, keep my mind busy," Carole Ann replied, grateful for the woman's open, direct manner. So many people did not know what to do with death, and those death left behind.
"Then you come to right place at the right time," Merle said with a dry chuckle, and indicated that Carole Ann should seat herself at the table, where Warren, who had not spoken since their arrival, already was sitting. Merle and Eldon spent the next few moments bringing food to the table, and the four of them spent the next hour-and-a-half eating, talking, laughing, in such relaxed joy that Carole Ann herself could not believe that they were strangers to her. She was more comfortable than she'd been in a very long time.
During coffee and dessert, Eldon casually, easily, turned the discussion to her presence, and Carole Ann told them exactly what she'd told Lillian: Everything. Then Eldon talked, adding significant details to what Warren had told her. Like the fact that the snake in the nurse's cotton ball drawer had been placed there deliberately. Like the fact that the several of the white plant managers had become ill, too, and Parish Petroleum had paid a quarter of a million dollars each for their silence. Like the fact that the ghost town Carole Ann had just visited was not the only Parish Petroleum site.
"I have three questions," Carole Ann said. "Who are the other three people killed because of all this? What is the former plant physician's name, what are the circumstances under which he disappeared, and why is it no one is certain about his fate? And how much of all this did Al know?" She leaned back in her chair to await the answers, then shot forward again. "Make that four," she said. "What did Parish Petroleum produce or make or develop? What the hell IS Parish Petroleum?"
Nobody said anything for what seemed to Carole Ann like a very long time. Warren Forchette broke the silence. "You can't count worth a good goddamn. How you get four outta that is a mystery to me." He put a coffee cup to his mouth that had been empty for half an hour, frowned at its emptiness and put it down, thereby missing Carole Ann's bewildered look at him, for Warren had sounded so much like Eldon, she'd have sworn it was the Swamp Baby instead of the lawyer who'd spoken.
"Should we start answerin' from the top or the bottom of that list?" Eldon said,.
"You know, that's the first time anybody has asked about those poor boys," Merle said, blue-green eyes flashing. "I don't know their names, do y'all?"
Then they all began to talk at once, first slowly and softly, and then loudly and so rapidly that Carole Ann did not understand any of the conversation. She held up her hands, right palm flat and perpendicular to the fingers on the left hand, and the talk automatically ceased. Eldon grinned sheepishly.
"I 'pologize for that. Guess we got a little carried away. Aw'right. Here we go." And he began answering her questions, beginning with the last question first. She listened without interruption—or significant interest—while he explained in great detail how Parish Petroleum made a component for plastic bottles from the by-products of an oil refinery owned by another division of the same company, operating under another name, but technically still Parish Petroleum. She felt a stab when Eldon said, without preamble or discourse, that Al had known everything there was to know. Her heart pounded so hard it hurt when Eldon identified the physician as Lafayette Devereaux and explained that his status was unclear because his brother was Congressman Leland Devereaux, and it was well known that the best way to get along with Leland Devereaux was to stay well out of his way. Asking about Lafayette would just make Leland mad.
Each time Eldon said the name, Carole Ann's heart thudded in her chest, a slow, hard thud that she could hear, and wondered if the others could. The thudding sound was so loud she only heard part of what Eldon said about the three dead boys: That all three had drowned in what everyone considered peculiar circumstances, since all three boys were swamp babies—born, raised and lived all their lives on the water. Swamp babies don't just drown, Eldon said; and by the time Carole Ann could make herself understand, both his words and their meaning, she was so tired she wanted just to lay her head down and sleep. Right there at the table.
"Just one more question, please," she said instead, not attempting to cover the fatigue. "Why do people think you're missing, Eldon, when you're sitting here, king of the hill, for all the world to see?"
Again there was the silence, but not so deep as before, and not for nearly as long, for Eldon broke it with a laugh that sounded just exactly like a goose honking.
"Don' many people 'bout this place," he said with the shrug that was becoming as familiar as a Cher or a Dahlin'. "I lived my whole life on the water, but Miss Merle here is a land crab. She grew up in this house, and after her Ma passed on, we fixed it up, bit by bit, still livin' mostly on the water, but comin' up here more and more in the winter, and durin' the storm season. But since, well, since all the trouble started, we been stayin' here. Ain't but one way in and one way out, so it's safe enough. But goddamn I'm bored!"
Then Warren and Merle explained further that people who'd known Eldon all his life would know where to find him if they really needed to; and that people who didn't know him—outsiders—would never know where to find him if he wasn't at his house on the water; and insiders never would give outsiders any information other than the fact that Eldon no longer was living in his house on the water. And Carole Ann could see the shrug of the shoulders, the pursing of the lips, and the dismissal of the outsider who'd had the temerity to ask the whereabouts of a swamp baby. So the outsider—Al Crandall—would surmise that Eldon Warmsley was missing, just as the three boatmen were missing, and later found drowned; just as the former plant doctor was missing and presumed dead. The doctor whose name was Devereaux. With the congressman brother whose name was Devereaux. Leland. Lafayette. And Larry. Devereaux.
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