“Um, hi.” Suzy eased her backpack down on the floor. “I’ve made a reservation for Suzy Oliviera. For just one night.”
While the woman looked as old as the building, she seemed to brim with the energy of someone who can’t be bothered with the supposed downsides of aging. She smiled warmly at Suzy and gestured at an elaborate but well-used chair in front of the desk.
“Of course,” she said. “Get you right there. That bag looks mightily heavy, dear. Please have a seat while I find your key. Oh, and please sign in here,” she added and handed Suzy a paper. Suzy started to fill out the form, but her eyes strayed to the walls.
The woman noticed. “Magnificent, isn’t it?” she asked. “You won’t find another hostel like this anywhere in town, I’ll tell you.”
“Yeah,” Suzy said, thinking there probably wasn’t a place like this in the state. Most likely, there wasn’t anything like this in the whole country. “I guess it’s pretty unusual Sort of cozy, though,” she added hastily, not wanting to insult the woman. As she jotted down her New York address, she found herself warming to the place. She couldn’t wait to email her friends back in New York and tell them she stayed in a place straight out of Bram Stoker’s Dracula.
“It’s rather popular, too,” the woman went on. “We haven’t got many rooms empty, and there are sixty-eight of them in this house. Oh, I know,” she added when Suzy looked up in surprise, “it looks almost abandoned, but it’s late and this is New Orleans. They’re all out there,” she said and nodded at the door behind Suzy.
“I see,” Suzy said, longing to join them. She signed at the bottom of the form and handed it back. The woman filed the paper in a folder, rose up and went to an aged cupboard behind her. A jingling sound echoed in the hall as she opened the cupboard. Inside were row after row with keys.
“The building’s been labeled a historic resource, whatever that’s supposed to mean,” the woman explained while she took down a heavy key. “So we can’t install keycard locks, unfortunately. You wouldn’t guess how much it costs to copy one of these,” she remarked, shaking her head.
“I see,” Suzy said again, not knowing what else to say. Her eyes wandered around the room and came to rest on a huge, murky painting that loomed above the doorway where the staircases met. She could just make out a young man in reddish, extravagant clothes, relaxing in a cushioned chair with a rapier resting across his knees. The artist seemed to have taken great care to capture the man’s wide grin, or maybe it was a smudge on the painting. Glancing at the other paintings again, Suzy realized that the same man was portrayed in several other paintings, in other positions and clothes.
“Who’s that in the picture?” Suzy asked.
The woman looked up and turned back to Suzy. “Ah, that’s Monroy himself,” she said. “Monroy Le Fari. He’s the one who built this house, more than a hundred and fifty years ago now. Designed it from the bottom up, they say, for his gatherings and guests.”
“Gatherings?” Suzy said. “You mean parties? Or dances, things like that?”
The woman smiled and shook her head. “Actually, from what I’ve read – there are some books about him in the city library – he was some sort of religious leader. Not a priest, but some kind of, well, esoteric preacher, I suppose.”
“Really?” Suzy asked and looked at the paintings again, intrigued. She couldn’t wait to tell someone about this. Her first night in New Orleans spent in gothic mansion built by a cultist. Not bad. Not bad at all. “Doesn’t look like an old preacher to me.”
“Actually, he disappeared before he turned thirty,” said the woman, apparently happy that someone was interested in what she knew. “If you’d like, I can walk you to your room and tell you more. The chill in here makes my legs ache.”
“Sure,” Suzy slung her backpack over her shoulder with a grunt, wishing she hadn’t brought half a dozen books and three sets of clubbing outfits. She looked at the stairs. “We’re not going far, are we?”
*
The doorway at the top of the curving stairs opened to a dim corridor lit by antique-looking lamps set between rows of heavy doors. At the end of the corridor, colors from the traffic lights on the street outside played on a huge frosted window. There were paintings on the walls here too, landscapes, people and objects of all kinds, but Suzy couldn’t make out much detail in the weak light. Even the air felt old, smelling of leather, smoke and the flowers outside. She felt oddly guilty as she treaded on the plush carpet with her Martens, as if she walked in someone’s home, but her guide didn’t seem to mind.
“These used to be the private rooms,” she explained to Suzy. “Monroy lived in one of these, along with the other residents at the mansion.”
“You mean his servants?” Suzy ventured.
The woman looked at her sideways. Was there a small smile on her lips?
“More his companions, if you see what I mean,” she explained. “As I said, Monroy held gatherings here, to which he invited people from all over the state.”
“Can’t blame the man,” Suzy mumbled. She couldn’t help smiling. “If this was my home, I‘d run a club in my kitchen.”
“His parties were popular,” the woman continued. “At one point, sometime around 1840, more than three hundred guests flocked here every time he opened his doors. I reckon that’s when his problems started.”
Suzy felt a slight chill wind itself around her spine. No doubt the woman would tell her of some horrific murder that had occurred in one of the rooms. Then again, she mused, that would certainly add to the house’s awe factor. As long as there weren’t any bloodstains on the walls, she’d spend the night. In fact, she’d do it anyway. She walked on and patiently waited for the woman to continue.
“Apparently,” she continued, “the church got wind of his activities, and they went straight to the city council. They sent someone to investigate, and not long after the police arrived at the house.”
“But why?” Suzy asked. “Was it, like, illegal to have those meetings? Or did he lead some kind of cult?” Please say yes, Suzy thought.
“It was certainly a clandestine society, whatever it was.” The woman stopped outside a large set of double doors. “They were said to be keeping watch over something. Don’t ask me what.”
“A treasure?” Suzy suggested.
“Maybe,” the woman said, “but from what I’ve read, I think it was something more dangerous.”
“I can’t believe this.” Suzy reached out to touch the wall in awe. This place was downright amazing.
“There are even worse rumors,” the woman added. “History has it that they performed some form of magic involving night-time rituals, and there were rumors that guests indulged in carnal acts.”
Carnal acts? Suzy thought and nearly sniggered. How old is she? “So Monroy got locked up?” Suzy asked.
“Not immediately.” The woman struggled with her keys as she spoke. “He was the only child to a wealthy merchant, rich from trading with Europe. He was also a generous contributor to charity and donated to the city. Because of that, the council tolerated what went on here until the church heard of it.”
The woman kept fiddling with the heavy keys as she continued. “The church pressed the council into sending the police, but Monroy traditionally donated to the yearly police ball, so no one thought anything would come of it. But in the meantime, a particularly zealous minister, one who had been ousted from his church in Virginia for being too puritan, would you believe it, rallied his convent to ‘bring down the house of sin’, as he said. The police could only watch as the parishioners arrived just before midnight, armed with torches, axes and God knows what, threatening to burn the house down.”
“Good thing they didn’t,” Suzy said.
“They got quite close,” the woman replied. “Ah, here we are,” she added and unlocked the doors. “Please give the doors a little push, they’re rather heavy.”
*
The woman flicked a switch and the room was batched in the w
arm glow from a chandelier, similar to the one in the entrance hall but several sizes smaller. Suzy dropped her backpack on the floor and looked around in wonder.
The room was twice as large as her flat back in New York and many times as decorated. On the high, beige walls hung at least three dozen paintings, small and large, oval and square, some portraying vivid landscapes or great castles, others depicting people and faces that stared at unknown horizons behind the artist. They were all in the same color scheme, with ashen highlights on backgrounds of rich browns and blacks, making many of the works appear monochrome. Suzy noted that many of them featured beautiful women and men in different poses and clothes shown against the same background or with similar objects.
A massive bed on Suzy’s left dominated the room. Four sculpted poles rose from each of its corners to support a frame draped with linen cloth that was twirled around the wooden pillars. The huge bed frame was large enough for at least three people to sleep comfortably. Beside it stood an old chest of drawers with rows of glass bottles and a porcelain hand basin. Large candlestick holders stood along one wall between a pair of fragile-looking chairs. A group of absurdly large pillows occupied half of the bed. They looked very inviting to Suzy, still sore after the bus ride.
Suzy walked over to a door opposite the bed and found a small bathroom. It felt cramped compared to the large room bedroom, but it sported a huge bathtub, complete with lion’s feet and a selection of soap bars arranged neatly on the edge of the tub. While the hostel cost more than the average, Suzy found it hard to believe that the room didn’t cost ten times what she’d paid. The woman next to her seemed to read her mind.
“Most are surprised when they see the rooms, thinking they’d be more expensive,” she said to Suzy’s unbelieving stare, “but that’s because the hostel doesn’t meet some standards, which brings the price down a bit. Also, there’s no real lounge downstairs as we can’t install any air conditioning or fans – the pesky historic status, you see – and the lighting is rather poor.
Suzy loved it. She couldn’t have dreamed up a gloomier atmosphere, and while that might not appeal to some fools – well, all the worse for them. She looked around at the paintings again. “That Monroy was kind of an art freak, wasn’t he?” Suzy said. “All these paintings must’ve cost him a fortune.”
“Actually, he painted most of them himself, if not all of them,” the woman replied. “He was rather good, I think, but I haven’t found any record of exhibitions of his works. Perhaps he preferred to turn his home into a gallery for his guests. I believe many of the paintings are portraits of his friends.”
“So what happened to the guy?” Suzy asked. “Did the mob get him?”
“Ah, no, they didn’t,” the woman said and cleared her throat. “It appears that the guests fled quickly enough, but Monroy refused to leave the house. One of the guests said in a police report that Monroy had locked himself into a room and busied himself with a painting. The priest and his followers spent some time calling for Monroy to come out and own up to his sins, but when he didn’t, they went in and searched the house. I gather that the present policemen stopped the mod from actually setting fire to anything.”
Suzy found herself liking this Monroy. In her mind, she could see him uncork a bottle of red and start painting with a sardonic smile on his lips while the mob barked outside his home. She felt a sudden pang of worry that the mob had found him and killed him.
“What happened to him then?” Suzy asked. “Did he go to jail?”
“They never found him,” the woman said.
“What?”
“According to what the priest wrote down later on, they found a painting, still wet, and half-finished glass of wine next to it, but no Monroy. They believed he’d escaped through a rear window.”
Hah! I knew there’d be wine, Suzy thought, happy the strange painter hadn’t been caught. Somehow that would have cast a gloomy shadow over her stay. A bad sort of gloomy.
“Speaking of amenities, there’s no kitchen either,” the woman continued, “so you’ll have to resort to the snack machine across the street or a diner. I’d suggest you go soon, before they start to close,” the woman added, eyeing Suzy’s slim frame with a frown.
“I’ve got plenty to eat right here,” Suzy said and prodded her back pack with her foot. “Chocolate bars. All a woman needs. By the way, if I go out, is there someone on the night shift?” Suzy asked, not wanting to be locked out when she returned from her club raid.
The woman smiled. “I am the night shift. Just look after yourself. This city is full of odd people and places.”
Suzy didn’t tell her that those were the ones she’d be looking for. “I’ll be fine,” she assured.
“Well, then, I’ll leave you to yourself.” The woman rubbed her hands. “If there’s anything you need, I’ll be by the desk down in the hall. There are no phones in the rooms, but there’s a payphone by the desk downstairs. Check out’s at twelve noon. Please set your clock. A lot of people tend to sleep late here.”
Yes, mom. Suzy smiled and took the key from the woman’s extended hand.
As soon as she’d left the room, Suzy promptly threw herself on the bed. New Orleans! Sure, maybe it was just one night, but she’d spend it in a gothic mansion that had been inhabited by a pagan cult. Or something close to it. Very nice.
But first she’d have a look at what the city had to offer. She upended her backpack on the bed and sorted though the mass of things she’d forced into the bag, brushing aside her make-up kit, clothes, a tube of Concrete Hairgel that she trusted to keep her hair spiky all through the night, more clothes, Charlaine Harris’s latest novel, a tattered Emily doll, even more clothes, until she found what she was looking for: The map she’d grabbed at the airport. She played with the ring in her lip while she poured over the layout of streets and alleys, realizing that the hostel couldn’t have been better located: All the places she’d jotted down in her notebook were within walking distance.
She glanced at a massive watch on the wall, its pendulum swinging in slow, heavy arcs. The dull tick tocks seemed too slow. Maybe time slowed down in here in respect of past events. If so, all the better; then there’d be more time to play.
And it wasn’t that late yet. Suzy glanced at the bathtub and flexed her shoulders. Maybe a quick dip before she headed out, to ease her back and clear her head? And her clothes felt seriously icky after the journey and a few hours of summer warmth. Yes, she thought. Just a quick bath, then I’ll be off.
Her leather pants stuck to her legs like a second skin, but after some effort she peeled them off, then padded naked to the bathroom, twisted the aged tap and popped what she hoped was a tube of bubble bath into the tub. She waited for it to fill up and then slipped into the hot water.
The soreness immediately seeped out of her body as she relaxed in the scorching water. It felt good. “Damn,” she said and smiled at nothing, having decided that she’d get a tub like this once she could afford a place of her own. In whatever century that would happen, she wasn’t sure, but still.
There were paintings even in the bathroom. She recognized Monroy in a dark painting that hung slightly ajar next to the gold-framed mirror above the hand basin. This time he was sitting in the classic pose of The Thinking Man, looking at the painter with that wry grin on his lips. Those very full and kissable lips, she added to herself, wondering if he’d worn lipstick. Now that she thought about it, he was kind of attractive, for a dead guy in that seriously outdated velvet shirt he seemed to be wearing in every painting. There was a something teasingly sinister over his look that came through in all the portraits. No matter what he wore or how he posed, he looked as if he knew the answer to a question you’d never known you wanted to ask.
Suzy idly wondered if there had been any truth to the rumors his alleged society. Had this house really been crowded with people dancing, chanting and having orgies? If she’d been around at that time, would she have been invited? She smiled and closed her ey
es as she felt a familiar warmth ignite just below her belly. No wonder the church got furious with Monroy and his crowd; they were probably mad with envy.
When she felt so relaxed her muscles seemed to have turned to jelly, Suzy reluctantly got out of the bath, swept a large towel around her and walked over to the bed, leaving wet footprints on the heavy floorboards. The air was cooler in the bedroom, but not much. She sat down, rested against the massive pillows and took a deep breath, pulling the fragrant scents deep into her lungs. She exhaled with a sigh and leaned over to rummage among her packing for her makeup kit. She must have been more exhausted than he thought; even the idea of putting on mascara seemed like an insurmountable project, especially as it meant that she’d have to leave the bed. The sounds of insects, traffic, music and other unknown nighttime noises blended to a sedating drone. She leaned back and took in the people in the paintings, wondering what the house had been like in their days. Her head filled with images of shadowy people beckoning her to follow, of long kisses in dark corners, of whispering and laughing from under heavy bedspreads. She thought of Monroy, walking among the scenes with a crystal glass of wine, smiling at the hedonist acts as he …
*
Suzy blinked slowly. Where did the visions go? And why did she feel all numb?
Oh hell, she thought, realizing that she’d fallen asleep. Had she missed her only opportunity to hit the clubs? She groaned and rolled over, dreading what the time it would be, but it was too dark to see the clock’s hands. The room was cast in deep gloom, the only illumination coming from street lights and neon signs outside.
A New Orleans Haunting: #1 in the Suzy's Adventure Series (NOW COMPLETED!) (Paranormal Fantasy & Erotica) Page 2