by Julie Smith
It pointedly named Angela Valentino as the lawyer for the neighborhood group (neatly setting the stage for later revelations) and ended with a teaser mentioning chumminess with a bail bond firm “and other improprieties.”
Jane Storey called before Talba left home. “Keep an ear out today. I’ve got the other stuff, or I will by the time it runs. I’m calling today for Buddy’s side. Maybe you’ll hear something good on the speakerphone.”
“I don’t think so,” Talba said. “I’m working downstairs today.” It was too bad the bugs were gone, but if ever Buddy was going to look for them, this would be the day.
She arrived to find the family in the kitchen, all except Kristin, poring over the paper. Buddy’s face was nearly purple. “Goddam, what a bunch of lies!” was the first thing she heard from Royce.
Adele looked at Talba anxiously. “I already made coffee. I don’t think anyone’ll be able to eat today.” She pointed with her chin. “And Royce is having his with brandy.”
“What’s wrong, Miss Adele?”
“Oh, that Times-Picayune rag’s printing some lies about Buddy.” Then she muttered, “Guess they’re lies.”
“I can’t go to school,” Lucy wailed. “Everybody’ll feel sorry for me.” Talba saw that her face was chalky and mottled.
“Oh, baby, I’m sorry,” she said, and cuddled the girl.
“Mommo, can’t I stay home?”
“Your room could use a real good cleaning,” Talba said. “Maybe you could help me with it.”
Adele took pity. “Okay. You can stay home.”
“I need some nails to chew,” Suzanne said, opening cabinets as if she expected to find them there.
“Fix you some eggs?” Talba asked, and to her surprise, everyone wanted them. And grits and biscuits, too. She took an odd, penitential pleasure in feeding them.
For a while, as they ate, an eerie silence descended, which was finally broken by Adele. “Any of it true, Buddy?”
Buddy didn’t even stop chewing. “Adele, you know better than that. Can’t believe you’ve got the nerve to even ask.”
“But the bail bond guys…,” Lucy said, and her father stopped her with a slap.
“Whose side you on, huh?” he shouted. “Ain’ nothin’ wrong with that. Everybody does that.”
Lucy retreated, chased by Adele, and Talba wished she could follow.
“What I don’t get,” Royce said, “is why they’re doin’ this to us. Somebody’s been talkin’ out of school, Daddy, and you know it.” Talba’s heart pounded.
Buddy stuffed a biscuit in his mouth and talked with his mouth full. “Got me a feelin’. Just got me a feelin’—somethin’ to do with that lawyer bitch.”
Talba’s face heated, and she looked fruitlessly for an escape route. If they connected her with Angie, with the mood Buddy was in, who knew what he’d do to her?
“You watch,” Buddy continued. “Gon’ turn out she’s behind this. And it ain’ gon’ do her a bit of good. We got that bitch cold. She’s goin’ down behind this.”
“Ben Izaguirre,” Suzanne put in. Angie’s client. “Daddy Buddy, I knew you shoulda let me put up whirligigs in his direction. This would have never happened if we had some decent feng shui going.”
“Royce, can ya shut this chatterin’ monkey the hell up?” Buddy said, and stood, crumpling his napkin in lieu of Suzanne. “I’m goin’ back to bed.” He looked around for a bottle of bourbon to take with him. He might have gotten drunk, Talba thought later, but he certainly didn’t sleep. The phone rang all day.
Talba spent most of the day in Lucy’s room, sorting through stuff that needed tossing, but she heard enough to be able to report to Jane Storey that the reporter had given Buddy the worst day of his life.
On her way out, Royce intercepted her. “You about caught up here? I need you at the marina tomorrow. First thing after breakfast.”
Chapter 10
If ever the term “TGIF” had resonance, it did for Talba the last day she worked for the Champagnes. “If I get through today,” she told Miz Clara at breakfast, “I may go to church Sunday, and get down on my knees and give thanks.”
“Hallelujah,” her mother said in her saltiest tone. “Hard work’s gone and done what a good Christian upbringin’ couldn’t.”
But of course it wasn’t only the work. It was the sensation of being in Pompeii while the lava was flowing. She was almost looking forward to a day of mucking around with piles of shrimp hulls.
Jane’s subject that morning was Buddy’s relationship with Harry Nicasio. Her story talked about gifts and services in return for what it called “favorable bonds” for Nicasio’s clients. The teaser said tomorrow’s piece would be about Buddy’s habit of phoning in court.
The scene Talba walked in on was like an instant replay of the day before except for two things: Royce had had the crudeness to come to breakfast in his undershorts, and Buddy was missing.
Once more, Kristin wasn’t there.
Once more, everyone was sitting around reading the paper and muttering about mendacity.
Lucy, still in her pajamas, was still playing the role of the kid who ratted out the emperor. “But is it allowed for them to come and give us hams and stuff? I mean, they do. Is there really something wrong with that?”
And she was still getting slapped down, this time only figuratively. Adele snapped, “You don’t know what you’re talking about, young lady.”
“But, Mommo, I’m asking!”
Talba felt for the kid.
Suzanne finished her section of the paper and looked up sleepily. “Where’s Daddy Buddy this morning? Should one of us go wake him up?”
Royce said, “I’ll go. Sandra, can you make me some eggs over easy?”
“I need pancakes,” Lucy said miserably. Obviously, school wasn’t in the cards today, either.
Talba hustled for the next half hour, turning out a different breakfast for everyone except Adele, who consumed only coffee and stared distractedly out the window. She was starting to clean up when Royce returned in grubby jeans.
“Buddy still asleep?” Adele asked.
“His bed hasn’t been slept in. Must be at Kristin’s.”
One less bed to make, Talba thought, and put on Royce’s eggs. She glanced anxiously at Adele, not wanting to make her life any more difficult. “Royce wants me at the marina this morning, Miss Adele. Would you rather make it afternoon?”
Adele was holding a tissue to her face. She sniffed before answering. “Oh, go ahead now,” she managed to croak. “I think we need some time alone.”
Royce certainly seemed to, even on the drive over. He was bleakly silent, a cloud of despair seeming to emanate from him, making Talba deeply uncomfortable and unexpectedly sad. She knew there had never been any choice. It was either the Champagnes or the Valentinos, and the Valentinos were her tribe now. But she had never been so close to the damage one of her cases had caused to the family of the wrongdoer.
Intellectually, she knew it was Buddy’s fault, not hers; that he was the one who should have thought about his family. But it was one thing to know it and another to assimilate it. This must be like survivor’s guilt, she thought, and broke the silence only once, to ask, “Got bags?”
“Shit!” Royce answered. He stopped at a convenience store for garbage bags, handing her a five-dollar bill without a word. Neither spoke when she returned to the truck. As soon as they arrived, Brad Leitner came out and stood on the dock, hands on hips.
“Hey, Royce? I just did twenty thousand dollars’ worth of business.”
“Sure, you did,” Royce said sarcastically.
“Listen, buddy, I’m real sorry about all this mess with your daddy.”
Royce tried to smile and failed. “Ah, it’ll turn out all right. Daddy’s not doin’ anything wrong.” But he couldn’t control the hurt in his face. Talba just had time to register the other man’s distress before she averted her eyes, feeling like an intruder. Out of the corner of her eye, she s
aw that Brad was hugging Royce as if someone had died.
Sighing, she went up on the dock and started to fill her bags, her sympathy for the Champagnes quickly forgotten. What kind of people would let this kind of mess accumulate? she thought. Place should be closed down.
Except for Brad, the marina was deserted. He’d undoubtedly been busting Royce’s balls with that windfall story. But they’d definitely been working the marina since she’d been here, so maybe they were buying from poachers. A worse-run place she’d never seen, and she wondered why. Laziness, she thought. Royce was a man who felt entitled, who got by on his charm, such as it was. And so was his daddy.
Royce had walked out on the dock, again with this cell phone, and she tried to listen. It didn’t sound like business he was talking—at least not the usual good ol’ boy, jokey business she’d have expected. He was whispering. Probably something about Buddy; or maybe it was Buddy he was talking to. She needed an excuse to get closer.
Looking around, she saw a net on a pole standing against the rail near Royce. All she needed was a reason to use it. Accidentally on purpose, she dropped some debris in the water, and went to get the net to retrieve it. But Royce was watching her. “Gotta go,” he said into the phone, and returned the instrument to his pocket. Lazily, he leaned against the rail, watched her get the net. “Whatcha need that thing for?”
“Dropped something in the water.”
“Let me get it. I’ve got longer arms.”
He leaned over the side with the net, Talba trailing beside him, and suddenly he cried, “Daddy!” He dropped the net in the water and took off at a dead run toward the other end of the dock. “Brad!” he yelled. “Daddy’s out there—in the Grady White.”
Talba looked over the side. There was a little powerboat tied to the dock, and in the boat was Buddy Champagne, toppled to the right on a cockpit seat, his feet on the deck, the rest of him lying on his side, as if he’d been sitting up and had fallen over. His right arm was flung out behind his head, fingers hanging over the side of the stern. He was white as a fish belly. Still as a rock.
And as dead as the boat he sat in. She saw it instantly. No live person was that pale, that still.
Talba was frozen. She thought of taking out her phone, calling 911, calling Eddie—but she could think only of Lucy.
Brad and Royce raced toward the boat with Buddy in it. Helplessly, she watched, too much in shock to dial, as Brad said, “Let me do it.” He jumped into the boat, nearly capsizing it. The motion caused Buddy’s head to roll ever so slightly, just enough for Talba to see the wound—a rather neat hole—on the right temple. Surprised there was so little blood, she tried to remember if it had rained the night before. It hadn’t.
“Shit!” Brad hollered, and Royce uttered a scream with no syllables.
Talba took a deep breath. “Don’t move him!” she yelled. But Brad had scrambled back onto the dock. Again he held Royce, neither of them speaking. Fingers shaking, Talba dialed 911 and gave the address of the marina.
Then she called Major Case Homicide and asked for a cop she knew well, Detective Skip Langdon, formerly of the Third District, but returned to headquarters after one of the department’s many reorganizations.
“Baroness,” she said. “What’s up?”
“Skip, get out to Venetian Isles—the old Pelican Marina. Buddy Champagne’s dead in a boat. Looks like a suicide.”
“Jesus. Call 911.”
“I already have.”
“I’m on my way. What the hell are you doing there?”
“Working a case. Long story, but you’ve got to get me out of here.”
“That Times-Picayune thing?”
“I’ll tell you when you get here. But here’s the short version—I’ve been working undercover as a maid for the Champagnes. It’s going to get ugly when they find out. Oh, and one other thing—they think my name’s Sandra. Could you possibly refrain from calling me ‘Baroness’?”
“As you wish, Your Grace.”
Talba hung up, and called Eddie, who, in turn, promised to call Angie. Finally, because she owed it to her, she called Jane Storey.
Then she ran down the dock to the two men, but Royce was already driving off in his truck. “What’s he doing?” she asked, outraged.
“All he could say was, ‘Oh, shit! What’s Lucy going to do?’ He went to break it to her before the police came and kept him for hours. You got a cell phone?”
“I’ve already called the cops.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Well. Quick thinking. How the hell could a thing like this happen? He must have had a heart attack. Or fallen, maybe.”
“Uh-uh. He’s got a hole in his head.”
“Shit!” Brad said. “Shot? Is that what you’re saying?”
“Well. You saw it. What did you think?”
Brad lowered shoulders tensed against the truth. “All right. Guess Royce and me thought the same thing. His daddy couldn’t take the heat. Offed himself.”
Talba’s knees felt weak. The last thing she’d meant to do was cause this man’s death.
She knew what to expect in the next few hours. The coroner would come to pronounce the judge well and truly dead; the crime lab would take photographs and gather evidence; the cops would ask endless questions, and then they would take her to the station and make her sign a statement. She wouldn’t get away for hours.
And she’d smell like dead shrimp all day.
Her cell phone rang: Angie. “Don’t say a word till I get there.”
“Whatever you do, don’t come down here.” Pointedly, she avoided using the lawyer’s name, but she walked away from Brad just the same. “You don’t want to be connected to this. Are you crazy? Everything’s going to come out. You want to be on television at the scene? Don’t do it, all right? I’ll be fine.”
Silence hung like a weight on the line. Finally, Angie said, “Okay, I see what you mean. I’ll get Jimmy Houlihan.”
“I do not need a lawyer, okay? I didn’t do it.”
But try to tell a lawyer you don’t need a lawyer. It took her another five minutes of arguing, and by that time, Langdon had arrived, along with Lieutenant Adam Abasolo, whom she also knew. To her amazement, they obliged by pretending they’d never seen her before in their lives. After a decent interval, Langdon took her aside to get her story—and the backstory to her story.
During the interview, she asked a question Talba was to remember later: Had she seen a gun in the boat? Talba visualized the scene. She had seen both of Buddy’s hands, and they were empty. It was a small fiberglass boat, white, so a gun would have stood out.
“No,” she said.
“Are you sure?”
“Positive. But one of his hands—”
“I noticed. Like maybe he dropped it. Try to be patient, okay? I’ll be awhile.”
Meanwhile, Jane Storey arrived, in a feeding frenzy. Talba had also warned Jane that for purposes of this encounter, they were strangers. But she’d forgotten about the police radio. Soon the television stations, smelling blood like buzzards, began to converge.
It wasn’t the first time Talba’d made news, either in her detective persona or that of well-known poet about town. Someone from Channel Seven shouted, “Hey, there’s the Baroness de Pontalba. Baroness, whatcha doin’ here?”
And she ran to the tiny office for cover, almost wishing she had Jimmy Houlihan to deliver the “no comments.”
Finally, after a couple of hours, during which she gave Eddie and Angie periodic phone updates, Langdon took her away, complaining the whole trip about the way she smelled.
Chapter 11
No matter how loathsome the man, it’s a terrible thing to think you might have caused someone to commit suicide—and suicide was what it looked like to her.
Langdon had gone relatively easy on her—though she’d have thrown the book if she’d known about the illegal tapes—but Talba wasn’t about to give out information on an open case—at least not yet. Talba hadn’t seen a gun,
but still, she didn’t dare hope it was anything other than suicide. She was on the hook and there was nothing she could do but twist.
She wondered how Jane Storey felt, but there’d been no reaching her later that day. She knew perfectly well what Angie’s reaction was—and it wasn’t sorrow. It was anger. She’d be mad that she hadn’t gotten the public revenge she wanted and that she was still accused of possession. Talba’d be able to get her off with the speakerphone story as long as Boudreaux caved, but Angie had wanted Buddy to take the rap for setting her up.
Alberta Williams was distraught. She phoned Talba in tears. “I didn’t wish him no harm, Miss Wallis,” she wailed. “I wish to God we never done this thing.” And Talba didn’t have to get a phone call to know how Lucy and Royce felt.
Adele she didn’t have to speculate about. The first television broadcasts had identified Talba as being on the scene, mentioning both her jobs. Adele left a message on her cell phone: “Hello, Baroness. I hope you’re happy. We knew there was a rat somewhere, but we never suspected you. We trusted you. How does it feel to deprive a little girl of her daddy? To betray a whole family’s trust?”
A quote from somewhere popped into Talba’s mind: “Loyalty to an employer is the most vulgar of loyalties.” At least, Talba thought, I’m not guilty of vulgarity.
Darryl was next on the phone: “Oh, God, Talba, you’re all over the news. I’m just so sorry it turned out this way. You okay?”
“I’ve had better days.”
“Look. You did what you had to. This was Buddy’s doing, pure and simple. He did the crimes, and he got caught. If he chose to take this way out, it was his decision. As long as you didn’t pull the trigger, you didn’t do it. Do you get that?”
Talba sighed. “Miz Clara always says, as long as you do your best, an angel couldn’t do better. Well, actually, she just said it for the first time today. I’m trying to take it to heart.”
That in itself spoke to the gravity of the situation: When Miz Clara got warm and cuddly, you knew things were bad. Talba took refuge in her work—beginning a poem about trust and how it could be abused.