Creole Belle

by James Lee Burke

  “Get off my car.”

  “I asked you a question.”

  “If I was following you around, would I park my car next to your crib?”

  “It ain’t a crib. It’s a condo. You want Waylon Grimes, or do you just want to look through people’s windows?”

  “What I want is your germs off my fender.”

  “Relax. We go back, right? Old school. I didn’t sic Grimes on your secretary.”

  “Who said it was Grimes?” Clete asked.

  “Maybe it wasn’t. What I’m saying is I didn’t have anything to do with it.”

  Clete unlocked the driver’s door and threw his books on the seat. “You threatened to harm my sister and niece. You think you’re going to walk off from that?”

  Bix stepped up on the curb, away from the car, flexing his neck the way he used to before he came out of his corner in the first round, both gloves flying into his opponent’s face. “You’re a bum and your word don’t mean anything, Purcel. Sorry your secretary got hurt, but it’s on you, not me.” He squeezed his penis and pulled it taut against his slacks. “You don’t like that, bite my stick.”

  “Here’s what doesn’t make sense, Bix. Why is it that after all these years you guys end up with an old marker you think you can use to steal my home and my office? Who could think up a harebrained scheme like that?”

  “I told you. Frankie Giacano opened up Didi Gee’s safe as a favor for somebody.”

  “For who?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Where was the safe?”

  “At the bottom of Lake Pontchartrain. How would I know? Ask Frankie Gee.”

  “I think you’re lying. Didi Gee kept a two-thousand-pound safe right by his aquarium, the one that was full of piranhas. I don’t think that safe went anywhere. I did some checking on the ownership of Didi’s old building. It’s owned by a guy named Pierre Dupree. Is that the guy y’all got the marker from?”

  “This is all over my head.”

  “You look a little uncomfortable, Bix. You don’t have a meth problem, do you?”

  “I don’t have any kind of problem,” Bix said, leaning forward, pointing his stiffened fingers into his own chest. “It’s you who’s got the problem, Purcel. You were a dirty cop. Everybody laughed at you behind your back. Why do you think our whores slept with you? It’s because Didi Gee told them to. I put you in a cab once outside the Dos Marinos. You had puke on your clothes and cooze on your face. Why are you staring at me like that?”

  “I think you’re scared.”

  “Of you?”

  “No, of somebody else. I think you and your lamebrain friends went out on your own and ended up stepping in your own shit. Now you’ve gotten somebody else jammed up, and they’re about to clamp jumper cables on your ears. That’s it, isn’t it, or something close to it?”

  “What gave you this brilliant idea?”

  “All this time you haven’t said anything about money. Every one of you guys has got only one thing on the brain, and it’s money. Y’all never talk about anything else. Not sex, not sports, not politics, not your families. You talk about money from morning to night. You never get enough of it, you don’t give five cents of it away, and you don’t tip in restaurants unless you can make a production out of it. For you guys, greed is a virtue. But there hasn’t been one peep out of you about the money you say I owe you. Are you hooked up with some kind of new action in the city? Something besides smash-and-grab scores on old people?”

  “Maybe I’m willing to let bygones be bygones. You want Grimes, I’ll give you Grimes.”

  “I didn’t think AB guys did that.”

  “So I’m making an exception. Grimes deserves anything that happens to him. Also, I’m tearing up your marker.”

  “You already missed your opportunity. I’ll find Grimes on my own. If I discover you told him to hurt Miss Alice, I’m going to cancel your whole ticket. In the meantime, you might start thinking about giving back your ink.”

  “Say again?”

  Clete Purcel pulled a small recorder from his pants pocket and rewound it until he isolated the moment when Bix had said he was making an exception to the code of the Aryan Brotherhood and was willing to rat out Waylon Grimes. “By tomorrow this will be on several Aryan-supremacist message boards.”

  “You can’t do that, man.”

  “Get on the Internet in the morning. You’re going to be a celebrity. Maybe I can get some pics from your jacket and post them on there.” Clete Purcel got in the Caddy and turned the ignition, an unlit Lucky Strike in his mouth. “Look, go to a psychiatrist. Get some help. Getting over on you is like cruelty to animals. It’s really depressing.”

  “Don’t talk to me like that, man. Hey, come back here. Come on, Purcel, we always got along. Hey, man, you don’t know what you’re doing. We’re old school, right?”

  IT WAS ALMOST ten P.M. when Clete called me at the house. “I creeped Bix Golightly’s crib. His toilet seat is inlaid with silver dollars. His interior decorator must do the decor for cathouses.”

  “You broke into Golightly’s apartment?”

  “I got into his phone records and listened to all the messages on his machine. I also got into his computer. He’s a degenerate gambler. He must have half a dozen bookies and shylocks after him. That’s why he was trying to squeeze me. I think he’s been trying to fence some stolen paintings, too. Or forgeries. He had written some e-mails about an Italian painter. What does a guy like Golightly know about art?”

  “Where are you now?”

  “Over in Algiers. Golightly is parked by an old brick apartment building. I think that’s where Grimes is holed up.”

  “Get out of there.”

  “No, I’m going to take the pair of them down.”

  “That’s really dumb, Clete.”

  “So is letting one of them pour scalding water on my secretary.”

  “Why’d you call me?”

  “In case it doesn’t go right, I want you to know what happened. This is what I think is going on. Golightly is working for somebody he’s afraid of. He and Frankie Giacano got ahold of my marker and decided to score a few easy bucks, then somebody else came down on their case. Now Golightly is sweating marbles on several fronts. The old-time Giacanos always behaved like family men and lived in the suburbs and didn’t draw attention to themselves. Golightly and Frankie and Grimes broke the rule.”

  “Are you carrying a drop?”

  “I always carry one.”

  “Don’t do what you’re thinking.”

  “I don’t let myself know what I’m thinking. So how can I do what I’m thinking if I don’t know what I’m thinking? Lighten up, big mon.”

  Try arguing with a mind-set like that.

  CLETE FOLDED HIS cell phone and set it on the passenger seat of the Caddy. He was parked behind a truck on a tree-lined street in an old residential neighborhood of Algiers that had gone to seed and been rezoned for commercial development. Across the Mississippi, he could see the lights of the French Quarter and the black outline of the docks on the Algiers side and a greasy shine on the surface of the river. Bix Golightly’s van was parked just beyond the streetlamp at the corner, in the lee of a two-story purple brick building, Bix puffing on a cigarette behind the wheel, the window half down, smoke drifting in the wind.

  Why didn’t Bix go in? Clete wondered. Was he waiting for Grimes to go to bed? Was he planning to pop him? It was possible. Bix usually hired button men, homicidal morons like Grimes, to do payback for him, but now his voice was on tape blowing off the AB, and in the meantime he’d probably brought some extra heat down on himself for queering somebody else’s action. Would Bix cap a guy like Grimes to wipe at least part of the slate clean?

  Would anybody who knew Bix Golightly even ask the question?

  Clete reached into his glove box and removed a .32 auto that was one cut above junk. The numbers were acid-burned, the wood grips wrapped with electrician’s tape, the sight filed off. He dropped
it in his coat pocket and got out of the Caddy and walked up the street in the shadows of the buildings. He saw Bix take a final hit off his cigarette and flick it sparking onto the asphalt. Showtime, Clete thought.

  Then he realized why Bix had remained in his van. Two city cops came out of a corner café on the side street and got in their cruiser and drove through the intersection and on down toward the river. Ironically, they paid no attention to the van, but the cop in the passenger seat looked directly at Clete. The cruiser’s brake lights went on briefly, then it turned at the next intersection, and Clete knew he had not only been made, but by cops who considered him an adversary.

  He reversed direction, got in the Caddy, throwing the drop in the glove box, and backed all way through an alley until he popped out on the next street, one block away, his mouth dry, his heart beating. He turned off his engine, his breath coming hard in his chest, and knew with no doubt what he had been planning for Bix Golightly and Waylon Grimes.

  Just rein it in, he thought. You can still take them down. It doesn’t have to be for the whole ride.

  Right?

  Right, he answered himself.

  He waited until he was sure the cruiser had left the neighborhood, then he got out of the Caddy and began walking up the alley toward the street where Golightly’s van was parked.

  THE INSIDE OF the apartment building was poorly lighted and smelled of old wallpaper and carpet that hadn’t been vacuumed in months. Bix climbed the stairs to the second floor, taking them three at a time, pulling on the banister with the elasticity of a simian swinging through the trees. He felt a sense of anticipation he hadn’t experienced in years. The blood-pounding rush of a big score had long ago faded into a memory, like the joys of sex or flashing money at the track. Intravenous drugs once were a great source of pleasure and secret comfort, but they no longer got him high and he shot up only to maintain, as they said in the trade. Which meant he was a zero plugged into the end of a needle. The vices he could easily afford had become bland and uninteresting, and there were days when Bix felt that someone had done a smash-and-grab on his life.

  He walked down a hallway that was lit by low-wattage bulbs inside fluted shades gray with dust, the wallpaper stiff from water seepage, the fire escape framed against the glow of the Quarter across the river. He paused in front of a door that had a metal number seven on it and slipped a credit card from his wallet and started to wedge it between the lock and the doorjamb, then realized the door was unlocked. He replaced the card in his wallet and put his wallet in his side pocket and peeled the Velcro strap off the .25 auto strapped to his ankle. He twisted the knob a second time and stepped quickly inside the room.

  It was almost totally dark. A digital clock glowed on top of a stereo; a television set was playing in the bedroom, the sounds of a woman in orgasm bleating from the speakers. Bix held the .25 behind him, staring into the darkness, waiting for his eyes to adjust. “Waylon?” he said.

  There was no response.

  “It’s Bix. I got a little hotheaded on the phone. I’m getting too old and don’t know how to hold my water sometimes.”

  The only sound in the room came from the porn film.

  “Hey, Waylon, what’s going on?”

  Bix felt on the wall for the light switch, the .25 flat against his thigh. Then his hand froze on the switch. He stared at the silhouette of a man sitting in a cloth-covered chair, the red glow of the clock reflecting a nickel-plated revolver the man was holding casually in his lap.

  “Jesus Christ, Waylon!” Bix said. “You trying to give me a coronary?”

  He eased the .25 into his back pocket, successfully concealing it from Grimes. He wiped his palm on his trousers. “This is your fuck pad? Where do you pick up your broads? At the Lighthouse for the Blind?”

  Bix waited for Waylon to speak. Then he said, “You want to put your piece away? Let’s have a drink, then we’ll go down to my van and I’ll give you the twenty large you got coming. We’ll forget about Purcel and the nun. Are you listening? Somebody slip you a hot shot?”

  Bix hooked his thumb under the light switch, paused briefly, then flicked it on.

  Waylon Grimes did not move, not an inch. His right hand rested on the frame and cylinder of a Vaquero .357. His head was tilted back slightly into the upholstery, his mouth partly open. One eye seemed to be fixed on Bix, as though he had been taking a nap and been disturbed by an unwelcome visitor. The other eye had been blown back into the socket, the lid hanging halfway down.

  Bix let out his breath. “Hey, who screwed the pooch?” he said, turning in a circle, his piece held out in front of him. “Is there anybody else here? If there is, I got no beef with you. I was here to pay a debt, that’s all. You heard me say it.”

  He felt like a fool. Was he losing his guts? He went into the bedroom and the bath and the kitchen, but there was no sign of a burglary. He replaced the .25 in its holster and pulled a hand towel from the rack in the kitchen and wiped the inside doorknob, then stepped out in the hallway and wiped the outside doorknob and stuck the towel in his pocket. Had he missed anything? He couldn’t think. He had touched the doorknobs and nothing else. He was sure of that. Time to boogie and think through complexities after he was clear of Grimes’s pad.

  He went back down the stairs and exited the building without being seen, the wind cool on his face and hair, the smell of the river balm to his soul. How lucky can a guy get? he thought. Somebody else had snuffed Grimes, and now Bix was home free, not only on the Purcel scam but on the invasion of the nun’s house and the twenty grand he owed Grimes. He could use the money to square his debts and maybe get into a program for his addiction. Thanks, Waylon. I never thought you could do me so many favors. I hope you enjoy your ride in a body bag to the mortuary.

  But who had popped him? That one was up for grabs. Plenty of people hated the punk, including Purcel and the parents of the kid Grimes had killed. Yeah, it could have been Purcel, Bix thought. Grimes must have known the killer, because there was no forced entry. Grimes always had two or three guns stashed around his crib and must have tried to make a play with his .357. It was probably hidden under the chair cushion; he had gone for it, and Purcel had parked one in his eyeball. If that was true, maybe Bix could squeeze a few bucks out of Purcel after all, or see him go down on a murder beef. How sweet could it get?

  Or maybe one of Grimes’s broads did it. There were stories that he liked to hang them up on a hook and work them over with leather gloves or make them play Russian roulette. Grimes was definitely not into long-term female relationships. Who cared, anyway? It was a great night. Time to celebrate, have a few champagne cocktails with a lady friend or two, maybe shoot craps at Harrah’s. This was still his city. Then he had a thought. What would make this whole caper perfect? What if he planted evidence implicating Purcel? He had plenty of time. Nobody would find Grimes until he started rotting into the chair. Bix knew a house creep who would steal something out of Purcel’s office and plant it in the apartment for a few lines of unstepped-on blow.

  Bix walked down to the van, tossing his keys in the air and catching them, a song in his heart. He opened the door and got in and peeled the Velcro-strapped holster off his ankle and locked it in the glove box. It was no time to get stopped and frisked in Algiers. He inserted the key in the ignition, lighting a cigarette, blowing the smoke at an upward angle out the window, like a dragon that could breathe fire.

  He had paid no attention to a figure standing in a doorway across the street. The figure stepped into the light and walked toward the van, wearing a red windbreaker and a Baltimore Orioles baseball cap and tight-fitting jeans tucked inside suede boots. The figure’s hands were in plain view. Bix started the engine but did not shift into gear, his cigarette hanging from his mouth, his grin stretched as tight as rubber.

  “Is that you, Caruso?” he said. “I didn’t know you were back in town.”

  The figure did not speak.

  “I took a wrong turn off the bridge,” Bix
said. “I ought to know better, growing up here and all. You want to get coffee or something? I’m supposed to close a couple of deals tonight. It’s part of a charity drive with the chamber of commerce, can you believe that?”

  The figure leaned down as though determining if anyone else was in the van, then stepped back, glancing up and down the street.

  “You can come along if you like,” Bix said. “I belong to an all-night health club. We can play some handball. I’m trying to get off of cigarettes and lose some other bad habits I got. Funny seeing you in Algiers. I always lived in the Quarter or uptown and never really dug the lifestyle over here. If it’s not in the Quarter or up St. Charles, it’s not New Orleans. It’s like Muskogee, Oklahoma, you know, downtown Bum Fuck with Merle Haggard singing songs about it. Jump in and we’ll take a spin across the bridge. From the bridge, the lights of the city are beautiful. When you visit New Orleans, you ought to call me. I know all the famous places you won’t find on any map. You want to see the house where that vampire novelist used to live? I can show you the rooftop where the sniper killed all those people in the Quarter. I was born and bred in this city. I’m your man. Believe me, Caruso, Algiers sucks. Why the fuck would you want to hang out here?”

  Bix stuck another cigarette in his mouth without ever missing a beat, forgetting he had left one in the ashtray, the cigarette in his mouth bouncing on his bottom lip while he talked on and on, his dignity draining through the soles of his shoes.

  Then he felt an engine inside him wind down and stop. He looked at the glove box where he had locked his .25 auto and became silent. He lifted his eyes to the figure standing by the window and removed the unlit cigarette from his mouth. He started to speak, but the words would not come out right. He sucked the moisture out of his cheeks and swallowed and tried again. When he heard his own words, he was surprised at the level of calm in them: “You ought to come here during Mardi Gras. Like Wolfman Jack used to say, it’s a toe-curlin’ blast,” he said.