“If you don’t have any other questions, officer, we need to be on our way.” I slipped my hand behind Angela’s back, leading her forward.
Comeaux stepped in front of us, obstructing our path. “I’ll be happy to accompany you lovely ladies to wherever you’re headed. I swear I can’t believe you’re mother and daughter. You look more like sisters.”
“Your time would be better spent contacting his family,” I said coldly, pointing at the ambulance pulling away. “Where are they taking him?”
“Charity Hospital in New Orleans.” He handed me a white embossed business card. “Take this in case you think of anything else. And in case I think of anything else, I’ll need a number from you.” His eyes settled on my bosom again.
“I don’t know the number.”
Comeaux’s eyes shifted back up to my face. The right side of his mouth jumped in a nervous tick.
“That’s understandable. You’re just visiting.” He smiled broadly but his eyes reminded me of the alligator’s, cold and vicious. “Just give me the name of the place and I’ll find you.”
“The Belle Viella,” I said, furious for his invasion of our privacy.
“Much obliged,” Comeaux said, tilting the brim of his hat before he scaled the hill in two strides while tugging up his belt. He waved before he slid inside the patrol car and slammed the door.
As he drove away I hoped I’d never see him again. He was obviously a sexist creature with no respect for women.
“Definitely weird, Mama.”
“An understatement.” I took Angela’s arm and led her up the grassy knoll toward the van. Even under the circumstances, I couldn’t help but marvel at the sky, a swirl of gold, orange and blood red.
“I never thought I’d say this but I’m actually looking forward to the Belle,” Angela said. She jumped back inside our van and buckled her seat belt.
I reached into my tote for the keys. They weren’t inside the zipper compartment where I usually put them.
“Don’t tell me.” Angela eyes watered, a sign she might start bawling if I didn’t find the keys soon. I frantically rummaged through my purse before scanning the car.
“Maybe you dropped them down there.” Angela pointed to the spot where Duffy collided with the willow tree.
I walked up and down the embankment, using my hands to rake through the thick, unmowed grass. Angela waited in the van, looking depressed, her chin almost touching her chest. I tried to reassure her but I was beginning to despair myself until I looked under the van and spotted the keys behind the left front tire.
“Found them,” I called out while reaching down. I noticed they were lying next to a blue, fiberglass suitcase. The same case Duffy was sitting on before he did his little dance. It was barely visible in the shadows between the front tires, probably why Sgt. Comeaux didn’t spot the thing.
As I pulled the case toward me I could see the right latch was broken. Something appeared to be sticking out on one side. Probably underwear or a sock, I reasoned, opening the luggage to shove back the offending object. What I saw was no piece of clothing. There was no clothing at all, only money, stacks and stacks of hundred dollar bills.
“What’s wrong, Mother?” Angela shouted. She was securely buckled up, unable to see the tossed luggage.
I jangled the keys in the window, wanting to lift her spirits. That’s when I decided not to say anything about the cash. The suitcase yes but not the cash. She might freak out if she knew.
Chapter Two
New Orleans
Sgt. Ben Comeaux’s House,
Dauphine St.
“I need to come by and pick up my stuff.” Holding the receiver away from his ear, Ben Comeaux winced at the sound of his ex-wife’s high-pitched voice.
“Your stuff?” He frowned in the mirror above the fireplace mantle. “Don’t think so. I’m the one paying off your fuckin’ credit cards,” he shouted.
Soon after Ben slammed the phone down, it rang again. When the caller ID flashed Josephine’s number, he pulled the plug from the wall jack, and the ringing stopped.
No way he was gonna talk any more to that bitch. The way he figured it, he’d gotten hooked up with Marcelliani because of her. Before then, he used to be an honest cop. Used to say he’d never be like some of the rogues on the force who take money under the table to look the other way.
Angrily, Ben paced his shotgun home on Dauphine Street, walking through the railroad-car shaped living room, kitchen, bath and two bedrooms in less than thirty seconds.
Eventually, he sank down in the tan, leather sectional sofa in the front room and glanced up at the young and smiling wedding picture of his mother and father, now both dead. Ben straightened the photograph, the center of a symmetrical wall display. His eyes wandered to pictures of his four brothers, nieces, nephews and cousins. He touched with pride the one of his mother’s parents, Renee and Sam Champlain. Beside it hung a gold-framed document penned in elaborate calligraphy by his mother:
Father learned to build light canoes that could race over the swampland. His cypress pirogues were sold throughout Louisiana. He was an honest man as his father, grandfather and great grandfather before him. He was greatly loved by everyone. He worked hard but enjoyed life, Laissez Le Bon Temps Rouler.
~ * ~
Ben closed his eyes and pictured his mother’s face, her gentle smile and charcoal hair. Josephine possessed the same exotic beauty but her likeness hid the truth. Soon after they’d married she became a compulsive spender who screwed around and eventually left him for another man.
This month they would have been married eighteen years. Damn long time. He’d been a cop for almost twenty. A regular hot shot when he first joined NOPD. Almost lost his big dick the night he kicked in the door of Denny (scum bag) Rickshaw. Motherfucker aimed right between his legs. Ben winced at the thought. Thank God Denny was a piss-poor shot even though the little shit flushed all the coke and other junk down the toilet before Ben got him.
Did the Chief appreciate his bravery? No way. Ben was reprimanded, not rewarded. Still, he hung in there till Josephine started breathing down his neck for a bigger house, more money, more this, more that. “Damn bitch wanted me to sell my home,” Ben’s voice rose as he summoned up the anger inside.
“My father helped build this house with his own hands. I’ve spent my happiest times here. Why would I wanna sell my home?”
“It’s a cluttered piece of shit,” she’d answered with a snarl. “Livin’ in a shotgun house, what a joke. Like they say, someone could fire through the front door and kill both of us.”
Just thinking about how she tried to jack him around made Ben recoil in disgust. He hated the name “shotgun house” as much as he hated Josephine although dreams of their passionate lovemaking still made his dick hard.
Nervously twisting his mustache, Ben jumped up from the sofa and studied his image in the mirror, surprised that his dark, vacant eyes seemed ugly. Josephine’s gone, dummy. Why do you keep taking the money? He asked silently, knowing the answer. Marcelliana would waste him if he did a turncoat number.
Wonder if the mob ordered today’s screw-up? Don’t think so. It came in his e-mail. Probably some Internet nut. But who cares. Paid him up front to follow that Duffy guy. Ben knew he’d blown the job. Spent too much time with that Metairie chick. Missed meeting Duffy’s plane. Shit. Already collected the two grand, delivered to his mailbox as promised for services he was supposed to but didn’t render.
How would he explain away the fuck-up? Ben came up with a simple answer: He’d say he followed Duffy, saw him jump into the back of an old truck, drunk as a skunk. No surprise Duffy fell out.
“Liar,” he scolded himself as night and storm clouds darkened his shotgun house.
Chapter Three
Belle Viella Plantation
“Cool!” Angela shrieked when we drove up to the yellow and turquoise Belle Viella plantation. “It’s shaped like a big boat.”
Loaded down with luggage,
we climbed three flights of stairs to the front door where Mary Viella had said she’d leave the key. Instead, we found the door unlocked.
Why hadn’t Ms. Viella secured the door and left the key in the tulip pot as promised? I felt a sickening knot in my stomach. “I don’t like this, Angel. Maybe we should check into a motel until we talk with Ms. Viella. I hope she’s all right.”
“Don’t be a worry wart, Mother. So she forgot to lock up. No big deal. We have neighbors back home who never lock their houses.” Angela pushed the front door open with her buttocks.
Inside, we searched the twenty-one rooms of the mansion for signs of life. I felt vulnerable and frightened though I tried to appear calm for Angela’s sake. “Hello. Anyone here? Ms. Viella?”
No response.
“Angela, you were right about the Belle being a boat.” I pointed to a gold-plated wall plaque in the long, cypress-planked foyer. “It says here, the architecture is ‘Steamboat Gothic.’”
“‘Captain Benjamin Mullette built the Belle in 1856,’” I read aloud, “`to celebrate his prosperous steamboat trading. Assembled as soundly as the steamboats he navigated, the Belle has managed to survive numerous hurricanes as well as the river’s wrath.’”
“Really cool.” Angela said, apparently, gaining a new appreciation for the historic house.
Wandering from room to room, we found Viella’s home immaculate, almost antiseptically clean, and smelling of pine, except for the sweet jasmine scent that blew in through an opened dining room window. The dining area was dazzling. The walls and floor were a golden butternut color. Two lard oil chandeliers hung from a frescoed, fifteen-foot ceiling above a twenty-six-foot-long American Empire mahogany table. Through one of the six glazed, double doors in the dining room, I saw a garden path lined with banana trees and palms, silver mimosa and yellow jasmine, hibiscus and red lantana. I started to walk out in the garden when Angela called from upstairs.
I found her waltzing alone, without music, in the third-floor ballroom. Together, we walked up a spiral staircase leading to the belvedere, an open-roofed gallery with a spectacular view of the grounds. Although darkness had claimed the night, a full moon and brilliant stars created a natural, lustrous light.
I thought I saw a truck drive into a barn-shaped structure nestled in the trees a short distance away. “Did you see that truck?”
“What truck?”
“It drove into the barn over there.” I pointed in the direction of the rickety building. “For a moment, I thought it was the same one...”
“Oh, Mother, don’t be paranoid. Forget about what happened this afternoon.” Angela gently touched my cheek.
I saw the deep sadness in her eyes and was glad I hadn’t mentioned the contents of Dan Duffy’s suitcase.
“Let’s go back downstairs and eat,” Angela said. “I’m starving. Aren’t you glad I made you stop for pizza?” Angela feigned an exaggerated smile, grabbed my hand and steered me downstairs.
I silently followed her into the kitchen and watched as she pulled apart two sections of pepperoni pizza, slicing the clinging cheese strings with her finger before popping them in the microwave.
“I only want a small piece,” I said, opening the refrigerator. “Look at all this food. Wine, cheese, eggs, milk, liver pate, gumbo, oranges, apples, grapefruit, sparkling water. My goodness.”
“I’ll stick with pizza. I hate gumbo and I’ve tasted pate. It’s the yuckiest stuff I ever put in my mouth. And besides, it’s unhealthy to eat animal organs.”
“Are you telling me pepperoni pizza is healthy?”
“No. But I’m sure it’s not as bad for you as something which tastes and looks like bird poop.”
Instead of commenting, I grabbed a package of wheat crackers, the disputed liver pate, a bottle of white zinfandel and a wine glass. As I sipped a glass of wine and spread the pate I worried about Duffy’s suitcase.
I’d stashed it under the four-poster bed in the Napoleon Room on the second floor where Ms. Viella had suggested we sleep. The room’s heavy wooden furnishings appeared sturdier than the other boudoirs, and after my frightful afternoon, I welcomed the security this particular room offered. Even the painting of Bonaparte hanging on a wall above the headboard gave me the feeling that the French emperor himself guarded the hidden luggage. After breathing a deep sigh, I took a bite of liver pate, pondering my options, while Angela heated more pizza slices.
Should I take the suitcase to the hospital and leave it for Daniel Duffy? Would it be safe there? What if he doesn’t recover? What if he’s in a coma for days or months? Should I notify his family and give them the suitcase? Should I give it to the police? No. Bad idea. Most cops will think he stole the money. Or, worse, that I did.
What if Duffy had stolen the money? Or what if it’s his life savings? Or maybe he won it. His money was none of my damn business. Whatever the story, Duffy is entitled to his suitcase and its contents. Particularly since I was partly responsible for parting him from it.
I had the feeling Sgt. Comeaux wouldn’t agree. I didn’t trust him. But I did trust Billy Joe, always had. He was like my big brother. There wasn’t anything he wouldn’t do for me. And as a cop he was in a good position to investigate.
“Earth calling Mother.” Angela placed her hand under my chin and turned it slightly. “From the way you look, I was right.”
“About what?” I smoothed the stray wisps of hair framing Angela’s face.
“The pate caused brain damage.” Angela placed her hands on my head like a faith healer.
“Yeah, right. It’s changed your patient mother into an irritable grump who’s turning in early tonight.” I tapped the tip of Angela’s turned up nose. “And so are you.”
“Not before I take a long hot bubble bath,” she said defiantly.
Thunder crashed in the distance. I recalled the news reports on lightning deaths and bathtub electrocutions during thunder storms. “Mother nature has other ideas. There’s a storm moving in.”
“Oh, pooh, it sounds far off. I’ll have plenty of time.”
While Angela ran her bath, I cleared away the pizza, washed and dried the glasses, then returned them to the Chippendale china cabinet. I noticed the white, lace curtains over an open dining room window. They billowed upward, riding the wind. I watched dark clouds cover the sky and smelled fresh rain falling on the garden. The second-floor gallery covered the patio and kept the rain from blowing inside.
My heart lunged when a yellow streak of lightning illuminated the courtyard. In the second of light I spotted a figure in the garden.
When I looked again I saw nothing but the smoky black of a stormy night. Shuddering, I closed and locked the window, then hurried from room to room, bolting the outside doors, windows and everything else lockable. Heavy rain pounded the Belle. The moaning wind sounded like some poor phantom in terrible pain.
I passed the bathroom and knocked on the heavy wooden door, telling Angela to hurry up, then I raced to the Napoleon Room where I quickly opened Duffy’s suitcase and counted the stacks of bills for a rough estimate. Impossible. Could there be a million dollars here?
In an interior pocket, I spotted a journal with bright red peppers painted on the cover and a small address book. Consumed with curiosity, I looked inside the other pockets and found letters addressed to Duffy wrapped in a rubber band. I opened the large purse I carry around like a second skin and tossed the journal, address book and letters inside. In seconds, I closed the suitcase, and slid it under the bed, then reached for the antique wall phone to dial Billy Joe.
Dead.
A loud clap of thunder, sounding like cannon fire, rang through the old mansion. It scared me so, I dropped the phone as the lights went out.
“Angela?” I just knew she’d been struck and electrocuted in the bathtub.
“I’m out. All I can say is, thank God, we’re in a boat.” Angela stood outside the bathroom door, wet and dripping water, a towel tucked around her.
“I saw a
lantern somewhere, and a candelabra on a fireplace mantel in one of the bedrooms, but I don’t think I have any matches,” I said.
“Oh, forget it. Let’s climb in bed and tell ghost stories.”
BAM. BAM. BAM. It was a loud, dull thud, the heavy iron front-door knocker. I peeked through a window in the foyer and saw the image of a tall man in a black slicker.
Chapter Four
Bourbon Street
Jay Cascio at The Green Door Club
In the rhythm and blues style of Fats Domino, Jay Cascio played a piano ride to Blueberry Hill and scanned the crowd. Where are you Duff? You should’ve been here by now.
At midnight the Green Door club was packed with sweaty tourists, pool hustlers, regulars, drunks and members of Endymion, a New Orleans association that displays the largest non-military parade in the world.
But no sign of the redhead.
As the band ended the third set Frankie Ford crooned Sea Cruise from the juke box and Jay remembered how Duff used to plunk out the tune on his left-handed guitar.
Fifteen years later Jay started playing keyboards in New Orleans where he loved performing but hated the cigarette smoke. That night there was a thick gray haze, like a toxic mushroom cloud, holding him captive inside the barn-like cypress walls.
Seeking comfort for his burning eyes, he pushed through the smoky mass of revelers and headed toward the men’s room behind the peeling plastered hallway covered with pictures of Louie Armstrong, Joe King Oliver, Duke Ellington, Pete Fountain, Bessie Smith, Billie Holiday and Count Basie. A young woman wearing a tank top and tight jeans offered him a Sazerac.
“Maybe later,” Jay said, declining the strong Bourbon and bitters drink.
He slipped inside the bathroom where he poured cold water from the laboratory faucet and splashed his face while two tipsy tourists relieved themselves in a trough urinal.
Checking himself in the mirror, he smoothed his thick wavy hair. His eyes looked turquoise that night instead of bright blue because he was wearing a hunter green silk shirt.
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