Ritual

by Graham Masterton

  Henri fired, but the noise of the cars crashing together was so loud that Charlie didn’t realize they were being shot at until a hole burst through his windshield, the size of a man’s fist, surrounded by a spiderweb of crazed glass. He backed up yet again, with the station wagon’s tyres screaming on the polished concrete, and then stepped on the parking brake, so that the station wagon slewed around, facing the exit.

  Henri leaned forward, holding his revolver in both hands, and fired at point-blank range. The bullet thumped through the driver’s door, passed under Charlie’s calves, and buried itself in the carpet that covered the transmission hump. ‘Go!’ screamed Robyn, and Charlie pressed his foot flat on the floor. The station wagon shot out of the parking area, skidded sideways at the bottom of the exit ramp, and then surged up toward the street like an Apollo rocket out of control. Charlie glimpsed Mme Musette’s white distraught face right by the entrance to the parking lot. Then the station wagon flew clear of the sidewalk, hurtling right into the middle of Canal Street with a crash of ruined suspension, and hitting a taxi on the offside fender.

  Before the taxi driver could get out of his vehicle, however, Charlie had backed up, stopped, twisted the wheel violently sideways, and roared northwards on Canal Street in a cloud of oil and rubber smoke. Slewing the station wagon from side to side to avoid slower traffic, glancing quickly in his rear-view mirror to make sure that he wasn’t being pursued by the police or by Mme Musette, Charlie headed for Interstate 10, the quickest route out of New Orleans.

  The station wagon shuddered and complained as he turned eastwards on I-10, but he kept his foot pressed down hard on the floor. Ahead of them, the sun shone directly in their eyes. Off to their left, Lake Pontchartrain glittered like an early morning mirage. Smoke poured out of the back of the station wagon, and the suspension was making a noise like a bucketful of spanners, but they kept going at eighty m.p.h., and Charlie wasn’t going to let up for anything.

  ‘Where are we going?’ Robyn wanted to know.’

  Charlie checked his rear-view mirror again. The last thing he wanted was to be stopped by the Louisiana Highway Patrol. If Mme Musette had been telling the truth, and the Célèstines really were thick with every law-enforcement agency between here and Connecticut, they would find themselves back at the Church of the Angels on Elegance Street before they knew it.

  ‘We’re getting the hell out of New Orleans,’ said Charlie. ‘Then we’re going to make our way to Acadia. But we have to get rid of this car. Every cracker-barrel deputy between here and Bogalusa is going to be on the look out for a bronze station wagon with Connecticut plates and smoke coming out of the tailpipe. We won’t stand a chance.’

  ‘We can’t buy a new car,’ said Robyn.

  ‘How much money do you have?’ Charlie asked.

  Robyn checked her purse. ‘About one hundred fifteen dollars, that’s all.’

  ‘And credit cards?’

  ‘Sure. Visa, American Express, Mastercharge. But we can’t use credit cards, can we––not for buying a car? The FBI are bound to have circulated our charge-card numbers. They’ll jump on us straight away.’

  Charlie checked his mirror. There was nobody behind them, not for miles, but they were blowing out so much smoke that they were bound to attract attention before long.

  ‘We could always liberate a car,’ said Robyn.

  ‘You mean steal it?’

  ‘I saw it in an Elliott Gould movie. It’s easy. All you have to do is drive along until you come across a car-dealer, then stop. I’ll do the rest. Make it a Cadillac dealer, if you can.’

  Charlie said, ‘If you think I’m going to steal a car, you’re out of your mind.’

  ‘For God’s sake,’ Robyn retaliated. ‘You’re already wanted for homicide in the first degree, as well as kidnap and grand theft auto. What difference is one more stolen car going to make? It’s the farm for you, whatever.’

  ‘Yes, damn it, and you too.’

  They crossed the north-eastern corner of Lake Pontchartrain, and then Charlie turned off Interstate 10 on to Route 11. They limped smokily into the outskirts of a town called Slidell, and Charlie steered the station wagon off the road and parked it on a dusty patch under the shade of some overhanging oaks. He climbed out, tugging his sweaty shirt away from his back, and said, ‘I almost feel like putting a bullet through its hood, so that it doesn’t suffer.’

  Robyn said, ‘There’s a Chevrolet dealer down there, look, two blocks away.’

  ‘And I’m supposed to walk up to him, without any shoes, and persuade him that I want to buy a car?’

  ‘Charlie, for Christ’s sake, stop being so defeatist! We’ll buy you some shoes at Woolworth’s. Then we’ll go get the Chevrolet.’

  They went into Woolworth’s and Charlie bought himself a pair of grey leather casuals with a silver chain across them, which was about the most tasteful pair of shoes he could find. Then together they walked into the corner lot of Gramercy Chevrolet, under lines of fluttering bunting, to the small concrete office where Dean Gramercy himself sat in his shirtsleeves behind a bare desk, smoking a bright green cigar and talking on the telephone. There was a citation on the wall from the Slidell Chamber of Commerce, and a Vargas calendar. Dean Gramercy was stubby and big-bellied and ginger like a hog.

  ‘Be with you folks right away,’ he told them, covering the mouthpiece for a moment. ‘That’s right, Wally. You bring those spares over by Monday. Then we can talk about price. But I gotta see them first. You know me, Wally. I pay good but I like to see what I’m paying for.’

  Dean Gramercy hung up, and extended his hand to Charlie as if he were his favourite cousin come visiting. ‘Good of you to drop by,’ he beamed. ‘If it’s a quality automobile you’re after, you’ve come to the c’rect location.’

  ‘We were looking for a late-model sedan,’ said Charlie tentatively.

  ‘Well, now, I’ve got maybe a dozen that would fit the bill. But there’s one special that I know you’re going to love. You come down to the lot and take a look.’

  Obediently, they followed Dean Gramercy to the front of the lot. With a flourish, he showed them a silver Caprice Classic with a silver vinyl roof.

  ‘Now you just take a look at this baby,’ he enthused. ‘Genuine ’85 model, fully loaded, 5.7 litre gasoline engine, only 9,000 miles, one owner who was so careful she didn’t even take off the plastic seat-covers.’

  ‘Sounds perfect,’ said Robyn. ‘Do you mind if we take it for a drive?’

  ‘Well, sure thing. All I have to do is turn the key in the office door. Not that there’s anything to steal, apart from my calendar.’ He snorted in amusement, and waddled off to lock up.

  Charlie said, ‘I’m sweating. Do you think we can pull this off?’

  Robyn said, ‘Easy. When I say go, just make sure that you go.’

  Dean Gramercy came back, and opened the Chevrolet’s passenger doors so that Charlie and Robyn could climb in. Then he settled himself in the driver’s seat, adjusting the steering wheel so that it didn’t press into his belly, and started up the engine. They drove sedately down the sun-gilded street between the overhanging live oaks, and all the time Dean Gramercy puffed affably at his cigar and rattled on about the pleasures of living in Slidell and what a desahrable vee-hickle this was, and how they couldn’t do better anywhere for Chevrolets than good old Gramercy, and what’s more he was going to throw in a Toshiba microwave oven as a fall bonus.

  Eventually, just north of Slidell, he pulled the car over to the side of the road and said to Charlie, ‘You want to drive her back? Just slide over.’

  He climbed out of the car. Charlie slid over behind the wheel and re-adjusted it while Dean Gramercy walked around the front. He was just about to take hold of the passenger door handle when Robyn shouted out, ‘Lock the doors! And go!’

  Charlie flicked the central locking switch, shifted the car into gear, and kicked his foot down on the gas. The Caprice roared forward, leaving Dean Gramercy with his mout
h open and his hand just about to curl round a door handle that wasn’t there any more. The car’s tail snaked a little as Charlie accelerated around a long curving bend. Then they were out on the open highway, heading northward into St Tammany County, with the sunlight flashing through the trees and the day dusty and bright.

  ‘Wow,’ breathed Charlie softly.

  ‘What did I tell you?’ Robyn laughed. ‘You drive like Bullitt.’

  Charlie checked his rear-view mirror, then turned around in his seat to make absolutely certain that they weren’t being followed. ‘Anything’s possible, isn’t it, if you’ve got the nerve?’

  ‘You’ve found that out.’ Robyn smiled and squeezed his arm. ‘So believe me, if you can liberate a late-model Chevrolet, you can liberate your son, too.’

  Charlie slowed the car and kissed her. ‘I do believe I’m beginning to love you more than a man should.’

  ‘Nobody ever loved anybody more than they should.’

  Charlie said, ‘I located Acadia on the map. It’s way over to the west, in St Landry County, between Normand and Lebeau, right in the middle of Cajun country. If we keep to the side roads, we should be able to make it there without too much danger of being picked up by the police. You know what I should have done, don’t you? I should have taken the licence plates off Mrs Kemp’s station wagon, and changed them over.’

  ‘You’re getting to sound like a professional car thief,’ Robyn teased him.

  They drove throughout the morning through the flat Delta countryside, under a pale bronze sky, heading westwards, in the general direction of Baton Rouge and Lafayette. At times they could easily have believed that they had the whole of Louisiana to themselves. They saw no highway patrol cars, no helicopters, nothing. Just shining bayous and girder bridges and water oaks, and glistening muddy banks thick with black-shelled mussels. They kept the Chevrolet’s air conditioning turned off to save gas, and drove with the windows open. The air flowed in humid, smelling of vegetation and slow-moving water.

  They stopped for wheat Po-boys and shrimp-on-a-stick at a breezeblock roadside restaurant called Frugé’s All-Day. There were cheap sunglasses for sale on a card, and they each bought a pair. They sat on the Chevrolet’s hood eating their shrimp and watching the clouds slowly come apart at the seams. A Cajun music station played ‘Laisser les Amis Danser’.

  ‘Well,’ said Charlie, when they had finished eating, and wiped their hands on their paper napkins, ‘I guess we’d better be moving along. Acadia’s a good fifty miles.’

  ‘I hope we can find someplace to stay the night,’ said Robyn. ‘I could use a shower and a change of clothes.’

  ‘We’re going to need somewhere to stay for two days. The Last Supper isn’t till Friday.’

  ‘Maybe you should ask,’ Robyn suggested.

  Charlie went back into Frugé’s All-Day and approached the grizzle-haired black man behind the counter. He was watched with unabashed interest by an old man with a Jim Beam golfing cap who was making his way steadily through what the proprietor advertised as a seven-course Cajun meal – a six-pack of beer and a one-pound boudin.

  ‘I’m headed toward Lebeau,’ said Charlie. ‘You don’t happen to know anyplace quiet I could stay for a few days?’

  The black man stopped rag-wiping the counter and pressed his hand thoughtfully over his mouth. ‘You could try Eric Broussard. He lives about six miles shy of Lebeau back from the road by the Normand Bayou. He used to take in guests from time to time, back when his wife Nancy was still alive, though whether he still does it now, I can’t say. Tell him that Jimmy Frugé sent you and everything’s okay.’

  ‘That’s generous of you,’ said Charlie.

  The black man looked at him with his eyes narrowed into cynical slits. ‘You’re running from the law, mon ami, so don’t talk to me about no generosity.’

  Charlie was about to protest, but the black man waved his hand dismissively. ‘I know a fugitive when I see one. I’ve been selling Po-boys beside this highway for thirty-two years. You get along now, and good luck, and don’t try driving along these back roads at night, lessen you want to go swimming inside of your car.’

  Charlie hesitated for a moment. Jimmy Frugé was the first person to have offered them help since they had left Connecticut. He wanted to tell him how much this meant, but he couldn’t find the words, and in any case Frugé wouldn’t have understood what he was talking about. So he just said, ‘Thanks,’ and left the restaurant, and walked slowly back to the car, where Robyn was waiting for him in her $3.75 sunglasses, looking as if she had just stepped out of 1963.

  19

  Eric Broussard was sitting on the verandah of his house soaking in the late-afternoon sunshine as they came bumping and jolting down the muddy track that led through the fields to the Normand Bayou. They could see his bifocal spectacles reflecting the marmalade-coloured light.

  His house had two storeys and was clad with weatherboarding that had once been painted red. There was still red paint to be seen in the nooks and crannies and knotholes; and the redness of the house was increased by the redness of the light and by the stand of cypress trees that surrounded it. Eric Broussard didn’t wave as they approached, or give any indication that he had seen them, but when they drew up in front of his verandah and climbed out of the Chevrolet, he stood up, walked to the top of his steps, and stood facing them, an old black man in a warm plaid shirt whose sleeves were too short for his long accordion-player’s wrists. He must have been very handsome once. Now his moustache was grey and most of his front teeth had gone, and of course he wore those heavy horn-rim spectacles with two kinds of lenses in them, so that he could see to read the sports pages in the Times-Picayune and also to scrutinize whoever was driving through the fields towards his house.

  Charlie mounted the first step. ‘Mr Broussard?’ he said. A north-westerly wind was blowing off the bayou, and it made the pages of Eric Broussard’s newspaper stir and flap.

  ‘Who wants him?’ Eric Broussard demanded.

  ‘Mr Broussard, my name’s Charlie McLean. This is Robyn Harris. We’re travelling hereabouts and we’ve been looking for some place to stay. Jimmy Frugé suggested we come to you.’

  ‘Jimmy Frugé? That boll weevil? He didn’t have no business sending you here. I don’t take in guests no more. You’re wasting your time.’

  Charlie wiped the sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand. ‘Mr Broussard, we’re kind of desperate.’

  ‘Desperate? What does that mean?’

  ‘It means we don’t have anyplace else.’

  Eric Broussard scratched his black, wrinkled neck. His skin had the quality of dark-dried tobacco leaves. ‘There’s a Howard Johnson’s over at Opelousas. Whyn’t you stay there?’

  ‘Because we’re having a misunderstanding with the police,’ put in Robyn boldly.

  Eric Broussard frowned. ‘A misunderstanding? Who’s misunderstanding whom?’

  ‘They’re kind of misunderstanding us,’ Charlie explained. ‘They think we’re guilty of one or two rather unpleasant misdemeanours, and the fact is we’re not, but at the moment we’re having a difficult time persuading them of that.’

  ‘You was framed,’ Eric Broussard suggested.

  ‘Something like that.’

  Eric Broussard slowly shook his head. ‘I didn’t never meet no lawbreaker who wasn’t framed. You go talk to all of the men on all of Louisiana’s state farms, and the amazing thing about it is they’re all innocent, every last one of them. They was all framed by ill-wishing associates who of course are still free. So what manner of state do we live in, that sends innocent men to prison, and allows guilty men to walk the streets unmolested?’

  Charlie said, ‘Believe me, Mr Broussard, we’re not criminals. But we do need somewhere to stay. Only a couple of days, that’s all we need. Then we’ll leave and you won’t ever see or hear from us again.’

  Eric Broussard sucked at his gums and thought about this. ‘Jimmy Frugé sent you, hey? That bo
ll weevil.’

  ‘He seemed okay to me,’ Charlie ventured.

  Eric Broussard shrugged and sniffed. ‘He’s okay. He and me used to be the best of friends once upon a time. We fell out over some fiddle-playing and we haven’t hardly spoke since then.’

  Charlie said, ‘We really do need someplace to stay, Mr Broussard.’

  ‘Well, I can understand that,’ said Eric Broussard, ‘but the fact of the matter is that I don’t take people into my house no more. I’ve grown too old, and to tell you the truth I don’t care too much for anybody excepting myself.’

  ‘We don’t expect meals, or any looking after,’ said Robyn. ‘And we can certainly make our own beds.’

  But Eric Broussard kept on shaking his head like a man who has spent far too long alone, sitting on his verandah and watching the hawks circle around the cypress trees.

  ‘Come on, Charlie,’ said Robyn. ‘I think we’re wasting our time.’

  Charlie stepped back from the house and lifted up both hands in resignation.

  ‘Hurt your hand there,’ Eric Broussard remarked.

  Charlie nodded. ‘Did you ever hear of the Célèstines?’

  The effect of this question on Eric Broussard’s face was astonishing. He stared at Charlie until his eyeballs looked as if they going to press against the lenses of his spectacles. His mouth dragged itself downward, and he took two or three epileptic steps backwards across the verandah. Charlie said, ‘Mr Broussard? Mr Broussard? What did I say?’ But Eric Broussard kept on stepping backwards until he was flattened against the weatherboarded wall of the house.

  ‘Mr Broussard,’ Charlie said, ‘I don’t know what you know about the Célèstines. Maybe you support them, I don’t know. But let me tell you that they’re holding my son in captivity, and that they’re planning to kill him. That’s why I need someplace to stay – at least until Friday.’

  ‘You say Friday?’ asked Eric Broussard, with unconcealed dread.

  ‘That’s right. They’re holding a special ceremony. A special Last Supper.’