by Bailey Cates
* * *
Cookie was true to her word. An hour and a half later, the Honeybee phone rang. Ben picked it up, murmured something into the handset, and handed it to me with raised eyebrows and a knowing grin. I took it back to the office, where Mungo was snoozing on his sheepskin again. He cracked open an eye as I sat down at the desk, but it drifted shut a moment later.
“I called an old friend of my family’s,” Cookie said. “He is from Port-au-Prince, and came to America soon after my mother moved us here. They call him Poppa Jack.”
“Wonderful! And? Will he help us?”
“I don’t know yet.” Was that nervousness in her voice?
“I don’t understand,” I said.
“He wants to meet you. To . . . see you in person. Before he’s willing to talk to you at all about voodoo or any of its many manifestations.” She inhaled. “Poppa Jack will determine whether you’re worthy of his help after he sees you face-to-face.”
“Okay . . .” I drew the word out, trying not to feel slighted. After all, I didn’t know this Poppa Jack person, either, and I was the one asking for help. “When can I meet him?”
“I would normally pick Oscar up after work, but I can leave the car for him if you will drive.” Cookie, usually willing to rely on public transportation, now regularly borrowed her husband’s car for her job. They were shopping for a second vehicle but hadn’t found anything they liked yet.
“You mean now?” I looked at my watch. It was a few minutes after two.
“Right now. I’m on my way to Oscar’s laboratory.”
Lucy had already assured me I could leave. “That should be fine. I’ll be there in ten minutes.”
I hung up and untied my paisley chef’s apron. Mungo had come to his feet, wide awake, at the mention of my leaving. I leaned down and scratched behind his ears. “Sorry, buddy. I don’t know this voodoo friend of Cookie’s, and he might not be into dogs.”
Ar-arr-ar.
“Shh. I know, it’s a drag. But I can’t leave you in the car—it’s just too hot out. So hang out here, and maybe Lucy or Iris will bring you a treat.” I stepped back, eyeing his wee form. “Not that you need it after that chicken pecan salad.”
He snorted his disdain for effect, but then blinked up at me with worried eyes.
“It’ll be okay,” I said. “I’m just going to ask a few questions—if this Poppa Jack guy gives me the chance, that is. Cookie will be with me.”
He made a noise in the back of his throat, but allowed me to grab my tote bag and walk out of the office without further protest.
“Lucy,” I called.
She hurried back from the front of the bakery. “Katie? Is everything all right?”
“Cookie came through,” I said. “She wants me to meet a friend of her family’s. Can you handle things if I take off now?”
She glanced at the wall clock. “Sure. Iris and I can handle the prep for tomorrow. Right?”
Iris, chopping dried apricots, nodded. “Already started.”
“Thanks,” I said, rifling in my bag for my typically elusive car keys.
“Where are you going?” Iris asked.
“To see a man about something that’s lost,” I fudged.
She frowned.
Lucy waved me toward the door. “Go. Call me if you find out anything. Otherwise, I’ll see you before closing. Or if I don’t, come by and pick up Mungo at our place.”
“You’re the best.” I stooped to give her a kiss on the cheek.
“Pshaw,” she said. I could see the quiet strength in the set of her shoulders and the compassion shining from her face. My aunt would do everything she could to help me—and Dawn Taite. That knowledge not only made me feel warm, but also bolstered my own resolve.
Franklin must have believed in me, or he wouldn’t have sent Dawn to find me. I’ll track down that gris gris, whatever it is. And I’ll figure out what happened to them both.
* * *
Cookie closed the passenger door, and the Bug filled with the sweet scent of gardenia. My nonna, who had died when I was nine years old, had always worn gardenia perfume. Now the scent usually indicated that she was nearby, and a few times she had even spoken to me. However, this time I was pretty sure it was just the flower in Cookie’s hair.
She saw me glance at it and removed it from behind her ear. “Here,” she said, putting it in the empty stem vase attached to the dash.
I started to protest, but thought better of it. Perhaps refusing her gift would be seen as an insult. So all I said was, “Thanks.”
The tiny smile that tugged at the corner of her lips told me I’d made the right call.
“Go toward Abercorn Street,” Cookie directed. “Then follow the extension. Poppa Jack lives on the Southside, on the other side of the Armstrong campus. Look for Windsor Road.”
I checked traffic and pulled away from the curb. As I drove, I debated how to ask Cookie about voodoo. Heck, I wondered what to ask her about voodoo.
“It’s not evil,” she said.
My eyes cut to her. “You’ve taken up mind reading now?”
“It’s not that difficult. You’re on another case, Katie. I understand that you’ve been called again, as a lightwitch or . . . I don’t know exactly. However, I do know, as a member of your coven, that it’s my duty to aid you.”
“Duty, huh? Sounds pretty . . .” I trailed off. I had been going to say grudging, but that was uncharitable. I knew I was asking a lot from her.
“Yet it’s the truth. And in this case I’m the only one of the spellbook club who can assist you. So I shall, as I am able.” Her speech pattern was becoming more formal, though her accent remained nearly undetectable. Like me, Cookie had the ability to use her Voice to infuse her words with power, but that wasn’t what was happening here. I had a feeling she was remembering an earlier time, a time she had put behind her—and now I’d forced her to think about it.
There was no help for that, but the least I could do was get to the point and not make her linger in the painful past.
“So, voodoo isn’t black magic,” I prompted. From what the others had said, Cookie’s tendency to practice a slightly darker magic than the rest of us was rooted in her voodoo background.
She surprised me with a laugh. “It is black. It’s white. It’s purple and green and red. You and the others always talk about gray magic, as if the only colors of magic can be found on some continuum between white and black. But magic is bigger, wider, deeper than that.”
I nodded and flicked on my right-hand turn signal. “That makes sense.”
“The spellbook club believes it’s dark magic to try to bend anyone to your will. Even love spells are forbidden—though I do know you and your aunt open the way for such things in some of your kitchen spells.”
Like the vanilla in Mrs. Standish’s éclairs, which had opened the way for her to meet Skipper Dean. “True. But that’s not the same as tricking—or forcing—someone into falling in love with you.”
“Exactly. In voodoo that would not be considered evil, however. The very definitions of good, evil, dark, light—all are different,” she said.
“Really?” On one hand, stepping outside the box of good and evil was enticing. On the other, it felt vaguely dangerous. “What about the Rule of Three?” I referred to the part of the Wiccan Rede that stated that anything you did would come back to you threefold—good or bad. It was kind of like the Golden Rule on steroids, and the members of the spellbook club all tried to adhere to it whenever possible.
Cookie took a deep breath. “I personally believe in the Rule, of course, but it’s not a part of voodoo tradition. This is really simplifying things, but you don’t have the time to learn everything there is to know about voodoo. There’s not even one voodoo to learn about. There is voodoo from Louisiana, and vodou from Haiti.” She spelled each of the version
s. “Vodou is the national religion in Haiti, a deep part of the culture originating with the slaves that rebelled there. Did you know Haiti was the first country where the slaves overcame their oppressors and freed themselves?”
I nodded, fascinated.
“And there’s vodun, which originated in West Africa and holds the seeds of Haitian vodou. Each, er, branch may revere different spirits—the loa—but they all believe in and respect the spirits of ancestors. Then there are regional variations of hoodoo, which is more of a folk practice. There is a Gullah-based version here in the Low Country.”
“Okay,” I said. It was starting to sound pretty complicated. “So, what kind of voodoo queen are we looking for?”
She shrugged. “She could belong to any of the sects. There are also hybrid belief systems that have developed over time. Not to mention charlatans in it for the money.”
“But none of the flavors of voodoo are evil, per se,” I said, thinking out loud. “Why does voodoo have such a bad reputation, then?”
“Well, there are certainly those who practice left-handed magic, who seek to harm, and who will take money from those who wish to harm others. You could think of them as witch doctors. They can be very dangerous. Very powerful.”
A shiver ran down my back, and I turned the air-conditioning down a notch.
Cookie gave me a skeptical look but continued. “Then there are those practitioners who are like you.”
“Like me?”
“You’re a hedgewitch. They’re root doctors. The grune hexe. They use the power of plants and intention much as you do. Many are healers. You could think of them as medicine men and women.”
“I like that.” My father was nearly full-blooded Shawnee and descended from a long line of shamans and medicine men. Though hedgewitchery ran in my mother’s family, much of my gift for magic came from him.
“I thought you might. So you see, there can be evil in voodoo as there can be in witchcraft or any other magic,” Cookie said. “At times it’s a kind of tug-of-war. A man hires a witch doctor to curse his neighbor—like what happened to Oscar’s sister. The neighbor learns of this and hires a medicine man—or woman—who is more powerful to protect him. He might also hire another witch doctor to curse the first man. And then the first man might hire a more powerful witch doctor to re-curse his neighbor.”
“Sounds complex.”
“On the contrary, it’s very simple. Good or evil, the one with the most power wins.”
We rode in silence for a minute. As I watched for the sign for Windsor Road, I let what she’d said sink in. People brought their own intentions into any kind of sorcery, including voodoo. The fact that there was a great deal of power there, and that people are not always the best stewards of power, upped the ante.
“My father,” she began.
My breath caught in my throat. I hadn’t been going to ask her about him, as it wasn’t any of my business, and Cookie was a fairly private person. Still, I wanted to know.
“He was a priest,” she said. “A hougan. He had an enemy who was very strong.” She licked her lips. “Stronger than he was.”
And my father lost. The unsaid words hung in the air between us.
I reached over and squeezed her arm. A quick glance at her face revealed eyes shiny with tears. I returned my attention to the road. “I’m so sorry, Cookie.”
Her chin dipped. “As am I. This man we are going to see was a friend of his in Port-au-Prince.”
I pushed my foot down on the accelerator.
Chapter 8
Cookie directed me to turn right onto a private drive. We passed under an iron archway with a large sign over it. I turned to her in surprise. “Magnolia Park Senior Care? Your friend works here?”
She smiled. “No. Though he probably does work here, now that you mention it. Poppa Jack will never stop working until his heart gives out, I suspect. He lives here.”
Live oaks strewn with Spanish moss lined the winding driveway. We crested a hill, and a large, stately house came into view. It looked more like someone’s elegant home than a senior-care facility, and I suspected Magnolia Park’s historic origins had involved some kind of plantation. A gabled roof rose above the white-and-brick building. Iron trellises decorated—and protected—the lower half of the tall windows on each of three floors, some with ivy or roses climbing up them, others bare to reveal intricate scrolls and swoops of dark metal.
I parked next to a gray van in the small lot in front, and we exited the car. I glanced at my watch. Almost two-thirty. The smell of new-mown grass and hot asphalt infused the muggy afternoon. We made our way up the front walk, and I pushed the button that automatically opened the impressive wooden door. Side by side, we entered. I paused to blink in the comparative darkness, but Cookie whipped off her ginormous sunglasses and marched up to the reception desk.
As I joined her, the woman behind the desk—Gloria, according to her name tag—reached for a phone and punched in a few numbers. While she waited, her heavily mascaraed eyes assessed her manicure from behind blue-framed glasses. Her hair was twisted up into a French braid on the back of her head, and her matching cotton T-shirt and slacks were a light peach color. “Good afternoon, Jack. You have a visitor.” Her gaze flicked to me. “Are you with her?” she whispered.
I nodded.
“Actually, it looks like you have two visitors,” she said into the phone. “Ladies.” A few seconds, and then she nodded. “Okeydoke.” She replaced the receiver and pointed behind her. “Down that hallway, then turn left. Jack’s room is on the right.”
I thanked her, and we began walking the direction she’d indicated.
The inside of Magnolia Park was appointed with antiques and plush brocade draperies, but the floor was a dark Marmoleum; nice enough, but out of sync with the rest of the furnishings. Practical though. My thought was confirmed when a white-haired woman in a tailored track suit went whizzing by on a motorized scooter. A fifty-two-inch television took up part of the back wall of the room we were walking through, and the lobby morphed into a general living area. A group of five ladies and one gentleman sat on the sofas arranged in front of it, watching Judge Judy take someone to task. As we passed a doorway, I peered in to see the dining room. Tables laid with white cloths had already been reset for the evening meal, but the air still hinted at a savory lunch.
Cookie’s heels clicked quickly down the hallway that the nurse at reception had directed us toward, and I hurried after her. She slowed at the end, where we were supposed to turn left, then stopped. I reached her side and put my hand on her arm.
“You okay?”
She shot me a look of defiance, but I could see the reluctance there, too. Sudden trepidation bloomed in my own chest. I was about to meet a voodoo priest, and I realized I had no idea what to expect.
“Is this Jack fellow an intimidating sort?” I asked.
Her cool green eyes regarded me. “It depends on whether he likes you or not.”
“How can you tell if he does? Like you, I mean. Me, I mean.” Good goddess, I was babbling like an eight-year-old on the first day of school.
A humorless smile quirked her lips. “Oh, you’ll know soon enough.” Taking a deep breath, she stepped around the corner.
Paused, staring.
I rounded the corner, too, as a wide smile broke out on her face. “Oh, Poppa Jack!” And she was running down the hallway, arms open to embrace the man standing in the doorway of a room on the right. She flung her arms around him, burying her face in his neck. He swayed at her impact, but caught himself with the cane he held in one hand and embraced her with his other arm.
“Cookie. It has been so long. Far too long.” The way he said it made me feel warm and fuzzy. I’d never met any of Cookie’s family. Her brother was several years older and lived in Florida, and her mother had left Savannah to live near him and her grandchildren. But th
is man had family written all over his face, in sentiment if not by blood.
“I’m sorry, Poppa. I should have called before.” She stood back and beckoned to me.
Poppa Jack turned slowly as I approached. Despite the deep lines carved in his mahogany face and the gnarled fingers that gripped his cane, his back was straight and his gaze steady. A ruff of still mostly black hair ringed his shiny pate like a monk’s tonsure. Close up, I saw that his eyes, though trained on me, were both filmed with cataracts.
He was not nearly as enthusiastic in his greeting to me. “This is the woman you told me about,” he said. Not a question.
Cookie nodded. “Katie Lightfoot. She needs your help.”
“We will see.” His tone was mild but firm.
“You’ll like her,” she said.
“We will see,” he said again.
I pasted a smile on my face and held out my hand. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Pop—”
Cookie shook her head, just once, and I brought myself up short. Apparently Poppa was a title I, an outsider, was not supposed to use.
“Um, Mr. . . . I’m afraid I don’t know your last name.” My eyes cut to Cookie. Why hadn’t she told me how to address him?
“Call me Jack,” he said, turning toward the paned double doors at the end of the hallway. “Let’s retire to the garden to talk.”
“Outside?” I asked, instantly regretting it.
He turned and looked at me with cloudy eyes. “Yes. Outside. They keep it too damn cold in here for old bones like mine.”
“The grounds here are beautiful,” I said. “Lead the way.”
Whether he detected my false enthusiasm for sitting out in the ninety-eight-degree heat in ninety-five percent humidity, he didn’t say. He simply nodded and, with Cookie’s hand on his arm, went outside.
I followed behind, thoughts as to what to tell this man about Franklin and Dawn Taite already racing through my mind.