The band turned around and Mr. Trombone said, "Hey, Sam, where y'at?"
The cute, fireplug of a man jumped up onto the stage and headed for the old Story & Clark upright. He lifted his hands and caressed the wood and keyboard cover like he was making love to it. "Hello, sweet dahlin'," he said softly. "You and me, we gonna rock their world tonight."
It was kinda hot, and made me a little embarrassed. I spun around and bumped into Jack who stood behind me smiling as he watched the new piano man feel up the piano. "Looks as though we might be in for something special tonight," he said.
I hoped so. I hadn't gone into details about what happened the night before. Just told him the other man had a pressing engagement.
The bartender came up beside us, carrying a highball glass full of a creamy pale liquid. "Here ya go, Sam," he said. "Had to go all the way to the kitchen to find you some buttermilk."
Sam came to the edge of the stage, bent down and took the glass. "Thanks." He looked at me. "I got me a real touchy stomach lately."
He turned back to the piano, set the glass on the narrow ledge above the keyboard, pulled up the bench, adjusted the microphone that had been set up beside him, and sat down.
The drummer banged his sticks together four times then hit the drums and the group rolled into "Ragtime Cowboy Joe," which Sam the piano man sang with gusto.
Jack laughed, sang along, tapped his foot, clapped, and just generally seemed to be having a great time. When the band took their break, after an uneventful first set I might add, he stood.
"They're terrific," he said. "You've done a good job keeping it together here after losing that first guy. Great job, Melanie." He took my hand, raised it, and touched his lips to it. I was so caught by surprise, I snatched it back and put it behind me.
"Th-thanks," I stuttered as I watched him saunter out.
The crowd milled around. The bar was doing a thriving business. Things seemed to be going well.
After only about fifteen minutes, the band went back up on stage. The audience quieted as the piano man leaned back over to the mic. Only the words he uttered weren't an introduction to the next song. "All right, y'all," he said. He sounded angry. "'Fess up. Who the hell drank my buttermilk?"
My gaze shifted to the right side of the piano where the highball sat. Empty. He was right. And I honestly couldn't recall seeing him take but one sip during the first set. Had someone really gone up onto the stage while the band was on break and drank Sam's buttermilk? I hadn't noticed anyone, but had to admit I wasn't watching the entire time.
It only took a couple of minutes to roust him up another glass of buttermilk, and the band went into its next set.
Again. Nothing went wrong. The band took another break. This time I had a look at the glass sitting on the piano as the band walked away. Half full.
From my jeans pocket, my phone buzzed. I stepped out of the room and crossed into a quiet area by the lower staircase. It was a text from my roommate, Catalina Gabor, the hotel's resident tarot reader. She was vacationing with her lover, Deputy Quincy Boudreaux of the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Department. The two had rented a bungalow on Myrtle Beach where I truly believed they intended to order out for pizza and Chinese food and stay in bed knocking boots for the entire week. I'd have been lying if I said I wasn't jealous. Of the situation and their great relationship. I couldn't help but wish that someday I might be able to spend my vacation like that, only with Jack Stockton.
Her text just reiterated what I already thought. They were having a great time and weren't looking forward to returning to work. I replied that if I were she, I wouldn't want to come back either, then returned to the Presto-Chang-o Room where Sam the piano man was having a world-class conniption fit.
"This ain't funny y'all," he hissed, his slitted eyes glancing all around. In one hand was the highball glass. And it was empty. Again. From the way he was yelling, I guessed it hadn't been Sam who'd emptied it.
"I'm telling you I got a sensitive stomach. I need my buttermilk to soothe it. Who's doing this?"
Before I could even make it halfway across the room, he set the glass back down on the piano—hard. "Damnation!" He kicked the stool aside and slapped his hand against the side of the piano. "This makes me plumb mad!" And he flattened both hands down onto the keys.
The injured ivories responded with a horrible discordant screech that matched Sam's as the keyboard cover slammed down on top of his hands with a loud bang, and a sound came from the piano itself that sounded something like the wail of a banshee.
The clarinet player put down his instrument, ran over, and shoved the keyboard cover back off Sam's poor hands.
"Holy Moses," he said, looking down at Sam's fingers, already beginning to swell. "You took a real whack on those digits, Sam. Anything broken?"
Sam cringed and flexed his fingers, grimacing as he did so, then he looked at the piano—long and hard.
I reached the stage just as he said, "Mean ol' bitch, and after I sweet-talked ya, too."
He stepped down off the stage, cradling one hand inside the other, and stalked off. The other five players all took a long look at Booker's old piano. Scared, maybe. Confused, certainly. I couldn't help but stare at it, too.
The crowd went wild with applause, obviously thinking it was part of the show.
The drummer did a rim shot and cymbal rattle. The others followed suit and swung into "Sweet Georgia Brown."
Thank God nothing else happened during the last set, but then again, no one went within ten feet of the piano.
I waited after the last song while the band went into a tight little circle and confabbed before stepping down off the stage and heading my way in force.
I kind of thought maybe I knew what they had in mind. I was wrong.
"We took a vote, Miss Melanie," the trombonist said. "And we all agree. We ain't gonna play the last night unless you do something about that crazy piano."
I didn't know what to say. Harry Villars loved that piano. He hadn't been here to see all the trouble it was causing, and I didn't think he'd let Jack get rid of it.
"I don't think we can get you another piano, guys. The owner of the hotel, he—"
"You don't have to get rid of the piano, Miss," he interrupted.
Oh, thank goodness. I had already begun to imagine the reaction I'd get if I had to go to Villars.
"No, ma'am," he went on, "just see what you can do 'bout getting that haint outta it. And while you're at it, better see about another keyboard man. We're fresh out."
* * *
I met Desi Lopez de Monterra via my neighbor Beauregard Taylor, who worked as a bartender at Thibadeaux's Bar on Bourbon Street where Desi played piano for a five-piece blues band three nights a week. This wasn't one of those nights.
It seemed to take forever for him to answer the phone. When he finally did, I was pretty sure I woke him up.
"Better be some money in this." He was definitely grumpy.
"Desi, it's Melanie," I said. "You work last night?"
"Mmm. 'Til two, then went to a tasty jam down Musician's Village 'til five."
"Oh." I looked at my watch—just coming up on eleven. "Sorry, but I need a favor."
I explained the situation, and Desi jumped on it. Evidently sitting in with the Ragtime Players was a hot gig. Who knew? He promised to be there for a quick practice session later in the day, and I knew he would be. Desi was good people. I'd seen him on a roof lots of times when his eyes were bloodshot, and he could hardly hold his head up, but he'd promised to work on a restoration crew at St. Antoine's. He always showed up and carried his weight. If he said he'd help us out, he would. And I intended to see he was well paid for the short notice.
* * *
"An exorcism? Really? Come on, Melanie. What, do you think it's the twentieth century or something? The Church hasn't been in that business for quite a while now."
Father Brian shook his shaggy head and gave me what my grandmama would have called the "evil eye."
Yeah, I know I was groveling, but I had to. I didn't know where else to turn. Jack had thrown his hands in the air and looked at me with those big brown eyes. "So, the band told you they wouldn't play unless you did something about it. Right?"
"Right," I'd said.
"Well, something like what?"
I'd said the first thing that popped into my head. "We should get a priest to chase the thing out."
He stared at me a long time. I think he was trying to keep from laughing. "You mean like an exorcist. Yeah? Has the piano been levitating off the stage yet?"
He was pulling my leg, and I knew it. "No," I said. "But it's come pretty darn close."
He seemed to think about it a minute before he shrugged and said, "Why not? If it brings the musicians back, why not?"
And that's how I came to be in the temporary meeting hall of St. Antoine's Parrish in the Holy Cross neighborhood of the Lower Ninth Ward. Father Brian owed me a favor. My friends and I spent many, many dollars and many, many hours trying to restore the actual church, which had been so badly damaged by Katrina, it had to be condemned. Slowly, but surely, we were bringing her back to grace—but obviously even that wasn't enough to bring out the demon slayer in Father Brian.
"You sure?" I said.
"Oh, yes, Melanie," Father Brian said. "I'm sure."
I stopped on my way out for a good look at the holy water vessel by the front entrance. Hmm. What if I took a little of it back to sprinkle on the old piano? Chase my old buddy Booker clean outta that thing? It sounded good in theory, but I knew deep down if there really were a restless spirit dwelling there, it would take more than a little shower (even if it was with sanctified water) to evict it. And besides, I didn't think the Lord would look kindly on my purloining holy water from the church.
I headed straight over to my grandmama's house. She'd know what to do. There was a time when I was a little girl she'd painted a blue stripe all the way around the house to keep haints away. Then a few years ago, she'd painted the whole thing Haint Blue. If anyone knew how to discourage hauntings, it was my grandmama. Only what she had to tell me might not sit too well with my conservative boss.
Had she really said what I thought she'd said? "Voodoo, Grandmama?"
"Too right, my sweet girl."
I sat there picking at my grilled cheese sandwich and shrimp gumbo, thinking about it.
"And you know just who to call, too. Don't you, young'un?" she said.
She was right. I did know who to call. Ghostbusters.
* * *
The Who-do Voodoo We-do Shop at The Mansion was like a mini-replica of one of those creepy places in Diagon Alley. An old brick "storefront" with a big paned-glass window revealed all things voodoo you could expect inside—legitimate: mojo bags, religious statues, candles—as well as the bogus: shrunken heads, voodoo dolls, and chocolate candies in the shape of voodoo talismans.
Mambo Bon Magie (Mama Good Magic) sat behind the counter reading a copy of Fifty Shades of Grey. Mambo was a stereotype of a voodoo priestess if I ever saw one, maybe part of the reason she was drawing a paycheck at The Mansion on Mystic Isle.
People seemed to expect her to look as she did—in her late-forties, pushing three hundred pounds, dressed in her "work clothes" consisting of a white turban and robes, her skin shiny and gorgeous as chocolate icing. She wore her long hair braided into cornrows and tucked under the turban. She had a smile like the rising sun and capable-looking hands equally at ease with comforting strangers and driving out demons. Everyone said Mambo was good people, but she made me nervous. I guess it was the voodoo connection.
What little I knew about voodoo I learned from Grandmama Ida. She always told me not to be afraid of what I couldn't see. "Most of it's good, child, and what isn't, well, there's usually a way around it." Voodoo being one. Ever since I'd gone through puberty and took off those rose-colored glasses and little girl panties, I'd pretty much filed voodoo under W for Old Wive's Tales, along with Papa Noël, Baron Samedi, swamp vampires, and Bloody Mary. But I have to admit somewhere in the back of my mind the ghost of Marie Laveau might have been winking and shaking her finger at me.
"Haint, you say?" Mambo frowned, put down her Kindle, and fixed her big brown eyes on me. "What you think? I can just whip up a spell like a chicken supper? No, girl, if it's gonna work, I gotta confab with the spirits first and get my wits about me, not to mention gathering up all them special things I be needing to chase out that nasty thing."
"Oh," I was disappointed. Another plan shot down. "I thought—"
She shook her head so hard her cheeks jiggled. "A gal just can't throw a thing like this together at the last minute."
"Well, if you can't do it—" I began.
"Hold on to your horses, missy. Did I say I couldn't do it? You're lookin' at the reigning priestess of Jefferson Parish House of Voodoo." She hauled herself off her stool, went to the front of the store, and turned the sign from Ouvert to Fermé. "Give me an hour."
* * *
Jack had insisted on joining us in the Presto-Chang-o Room. He offered drink coupons to the three couples at the bar, sent the bartender and waitresses off on a break then hung a sign on the door that said, Closed for cleaning. Please check back later.
He didn't believe in any of this and thought it was a total waste of time. But, as he said, "If a voodoo ritual claiming to drive a restless spirit from a Story & Clark century-old upright piano is what it'll take to get us a piano player for the last night of the summer jazz festival then I'm more than willing to go with the flow."
The piano tuner and I were on a first name basis by then. I was even thinking of liking him on Facebook. The whole time he worked on Booker Jones's piano, he just kept shaking his head and muttering, "I don't get it. I just don't get it."
* * *
At 4:15 the five remaining members of the Ragtime Players arrived. I'd called them after I left the voodoo shop and told them the Mambo Bon Magie show would begin around 4:30, and if they were interested in seeing the haint "voted off the island," they might want to show up around that time. They must have taken me at my word. I'd always heard musicians could be a superstitious lot.
Desi arrived about ten minutes later, dressed for "work," in a lime green zoot suit, white oxfords with Cuban heels, and a yellow fedora with a pheasant feather stuck in the hatband that matched his tie and pocket square. I stared. Whenever we worked at St. Antoine's, Desi looked fairly normal with the exception of his hair that was always combed into an outrageous pompadour that stood on his head like a bowl of meringue.
"Hola, cats and ladies." He swept off the hat and bowed, shook hands with the other five and Jack (who squinted at the lime green suit like the glare hurt his eyes), then Desi strutted across the room to the stage where he hopped up and had a good walk around the old piano. "Haunted?" He turned back to the rest of us. We all nodded.
Since I'd told him what happened with the other keyboard guys, he stood back a couple of feet before gingerly lifting the cover off the keys. We all pretty much held our breath. You could have heard a skeeter snore. When nothing happened, Desi turned and grinned. "Hey, cats, not so bad, eh?"
That was when Mambo rolled in, shaking her finger at him, the flesh under her arms flapping. "Get yo'self down offa that stage, boy." She was decked out head to toe in beads and bling, and wearing this monstrosity on her head I can only describe as a headdress consisting of various parts of dead birds—feathers, chicken feet, a couple of staring heads, and a centerpiece of some green waxen figurine that was a dead ringer for the Incredible Hulk and a perfect match to Desi's suit. In one hand, she carried a big boom box by the handle, and strapped around her cross-body style was a big tapestry bag. She went on, "Not so bad? What's wrong wit' you, boy? That haint's just keepin' hisself quiet to draw you in. Then, just when you not l
ookin'…bam!" She stomped her foot, and we all jumped. "He put the hex on you."
Jack, always what Grandmama Ida would call a gentleman and a scholar, reached out and relieved Mambo of the boom box and her overstuffed tapestry bag, which he sat on the edge of the stage. He took her by the hand and escorted her up the steps. She grunted as she hefted herself up.
"Thank you for coming on such short notice, Mambo. I can assure you the management appreciates it. Is there anything we can do to assist you?" Jack asked.
"Since you at it, you could use them muscles and lift those heavy old things up onto that bench."
"My pleasure." He moved the bag and boom box onto the piano bench as she asked.
She opened the bag, reached inside, and began to pull an odd variety of items from it. "You betcha your cute bootay," she grinned.
I cringed. Jack Stockton might be the cutest boss on the planet and Cap'n Jack in my mind, but I never dared call him that. He hadn't seemed to notice the bootay remark, or was at least pretending he hadn't.
Mambo cracked her knuckles. "What y'all can do for me is stay the heck outta my way. This here be serious bizness, and I don't need no distractions."
Jack gave a curt nod and stepped back. "We're here if you need us." It might have been my imagination, but it seemed like his voice cracked when he said it. Could it be I wasn't the only one who had the heebie-jeebies?
We lined up at the edge of the stage and all stared while Mambo began to assemble the implements of the trade required by a connoisseur voodoo priestess.
She bent over the bag, the chicken feathers in her headdress swaying. First came a small vial of amber liquid. "Lilac voodoo oil." Mambo held it up for us to see. The bright stage lights shimmered through it.
"Dis here's my special spell powder. Haints don't like it much." She set the small jar on the bench next to the lilac oil.
"And what I got here is," she took out a Ziploc baggie that looked as if it were full of "blueberries." She popped open the bag and sampled a few. "Elderberries herb is what we generally use, but they's hard to come by on short notice. I imagine blueberries is better'n nothing at all."
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