The Legend of Marie Laveau Mystery Trilogy

by Jewell Parker Rhodes

  “We’re ‘mixed bloods,’” caroled her mother each year, on her and Marie’s birthday. Marie never understood what her mother meant. But she sensed her mother’s secret glee. The knowledge was supposed to be some talisman. “Mixed bloods. A history of power.” But what power did her mother have? She was just a woman, aging early, trying to survive in a world unkind to women.

  Dead almost twenty years and Marie still felt her mother’s warm breath, her mother love. She could see her lying, dead, on the floor. She’d just dropped, straight down dead like a black Sleeping Beauty. Except there wasn’t any Prince, no one to reach her where she’d gone.

  She’d been washing dishes, the water was still running, her hands and arms still damp. Marie didn’t know how long she’d lain. Just as she didn’t know anything about her people. She only knew her mother loved honeysuckle, knew she lived in Chicago where her mother cleaned houses, trying to provide, and when she died, there was no money, no relatives, little food, and only a few boxes of belongings.

  Marie stared at the brightening sky. A swarm of mosquitoes was heading south. Strange. Didn’t mosquitoes only rise at night? Swooping in from the swamps, infected with West Nile?

  Summer—“killing season,” local doctors intoned. West Nile replacing yellow fever. Both carried by the lowly mosquito. Two centuries and nothing had changed. Summer, the dangerous season. Time of disease. Illness. No ease. Time when Nature’s small creatures sucked and infected blood.

  Marie looked down the narrow street. Homes mixed with businesses. Families and single folks like her, living—trying to live above and between bars, grills, restaurants, blues haunts, porn shops, and less-than-respectable boarding houses. A steamship bellowed. The sun inched higher. Why live here? Downtrodden. Edgy. Fat tourists mixed with lean scammers. Pigeons clamoring over crumbs. A cacophony of music: rock, blues, Latin jazz, pop, big band, Cajun, and zydeco spilled out of bars, loudspeakers above trinket shops. Why here? Mosquitoes, perversely, swarming at dawn. Soft, porous soil supporting centuries of crimes: piracy, slavery, invasion. Church bells competing with sinful revelers. She’d been drawn for a reason.

  Her mother had walked these streets. Maybe even given birth here, surrounded by sin. She’d always known New Orleans hadn’t been random. Skin tingling, she remembered being a toddler, drifting to sleep, drifting, drifting to a Creole lullaby. When she was three, her mother pronounced, “English. English. Speak only English.” But, in private, she’d never given up the staccato lilt of “Marie.” Never stopped praising “mixed bloods.”

  Marie needed to find the baby.

  Kind Dog whimpered. Hopped a bit to the left.

  She made up her mind to call in sick. Doctor, heal thyself.

  She’d go to Breezy’s.

  She scratched Kind Dog’s ear. “Come on.” They started across the deserted street. Dog barked at a squirrel darting, zigzagging across the street.

  “You like hunting?” The dog seemed to nod. “Maybe you’ve got hound in you?”

  She felt almost happy. She and Kind Dog rode the makeshift elevator, an iron cage with rudimentary pulleys added in the modern age.

  She scrambled eggs, gave half to the dog. He lapped water while she heated coffee with chicory and milk. She wrapped plastic wrap around the dog’s wound.

  They both took a shower in an old-fashioned tub where easy women had lounged, bubbles covering their breasts. A circular rail and a plastic curtain converted it into a shower. Kind Dog sat; she stood, a canopy over him, gently washing his back.

  She dried herself and the dog off.

  She dressed. Jeans. T-shirt. Picked up the phone. “Sick. I’m sick, El.”

  Marie could almost see El at the nurses’ station, tapping her purple nails: “Sure,” she finally said, “Sure.”

  Marie wanted to reassure her that she was all right. But she was still too angry, too hurt. El didn’t have to lie about the baby’s family. Didn’t have to send an innocent to Child Welfare. Marie clicked the receiver without saying, “bye.”

  She powered up her computer, punched in Breezy’s on Map Quest and grabbed her keys. “Let’s go.” Kind Dog barked.

  She stopped. “Shit.” Her Volkswagen was belly-up.

  A horn blared. She went to the balcony. Reneaux was leaning against his car, passenger door wide open. “I figured you’d want to be moving.” He grinned.

  Marie wished she had a flowerpot to throw at him. My, he was too handsome. Light shining from behind his back; the crucifix in his ear sparkling. Black car, black jacket, black man. Egypt-beautiful with a good ole boy drawl. No need to leave New Orleans for interesting men. All shades, all accents; multilingual. If that was what she was looking for—but all she ever needed was sex, not love. The baby needed her. Profoundly. Loving her, finding, taking care of her was more important than any man.

  “I want to go to Breezy’s.”

  “I figured. Come on down.” She and Kind Dog did.

  * * *

  “Here.” He handed her beignets, still hot and melting sugar.

  “Café au lait.”

  The dog climbed into the backseat.

  “Why’d you bring him?”

  “Good company.” Biting into her beignet, she stared straight ahead. White powder dusted her hands and shirt.

  Reneaux shifted the car in gear.

  They headed toward the most depressed part of the parish. Beyond the elegant Garden District with its stately manor homes, near the waste dumps—a cesspool, literally, for the city. Gangs. Drugs. Entrenched poverty. More dangerous than usual. But what part of New Orleans was really safe? Homes with manicured lawns had their share of secrets, too. Wife beaters. Child abusers. A variety of sins.

  Reneaux slipped in a CD. Nina Simone. “You Put a Spell On Me.” As the car sped on, the houses became smaller, more ill-kept. Rats darted across the road. Mosquitoes died on the windshield.

  * * *

  Breezy’s was less than sixteen miles from the hospital. Still in St. Charles Parish but a ragtail collection of streets where the poorest of the poor seemed to live.

  Marie was even angrier at El’s and DuLac’s lying. She could’ve been here in thirty minutes, finding the baby’s people. Instead, she’d hurt a dog. Her car was on its back in a ditch. And she’d been scared. Run off.

  Here, doors, windows, and drapes were pulled shut, closed southern style against the heat. Indoors, men, women, and children were desperately starving. Or plagued by diabetes, blood pressure, lucky enough to get help from a free clinic. Skipping medicines, cutting pills in two. Children played outdoors in frayed underwear. A sluggish creek edged the community; it was rancid with chemicals from the plastics plant across the river. Who knew what cancers leeched into soil, water? She already knew some of the children were stunted from too much lead. She’d treated dozens for eating paint flaked from windowsills. If this was what her mother had been escaping, she was glad of it.

  She was glad, too, that Reneaux had come with her. She probably would’ve been distracted by sorrow. She would’ve missed the turn. Missed the black arrow, low to the ground, almost covered by weeds, sunflowers, and black-eyed susans.

  They bounced down a dirt road. A hand-lettered sign: BREEZY’S.

  The car slowed to a stop on gravel. The low-slung shack, made of whitewashed pine, looked as if a strong wind could knock it down.

  She turned toward Reneaux. “I’m not going to say ‘I’m sorry.’”

  “You were right, Doc. I was wrong.”

  “El and DuLac, too.”

  “I’m not going to speak for them. They’d their own reasons. For myself, I’m sorry. I should’ve told you as soon as I knew about the baby’s family.”

  “Why do you do that?”

  “What?”

  “Make me angry. Then, make me—”

  “What?”

  She shook her head. “Like you,” she almost said, but she already liked him too much.

  “I’m going to make them give me the baby.” M
arie got out of the car and took one step toward the shack. “Kind Dog. Stay.”

  She heard Reneaux getting out of the car, stepping like a shadow behind her. She felt relieved.

  It wasn’t even nine; sweat drained down her back. The building seemed haggard, like an old woman gone to lie down, to soothe her sore back. Nothing but weathered, pockmarked wood. Lopsided windows. A metal-hat exhaust poking into the sky. But she’d be lying if she said she didn’t feel evil. Inside, the baby’s mother had died. How? Inside, a slew of folks had fought, been knifed, shot, and driven to Charity.

  Except for a road sign, there was no marquee, no neon glittering on the shack’s roof. It was just a shack, harmless looking, but it radiated sin.

  “Former slave quarters,” said Reneaux. “Men might’ve lain here, tired out from hauling cotton to the harbor.”

  “No, no. This was the women’s house.” She didn’t know how she knew that. Somehow she smelled and felt the sweat, spirit of women. Like the few times her mother had taken her to a church—after the service, after kneeling, sitting on hard wood pews, her mother took her downstairs to the kitchen. There, young women, old women, worked in unison kneading dough, flouring chicken, crimping pie. You could feel the specialness of the women, tired out, but soothing each other with soft melodies floating out of their mouths like doves. Like a trick of the light, the shack shimmered. She shook herself. She was being silly, believing DuLac’s press. This was a shack. Now a bar. Layered with crime, greed, and violent pleasures.

  She and Reneaux moved toward the blackened windows; she felt she was being watched. Ghosts behind those windows.

  She knocked on the door. No sound of scurrying. No creatures about.

  Reneaux pounded. “Police. Open up.”

  Like open sesame, the door swung back on its hinge. There didn’t seem to be anyone. Just a pit of vile-smelling darkness.

  “It’s the hooch. Shine. Whiskey.”

  “Something more.” She coughed. Urine, feces, but still something else. Marie told herself it was her doctor’s senses making her so sensitive. There was some chemical, man-made, not organic smell. Or was it the reverse? Some unfamiliar, organic smell. Primeval. Latent in the darkness.

  Marie stepped inside.

  “Wait.” Reneaux reached for her just as men rushed them from both sides and grabbed her, pulling her farther into the room.

  Marie felt their hands on each arm, twisting, forcing her down to the floor. Thick, punishing hands. She tried to resist and cried out.

  “Police. Let her go,” Reneaux called. “Let her go or I’ll shoot.”

  Someone kicked the door closed, blotting out the light. A hand clamped over Marie’s mouth and one of the men leaned his full weight on her, pushing her to the floor. His weight was suffocating, his hands like her foster parent’s hands, trying to snatch her spirit. She couldn’t breathe. She was a child again, helpless; they were powerful.

  Marie raged, digging her nails into the man’s arm, biting down on his hand.

  A flashlight pierced the dark. Reneaux grabbed one of the men.

  “Let go of me,” she screamed, her rage and hatred bubbling up from childhood memories.

  “Fools. Do as she says. Let her go this instant.” A candlestick moved, disembodied in the darkness. “Put away your gun, Reneaux. You think it gives you power here?”

  Caught in the candle’s glow, Marie saw an ancient face. Not much more than a skull. Skin tight, glowing translucent in the candlelight. Blue veins like tentacles reaching across the brow and temples.

  “Be better off dead, non?”

  Marie didn’t flinch.

  “Hah. Bon femme. Not frightened of death. Turn on the light, fools. Don’t you know who she be? Don’t you know?” The woman blew out her candle.

  The man beside her clicked off his flashlight.

  Yellow lights buzzed overhead. The bar’s walls were blood red. Peanut shells littered the ground, dead beetles, roaches, too. The bar was lacquered black. There was a small stage, a drum set, mikes, a guitar, and a metal washboard, almost like armor, except it made music when worn, slapped or scratched with nails. There weren’t any tables or chairs. This was a place for drinking and dancing—bodies packed tight enough, the room dark enough, no one could tell (or care) who was stroking and touching whom.

  Out of the corner of her eye, Marie saw movement. A haze swelling, taking form. Will-o’wisps, waifs shuffling between rows of cots.

  “You all right, Marie?”

  She nodded. “You?”

  Reneaux shrugged, wiped blood from his nose. His jacket half pulled off, Marie could see his gun, locked in its holster.

  “No more violence here.” The voice was reedy, but powerful.

  Three men, ugly, thick like bulldogs, backed away from her and Reneaux.

  The woman wore a red and gold chignon and Marie could almost imagine her skin once fair. Beautiful, creamy-white like the baby’s mother. She was petite, small-boned, like the man beside her. But it was clear that the man dressed in a red silk shirt, looking like a retired jockey, was the escort. Caretaker. The woman was in charge. The boss. A contradiction. Elegant in a chantilly lace and rose silk dress. Elegant in a gown her ancestors would’ve worn. A black ribbon of smoke trailing from her candle. Her satin shoes stepping on filth.

  “I could arrest them.” Reneaux pointed at the bulldog men.

  “But you won’t.”

  “I should.”

  “What you expect, sneaking up? My men thought you was going to rob me.”

  “You call, ‘Open up, Police’ sneaking?”

  The woman cackled.

  Marie stepped forward. “Madame.” Inexplicably, she bobbed a small curtsy. “We’ve come about your great-granddaughter.”

  “Je n’ai pas de petite-fille.”

  Marie looked to Reneaux. He shook his head, mournful.

  “I don’t understand.”

  “You understand my Creole well enough. No great-grandchild. Non. None.”

  “I held her in my arms.”

  “Oui, your arms good for holding babies.”

  “Making them, too,” said one of the men.

  “Shut up.” Reneaux jerked forward; Marie clutched his arm.

  Marie’s eyesight had adjusted. There were other people. A freckle-faced bartender. Another man, stocky like a defensive linebacker; and another, with dreads and a lazy, out-of-place smile.

  “Mind if we look around?” asked Reneaux.

  “Got a warrant?”

  “You going to be difficult?”

  “You come to see if I had a baby, non? So why you need to look around?”

  “You’ve known about the baby all along,” blurted Marie.

  The woman spoke, scornful. “You think I don’t know what you want?”

  The two stared. Ashamed but not knowing why, Marie lowered her gaze. The woman smiled, tight-lipped yet pleased. The jockey man seemed disappointed. The man with dreads smiled wider.

  Marie knew she’d lost ground. But she had no clue about the territory. No sense of the terrain’s mysteries.

  “What else you looking for? Drugs? Money? Check the cash box. You can dip your hands like the other police. Firearms? Everyone has a permit. I even got a permit for this.” She pulled a pearlized derringer from a fold in her gown. “Small but dangerous. Keeps me safe. From bad men. Weak men. Gamblers. Corrupt cops. Good cops trying for redemption. Non?”

  Reneaux kept his face blank. But Marie saw the clutch of his hands, the slight contraction of his jaw. He’d been insulted, hurt deep.

  “Have you told this child your tale?”

  Reneaux’s back bowed. Marie wanted to defend him, but she didn’t know from what. She attacked: “How can you say the baby isn’t your kin?”

  “How can you say it is?”

  Marie stepped closer and the bulldog men shadowed her. “Don’t you have a granddaughter?”

  “Non. Marie-Claire—”

  The girl’s name.

&nb
sp; “—used to be.”

  “What do you mean? She is or she isn’t.”

  “I’m tired. Need to lie down.” She turned, her gait slow. The jockey man offered his arm.

  “Marie-Claire was here the night she died.”

  “Non. She wasn’t here.”

  “There was a big fight. They dropped her at Charity with the other bodies.”

  “Not here. She wasn’t here. Never here.”

  “You’re telling the truth?”

  “Why should I lie, girl?” the woman screeched, looking like an ancient fury.

  “You lied about the great-grandchild.”

  “Non. I disowned my granddaughter. Nothing she be, nothing she do be a part of me.”

  Harsh, unforgiving. Marie felt Madame’s anger like a weight, a wall collapsing.

  “Maybe we’ll speak to your daughter.”

  “You do that.” She scuttled forward. “But don’t let her claim that baby. Better baby die first than be given to her.”

  “You’re afraid of her. The daughter?” Soon as she said it, Marie knew it was true.

  Eyes wide, hands flailing, Madame screamed, “Cochon. You’re no one. Ignorant girl. Don’t even know how to use your power.”

  “Madame.” The jockey man clasped her hand. “You need to lie down. Let me help.”

  The old woman was trembling, muttering Creole.

  Marie understood snatches. Malice mixed with regret, disappointment. “Broken.” “Blood too red.” “Spirit snatch”; no, “steal.” “Steal the spirit.” “Undo the line.” “Mixed blood.”

  On the far right, someone moved. There was a door. Another room. A man was hiding in the doorway, shadowed, his hand on the frame. He pulled back inside the room; his ring finger glinted, catching shards of light. No one else saw him. Or else Madame’s men were covering for him.

  Marie shuddered. She saw Jacques, on a mattress, on the floor, his knees to his abdomen.