“Sign! Both… of… you. Now!”
Corlis hastily scratched her signature and rose from Julien’s bedside. When she crossed the room to stand next to Lafayette Marchand, she sincerely doubted that he would serve as the necessary second witness.
However, she was mistaken.
“My sister has been properly provided for,” he murmured. “I will sign.”
By the time Corlis and Lafayette Marchand looked up from Julien’s will, the waxen countenance of the short-lived owner of Reverie Plantation told them both that the last written testament they all had just signed would immediately come into full force.
Julien LaCroix, age thirty-one, was dead.
Chapter 26
May 29
Corlis’s nose twitched.
Something was burning.
Off to one side, she heard the faintest sound of a tinkling bell. The pungent odor grew stronger and stronger, until she forced open her eyes. Then she sat bolt upright on the chaise longue in her shadowed bedroom. Dylan Fouché was leaning over her, a silver bell held in one hand and a smoldering white feather in the other.
“Welcome back,” he said with a worried expression.
“What are you doing?” she demanded, batting away Dylan’s hand from beside her face.
“Well, I could hardly use smellin’ salts to bring you round, now could I?” Dylan replied peevishly. “Since it was smellin’ salts that put you in the trance in the first place! I used these.” He rang the little silver bell in one hand and fanned the white chicken feather back and forth with the other in order to extinguish the small flame that continued to consume it. “I’m not exactly an expert in this particular aspect of psychic phenomena,” he confessed with a studied show of modesty, “but I remembered readin’ somewhere that a burnt feather was a handy alternative for women needin’ to be revived after sufferin’ the vapors.”
“Well… it worked,” Corlis replied ruefully, swinging her feet from chaise longue to floor.
“It sure took a while,” Dylan said, frowning. “You had me worried there when you didn’t come out of it at first.”
“Boy, have I got a doozy of a headache.” She recalled the vision of Julien LaCroix, lying still and cold, on a bed very much like the one looming on the other side of the room. “Whatever trance you just induced turned out to be a big-time woo-woo experience.” She cocked her head in Dylan’s direction. “Well… I suppose you’re waiting for me to treat you to a very nice dinner?”
“I was thinkin’ you’d never ask,” Dylan replied with a grin. “But first… what happened? Did you learn any more about the saga of Joseph Dumas?”
“Not about him specifically,” Corlis replied, discouraged.
“Enough to link his family to the city council president’s?”
“Maybe,” she replied. “Joseph Dumas had a son who worked with him in the tailoring business and whom Julien hoped would one day marry Lisette, the daughter of your ancestor, Martine Fouché.”
“Well, at least we know that Joseph Dumas had someone to carry on his family line, but too bad you couldn’t make a direct connection to Edgar closer than that,” Dylan said. “We’ll have to show a stronger link than merely the name Dumas to get ol’ Edgar to wax nostalgic and vote against demolition, ’cause then he’d have to give up whatever might be comin’ his way from Grover Jeffries’s coffers.”
“Right,” Corlis agreed, and added, “I can confirm that poor Julien LaCroix wrote a new will just before he died of yellow fever. At least that’s what I saw. There might be an official way of nailing down a fact like that through parish death records or wills filed with the state or something.” She allowed Dylan to take her arm while she rose unsteadily from the chaise longue. “I’ll fill you in on the rest at dinner, if you’ll swear to absolute secrecy, Mr. Wizard.”
Dylan struck a tragic pose.
“Cross my heart and hope to die.” Then he grimaced. “Cancel that. Under the circumstances, I think a simple ‘I promise to keep my mouth shut’ will suffice.”
***
“McCullough!” a voice boomed over WJAZ’s intercom, penetrating every nook and cranny of the television station, including the ladies’ room. “You’re wanted in Zamora’s office. On the double!”
“Oh boy.” Corlis sighed, applying a swipe of color to her lips. “What now?”
She smacked her lips together and peered into the mirror at her freshly made-up face. Then she glanced at her watch. It was quarter to eleven. Chances were excellent that Zamora’s unexpected summons meant that her nice working lunch with Althea LaCroix at the Acme Oyster House in the French Quarter would be history.
In the hallway outside the restrooms, Corlis and Marvin Glimp nearly collided as they both headed for the station owner’s corner office.
“An emergency city council session on the Selwyn buildings has just been called for later today,” Glimp announced anxiously as he scurried down the corridor. “Andy and I want to be sure you understand the ground rules before you take off for city hall.”
“How about just employing fairness and accuracy?” Corlis inquired testily.
Glimp shot her a watch it, young lady look over his shoulder as they entered Zamora’s office.
The station owner slid the last tiny disk from his roll of Tums and put it under his tongue, balling up the shredded wrapper. “The meetin’ is called for four this afternoon,” Zamora told her. “I want you to interview both sides of the controversy for the early news today. Ask them for reactions—win or lose. Both sides, got that?”
Corlis nodded.
“Then, after the vote, pick up reactions from people on the street: from the descendants of the original builders, from some of the union construction guys who’d ultimately work for the Del Mar hotel folks—whatever you can get, so we can do a full wraparound on the late news.”
Her boss’s suggestions were standard operating procedure, even for a rookie television journalist.
“And?” she asked, waiting for the other shoe to drop.
“Lafayette Marchand’s already called the station this mornin’,” Zamora announced grimly, handing her a written record of a call marked “urgent” from Grover Jeffries’s public relations henchman. “I talked to him briefly. He asked specifically to speak to you. Wants you to call him right away.”
Corlis felt that familiar anxiety-ridden fluttering in the pit of her gut. Marchand’s call couldn’t be good news. The fix was in about the city council vote on demolition, and Lafayette Marchand wanted to be given the first opportunity to sock it to her on camera.
“Mind if I get King Duvallon and Althea LaCroix’s reactions on tape first?” she inquired, trying to sound casual. “I’d feel more comfortable if we had some of the players in the can before the city council meeting starts. Afterward it’ll be a mad scramble to find everybody before our show deadline.”
Marvin Glimp studied her narrowly. “Just be sure you give Grover Jeffries’s side equal time—to the nanosecond! Since I’m a bettin’ man, and I’m bettin’ all twenty-eight stories of that new hotel’s gonna be towerin’ over the French Quarter some day very soon.” He shrugged apologetically in Zamora’s direction. “And if that happens, Andy… I just want WJAZ to still be broadcasting.”
“I’d be sorry to see those Greek Revivals come down,” Zamora admitted with resignation, “but I think you’re probably right, Marvin.”
“So, you think it’s a done deal?” Corlis asked sharply.
Both men exchanged glances.
“That’s an inelegant way of phrasing it,” Zamora said with a sour laugh, “but that’s my gut’s guess.”
“Whatever,” Corlis replied, feebly attempting to mask a mounting sense of desolation. “Equal time for everybody concerned—to the nanosecond,” she added for Glimp’s benefit.
It seemed certain now that King’s beloved buildings were about to become rubble and dust, she thought bitterly. And even though she could practically hear Aunt Marge’s voice warning her
not to take sides on this issue, she felt as if she might start to weep. In fact, she would burst out crying if she didn’t get out of her boss’s office pronto. She turned toward the door.
“Good luck,” Zamora said quietly.
“See y’all later,” she drawled, wishing she could erase from her mind the sight of Kingsbury Duvallon—courageous, implacable, unmovable King—braving the onslaught of Grover Jeffries’s giant bulldozers.
What would the man do if he lost this fight?
***
By 11:00 a.m. Corlis swung by the deserted Café LaCroix and picked up Althea. Surprisingly, her friend directed her to drive down St. Charles Avenue toward the Kingsbury-Duvallon house on Orange Street.
“What?” Corlis protested, dismayed at the notion of encountering King’s parents.
“I want you to do your interview with us there,” Althea insisted stubbornly, “in front of a beautiful historic building white folks saved! King would agree.”
“I really don’t think that’s such a great idea.”
“We’ve used the garden as a background for video stuff several times,” Althea replied, unmoved. “When King’s parents are at work, we’ve zipped in and zipped out, with Antoinette and Waylon none the wiser. The place looks real New Orleans, ya know?”
“But it’s me doing the interviewing, remember?” Corlis fretted as they drove by a stand of moss-draped oaks flanking the thoroughfare. “King’s parents might not like the idea very much, considering the piece I did about their daughter’s wedding.”
“It’ll be fine,” Althea assured her, gazing through the windshield. “This is an emergency. I left a message on King’s voice mail at his house about the city council meetin’, and at the Preservation Resource Center, and at his office at the university. Chris Calvert’s been tryin’ to track him down on his cell, too. He said he’d alert King about our interview with you at the same time. He’ll show up.”
“Okay,” Corlis replied resignedly as the car drew closer to the Kingsbury-Duvallon residence. “You and King are the costars of this little show, so have it your way.” She quickly dialed Virgil on his cell phone and directed Manny and him to meet her on Orange Street.
“Should be nice and relaxin’,” Virgil replied, “ ’specially since we just finished shootin’ this cockamamie story they got us doin’ this mornin’ about a lady with thirty-nine black cats who lives next door to a cemetery. See you in ten minutes.” He signed off.
Corlis pulled up to the curb in front of the Kingsbury-Duvallon family home, parked, and locked her car. The sooner she got this interview over, the better. She felt butterflies in her stomach at the mere thought of seeing King again. She glanced once more at her watch, remembering suddenly that she still hadn’t returned Lafayette Marchand’s urgent call. Too bad she couldn’t catch his client, Grover Jeffries, on camera, passing out the thank-you checks to certain members of the city council before they took the vote! she thought darkly.
Much to Althea and Corlis’s surprise, however, they discovered when they rang the front doorbell that King’s mother was still at home—and King wasn’t there.
“I don’t rightly know what to tell you,” Antoinette exclaimed, a worried frown creasing her alabaster forehead. “Everybody’s been tryin’ to get hold of him today, but no one’s heard from or seen King since yesterday!” She stood at her door, framed by the carved wooden moldings and fanlight that arched over the threshold of the venerable old house. Mrs. Duvallon wore a smartly tailored St. John knit suit and sleek kid pumps, looking as if she might have a luncheon at Galatoire’s on her agenda this afternoon.
“Since yesterday?” Corlis echoed, her pulse quickening. “Do you have any reason to think there’s cause for concern?”
“Well, with all the controversy brewing at city council, and those awful public protests… that boy has ruffled a few feathers in the town, I can tell you that!” she said in her soft, steel magnolia accent.
“Do you think you should call the police?” Althea asked anxiously. “Report King’s gone missin’, Mrs. Duvallon?”
“The police have put King in jail so often this year, I don’t know what good it would do to call them,” Mrs. Duvallon declared. Then she heaved a sigh. “In actual fact, I said the exact same thing this mornin’ to my husband, Waylon, but he thinks it’s premature to file a missing person report, and I—”
King’s aunt, Bethany Kingsbury, appeared at the door. Her normally tidy gray hair fell in disarray about her shoulders, and her face was etched with worry. “Missing person report? Oh, goodness! Why would you think—”
“That’s just the problem I’m trying to tell these ladies about,” Antoinette cried. “When Waylon went out to the curb this mornin’ to get his newspaper, he found a bunch of King’s preservation literature and his briefcase lying on the sidewalk, right in front of the house. We had no idea he’d been by here. After we tried all his numbers, we called his next door neighbor on Dauphine Street who’s got a key to his place, you know? And when he looked in his room, his bed hadn’t been slept in last night. I told Waylon that the police should at least know about the briefcase and that he hadn’t been at his house all night, but then Waylon said that when King was dating Cindy Lou, there were plenty of nights when he probably didn’t—”
Just then the WJAZ news van pulled up in front of the house. Antoinette stared accusingly at Corlis. “Why are the TV people coming here?” she demanded to know.
Looking like a scared rabbit, Bethany spoke up quickly. “I told Althea, here, it’d be all right if they just used a corner of the garden to—”
“You did what?” Antoinette screeched.
“We’ve been trying to reach King all mornin’, too, Mrs. Duvallon!” Althea intervened swiftly. “We were supposed to do an interview here, prior to the city council meetin’ this afternoon.”
“I never gave my permission to do that,” Antoinette declared heatedly. “A TV interview about the controversy? That’s all we need at this point.” She glared over their heads at the sight of Virgil and Manny assembling their camera equipment on a small dolly near the news van.
For his part, Virgil was oblivious to the tension-filled drama taking place on the front porch. The cameraman shouted, “Good mornin’ ma’am!” Then he waved his cell phone in one hand and directed his next words to Corlis. “Hey, boss! Lafayette Marchand’s on the phone for you. The station forwarded his call to us in the van. He sounds mighty agitated.”
Corlis watched, surprised, as streaks of scarlet suddenly flooded Antoinette Duvallon’s cheeks. In contrast, her sister, Bethany Kingsbury, seemed to blanch.
“Lafayette…?” King’s aunt repeated faintly.
“Lafayette’s callin’ here?” Antoinette murmured with astonishment. “Ever since King and he had that falling out, he never calls anymore…”
“I’m supposed to do an interview with him, too—or with Grover Jeffries—sometime today,” Corlis explained, dreading to take Marchand’s call. “We’re just trying to cover the building controversy fairly, Mrs. Duvallon. We’re giving both sides a chance to air their views.”
Antoinette nodded absently, as if mesmerized by the sight of he enormous black man making his way, cell phone in hand, past the iron gate and up the path to her front door.
“Nice to see you again, Mrs. Duvallon,” Virgil said politely.
“Hello, Mr. Johnson.” Antoinette said curtly.
“Good mornin’, Miss Kingsbury.”
Bethany nodded warmly, but her features were pinched and careworn.
Then, as if Antoinette had suddenly been reminded of her manners, she said to Virgil, “You were very nice doin’ all those pretty close-ups of our flowers at the symphony luncheon this spring. I appreciate that… very much.”
All eyes were now on Corlis as she put the phone to her ear.
“McCullough, here.” Corlis announced in a businesslike voice while taking a few steps beyond the group at the Duvallon front door.
“Lafaye
tte Marchand. I’m callin’ regardin’—”
“You were on my list to call back, Mr. Marchand,” Corlis replied hurriedly. “Sorry for the delay. I was hoping you could arrange an interview—”
“This call is about… King.”
“King?” she echoed, surprised. “What about King?”
Both Antoinette and Bethany were staring intently at Corlis while she spoke into Virgil’s cell phone.
“Look, could you meet me at Commander’s Palace at twelve?” he asked, referring to one of New Orleans’s most renowned eateries located in the heart of the residential Garden District, only minutes away from the Kingsbury-Duvallon home.
“I really don’t think this is a day for a lunch date, Mr. Marchand,” Corlis said pointedly. “As you well know, the city council is meeting late this afternoon, and I had hoped that either you or Mr. Jeffries would be willing to talk to me on camera about—”
“That’s not why I’m calling,” Marchand intervened brusquely. “And I’m not inviting you to lunch.” He sounded increasingly grim. “To put it as clearly as I can, Ms. McCullough, I know you care about King, and so I am strongly suggesting that you meet me in front of the restaurant as close to twelve as you can make it.”
Before Corlis could reply, the phone line clicked. Marchand had hung up on her.
“What did he say about King?” Antoinette demanded. “What did that man say about my son?”
Nonplussed, Corlis exchanged confused glances with Althea and Virgil.
“Lafayette Marchand wants me to meet him in front of Commander’s Palace for purposes unknown,” she disclosed reluctantly. “It’s a pretty weird request,” she added for Virgil’s benefit, “but my instinct says we should go there, okay? Maybe we can grab an interview with him in case Jeffries won’t talk to us on camera after the city council vote.” She turned to King’s mother and aunt. “I don’t know what all this is about, but I will call you right away if I learn anything about King’s whereabouts… all right?”
“Thank you,” Antoinette said faintly.
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