Fairbanks, Nancy

by Crime Brulee (lit)

  "I've never tried any of them," I replied, sniffling. How­ever, I certainly should. German immigrants had been the primary brewers of beer in New Orleans, a city proud of its local brands. In fact, the word Dixie was of New Orleans de­rivation, having come from an American mispronunciation of the French word for ten displayed on one side of a ten-dollar bill printed in the 1800s for circulation in the city. "But I choose the Dixie longneck," I added, always inter­ested in things of historical significance.

  The lieutenant pulled a six-pack from the refrigerator and paid for the two sacks and the beer while I used a corner of his handkerchief to stem my tears. "Well," he said, once we were back in the car with the enticing odor of his purchases wafting through the grill from the backseat, "where shall we go to eat this?" He put the key in the ignition and turned to smile at me. "My place all right?"

  Oh, dear, oh, dear. Somehow or other, the lieutenant had gotten a very wrong idea about our relationship. Kind as he had been, I had no intention of... no desire to ... I glanced, panic-stricken, at my watch. Worse and worse. It wasn't lunchtime. It was five-thirty. Jason would be arriving at the hotel just about now, wondering where I was, and now this handsome policeman evidently expected me to accom­pany him to his place.

  Unfortunately, I couldn't take that to mean the Vieux Carre substation. He expected me to join him for a private feast of crawfish, hush puppies, beer, and goodness knows what else. I closed my eyes and wished myself elsewhere. What an absolutely dreadful week this had been, and some­how or other, I had to write a book about it. How would I ever manage? How would I ever manage to explain to Lieu­tenant Boudreaux that I wasn't amenable to ... to New Or­leans cuisine followed by late-afternoon adultery?

  "Ah can see you're jus' speechless at man suggestion," he said, his tone somewhat wry.

  Reluctantly, I opened my eyes. "Lieutenant, I'm a hap­pily married woman. Very happily married. If I have some­how given you the impression that... well... well, I'm so sorry. And embarrassed. And—"

  "Mah mistake," he said, sounding perfectly amiable.

  Thank goodness for that. What if he'd made a scene? Which perhaps he had a right to make. But what had I done—

  "Saw you look at yo' watch," he continued. "Reckon yo' husband might be comin' home to the hotel jus' about now? Not stayin' fo' any talk about teeth an' such?"

  "He's with the American Chemical Society," I replied earnestly, glad to get away from the topic of afternoon trysts, "not the Southern Orthodontists Society." Hadn't I told the lieutenant that before? Yes, I thought I had, which only goes to show that men don't really listen to women. "I only know the orthodontists from falling into their dessert," I contin­ued. "Well, actually, I don't know them at all, although they were reasonably gracious about the destruction of their king cake."

  "And so they should be," said the lieutenant gallantly. "A pretty lady like you. Ah hate to think what bad memories you're gonna have of our city." He shifted and pulled out into traffic. "When you leavin'? I recollect you said some-thin' about tomorrow."

  Oh, he remembered that, did he? Just like a man, even a pleasant one. He had been looking forward to a one-night stand, with the lady in question, me, conveniently disap­pearing the next day on an airplane.

  "Tomorrow afternoon," I replied.

  "Well, you'll need to come on over to the station tomor­row mornin' to make a statement."

  "Another one?"

  "Formal statement. Signed statement. You wanna tell her husband the news?"

  "I don't even want to see him," I said bitterly. "If he hadn't berated her at the dinner, she wouldn't have left, and then—"

  "No use, thinkin' that way, Mi/ Carolyn. If her brother was set on killin' her, likely he'da found another opportu­nity. Anyways, we'll take care of notifyin' the husband."

  "Thank you." We were back in the Quarter. In fact, we were on Royal Street, and I wondered if he planned to make me walk home to the hotel from the substation.

  However, that thought did him an injustice. He drove me right to the Hotel de la Poste and even insisted that I take the dinner he had purchased. Of course, I protested, and, of course, he insisted. "Jus' so you remember us kindly," he said, smiling. He didn't offer to escort me inside.

  35

  The Last Creme Brulee

  Le Bistro Creme Brulee

  Preheat oven to 325° F. In a medium saucepan, scald 1 qt. heavy whipping cream and 2 vanilla beans, split lengthwise, over medium heat.

  In large bowl, whisk 6 egg yolks and 2/3 cup granu­lated sugar together until thick and lemon-colored. Remove vanilla beans from cream. Slowly whisk hot cream into yolk mixture until smooth. Strain through a fine-meshed sieve.

  Fill ten 4-ounce souffle dishes to 1/4inch from top. Place cups in baking pan and add 1 inch warm water to pan. Cover cups with aluminum foil or baking sheet. Bake 30 to 45 minutes or until set. Remove from oven and cover each cup with plas­tic wrap. Chill for at least 8 hours.

  To serve: Preheat broiler. Evenly spread 5 table­spoons raw or brown sugar on top of custards. Place under broiler about 4 inches from heat until sugar is caramelized. Let custard cool and tops harden before serving.

  Serves 10.

  When I opened the door to our room, Jason was lying on the bed with his shoes off, watching the national news on TV. He took one look at my face as I came in, my arms loaded with paper bags, and clicked the remote to turn off the program. "What's wrong, Caro?"

  "She's dead." I set the bags down on the dresser in front of the ornate mirror. By the time I turned, Jason was there to put his arms around me. He didn't need to ask who had died.

  "Does Nils know?" he asked after a minute.

  "Not from me. The police will tell him. I couldn't bear to talk to him ... I guess because I hold him partly to blame."

  Jason led me over to the bed and sat down beside me, his arm around my shoulders. "What happened?" he asked qui­etly.

  "She and Philippe went out together on a boat. He pushed her overboard, and an alligator got her." I swallowed a sob.

  "My God." Jason sounded horrified. "I guess that means they found the body?"

  "Yes."

  He remained silent for a moment, then said firmly, "They'll need someone to identify her. I do not want you to volunteer, Caro. Let Nils do it."

  "I've already seen the body. I just didn't know it was her."

  He thought a moment. "When you went to the morgue? That was... well, of course it was. Still, Nils can damn well be the one to go over there a second time."

  "He won't be able to tell, either."

  "That bad?"

  "Yes. They'll have to use dental records. Or a DNA com­parison between her and Philippe." I was beginning to feel numb, as if the real me was standing back watching this Car­olyn Blue as she answered questions with little apparent emotion.

  "But why would Philippe—"

  "Because he's sick ... mentally ill. Bipolar, and paranoid too, I imagine. He thought their mother had unfairly favored Julienne over him in the division of the estate. And he claims Diane is his daughter and Julienne wouldn't give her back."

  Jason looked astonished. "Could that be true?"

  "About the money? Not really. About Diane? I just don't know, but, Jason, if she is Philippe's daughter, we'll have to think long and hard about telling Nils or her."

  Jason nodded. "It's not news either one would be happy to hear, especially not after he killed Julienne. What an awful mess."

  "I know." It made me even more miserable just talking about the situation, and I tried to change the subject. "I brought home dinner. A police lieutenant took me to this lit­tle grocery store."

  "Good idea," said Jason absently. "You probably don't feel much like eating out again."

  "No," I agreed.

  "You realize that even if we say nothing about Diane and Philippe, he probably will."

  "Right now, according to the police, he's practically cata­tonic. Maybe he'll never recover." I spread newspapers across the
bedspread, unloaded the paper bags, and pried the tops off two Dixie longnecks. "In fact, I hope that's what happens. I hope they commit him to some archaic mental in­stitution and never let him out."

  Jason looked somewhat taken aback at my vehemence, but he said nothing and accepted a helping of crustaceans and hush puppies. Lieutenant Boudreaux might be given to hitting on married ladies, but he did know his "crawdad-dies." They were delicious, although I had to page through one of the tourist magazines the hotel provided to find the directions for eating them.

  "All right," I said to Jason. "First, twist the tail off." He did so. "Now, hold it by the bottom and peel off the top ring." Jason peeled. The juices dripped. I read further. "Now, pinch the bottom of the tail between your forefinger and thumb, and pull the meat out with your teeth."

  Jason did that and smiled at me. "Terrific," he said.

  I nodded and rose to take off my raincoat. I didn't want to get crawfish juice, no matter how delicious, on the gar­ment that had been the most useful to me during this dread­ful visit. My mind was on Diane, that sweet girl in boarding school who didn't know that her mother was dead and her biological father—I shook my head and devoured two craw­fish in the prescribed manner. Nils obviously didn't know that his adopted daughter was also his niece-in-law. With any luck, neither of them would have to face that dilemma.

  "Why are you wearing that awful suit?" Jason asked.

  "My other clothes were ruined."

  "How?" He looked puzzled.

  "Philippe threw me into a cake." I didn't mention from what height, anticipating that Jason would be upset that I'd been thrown from a two-story balcony. Time enough for the whole story later, when neither one of us was in shock.

  "A cake?"

  "A big one. It belonged to a bunch of orthodontists."

  "Maybe you could explain that?" We were both cracking open the crawfish and sucking the tender, spicy morsels into our mouths.

  "Well, I told you Philippe was crazy. I wasn't exaggerat­ing. He's not only crazy, he's violent." Did Nils know that his brother-in-law was bipolar and probably his father-in-law as well? Evidently it was a genetic disorder.

  "Good lord! He attacked you, too?" Jason exclaimed in response to my remark about Philippe. My husband shook his head and opened a second round of beer for each of us. We were drinking straight from the bottles. I suppose we could have used the glasses in the bathroom, but it didn't occur to us. My mind returned compulsively to Diane and Nils. Perhaps, after all, I was obligated to tell him that his daughter might be at risk? But then he'd watch her like a hawk, looking for signs of abnormality, perhaps seeing symptoms that weren't there. He could ruin her life. Every­thing about the situation made me want to weep, to hide my head in the sand, to pretend none of it had happened and I knew none of the tragic details.

  "My paper got an excellent reception," Jason told me. By that time we were finishing off the last of the hush puppies.

  "I'm glad."

  "Now, you think of something good that happened on this trip."

  It was an old game of ours. When everything was dread­ful, we tried to think of good things. "Well," I said listlessly, "a handsome police officer asked me out."

  Jason looked surprised but, on consideration, remarked, "Just goes to show the good taste of the New Orleans Police Department. What's his name? I'll file a complaint."

  "No need. I didn't accept the date."

  "That's good news." He opened the last two bottles of beer and handed me one. "Want to drink a toast to Juli­enne?" he asked.

  I set the bottle down. "No, I have a better idea. Do you remember Julienne saying that the three of us should go to­gether to Le Bistro for the creme brulee?"

  "When did she say that?"

  "At the alligator dinner." Oh God, I'd have to stop think­ing of it by that awful name.

  "I like creme bruise," said Jason.

  "Correction. You love creme brulee! So let's go there and have dessert. In her memory."

  "But do you think they can fit us in? At this late hour, and just for dessert?"

  "I'm a food critic! Of course, they can!"

  And they did.

  In Memory of Julienne Delacroix Magnussen

  Brilliant Scientist

  Best of Friends

  We loved the creme brulee, and you, Julienne.

  Carolyn Blue, Eating Out in the Big Easy, Dedication

  Recipe Index

  Carol Lee's Avocado Stuffed Shrimp Remoulade 27

  "Banana. Bread Pudding with Banana-Rum. Sauce and Whipped Cream 35

  Chef Frank Brigtsen of Brigtsen s Restaurant, New Orleans

  Pat O'Brien 's Hurricane Punch 52

  "Cajan Bloody Mary 85

  Tony Scott, Mixologist at Windsor Court, New Orleans

  "Risotto Mille e Una Notte 99

  Chef Fernando Saracchi, Ristorante Bacco, New Orleans

  "Mint Julep 125

  Tony Scott, Mixologist at Windsor Court, New Orleans

  Joan's Pralines 155

  "Catfish Pecan with Meuniere Sauce 165

  Chef Dick Brennan, Jr., Palace Cafe", New Orleans

  "Filets Mignons with Shiitake Mushrooms

  and Cabernet Sauce, and Garlic Mashed Potatoes

  with Roasted Onions 215

  Chef Richard Hughes, Pelican Club, New Orleans

  "Le Bistro Creme Brulee 270

  Chef Randy Windham, Le Bistro at Maison de Ville, New Orleans

  "Taken from Great Chefs: The Louisiana New Garde by Nancy Ross Ryan with Chan Patterson (New Orleans: Great Chefs Television & Publish­ing, G.S.I., Inc., 1994).