The Caesar Clue (The Micah Dunn Mysteries)

by Malcolm Shuman

  “Check the tire size and get a rim somewhere and then go out to K-Mart or Sears or whatever’s open and get a new one and put it on. But save the old one.”

  “Save it?” he asked, surprised. “You selling old rubber or what?”

  “Just do it, send me the bill, and we’ll be square.”

  “Naw,” he said. “You kept my ass out of Angola. Tire’s a cheap price to pay. Look, the hurricane’s fifty miles off the coast. You want some water wings, too, while I’m at it?”

  It was just before noon and a feathery rain had already started when Mancuso pulled up outside. I gave a quick look through the curtains and then nodded to Sandy. She went upstairs while Katherine discreetly melted away into the kitchen. Seconds later Sandy reappeared with Jenny. The blank expression had returned and I couldn’t help but think it was real. I watched them descend the steps and opened the door as they made their way slowly across the room.

  The girl stopped suddenly and turned to Sandy. “Are you coming?” she asked suddenly.

  “Sweetheart, I’ll be right there every second,” Sandy replied. That seemed to reassure her and they moved out onto the sidewalk.

  The fog had lifted but a grayness still clung to the sky, and the temperature had dropped ten degrees from what it had been at the same time yesterday. I scanned the other houses and the cars along both sides of the street, but everything seemed in order. Mancuso had the back door open and the girl entered willingly. It was his own car, no markings, no flasher on the dash, but he had a radio, which made me feel better. Sandy slipped into the backseat beside Jenny and I closed the door.

  “Thanks, Sal.”

  He waved and I watched them go.

  At one-thirty I got a call that my car was ready. I thanked my contact and turned to Katherine.

  “I have a feeling things are about ready to break open. I know Solly. He let me go last night. That may mean he’s on the outs with his people. I have to put myself in a place where he can find me if he needs to come in. Because until Jenny talks, nobody else can finish putting things together.”

  “Then I’ll go with you,” she said quietly.

  “You’ll stay here,” I said firmly. “You’ve seen how rough these people play. It’s bad enough just to have a hurricane to deal with.”

  The phone rang then and she froze, startled. Finally, on the third ring, she picked it up and I saw her face relax.

  “Well, it’s all right with me if I won’t be a drag.…”

  She turned to me. “It’s Scott. They’re having a hurricane party and they want to know if they can come over.”

  “Problem solved,” I said. “They’ll need a chaperon, anyway.”

  “Micah …”

  “You couldn’t be in better hands.” I kissed her good-bye and closed the door behind me. Half an hour later I was getting out of my car in the courtyard of my apartment. Old Mr. Mamet, the caretaker, had cut off the fountain. Now he looked down at me from the balcony opposite, as I hurried across the yard for my stairs.

  “Gonna blow,” he called. “It’s got that feeling. Better get your flashlight batteries before they’re sold out.”

  I nodded acknowledgment and saw through the back door of the voodoo shop that Lavelle was fastening his storm shutters. I hurried up the outside steps and went in the back way, stopping to sniff the air. But there was no tobacco odor and everything seemed as I’d left it. I checked my answering machine but there were no messages. Then I got some flash-light batteries out of the bottom drawer of my desk. Fortunately, as a PI, they were something I always had enough of.

  I put the radio on the public station, to get some decent music as well as the latest weather news. The Saints were supposed to be playing in the Superdome, but they’d postponed it, because the last thing they needed with a hurricane was fifty thousand tourists to worry about.

  In the last day I’d had about three hours’ sleep and it was catching up with me. I propped a chair against the front door and another against the door onto the balcony, then sat down in my easy chair, eyes closed. The gun jabbed my flesh through the pants, but after a few minutes I stopped noticing, as dreams slipped in to wrest away my attention.

  I must have slept half an hour when I heard the noise. At first I thought it was from outside, but then realized it was coming from the door that led down to Lavelle’s level. As I watched, the handle turned and the entire door jerked back against the chair that was tilted against it. Then it stopped, pulled back, and slammed forward again.

  My hand snaked down, grabbed the pistol, and I jumped up, gun leveled at the doorway. I silently lifted the chair away and stood back as the door came forward again.

  “Holy Christ, don’t shoot!” It was Lavelle’s voice, raised at least three octaves, and for an instant I thought he was going to topple backward down the steps.

  I lowered the revolver and thrust it back into my belt.

  “Close, David,” I said. “Very close. Next time try knocking.”

  “I didn’t know you were here,” he protested. “You told me to use the key you gave me if there was ever an emergency, so I figured you wouldn’t mind.”

  “What’s the emergency?” I asked.

  “Well, I thought maybe I ought to check your windows, make sure everything was shut up. If the hurricane comes through here there’s no telling what’ll go. This building is over a hundred years old.”

  “I appreciate the thought, but I think I’ll be okay.”

  “Right.” He half turned. “Oh, and there was just something I wanted to pick up.”

  “What was that?”

  “Oh, nothing,” he mumbled and headed through the office toward the kitchen, and I got a sinking feeling as I saw him head to the refrigerator and open it.

  “David, by God, if you …”

  “It was just for a couple of hours, that’s all.” He held up a plastic pouch with a disgusting brown object that caricatured a hand. “I found a man in St. Bernard Parish who’s into occultism. I told him this was a mummified human hand, a hand of glory, from a condemned killer, that had been electrocuted at Angola, and that was why it would be so shriveled. He’s on his way in, he said never mind the weather, he’s been trying to get something like this for years.…”

  “Get out, David!” I shouted, advancing on him. “And take that damned thing with you.”

  “You were right, Micah, the rest of the shipment wasn’t any good,” he babbled, making a beeline for the stairs. “But with what I’ll make on this one it won’t matter. I’ll even buy you a new—”

  “Out!” I commanded and slammed the door so hard after him that for a few seconds I didn’t realize my phone was ringing.

  I lifted the receiver and heard static, then a voice that was vaguely familiar.

  “Mr. Dunn? This is Nelson Benedict, Congressman Stokley’s aide. I wonder if you could come down to Godsend. It’s urgent.”

  “Right now?” I asked, taken by surprise. “There’s a hurricane on the way and—”

  “Yes. As soon as possible.” His voice was trembling and then, finally, he blurted out, “Please. It’s a matter of life and death.”

  21

  The sky was leaden as I backed out into Barracks, and bits of paper were already dancing down the narrow street. A few tourists hurried along, looking confused, but a gaggle of college kids stood at the corner of Barracks and Chartres with beer cans in their hands, laughing and enjoying the thought of a real hurricane. Only the bums who inhabited the steps of Our Lady of Victory seemed unimpressed, but then, another disaster would only be a footnote in their lives.

  I took Esplanade to Claiborne, trying to skirt the downtown traffic. The old homes looked desolate and I wondered what another hurricane would do to many of them.

  I didn’t like the idea of driving twenty miles across the river in the teeth of a storm. If there was danger at Godsend, it was the job of the police. But then I realized they would never call the police because that would open them to public view. And
I had the feeling that by going there I would finally make the pieces of the puzzle fit.

  O’Rourke said I was a fool. He offered to go with me, but I told him to stay home, by the phone. He said two of us could do more than one, and I knew he meant it. In the days of protest he’d shown unusual courage in the face of police brutality, but nonviolence was too much a part of his character for him to be useful in a situation that could become explosive.

  Finally, he agreed to keep calling Mancuso until the policeman returned.

  The powdery rain turned hard while I was going up the east ramp of the bridge. Traffic was light in my direction but there was a heavy stream heading west, into the city and away from the mouth of the river. By the time I hit the down ramp, the rain had become a blowing succession of sheets, so that the Fischer Project, off to the right, was shrouded in a gray curtain.

  The last few hurricane seasons had been lucky ones for New Orleans, but the radio said this one was headed straight into Plaquemines Parish, immediately to the south. Once over land the storm would start to break up, but that would take a while, and in the first few hours after landfall there was time for a major disaster.

  I couldn’t do much about it now. I had a small travel bag with some necessities, my slicker and a spare flashlight. I also brought an extra box of .38 ammunition, which I’d leave in the car, and a tiny Navy Arms replica of a Sharps pepperbox, the kind of four-barrel hideout gun that used to be favored by gamblers—.22 caliber, without enough punch to stop anyone who was determined, unless you hit him in the head, but, as my old DI used to say when teaching unarmed combat, better than a sharp stick in the eye. I’d keep the pepperbox taped to my ankle and hope things wouldn’t come to that, but it was a measure of my uneasiness.

  The congressman and his wife were away, so what made it necessary for me to visit Godsend on the worst day of the year?

  Maybe it was a setup, another trap, and if so I was the world’s biggest fool for allowing myself to be drawn in.

  But, of course, it was Julia who drew me there. Julia who had died and yet somehow seemed still alive.

  The wind was bending trees as I ploughed my way down General de Gaulle, headed for the Intracoastal Bridge. Already water was backing up in the street, and in an hour or two there would be flooding. I realized that I would have to stay the night at the plantation.

  It was Rivas, had to be. There was no other reason to call me.

  As I crawled to the top of the bridge, the wind shoved the car sideways and I fought to keep to my lane. The view from the top was unrelieved grayness, in all directions, and as the storm’s fury increased even that scene was blotted away by a hail of raindrops. Approaching the bottom of the bridge I saw the flashing lights of a traffic-control point, where the four lane met River Road.

  A state cop in a yellow slicker stuck his head at the window and I rolled it down.

  “Road’s closed,” he informed me. “We’re evacuating people. Do you live down here?”

  “I’m working for Congressman Stokley,” I said. “You can call his aide to confirm.”

  The cop took my driver’s license and went back to his car. I rolled up my window and waited. Three minutes later he returned with my license and handed it through the window, shaking his head.

  “Okay. But I’d tell them to come up to higher ground. And be careful: Parts of the road are starting to flood.”

  “Thanks.” I took my license back and went right, onto River Road.

  Now I was on my own. I turned up my radio.

  The latest weather report had the eye of the hurricane near the river’s mouth.

  A blue pickup emerged from the storm, ploughing water out from the sides, and I slowed. As it passed waves rocked the sides of my car and I heard splashing against the floorboards. The water was already to the hubcaps, and if it got much deeper the engine would stall. If I stopped, though, it would flood into my exhaust and that would be just as bad.

  I tried to remember—the Stokley place had to be just after the next bend. But there were so many bends it was hard to know if my memory was playing tricks on me.

  All at once the car hit a dip and I heard water gush out as the vehicle started to sink. But miraculously the wheels bit into something solid and I felt myself skidding up onto a hard surface.

  The victory was short-lived. Suddenly we were floating, and then the wheels touched again and the engine sputtered at the same moment. I pressed the accelerator, trying to squeeze out enough speed to keep up forward motion, but the water was too high. The engine quit and the car came to rest at the side of the road.

  I swore aloud and got out my extra flashlight. Then I emptied a handful of the extra cartridges into my top pockets. I untaped the pepperbox from my leg and this time retaped it to my useless left arm, just above the elbow, on the inside. I took a piece of oilcloth from my traveling bag, wrapped up the .38, and stuck it back inside, with the spare flashlight. Then I struggled into my slicker, took a deep breath, and stepped out into the flood.

  The wind, loud enough inside the car, was deafening. Bits and pieces of debris shot past my body but I hardly noticed. All I could do was keep my balance as the water swirled around me.

  It rose midway to my knees, and already had a good current as it cascaded down off the levee and onto the road. I held the car with my good hand, trying to keep my balance and avoid dropping the flashlight. My watch said only four-thirty but it was dark enough to make me wonder if I could find my way. There were fence posts on my right, and what appeared to be a copse of trees. With luck Godsend would be just the other side.…

  I let go of the car.

  For the first fifty yards I did reasonably well. The water stayed at about the same level and I managed to keep my balance. The next fifty were my undoing.

  I stepped in the first hole but managed to maintain my balance. The second hole sent me swaying and I reached out for something to hold me up. By luck there was a tree limb, a branch thrusting up from the water and I clung to it for a second, trying to keep from falling.

  The third hole was just the other side, and this time there was no hope. I felt myself going down and instinctively released the traveling bag. Water splashed up into my face and I threw out my good arm to break my fall. On hands and knees I caught a last glimpse of the bag bobbing away before it vanished in the gloom.

  I struggled up, shaken and angry. Just ahead, the road rose slightly and I found the water receding to my ankles. Through the trees I thought I saw lights, flickering in the tempest.

  Water sloshed in my shoes and rain pounded my body and face. The woods were a dim screen and where they stopped the grayness was only slightly lighter. I bowed my head and forced myself into the wind. A sudden burst of air blew me sideways, but I plunged forward. When I reached the edge of the woods I saw the guard shack beside the driveway. It seemed to be deserted, and a heavy branch had fallen onto the gate bar, splintering it.

  I made my way through the branches and took my bearings.

  The mansion was a pale outline through the leaning trees, the drive a gray river paved with water.

  I started forward again, my feet crunching into the shells that were now covered by the flood. The wind rose to a howl and for a second I thought I heard a human scream, but then I realized it was a trick of the storm. A branch splintered with the sound of a gunshot and fell twenty feet to my left. I came even with the gazebo and saw that the trellis on the near side had been blown away, and a combination of light and shadow gave the strange impression of a figure seated motionlessly inside.

  I stared an instant too long. Something hit me on the head and the watery ground came up at me. Somewhere, vaguely, I was aware of voices and lights, and then I realized hands were dragging me forward. There was light all around me now and I was seated in a chair, in what appeared to be a kitchen. A television was broadcasting weather reports from one corner and I watched the radar needle trace a line of solid white across our area. The atmosphere of the room was stale an
d if I needed a further sense of claustrophobia, it was provided by the closed shutters, that had the effect of converting the house into a sealed box.

  The black manservant who had greeted me on my previous visit poured whiskey into a tumbler, and a man I recognized as Nelson Benedict stood across from me, his face twisted with anxiety.

  “Thank God you’re all right,” he said. “I was so afraid.”

  I took the glass of whiskey and downed a swallow.

  “Piece of wood hit you,” the manservant said. “Bad out there, bad as I ever seen it.”

  “Why haven’t you evacuated?” I asked.

  The manservant looked away, leaving Benedict to answer.

  “Congressman’s orders,” he said. “The storm was supposed to miss us and there’re a lot of valuables in Godsend.”

  It was a feeble explanation, but I didn’t see any sense in making an issue.

  “Come on,” Benedict urged. “I’ll get you some dry clothes. I think you and the congressman are about the same size.”

  I stood shakily and followed him to a downstairs bathroom. A few minutes later he reappeared with some fresh clothes, a towel, and some shower shoes. “I’m sorry,” he said, nodding at the latter. “They’re the best we can do.”

  “They’re fine,” I said. “By the way, do you have any adhesive tape? I hurt myself a while back and I’m trying to keep my ribs taped up.”

  “Of course.” He went away and came back with some tape. When he’d gone I removed the pepperbox and discarded the old tape. Then I dried the little pistol as best I could and, after making sure my own skin was dry, retaped it to my left arm. When I emerged from the bathroom my head still ached from the blow and I had some bruises where I’d fallen, but I was dry, and that alone made me feel like new.

  Benedict was standing in the hallway, dithering. “This way,” he said, gesturing toward the living room. I followed, conscious of the branches battering the eaves and the banshee howl of the wind. To the left was a closed door that apparently led into a study.