Arcanorum

by C. L. Bevill

  “It’s a Sasquatch,” someone from the counter said. “Sasquatches are pissed off and have decided to take over the world.”

  Weary giggles answered him.

  “Is there a phone?” Jane asked of no one in particular. A young man with a barely grown-in soul patch handed her his cell phone and said, “No long distance calls to Brazil, Morocco, or Tanzania. My parents were awesomely pissed the last time they paid my bill. Ma screamed, and it was a purely awful sound.”

  “It’s a local call,” Jane said. She glanced at the business card in her hand. “Does anyone know where the 2400 block of Chartres Street is?”

  “Chartres is two big city blocks south,” the young man with the cell phone said. He jerked his thumb over his shoulder, presumably in the right direction. “But I think the 2400 block is in Marigny. What, a mile or so thataway.”

  “Jane!” Haley said loudly as he stumbled in the kitchen. He held a plastic hurricane glass in his hand. It was half full with the reddish drink and garnished with two cherries and an orange wedge. “I thought you left hours ago.”

  “Fell asleep,” she said. She turned to the man she had borrowed the cell phone from. “Give me a few minutes, and I’ll give it back.”

  The young man shrugged. “I’ve got insurance.”

  Jane took the coffee and the phone outside to a patio. Above the sky was blue and cloudless. The typical noises of the Quarter were muted. Everyone had taken the news about an errant beast to heart and seemed to be staying inside. Either that, or everyone was seriously hungover.

  Sitting at a wrought iron table with ornate decorative chairs, Jane looked around. The area was red brick lined with flower beds circling it. Bougainvillea and jasmine climbed nearby trellises. It seemed lazy and dead. A sedate Quarter was odd all by itself. Another memory?

  Jane dialed the number on the card and listened as the numbers made little beeps. The phone rang once on the other end, and a disgruntled voice answered, “Perdue Cleaning.” The man sounded as if a weed trimmer’s engine had been used to replace his voice box. He was all gravelly irritation.

  “I’m interested in a job. My name is—”

  The man cut her off. “Don’t do job interviews on the phone. Come in person. Bring the right information. Got lots of work today. If you want to eat this evening, you can work today. And that’s the kind of work where you use a mop and a broom and a whole lot of elbow grease. Got me?”

  “Be there as soon as I can,” she said, mildly amused by the man’s brusque manner. The phone went dead as soon as she said the last word, and she wondered if he had even listened to her. What right information? I’ve got nothing. The orderly said the guy hired illegals. He won’t care that I don’t have a social security number or a driver’s license. He isn’t interested in giving the government a cut of his money. And who’s going to report him for his inaction?

  Jane drank the rest of the coffee in a single long gulp. Her stomach rumbled again. She’d grab a donut and make her way to Perdue’s Cleaning. She didn’t know what day of the week it was, but the man was in the office, and she needed a regular income to solve the mystery that was her life. She needed to survive, and for the moment, survival meant a third-rate job that was questionable at best.

  Movement out of the corner of her eye made her head swivel to her right. The courtyard she sat in was situated between Tommy’s familial home and another home. The heavy occupation of the downtown area of New Orleans meant houses butted up against each other. The house that sat in front of her appeared empty. The shutters were drawn, and no one was moving. But to the right was another courtyard shared by the two houses. The carriage house that Haley had mentioned must be on the side opposite of where she was sitting.

  Anyone from Tommy’s party-to-end-all parties could be wandering in or out of the house. Even Gumby could still be about, looking for more lime Jell-O shooters. But Jane’s peripheral vision didn’t tell her brain that it was someone from the party. Instead an electric shock juddered down her spine.

  Roux-Ga-Roux.

  Jane sat up straight in the chair. Her head went to the right. Both eyes searched for something she wasn’t sure was there.

  The sun shone down on her flesh, warming her suddenly chilled skin. Broad daylight, isn’t that what the girl said inside? Isn’t that what fools think? Nothing bad happens in broad daylight?

  There wasn’t an animal there at the end of the courtyard, not fifty feet away. No, there was a man standing there, in the blended shadow of the old house, returning her keen gaze. Jane’s fingers twitched on the cell phone. But the reaction was absurd. Who was she going to call when someone was standing a little distance from her, merely watching her? What would she say to the imaginary person on the other end of the line?

  A very tall man with dark hair stood in the shade staring at her. Jane didn’t remember him from the party, but then she’d been looking for bald men and people in police uniforms. Since Gumby green and drunken idiot had been the only uniforms present, she had relaxed. They couldn’t have followed her. She’d twisted her way through all kinds of blocks away from the hospital. She’d gone through people’s backyards. She’d threaded her way through throngs of people who stank to high heaven of beer, marijuana, and body odor.

  No one had heard her conversation with Haley about their destination. Jane had glanced over her shoulder as they’d walked to Tommy’s house, and she’d perceived no one in particular following them.

  I should…she thought and stopped. Her eyes were locked on the man. His body maintained its interested stance. He was merely standing there. She couldn’t see his face because of the black shadows there. She couldn’t be certain that he was looking at her. But Jane knew all the same. He was watching her. Her.

  Fear flushed through her body and was slowly replaced with relief. Although the man’s broad shape and dogged carriage could be comprehended as threatening, she knew he wasn’t a danger to her at the moment.

  Is it you?

  “Jane!”

  The sudden burst of noise made Jane jump, and she spun her neck to look over her left shoulder. Haley had tripped, stepping through the French doors. The plastic hurricane glass went flying across the courtyard, spilling grenadine-tainted alcohol everywhere.

  Jane settled down minutely. Haley laughed and got to his feet, brushing off his trousers. “Damn, I’m a klutz today,” he said. “Where did you go, girl? I mean, one minute I was doing a shot off Tamara’s belly and the next, well, you know Tamara doesn’t mean anything to me, don’t you?”

  Jane looked back to her right. The man was gone. For an instant she wondered if it was in her head, like the distant nightmare that had been the previous evening. “It’s not like you proposed to me,” she said to Haley as she looked for the dark man.

  “Right, exactly, precise-a-mundo,” Haley said. “I love a girl who gets that.” He pulled out one of the graceful wrought iron chairs and sat in it, nearly falling off as he tried to balance on it.

  “That being said,” Jane turned back to Haley, “you should know that I’m a bad girl and no good for you.” That’s better than saying I’m likely a paranoid schizophrenic with severe issues, like bald-headed men chasing me for the fun of it.

  Haley’s blood shot eyes widened. “I like bad girls.”

  “Let’s say that someone comes to you and asks, ‘Did you pick up a girl in the Quarter last night? Dark hair, weird gold eyes, tall, slender?’ And you say, ‘Yes, I did because she looked like she didn’t like beer.’” Jane picked up the empty cup and wished for more coffee. Putting it back down, she glanced to her right, expecting someone to be standing there again, but there was no one there.

  “Okay,” Haley said agreeably. “I did pick you up in the Quarter. But if it’s because you’ve got a husband, then we didn’t do anything.” He frowned. “Really. Nothing.”

  Jane smiled. “And you don’t know where I went, am I right?”

  Haley frowned harder. “I don’t know where I went. I’ve
got classes today, you know. They don’t think much of students showing up three sheets to the wind. Or is that five sheets to the wind? Some amount of sheets to some wind. So my point is, that my point is something? What did you ask me?”

  “If someone comes to you and asks you if I was here, you need to tell them the truth,” Jane said gently. “I think there are dangerous people chasing me, and I don’t want you hurt because you helped me without knowing that you helped me. You don’t seem like a bad kid.”

  “I think I’m very confused,” Haley said, scratching at the side of his head. “Dangerous people are chasing you? Who’s dangerous?”

  Jane stretched her arms out with the palms facing upward. In the bright light of the morning sun, the marks and bruises were readily apparent on her arms. Haley blinked and focused on her limbs. “Hey,” he said, “I didn’t see those last night. Is that from handcuffs?”

  “You were somewhat intoxicated,” Jane said helpfully, “but absolutely charming all the same.”

  “Well, you’re a babe,” Haley said. “A little older than me but still a babe. But what happened to your arms? Jeez, did someone…do that to you?”

  “I’m leaving now,” Jane said. I can skip the donut, especially if the dark man is hanging around. She handed the cell phone to Haley. “Would you give that to your friend? He’s got brown hair and a little soul patch on his chin.”

  “Oh, Cary, sure.” Haley’s confused expression deteriorated into painful concentration. “You know, we’re all pre-law. We know a lot of lawyers. We can help you. If it’s a husband or something, there are lots of things to be done about it.”

  “I don’t think I’m married,” Jane mused, standing up.

  “What do you mean, you don’t think you’re married?”

  “I can’t remember much about anything,” Jane admitted. “But thank you, Haley. I know your original intent was less than altruistic, but you’ve certainly done me a good turn.”

  “You’re welcome, I think,” Haley said. He switched the cell phone to his other hand and scratched his head again as if it would help him think more coherently about the words coming out of Jane’s mouth. “You need a ride some place?”

  “It’s all right,” Jane said, “I’ll catch a taxi. Better if none of you know where I’m off to.” Her face creased into unhappiness. Not a taxi. The bus. I don’t remember my name, but I know New Orleans has a helluva transportation system. And I can’t let anyone know where I’m going to, so there can’t be any loose ends. “Let me have that phone again, huh?”

  Haley shrugged and gave it back to her. He watched as she dropped it onto the brick pavers and stomped it. Bits of plastic flew into the air, and he said faintly, “Hey.”

  Just before Jane turned to leave, going in the direction opposite where the dark man had been, she said, “Cary said he had insurance on his phone. Tell him I’m sorry about the phone, but it’s better this way.”

  Chapter 8

  He is lucky who forgets what cannot

  be mended. – German proverb

  Jane would have thought that the expectation of something bad about to happen would have been debilitating. On the contrary, she worked hard for Titus Perdue, and when he handed her cash at the end of a long day, she was uncommonly serene. She slept in the back of an abandoned warehouse in the industrial section near the river. Despite damage from Hurricane Katrina, there was a way to block the door, and there wasn’t another exit to the place, unless she felt like taking a swim in the Big Muddy. Sometimes she heard other homeless people in the night, but mostly she wasn’t bothered by anyone or…anything.

  Sometimes she dreamed, and two dreams bothered her in particular. One she watched from the perspective of herself. Her arm was cut, a bad cut, something that had slashed through the soft meat of the underside of her forearm. There were several people with her as she was rushed somewhere on a hospital gurney. One was a girl in her middle teens with the same gold eyes that Jane had seen in her mirror. Her lovely face was worried as she’d peered down into Jane’s. The words she’d used were anxious. “It’ll be all right,” she said hurriedly. “You just need some blood. Remember we’re the same type and I can donate to you.” The dream slipped away before Jane could see what happened after that.

  The other dream was of a man whose face she couldn’t make out. He stood in the shadows, strewn with darkness and cloaked in mystery. Jane so badly wanted to see his features, to understand what he looked like, but it never culminated in the dream. He stood out of reach, out of the light, and away from her, as if showing her she could never really have him. Jane could tell she wanted him, too, with a desperation she rarely had felt before.

  In the dream, they stood near the bank of a great black lake that stretched away with an impenetrable surface. It was someplace very important and someplace she’d been once upon a time.

  Jane would wake up in the deserted warehouse, lonely and wanting, knowing something tantalized her at the edge of her consciousness.

  The warehouse still had running water, which she used to clean with daily. She got a travel toothbrush and the barest of essentials. She found a cheap shoulder bag at the French Market for a dollar. She had two changes of clothing and a comb. However, she had to buy a mirror and a pair of sharp scissors to take the stitches out of her head. Removing them herself was an arduous process, but she couldn’t afford the expense of going to a clinic. Moreover, she suspected anyone still looking for her would have realized her need for such a place. They might be watching the various facilities.

  Paranoia: just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they’re not after you, she thought ironically. Jane didn’t know who she was quoting but it was apt. She was paranoid and something was definitely after her.

  But Jane hadn’t seen anything suspicious for nearly a week. No one followed her. Her closed expression deterred friendly people from speaking to her overly.

  She bought her meager supplies at a hole-in-the-wall neighborhood grocery. The Iranian-born owner began to recognize her, but he didn’t acknowledge her as a regular. She thought he must be used to customers who really didn’t want other people to see them. She was like a thousand other people who wanted to be invisible.

  As her little cache of money grew, she thought about what she wanted to do. The social worker, Lareina Rule, had mentioned looking at a list of missing women. Jane wanted to look at such a list. She wanted to see a photograph of the face she now knew was hers looking back at her from a poster.

  Jane wanted to believe someone missed her. She wanted to believe that someone cared enough to report her disappearance to the police. If that was the case then she could identify herself and do…what?

  She purchased a small notebook and listed names in it. Her life was a conundrum, and she needed details to understand how it all came together. The police detectives, the doctor, the nurse, the social worker were all added to her notebook. Then she recorded the name of Dr. Millet and the facility he’d said he’d worked for or headed up. Red something in Lafayette; the name was only mentioned once within her hearing, and she couldn’t remember it completely.

  The name the doctor had mentioned was hers was also listed. Margot Alder. Others were added. There was Raoul, last name unknown. There was the Roux-Ga-Roux. There was the man who spoke inside Jane’s head and didn’t care to answer questions. He’d been remarkably silent the previous week, and she was beginning to wonder if she’d imagined him.

  Finally, there was the unknown person who blamed Jane for something. That was what the other voice had implied. She was being held accountable. If she had the mettle to believe in the reality that was telepathy, then she could believe someone wanted her to pay for some crime she’d committed against them.

  The day after she took the stitches out of her head by herself, she decided she would go to the library. She didn’t want to tick off her erstwhile employer by skipping a day of work, so she would wait until the day was completed on one of the lighter jobs.

 
Titus Perdue was an individual who took advantage of people who had less than sterling reputations. He used runaways, illegal aliens, and people with criminal pasts. He put them in cleaning crews in various buildings he held contracts with, and he paid his employees a fraction of what he would pay legally. Jane didn’t know how he managed to stay on top of the law, but she’d seen his newest model Mercedes-Benz parked behind his business, and there was a photograph of his boat on his wall. The large cruiser was called The Clean Sweep and parked in one of the river’s many marinas. Titus’s love of money outweighed legal concerns.

  Titus had a good thing going on with his business. He was savvy and aware of the risks he took. The moment Jane had stepped into his office asking about work, he’d taken one comprehensive look at her. He ascertained bruises as if they were currency of the realm and asked, “Running from someone?”

  Jane had nodded.

  “Boyfriend or mob?”

  “A creep,” she’d answered honestly, hoping the man wouldn’t pry any further. It turned out that Titus wasn’t interested in her specifically but whether or not Jane’s problems would later come to bite him in the ass.

  “Cleaning crew number six,” he had said, making a decision. Titus provided overalls and supplies. He sent her with a group of similarly encumbered individuals to a building on Elysian Fields Avenue. He had vans to transport his people, and he had cleaning supplies. All the so-called employees had to do was supply back-breaking labor. Work was day-to-day. No promises of further work were made. Pay came at the end of the day; he paid less than half of minimum wage, and no one thought about complaining.

  The first days Jane had worked had been difficult. She’d been sore from head to toe, but she’d also been grateful she slept at night, and dreams did not typically bother her. She’d slept so hard the first few nights she worried that something would happen, and she wouldn’t be able to wake up enough to hear it.

  But nothing disturbed her.