Gunsmoke Blues

by Balogun Ojetade

  The bed occupied by Robert was now taken by an elderly patient with pneumonia, Mr. DuPont. Robert had been a pleasant, polite man, who hadn’t asked for much. Susie had heard the story of how he’d saved the lives of a group of children, getting his arm bitten in the process. In contrast, Mr. DuPont was a grumpy old man, forever finding reasons to summon Susie to his bedside. He had rung the bell for her again just then, probably for some trivial matter.

  “Yes, Mr. DuPont?” she said wearily, as she arrived at the old man’s bedside. The old man waved a weak hand at her, beckoning her to come close. He was in his eighties and had great difficulty breathing. It wasn’t surprising he was grumpy. “What can I do for you?” Susie asked him, not unkindly.

  “That man in the next bed. He frightens me.”

  Susie glanced sideways at the patient. Albert Bernette, according to the slate on his bed. Another bite victim, like Robert.

  Susie shuddered. She understood how Mr. DuPont felt. The bite victims had a sinister quality to them. Even when they recovered, they still seemed damaged in some way.

  She didn’t know what was going on, but the number of bite attacks had continued to rise in recent weeks. At first she’d wondered if it was a new strain of rabies, but the incubation period was far too short for that. Rabies normally took weeks to produce symptoms after a bite, but with this new condition, a bite could lead to anaphylactic shock within minutes. Most frightening of all was that the latest victims had been bitten not by dogs, or rats, but by other people.

  This man, Albert Bernette, was in his late thirties and had somehow found himself at the wrong end of a set of sharp teeth. He’d been admitted directly to Intensive Care, and had remained unconscious for most of the first week or so, before starting to show signs of improvement. His fever had gone, and he was recovering steadily from his infection. He was asleep, and had been all morning. He still had an IV tube in his arm, and a breathing tube down his throat, but he was well past the critical stage.

  She sympathized with the old man, Mr. DuPont, but she didn’t have the authority to move patients around. “Mr. DuPont, there really isn’t anything I can do. All the beds are full, and I can’t move people just because you don’t like them.”

  “There’s something wrong with him,” the old man grumbled. “He keeps looking at me in a funny way.”

  “The man is barely conscious, Mr. DuPont.”

  The old man shook his head with surprising vigor. “He wakes up and stares at me. His eyes are bright yellow. I heard him say he wants to eat me.”

  “Eat you?” Susie said. A cold feeling gripped her. The old man was half-deaf, but the words sounded chillingly familiar. She glanced over at the sleeping man. His chest rose and fell smoothly. His restraining straps had been removed a few days ago. He didn’t look like a threat. He probably couldn’t even climb out of bed on his own. “You probably just misheard him, Mr. DuPont.”

  “The man’s mad. He should be in a psychiatric ward. I don’t feel safe.”

  The old man is right, Susie thought. The bite cases ought to be kept in a separate ward, even the ones that seem to be recovering well. Until we really know what is happening, the risk of mixing patients is too great. “I’ll speak to Doctor Laveau and see if we can get this patient moved.” She squeezed his hand and he gave her a toothless grin.

  “Thank you, my dear.” He no longer seemed grumpy at all.

  Susie went in search of Doctor Laveau and found him examining a patient in a nearby ward. The doctor seemed to have aged in recent weeks. The thin lines around his eyes and mouth had deepened into furrows. She wondered how many hours it had been since he’d last slept. “Doctor Laveau? May I have a word?”

  The doctor gave her a thin smile of acknowledgment. “Susie. Of course.” He finished with his patient and led her into a small office. “Do you mind if we sit down?” He dropped into one of the chairs and removed his spectacles, giving his dark eyes a rub. “What can I do for you?”

  Susie sat opposite him. Without his glasses, the doctor looked vulnerable and all too fragile. “It’s the bite patients, Doctor. I think we need to isolate them from the other patients. They’re too dangerous.”

  Doctor Laveau frowned, the lines around his eyes deepening further. “I’m not sure we can do that. We don’t have enough beds. It would mean reorganizing the wards, reallocating staff—”

  She cut him off abruptly. “One of them just threatened to eat another patient.”

  The doctor’s face crumpled at the news. Susie realized that he was completely exhausted. “Which patient made the threat?” he asked.

  “Albert Bernette. He was moved onto the ward two days ago, and he’s been sleeping most of the time, but—”

  “I know Albert Bernette. I moved him out of Intensive Care because another level-one trauma case was admitted and we needed to free a bed. I thought he would be safe to move.” The doctor rubbed his eyes again. “Albert Bernette was the least sick patient. I didn’t know what else to do.”

  Susie hesitated, then took the doctor’s hands gently in her own. “We’re becoming overwhelmed, aren’t we?”

  He smiled at her, suddenly shy and boyish at her touch. “Not overwhelmed. The official word is challenged. The Medical Director told me so himself, just this morning.”

  “So you’ve already spoken to him? Will he provide more resources?”

  “No.” The doctor’s smile died on his face. “He’s keeping the situation under review. In the meantime, I suggest you keep a close eye on Albert Bernette.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  North Rocheblave Street, Seventh Ward, New Orleans.

  When Dabney Espion arrived home, his wife, Iris, was waiting up for him, an anxious look on her face. He pulled off his coat and shoes and kissed her on the cheek. He was surprised by how hard she hugged him to her.

  “Everything okay?” he asked. “Did Lenore get off to sleep all right?” Their two-year-old daughter had been wakeful the past week as the last of her baby teeth painfully emerged from her gums.

  Iris brushed her long hair out of her eyes. “The teething kept her awake for a long time, but she’s gone to sleep now.”

  “I wish I could have been here.” Dabney checked the time on his watch. A quarter to midnight. Iris looked exhausted. “You go to bed,” he told her. “I’ll wait up and listen out for Lenore waking. I haven’t seen her all day.”

  His wife looked at him apprehensively. “You look dog-tired already, amour. What happened?”

  He sat down heavily on the sofa, letting the padded leather take the weight off his feet. “Another killing, in the Tremé, near Place Congo. The murderer was still at the scene, as bold as brass. Red-handed.” An image of the man’s bloody hands clutching his victim’s heart flashed into his mind. “I chased him, but he climbed over a wall.”

  “Wasn’t he eventually arrested?”

  “Arrested? No, he got away. It was damn frustrating. He was just yards away from me.”

  Iris shook her head. “Constable Alain said—”

  “Constable Alain?” Dabney said, scratching his head.

  “Jennifer’s beau,” Iris said, pointing toward the house across the street. He said they chased him with an ornithopter and velocipedes and cornered him on Canal Street. He’s been arrested, amour. The constables said they’d caught the Ripper.”

  Dabney let his body sag against the sofa cushions. “Well, good. I’m glad they got the bastard. I just wish I could have caught him myself.”

  Iris sat next to him, putting her arm around his shoulder. “You did your best, Dabney.”

  “I don’t know what else I could have done. That man… he was barely human. I’ve never seen anything like it. He was a savage. When I chased him… I dunno what happened, Iris, he just ran straight over that damn wall like it wasn’t even there. I don’t know how.”

  Iris said nothing. It wasn’t words he wanted, but her warm touch. She held his big clumsy hands in hers.

  He found himself w
ondering about the man who had been murdered that evening, his body defiled so horribly. Who was he, and was someone waiting anxiously for him to return home? If so, they would never see him alive, never hold his hands in theirs again. His thoughts drifted to the killer with the wild look in his eyes. He, too, could have been anyone. But he’d been caught at last. The world was safe again.

  But for some strange reason, Dabney didn’t feel any comfort from the news of the killer’s arrest. Perhaps he’d seen too much. Things that he would never be able to forget. “I don’t know what’s happening out there,” he said. “The Ripper, the Beast… the world’s going fou.”

  “You’re home now,” Iris said, leaning in close to kiss him. “You’re safe.”

  “I’m going to keep you safe, too,” he said. “Whatever happens. I promise I’ll keep you and Lenore safe.” Iris released his hands and he patted her swollen belly. “And this one, too. I’ll keep you all safe.”

  She kissed him on the lips, then started to undo the buttons of his shirt. She kissed him again, longer that time. “Let’s go upstairs. We can wait up for Lenore together.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  Hôtel Apogée, Conti Street, French Quarter.

  Freda Brigitte languished naked in the hotel bed as her latest conquest continued to bathe. She could hear the hot water gushing, hear him humming tunelessly as he scrubbed and soaped. He was probably telling himself how lucky he was, or more likely, that he deserved a woman like her, that he was somehow entitled to her.

  She would teach him a lesson about entitlement.

  She flung the white cotton sheets away then slid out of bed, moving gracefully and silently on her bare feet. Cool winter light filtered through the maroon curtains and she couldn’t resist parting them to peep out. The hotel stood on Conti Street, and from her fourth-floor vantage point she could see right across the green space on Elk Place. She adored this part of New Orleans. She could happily look at it for hours, but unfortunately she would have to forego that pleasure.

  Her clothes were still scattered across the floor of the hotel room, where she had allowed him to undress her. She gathered them up and dressed quickly. On the other side of the bathroom door she heard the humming stop, followed by the fast dripping of water, presumably as he stood in the tub and reached for the towel. The humming resumed again.

  She picked through his clothing, also cast aside in passion. She found several gold coins in his suit coat and trousers pockets. She took them all.

  It would be easier if she was gone before he saw her. She brushed her thick, wavy hair in the wall mirror then crossed the room quietly. She slipped the chain off the door.

  Behind her, the bathroom door opened and he stepped out, naked as a baby, a big grin plastered across his face. “Freda?” The grin quickly turned to disappointment. “Weren’t you going to say goodbye?”

  “It’s easier this way,” she told him.

  “I see.”

  He didn’t of course. Soon he would, and she would need to be long gone by then.

  “Will I see you again?” he asked.

  She admired his optimism. She could have laughed in his face, but there was no need to be cruel. He would discover the truth soon enough. She shook her head, making her long black hair sway from side to side. Nature had been generous with Freda’s hair. It was one of her best assets. That, plus her flawless copper skin, her curvy figure, and her devious and merciless guile.

  He crossed the room toward her. “Let me give you one last kiss.”

  Danger signal. She should run. He was still stark naked. She could be out and away before he had a chance to follow. To stay risked discovery, or worse. But she hesitated, and he had already halved the distance that separated them.

  She pasted a smile on her face and stepped into his embrace. “A goodbye kiss,” she said.

  He was in no hurry for her to go. He made the kiss last, and she could feel that he wanted more. She extricated herself from the embrace, making it clear that his time was up.

  “You sure we can’t meet again?” he asked, offering her the most charming smile in his arsenal.

  She had to laugh at that. The guy certainly didn’t quit easily. “Best not.” She opened the door and slid through the gap.

  The stairs were a little way along the corridor. She walked briskly to them and started walking down to the ground floor. She wondered where she would head first. Her favorite stores were all in easy range. She already had an itemized mental shopping list. Start with jewelry—that was the number-one rule.

  She heard the man shouting from the floor above her. “Hey! My wallet!”

  When she arrived at the lobby she headed for the exit, smiling at a porter as she reached the door.

  A breathless shout came from behind her. “Stop, thief!”

  She peered over her shoulder. He had followed her down the stairs, still naked as the moment he was born. The day was turning into more fun than she could possibly have imagined.

  She didn’t wait to see how far he would get before hotel security stopped him. Running in stylish boots was an entry-level requirement for a woman in Freda’s profession. Five minutes later she was already trying on a diamond necklace with matching earrings.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  Audubon High School, New Orleans.

  Keith Gaston stood at the front of the classroom, regarding what remained of his Life Sciences class with a sense of dismay. The front row of desks was empty, and the back too. Almost half the class was missing for one reason or other. Some mystery illness was going around the school, but that alone didn’t account for all the empty chairs.

  Precious Dumas and Bobo Lanier were still missing from home. It had been weeks. Their parents must have been worried sick. The same with Steven Smallwood.

  Now Marcel Jean-Baptiste had vanished.

  It was too much of a coincidence. The wild talk of the Beast and the Ripper had made everyone jump to obvious conclusions, but Keith still took hope from the fact that no bodies had been found. Yet.

  And now Anton Sardis and Smokey Donaldson were out of school, too. No one knew why. Apparently they’d been sent to Mr. Howard for fighting the previous week, and nobody had seen them since. He couldn’t imagine a boy like Anton ever getting into a fight.

  Teachers were off sick too, and he had to cover more and more classes. That’s why he’d been late getting to his class on Friday, when Anton, Smokey and Marcel had been caught fighting. He blamed himself for being late to the class, but such things were almost unavoidable when resources were stretched to breaking point. He was desperately looking forward to the Christmas break and two weeks to rest and catch up with his workload.

  At least Ava L’Esperance was back after her terrifying ordeal at the animal clinic, although she still seemed traumatized, and had barely spoken a word. It was hardly surprising.

  The only upside was that with a smaller class size, and some of the biggest mischief-makers absent, he was starting to make some real progress with the remaining children. Unlike some of his colleagues, Keith didn’t believe that the children at Audubon were incorrigible. They just needed the right environment and stimulation. Unfortunately, they mostly had the wrong environment and little or no stimulation or parental support.

  He pointed at the image on the blackboard. “So, to recap, who can tell me what Corpus Delirium is?”

  Rita Lambert shot up her hand. “Sir, Corpus Delirium is the transformative moral, psychological and societal changes a person suffers as modifications to their bodies—steam-powered limbs, aether-powered organs and the like—erode their connection to mankind.”

  “Very good, Rita,” he said, and received a beaming smile in return. Unwittingly, Rita had demonstrated the truth of the matter. In the classroom, just as in life, outcomes were never pre-determined. Just because Rita had known almost nothing about Life Sciences when she’d started that term, didn’t mean that she couldn’t learn if taught in the right way. When nature battled nurture, en
vironment was always the deciding factor.

  The end-of-class bell rang and he watched the children stampede out through the door.

  His own life demonstrated the principle clearly. With a good degree from a top university he could have chosen to do anything. His fellow graduates had gone into well-paid jobs in pharmaceuticals and medical research, or had retrained for finance, law and marketing jobs in the North. He could have done that too. But he’d chosen a more difficult path, opting to teach in the Tremé. It so often felt like life was determined to see him fail at that. And if all the odds were stacked against him, how could he ever realistically hope to change the course of these young people’s lives?

  He wondered what advice he would give to his younger self. Don’t fool yourself that you can ever make a difference, perhaps.

  Yet on days like this, he knew that he could.

  Some better advice for the youthful Keith Gaston then: hold on to your dreams with all your heart.

  He was tidying away his books and papers for the day when he heard a commotion from the corridor outside. Children started shouting and screaming, running past the open door of his classroom. “Hey!” he called, but they took no notice.

  Wearily, he walked over to the doorway and stepped into the corridor.

  It was bedlam.

  He had expected to see a few loudmouths causing trouble, but instead dozens of children surged along the corridor, sweeping past him in obvious distress. Rita Lambert came racing toward him, her mouth open in a scream. He caught hold of her arm as she passed. “Rita, calm down. Tell me what’s happening.”

  She looked at him in terror, before coming to her senses. “It’s the Principal, Sir. He’s gone fou!”

  “Mr. Howard… gone mad? What do you mean?”

  She answered with a shake of her head and he let her go.

  He turned to face the onrushing crowd. They were certainly coming in the direction from the Mr. Howard’s office. But why? It was hard to imagine anyone less crazy than stuffy old Mr. Howard.