by W E DeVore
“No, that ain’t right. You need to keep yourself out of this mess. I’ve been doing a lot of thinking up here. Ronnie was involved in some bad shit. Some of the things she said when she was high are coming back to me since my head’s cleared up a little. I’m working on getting Bessie fixed up. I’ll come back and deal with the police as soon as I do. This ain’t your fight, you hear me? You need to…. away from…” Pete’s voice started to break up. “Understand? Just…te…po…ba…my…”
The line went dead, but Q still yelled into the phone. “Pete. Pete?? Pete!”
She frantically redialed the number but it went straight to a message from yet another annoying woman informing Q that the mailbox wasn’t properly configured. She threw her phone, letting impotent anger get the better of her, and it bounced out its case as it skittered across the floor.
Ben calmly picked it up and handed it to her. The lower portion of the screen had a small crack in it.
“Where is he?” he asked.
“He wouldn’t say.”
Q told him about the conversation, while she cleaned up the shattered remnants of her coffee cup. Ben listened and quietly drank his coffee.
He finally said, “I think you should call your godfather.”
“Pete didn’t give me any specifics. ‘Crazy things she said while she was high’ isn’t much to go on, baby. No use in calling the cavalry if I don’t have anything useful to tell them,” she said, sitting down at the table.
He handed her a fresh cup of coffee. “What about all that stuff that girl at The Dollhouse told you?”
“They’re not going to go after the Multers,” she stated flatly.
“Maybe not, but they definitely won’t if you don’t tell them what you know.” Ben gave her a meaningful look before walking back to the alcove to get dressed.
If you don’t try for princess parking, you won’t get it.
Q picked up her battered phone and called in the cavalry.
~~~
A few hours later, Q ducked under a balcony to escape a chilly, early afternoon rainstorm. Sprinting the last few steps, she opened the door to the RnR Grill and let the warm air surround her in a blanket of French fry and hamburger aroma. Ernst was already there, his long, lanky body tucked neatly into the chrome and black Formica table for two, enjoying a mushroom drenched cheeseburger, and drinking a beer in the RnR’s proprietary frosted goblet.
As soon as he spotted her, Ernst neatly wiped his mouth and hands with his paper napkin and stood up to greet her. “Clementine.”
She stood on her tiptoes to give her godfather a hug. “Hi, Uncle Ernst.”
“This is some trouble Peter’s got himself mixed up in. The D.A. is calling for his head on a damned silver platter. Ten will get you twenty, that the Senator is hanging his hat on this for his re-election. I hope to god you have some news about your boy. You hear from him, yet?” Ernst asked, sitting back down.
She sat down and told him about the call earlier that morning before signaling for the waitress. The waitress strolled over, straightening her green scarf around her black-dyed bouffant. Except for the tattoo sleeve that ran from her left wrist, across her collarbone, and back down to her right elbow, she looked like one of the teeny boppers in the black and white pictures that covered the walls. Mobs of rowdy kids smiling while they took over the RnR after school, back when it first opened in 1957.
Q opened her mouth to speak but Ernst interrupted.
“She’ll have what I’m having. Extra mustard. No ketchup,” he said around a bite of his hamburger.
The waitress looked unimpressed and vaguely annoyed as she sauntered back to the grill behind the long black counter that ran the length of the diner.
Ernst stared hard at Q for second and said, “You tell me you’ve become one of those vegan people and I’m leaving.”
It was Q’s turn to look unimpressed and vaguely annoyed. “No. So, I told you what Pete said. Is there anything you can tell me?”
“I can tell you lots of things, Clementine. Things like how the RnR makes the best damn burger in New Orleans, and it’s those little mushrooms that come out of a jar that take it right over the top.” He popped a mushroom that had fallen onto the wax paper into his mouth for emphasis. “I can tell you that this rain ruined my fishing trip in Cocodrie. And I can tell you that you need to keep your royal pain in my ass out of trouble or your daddy’s gonna make me buy my own damn rum when I go to visit him after I retire this summer. Do you know what this is doing to my blood pressure? I’m supposed to be retiring in six months for fuck’s sake.”
“You sound like Bubbe.”
“You show some damn respect. That woman worked her fingers to the bone helping your daddy raise you and happens to make the best damn babke I’ve ever had.”
“You mean the only damn babke, you’ve ever had,” Q retorted. “Besides, Bubbe doesn’t make it. Mavis does. Bubbe can’t cook for shit. That’s why she has Mavis.”
Despite being, as far as Q was concerned, the creator of the best pot of collard greens in the world, the secret of which was one very large ham hock, Mavis Johnson was also the most coveted and skilled Kosher cook in uptown New Orleans. Mavis knew every mealtime blessing, by heart, in Hebrew, much to the amazement of her fellow Franklin Avenue Baptist church congregants. She was also Constance Toledano’s best and oldest friend. Q had long suspected she was also Ernst Gautraux’s one true love, if for no other reason, then for his strangely enduring love for random Jewish cuisine that Mavis happened to make especially well.
Ernst opened his mouth and then closed it again. He opened it back up just as the tatted-up pin-up girl came to Q’s rescue with her beer.
“Burger will be out in a minute,” she said.
Q took a long drink and then a deep breath before saying, “Let’s start over. You know he didn’t do it. He loved that girl. He said this morning that she was involved in something bad, he just didn’t take it seriously before now.”
Ernst closed his eyes and rubbed the bridge of his broad nose. “One would think that her turning up dead on Lundi gras would have been enough to convince him.”
“I need to know if there’s anything you can tell me that will help get Pete out this mess. Ernst, please.”
“I’ll be damned if you two aren’t the most perfect pair of fools I’ve ever met.” He shook his head. “I love you like a daughter, Clementine. So, listen to me good when I say this: You are not a cop. You are not a member of the district attorney’s office. You need to let the professionals do our jobs and tell me anything that will help bring the person responsible for this murder to justice, no matter who they are and what they mean to you. You go poking your pretty little nose in where it don’t belong, and you’re liable to wind up just like Pete’s friend. Let me do my damn job. I mean it, Q, stick to playing piano.”
She was silent for several minutes before Ernst finally said, “You may as well tell me what you found out while you've been playing amateur detective. Out with it.”
“I know why Veronica Denton was at that party. The Multers hired her and this girl named Jessica from the Dollhouse to work some sort of after-party in Baton Rouge.”
Ernst didn’t look surprised. “You mean Jessica Valentine? Yes, we got that far on our own, thank you.” Q was nonplussed. He continued, “The Multers told us when we questioned them. They also told us that Ms. Denton was out of her mind on drugs and they didn’t want that kind of person around their guests.”
“But what were they supposed to do at the party?” Q asked.
He took another drink of his beer and replied, “Clementine, it was a late-night Lundi gras party. They hired a couple of dancers to spice things up for their guests. And the last time I checked, hypocrisy isn’t a crime in the state of Louisiana.”
She knew her cards were no good and folded. She quickly decided on begging as a suitable back-up tactic. “Pete didn’t do this. Please, Uncle Ernst.”
“Well, we have another suspect with s
omething of a history that we’re looking at, but there’s no link between him and the victim,” Ernst hedged.
“Good, there you go. What about him?” she asked eagerly.
He looked straight into her eyes. “Seems more than a few people saw your new beau drag a woman who was wearing one of those wigs through the crowd and push her inside his office right after your second set. You know anything about that?”
Ah fuck.
Q realized she had slipped into his trap. “Ernst…”
“Now, Clementine, you’re a grown woman. I’m not gonna tell you how to handle your business, but I am going to tell you that lying to New Orleans policeman is a bad idea. I find out you’ve been lying to me on my own and we’ve got a big problem.” Ernst leaned back and stretched his long, thin fingers across his stomach. “You and me both know you weren’t with Peter during that last break.”
So much for the cavalry.
“I was with Ben in his office,” she mumbled.
“What were you and Mr. Bordelon doing?” Ernst continued.
Q suspected he already knew the answer and was toying with her. She wasn’t sure which was worse: being caught lying in a police investigation, or having to tell Ernst what she and Ben had been doing.
“Where were you?” Ernst asked, looking at Q like a cat that swallowed a goldfish whole.
“I already told you, in Ben’s office,” she replied, hoping that would be sufficient.
“You hear or see anything I need to know about?”
“Nope.”
“Did you see the dead girl or Peter on your way to or from the office?”
“I was kind of, um, distracted. So, no. I don’t really remember seeing anyone.” Q was getting increasingly uncomfortable. Her heart throbbed in her throat and she tried to change the subject. “I saw her earlier in the evening with the Senator, they left the dance floor together.”
“Senator Multer isn’t who we’re discussing.” Ernst pulled out his notebook and skimmed through his notes. “Seems like you and Mr. Bordelon were in the office together for a good little while and there were some noises overheard by nearly everyone nearby. Some of the guests said it sounded like a fight, something slammed into that door pretty hard and there were a few raised voices. Some others said it sounded like... something else.”
Q felt her face get hot as her embarrassment spread to the tips of her ears. Just in time, the pin-up diva came to her rescue and handed her a mushroom cheeseburger.
“Looks great, thank you,” Q said to the waitress and quickly took a bite of her burger, stalling.
“Clementine, is that boy hurting you?” Ernst asked quietly, his eyes searching her face for any sign of trouble.
She choked down her bite of burger and took a sip of beer. “Christ, Ernst. We were screwing, alright? You got me. I lied to protect Pete. He’s been through enough. And I was having very consensual sex with my boyfriend up against the door to his office with fifty people listening on the other side.”
“You didn’t answer my question. Is he hurting you?” he asked again.
Q angrily wiped her fingers on a paper napkin. “No. He is not hurting me, Ernst. Ben wouldn’t ever hurt me. He’d never hurt any woman for that matter.”
“He’s got a history, Q,” Ernst said seriously. He looked careworn and worried.
“What do you mean ‘a history’?” she asked, not sure she wanted to know the answer.
“You ask him about that tattoo of his?” She shook her head and he slid a folder across the table. “As soon as I saw it, I remembered him. Pretty remarkable thing.”
“What does Ben’s tattoo have to do with anything?” she asked.
“Mr. Bordelon was engaged to this girl about ten years back. Girl named Angela Galvez. He claimed it didn’t work out. That she left him for another man. But if she did, she didn’t tell her friends or her family that it was over between them. That seem right to you? Poor girl was found badly beaten and strangled to death in her apartment a couple months after your new fella says she broke it off with him. Her coworkers and friends said she’d been showing up with all sorts of bruises for months. Figured someone was beating her, most thought it was her fiancé. Your Mr. Bordelon.”
She was stunned. “What did Ben say?”
“He seemed to think it was the guy she’d been seeing on the side. Said he’d noticed some weird bruises on her towards the end of their relationship. Said he hadn’t seen her since she broke it off and had no interest in working it out or getting her back. He alibied out. Family vouched for his whereabouts. But it never set right with me, something was off about the whole thing. Awful close, that family of his. They might do anything to protect one of their own. It’s all in here,” he said, tapping the folder. “We never did find who did it. I thought you should be fully informed about his proclivities before you get too involved.”
“What are you trying to say?”
“You wonder what got him so worked up that night that he had to have sex with you right there in the club?”
Q’s food turned to ash in her mouth. She felt numb. “I sang a song. He didn’t…he couldn’t…”
The words barely came out as she opened the folder. Her train of thought vanished at the gruesome crime scene photos that greeted her. Broken furniture. Blood on the floor. A badly beaten woman was lying at an awkward angle across the sofa. Q’s heart pounded in her ears as the familiar pull of a panic attack threatened to overcome her.
“Strangled,” Ernst said, pointing out the bruising around the woman’s neck in the photo.
She slammed the folder closed. “You are a hateful old man, you know that, Ernst? What the fuck is wrong with you? Ben didn’t do this, he couldn’t have. You said it yourself, Ben had an alibi.”
“I’m just looking out for you, Clementine. You’ve been through enough trouble for a lifetime. You say Peter didn’t do this and for what it’s worth, I agree with you. I’m trying to help get him out of this mess. I know you don’t believe that, but I am doing the best I can with what I’ve got. And what I’ve got is a man in the right spot, at the right time, with a history of doing not so nice things to the women in his life. Just need a connection to the victim. You get that for me and I’ve got something to help Peter.”
“First, it’s not ‘women’ plural. It’s one woman…”
“One that we know of,” he interrupted.
Q ignored him and continued, “…One woman that he apparently loved enough to want to marry, got murdered after they broke up. And he didn’t do it. He had an alibi. You picked the wrong horse ten years ago and you hate being wrong about your hunches. Just accept it. You made a mistake.”
“Maybe so. But I have me another dead girl in the general vicinity of this fella and it doesn’t sit right. You need to consider that it could have easily been you in that box.”
She lashed out. “Ben would not hurt me! What about Multer? Ben told you he saw her with him and I saw them, too, on the dance floor. That sleazebag had his hand on her ass and they were less than two feet from his wacko wife. Jessica saw them leave together, too. Did you even look at him for this?”
Ernst took her hand. “Calm down, Clementine.”
She ripped her hand away and said in a loud whisper, “Don’t you tell me to calm down. You suggest that the first man that I’ve loved since that mother fucker raped me is some kind of sick fuck that gets a hard-on from strangling a girl to death, and you want me to sit here and say what? Thank you?”
Her godfather remained silent.
“Let me tell you something, Ernst. You have no idea what my life has been like for the past decade. I’ve been alone, for ten years. Alone and barely able to stand being kissed, let alone have a fucking orgasm. I’ve been to four different therapists and still have a damned panic attack if anything gets anywhere near my throat. I don’t own a single fucking necklace. Not one. You think that’s normal? You think I put what happened in Arabi behind me? You think teaching me how to shoot a gun, or taking
me to a few of those ridiculous self-defense classes made it all better? You’re a fucking naïve old man.” Q stood up to leave and leaned in, hissing, “I am not your daughter, you hear me? You stay the fuck away from me.”
“Go ahead and take that with you,” he replied steadily, indicating the folder on the table before returning to eating his hamburger.
She grabbed the folder and stormed out of the RnR, hailing a cab as soon as she was back outside in the rain. Q’s head throbbed the entire taxi ride from the French Quarter to Ben’s house.
No no no no no no no no no, she said over and over in her head, reading the details about Angela Galvez’s murder. Arriving at Ben’s house, she ran up the steps and forcefully knocked on the door. Ben opened the door wearing a t-shirt and jeans and holding a cup of coffee.
“Hey, darlin’!” He smiled. “How was the cavalry?”
He leaned in to kiss her. Q rushed past him into the house.
“Nice to see you, too,” he said, closing the door.
She walked straight into the living room and held up the police folder, shaking it at him. “You were engaged to a girl who was beaten and strangled to death? You were the number one suspect? How could you set me up like that?”
Ben’s smile left his face.
“Would you like some coffee?” he asked calmly.
She slammed the folder onto the coffee table. “No, I don’t want some fucking coffee! I want you to tell me the goddamn truth!”
He sat on the couch, suddenly looking much smaller than his six-foot-plus frame should allow. “I was engaged. It was more than ten years ago. I loved her. We’d been together since high school. Her name was Angela, Angela Galvez, and she was beautiful, and funny, and wild, and…” Ben’s voice trailed off. “She lived in this little apartment on Magazine. The old Magazine, you remember? Mostly boarded up businesses, no gelato places and spas. I was living with my folks out in Old Metairie, trying to save up to buy my own club, managing this place in the Quarter, trying to build something of my own. For us, for our future. Angela was already working towards being a mechanical engineer and thought there was no reason to wait until we were married to live together. Maybe if I’d listened…”