City of the Dead

by Eileen Dreyer

  “Well,” James said, catching her attention. “At least she showed up.”

  He pulled the cab to a stop along the side of Wisner Boulevard where it ran straight up along the edge of City Park. On the other edge of that border ran Bayou St. John. Chastity imagined that at one time the area had been wild and mystical. Now it just seemed well groomed, with the park on one side and some very nice homes lining the other.

  The live oaks were there, of course, dripping their Spanish moss into the dark waters. The waters lay still and sullen beneath a low sky, and the grass rippled in a tepid breeze. But on a Tuesday morning, there was traffic in the park, children on the lawns, and the sound of lawn mowers to break the mood.

  Despite all that, the first sight of Frankie Mae Savage could well have sucked Chastity straight back into the more occult past.

  Frankie stood by her cab, a tall, thin woman who was regal in a way that seemed born in the bones of her. She wore a white T-shirt and a flowing flowered skirt that rippled to her ankles. Bracelets circled her wrists, and a collection of beads hung around her neck. Her hair was short, her face preternaturally calm, her eyes old.

  Chastity had a feeling that the trappings were for the tourist. The eyes, though, couldn’t lie. Frankie Mae turned them on Chastity with less than a friendly welcome.

  “Why are you here?” she asked, her voice as calm as her person.

  Chastity lifted an eyebrow. “If I’m not mistaken, you asked me to come.”

  James walked up alongside, his own posture a bit tense. “I hope you have some things to say to us, Frankie. I don’t want to think you lied to me for nothing.”

  “I lied because there are more important things than this girl’s curiosity.”

  “This girl’s right here, thank you,” Chastity said. “And she wants to know how you’re involved. She wants to know if you know what’s happened to my sister.”

  Frankie focused on Chastity like a cat, and Chastity found herself wondering what Frankie really was capable of.

  “Why you want to know what happened to your sister?” she asked. “You haven’t bothered to see her in ten years.”

  Chastity relaxed a bit. This kind of reaction she understood. “Ah, no. You have that backward. My sister disappeared ten years ago and hasn’t contacted me. If you’re acquainted with her—which I assume you are—you’ll know that.”

  “I know that I better hear a good reason why you come all the way down here.”

  “I came because I know my sister better than you do. If she needed to run away, then I might know how to help her.”

  “What about her husband?”

  “What about him?”

  “You came to see him.”

  “He asked me to help look for Faith. I started looking, and I’m finding out some unsettling things. But I won’t stop looking till I find Faith. Till I know for myself she’s all right. She doesn’t want my help, fine. But she has to tell me herself.”

  For a long moment, Frankie just looked at her. Chastity counted the seconds by the cadence of the insects that lurked in the trees. She felt the weight of the air in her lungs. She smelled old water and rotting foliage and decay.

  Finally, with a quick nod, Frankie made her decision. “Go home.”

  Chastity blinked. “What?”

  Frankie waved a hand, her bracelets skittering about her wrist. “Go back to your city up the river. Go now. Go without any more questions. You’ll get your answers.”

  “I don’t think so.”

  Frankie stiffened like one of those Garden District dowagers. “I beg your pardon?”

  “The spirits tell you that? Or the saints on your dashboard? Well, I’m sorry, I’m not going until you tell me where Faith is. I want to know why she’s disappeared, and I want to know what you have to do with this.”

  Frankie pulled herself up straight, a show of power and dignity that didn’t fail to impress Chastity. “No. I cannot. You must trust me on this, Miss Chastity Byrnes. I promise on Yamaya, my crowning spirit, who is guardian of our families and our lives, you won’t be disappointed. If you just go.”

  Chastity fought the urge to argue. “My sister?”

  “Is well. Is going to let you know what’s been going on. But only after you go home.”

  “But why? And what do you have to do with it?”

  But Frankie was shaking her head. “Your answers are at your own home. Go on. You want to get out of here before the hurricane comes anyway. I hear you scared of water.”

  It was Chastity’s turn to stare. To assess. To decide. And oddly enough, she decided that after having known this woman for a sum total of five minutes, she probably could trust her.

  “Faith is safe?”

  “She is safe. But only if you go.”

  Slowly Chastity nodded. “All right. But I do know where to find you, Yamaya or not.”

  For the first time, Frankie Mae smiled. A brilliant, powerful smile that was at once sly and sweet. “I’ll be here, you need me.”

  “What about Eddie Dupre and that girl who dresses up like Elvis? Will they be here, too?”

  For the first time, Frankie Mae looked surprised. “Eddie Dupre? What’s he got to do with this?”

  Chastity stared. “I thought…”

  Now she looked disdainful, and Chastity hoped Frankie never looked like that when her own name was mentioned. “Eddie Dupre has nothin’ to do with me, or the girl who dresses up like Elvis. You can believe me. Go home. Leave Eddie and everything else here.”

  “But Susan Reeves did have something to do with you?”

  A real shadow of grief crossed Frankie’s handsome features. “Yes. And now she’s dead, which is why you have to go.”

  Chastity believed her. So they left. James still grumbled about wasting three days searching for Frankie, but Chastity was galvanized.

  “I can pack in fifteen minutes. If I can fly standby, I can be out of town tonight.”

  “You might be too late already. That forecast is gonna make some people crazy.”

  “Nah. They won’t go till the last minute. At least that’s what happens in Florida every year. Think positively, James. You’re about to be paid.”

  She wondered if he heard that brittle ambivalence in her voice. God, she wanted to go so badly she was breathless with it. But—how stupid could she get?—she wanted to stay. She wanted to keep Kareena like a little household god to protect her. And James?

  Oh, hell, James. She hadn’t let a man that close in her entire life. Which was the most stupid thing she could do. She was barely hanging on by her fingernails as it was.

  Besides, the hurricane was coming.

  “What about Dr. Stanton?” James asked as he started the cab.

  Chastity shook her head. “I’ll call him from St. Louis. I don’t want to do anything to jeopardize my getting back.”

  “You think your sister’s there?”

  “It sounded like that’s what Frankie was saying.”

  Up in the front seat of the cab, James nodded.

  Chastity grinned like a freed hostage. “And I don’t even need to talk to my father.”

  He was watching.

  Over in the park, with binoculars, so he wouldn’t be seen. He knew what they were saying, though. He knew that it was time to take care of her. He should have been afraid. He was taking too many risks. Playing it too close to home. But all he could feel was the sudden sharp taste of exhilaration.

  Anticipation.

  The bitch was going to pay for what she was trying to do.

  For what they were doing.

  Because he knew, with the unerring instincts that had brought him this far, precisely what she was going to do.

  She just didn’t know that he was one step ahead of her.

  He couldn’t wait to see the surprise on Chastity Byrnes’s face when she saw him. When he placed the gun right against her cheek and leaned his whole weight against it.

  But first, he had something else to do.

&n
bsp; It took Chastity twenty minutes to pack up and get out. She left a message for Kareena, who was helping to coordinate the hospital’s response to Hurricane Bob, and she paid James out of her grandmother’s trust. Then she let him drive her to the airport, where she got a standby ticket for home.

  She never got the chance to use it.

  There was no room Tuesday night. Chastity finally gave up at eleven, when she saw the last flight of the evening pull back from the gate. She returned bright and early Wednesday morning, James and Kareena in tow. She sat in the hard plastic chairs in the waiting area and played endless hands of gin while she prayed that somebody would cancel from the suddenly overbooked flights. She told Kareena to go back to work, which Kareena refused to do, and she turned off her cell phone so Max couldn’t find her.

  She waited.

  And the planes left without her.

  Then, at about noon, Kareena’s phone went off. She carried on the entire conversation in French, which left Chastity completely out. But she knew what disaster looked like, and it was written all over Kareena’s expressive face.

  “James,” Kareena said, closing the phone, “we got a problem.”

  James, who had been flipping through the latest Times-Picayune, looked up without much interest.

  “That was a friend of mine from the force,” Kareena said. “They lookin’ for you.”

  James lifted an eyebrow. “Which they are looking for me?”

  She sighed. “You were looking for Frankie Mae Savage, yeah?”

  The hair went up on the back of Chastity’s neck.

  “Yeah.”

  “And you talked to her yesterday, over to Bayou St. John way?”

  “Yeah.”

  Now Chastity knew she didn’t want to hear more. She took a frantic look at the boarding gate, as if her status would suddenly change. As if she could get on a plane before the news got worse.

  But just like always, she was too late.

  “Frankie’s dead, James,” Kareena said. “They found her an hour ago by the bank of the bayou.”

  Nineteen

  There was a seat on a flight leaving at 12:45. Chastity wasn’t there to claim it. She was climbing into the cab with James and Kareena. They had an appointment to keep back in the city.

  The scene at Bayou St. John was distressingly familiar, the players all in place. Police units, crime scene van, fluttering yellow tape. Another detective Chastity didn’t know met them at the street. A Third District detective this time. Tall, thin, and wise-looking, he could have been Frankie Mae’s twin. He wore his regulation suit rumpled and his tie pulled, the New Orleans crescent and star tiepin dangling from it like a forgotten stepchild and his holster riding his left hip.

  “Mr. Guidry?” he asked James, ubiquitous notebook out. “How did you hear about this, sir?”

  It was Kareena who stepped up. “Cristophe Paissant, he call me, Kareena Boudreaux,” she said with a big Kareena smile. “Said you might want to talk to James. Aren’t you Louis Sanchez? Mario’s little brother?”

  Chastity listened even as she evaluated the scene. Out at the edge of the water, just beyond where she’d stood the day before, technicians were clustered around something on the grass. Something she knew was Frankie Mae Savage. Frankie with her wise eyes and graceful hands.

  One of the techs snapped a few more pictures and stood up. Nearby, the orange-clad prisoners with the body bag and stretcher stood smoking cigarettes. The live oaks whispered in a sultry wind, and across the park, children played. Chastity could still hear lawn mowers.

  “Yes, ma’am,” the detective was saying to Kareena. “I’m Mario’s brother. I appreciate your coming down here, Mr. Guidry, but I’d rather we talked at the station.”

  James couldn’t seem to look away from the crime scene. His eyes looked suspiciously blank, his posture stiff. “Third District?” he asked. “Oh, I don’t think so. I’ll talk to you here.”

  Detective Sanchez cast his own quick look over to where the technicians gathered on the grass. “It’d be more comfortable.”

  James snorted. “I don’t like razor-wire compounds, Detective. Call me finicky. I’m happy to talk to you, but let’s do it here.”

  The detective sighed. “For now.”

  Chastity should have picked up on that, but she was distracted. Somebody had moved, and she saw what lay beyond.

  Frankie lay on her back, faceup, her arms thrown out as if she were making snow angels. She wasn’t wearing her voodoo priestess attire today. Jeans and T-shirt and jump boots. Cabbie livery. She looked smaller, less dignified, her mouth sagging, her eyes open and opaque. Her right cheek was missing, and Chastity had the terrible feeling that if she got closer she’d see the clear, circular imprint of a muzzle just below Frankie’s eye.

  Then she noticed what lay around Frankie in the grass.

  “What’s that?” she asked, interrupting the detective as he flipped pages. “Mashed into the ground around her.”

  Everybody looked. James and Kareena actually sucked in identical breaths.

  “That what I think it is, James?” Kareena asked in a whisper.

  James kept staring. “Offerings,” he said. “Fish and cornmeal and melons. To Yamaya, maybe? She was Frankie’s crowning spirit.”

  “But they’re smashed and tossed around like a vandalized kitchen,” Chastity said, the sight of it crawling in her gut.

  The destruction had drawn not only flies, but wasps and bees that droned thickly in the heat. They settled and swarmed over the food that had been crushed around and over Frankie. And on something that lay scattered over her forehead. A small cloth bag, torn and leaking flakes of something that lifted and spun in the breeze. Placed deliberately, just like the angel baby.

  Chastity suddenly felt cold.

  “What’s that on her head?” she asked.

  James didn’t move. “I can see blue corn. Can you tell us, Detective? Is there lavender and chamomile in there? Maybe magnolia blossoms?”

  “I smelled lavender,” the detective admitted quietly.

  James nodded. “A gris-gris bag. For fertility and harmony.”

  “You know a lot about it, Mr. Guidry.”

  James shrugged. “I talked to Frankie some. Some of the other practitioners in town.”

  “What does it mean?” Chastity asked, hoping they didn’t make her smell the lavender. Wondering if it were some kind of cosmic joke she failed to see that it was lavender of all things that Frankie thought would protect her.

  “Probably means it’s something to do with voodoo,” the detective said. “I can’t remember the last time we had a ritual killing like this, but I’m sure there are records somewhere.”

  “No,” Kareena said. “If it were ritual, she wouldn’t have been shot. And different things would be left. A reversing candle, graveyard dirt. And they might have smashed eggs, but not watermelons. That’s a peaceful offering. This is a deliberate desecration of something sacred to her.”

  Chastity couldn’t get her mind off those angel babies.

  Susan Reeves had prayed to Saint Roch to give her a baby.

  Frankie Mae Savage had prayed to Yamaya.

  “Ms. Savage’s mama says you’ve been up there looking for her, Mr. Guidry,” the detective said, his voice calm. “That you seemed pretty upset.”

  James eyeballed the cop. “Not upset enough to smash melons.”

  “You talked to her yesterday?”

  “I talked to her yesterday,” Chastity said. “I’ve been looking for my missing sister, and we thought she might know something.”

  “Did she?”

  “She said I should go home to St. Louis, and I’d find my answers there.”

  “That upset you, Mr. Guidry?”

  James stood so still all of a sudden, almost as if he meant to disappear. “No. She explained herself just fine.”

  “Can you tell me where you were this morning? Say six a.m.?”

  Chastity looked between the two men. Then she caught
the look on Kareena’s face, a dawning horror that spoke volumes, and she knew she was missing at least half this conversation.

  “You want to know if I tracked down Frankie Mae and shot her because she did what Ms. Byrnes asked her to and gave her information about her sister?”

  “I want to know if you lost your temper because it took three days to do it.”

  James was smiling now, and that was even scarier than the stillness. “No, Detective. I didn’t lose my temper. I haven’t lost my temper in seven years. But I imagine by now you know all about that.”

  Chastity sidled closer to Kareena. “What the hell’s going on here?” she whispered.

  “Just a minute,” Kareena said without looking away from her cousin.

  Her cousin who was locked in an eye-fuck with the cop. The kind of eye-fuck Chastity suddenly recognized all too well.

  “I was still asleep,” James said. “I usually work evenings, and I don’t like to get up early. And before you ask, yes. Alone.”

  “You own a gun, Mr. Guidry?”

  “You know perfectly well, Detective, that an ex-felon can’t own a weapon.”

  “Not legally.”

  “I don’t like guns. But you should know that, too. And Ms. Savage wasn’t killed with anyone’s bare hands.”

  Chastity swung her attention back to Kareena. “You two have some explaining to do,” she hissed.

  Kareena returned her look glare for glare. “What happened before has nothing to do with what he was doing for you. Besides, that isn’t what we should be worrying about right now.”

  Kareena was right, of course. Chastity sucked in a breath and caught a whiff of lavender. Her stomach clutched. Over lavender. Which she could smell over fish and the metallic tang of blood and viscera. At least it got her attention back where it should be.

  Frankie Mae.

  Frankie Mae, who lay staring up at the fleeting sun as if surprised by it, her bag of protective herbs scattered over her like a curse, her beliefs trampled and demeaned beneath somebody’s heel.

  Just like those angel babies.

  It wasn’t rage Chastity saw here, no matter how messy the scene. It was disdain. It was domination and degradation. Deliberate desecration, as if death weren’t enough of a message.