Her spine, pressed against the marble column, began to ache, and she tried to remember the last time she’d felt something other than cold. Her mind summoned an image from Middle Bayou: lying close to May in a hay field on a warm afternoon, the girl’s arms around her neck, her body expressive with the heat of youth and perfect health.
She pushed herself off the column and made her way carefully across the foyer. She slipped the bolt, twisted the brass knob, and opened the heavy door, stepping to one side as she did so, but the space remained unfilled by the expected form, and she moved out onto the darkened porch. She heard her name called softly once and saw the glow of a cigar in the crape myrtles fronting the house.
Lucinda eased the door closed and moved shivering into the deeper shadows of the trees, her hands clasped around her arms. She saw Bill reach out with one hand as though to touch her face, but his fingers closed around her throat and he shoved her hard against the wall.
He said, “Keep me waiting like that again and I will hurt you in ways you can’t even imagine.”
She handed him the tin box and he pocketed it. “Tomorrow is the night,” he said. He looked at her stained shift and shivering form and whispered forcefully, “You know, Tartine says she’s never been sick a day in her life. Stay the course, Lucy, or I’ll be taking her to St. Louis in your stead.”
He turned and walked quickly along the avenue, soon disappearing into a poorly lit alley.
Lucinda stood against the wall, which was colder by far than the marble column of the house, with her head tilted back, looking at the sky, sensing the sweat and the deeper wetness of the blood on her shift being lifted away by the wind. She considered for a time remaining propped against the stones until all the parts of her vital self were likewise evaporated into the air, leaving behind only the shell. But after a time she roused herself and walked back into the house.
Chapter 28
Nate woke to a whitewashed room and a prolonged pounding on the door, which was eventually answered by the black-haired girl. He sat up rubbing the shoulder that had been pressed to the floor all night and saw the barefoot boy walking across the threshold as though familiar with the house and its owner.
He nodded to Nate but cut his eyes away in a nervous reflex, jamming both arms stiffly into the pockets of his trousers. He said, “Mr. Gorman is waiting for you. He says come now.”
Nate got up and began folding the blanket he had slept in when the girl shook her head and took it from him. He gathered up his hat, fit the Dance into his belt, and followed the boy outside. He had a thought that he should pay the girl something for the evening, but she had already closed and bolted the door and so he followed the boy back towards St. Charles Avenue. He squinted against the light and asked, “What time is it? And where’s my horse and rifle?”
The boy spit. “It’s past noon. And your gun and horse are with Mr. Gorman.”
Nate followed the boy for a few blocks, and after watching him nervously scanning the streets, Nate took hold of him by the shoulder and asked, “Something you need to tell me?”
The boy licked his lips, his eyes restless and searching. “Mr. Gorman says to come on…”
A cold, smattering mist had started falling and Nate pulled up his collar against the chill. He kept a close eye on the thoroughfares, though he wouldn’t have known which of the pinched or restless faces signaled a threat until it had crawled up his back.
The boy led him to the Buffalo House and Nate saw that its porch was filled with half a dozen men who wore their pistols exposed to both the elements and passersby. A few also had Enfield rifles held in the crooks of their arms. The boy chucked his chin for Nate go on inside and then he vanished into the street crowd. Gorman was sitting at the same table as the day before, and Pierre stood up, his face as shuttered as a bank window, and gestured for Nate to take his chair before wandering back to the faro table.
Gorman gestured to Nate’s face. “You’ve got a black eye.”
Nate touched the tender flesh and said, “From the recoil on the Whitworth, I guess.”
Gorman waved to a serving girl and she brought to the table steak and eggs and coffee.
Nate took off his hat. “Those men out there because of me?”
“Everyone in New Orleans has heard of your shot.” Gorman smiled tightly. “Duverje has his men looking for you.” He eased a small bundle wrapped in paper across the table in front of Nate. “You embarrassed my enemy and made a lot of money for me, Mr. Cannon.”
Nate pushed the bundle away. “I don’t need that. I just need to know where McGill is.”
Gorman poured a cup of coffee for himself and took his time blowing it cool. “There have been of late some unexplained killings in the district. Men murdered and robbed in alleyways and on dark streets. Their throats slit. I think it may be your man McGill, though it’s unusual for a man-killer of his ilk to change his tactics. From what I’ve been told, he likes to gut-shoot his victims.”
Nate started to eat from his plate, nodding tensely in agreement.
“McGill is here, I can tell you that, but no one has seen him since he brought a girl, your girl, to Hattie Hamilton’s sporting palace. The girl has not shown up for several days, but Hattie believes she and McGill are working a game to bilk one of her regular clients. The mark, if he’s still alive, will not remain that way much longer.”
Nate thumbed his plate away. “Where is this client?”
Gorman paused for a moment, seemingly to study the pattern on the coffee cup. He said, “Better than most, I understand the desire for settling disputes in a more time-honored fashion. The war robbed us of a great many things, but one thing we in New Orleans mourn the loss of, perhaps more than anything else, is the ritual for regaining our pride. McGill certainly does not respect those rules, but I believe you do.”
Gorman set down his cup.
“Therefore, I will admit to certain grandfatherly feelings towards you, Mr. Cannon. And I will tell you in all earnestness that instead of encountering McGill face to face, you should shoot him in the back. Lie in wait for him in the dark if you must, because if you don’t, he will be the one to kill you.”
Gorman propped his elbows on the table and leaned closer. “I will tell you that as much influence as I may have over some of my people here, I have very little over the police, even the ones I pay. There is also the complication now of Duverje, who does not put too fine a point on honor.”
Gorman gestured to the serving girl and she brought a bottle of brandy and poured some into both cups. “You should stay here until dark. Then the boy will take you to Hattie’s. You’ll have until first light tomorrow to find McGill and do what you came to do. After that, you must leave; for your own safety, and because those men out there are costing me a small fortune. You’ll get back your rifle and horse once you’re on the boat for Galveston. You’ll not see me again, I’m afraid, Mr. Cannon. But I wish you bonne chance.”
He walked out of the Buffalo House and disappeared into the street, and Nate passed the afternoon drinking coffee until he felt his hands shaking when he loaded fresh powder into the Dance. He sat watching the clock and the people that wandered in and out of the Buffalo House, some of them to find a drink or a girl, some of them to take a turn at cards. He suspected more than a few had come to gawk at him while passing pleasantries with Pierre, even placing bets on whether or not he would make it onto the steamer the following day. He tried to find a place of rage or even grief that he could sharpen his intent on, but in the well-ordered and functional arena that was the Buffalo House, the best he could find was a kind of nervous expectation.
The barefoot boy appeared at his table just after dark, and he led Nate past the armed men—who nodded to him with a kind of professional wariness—into the rain-swollen alleyways of Canal. They weaved their way through the numberless outhouses, stables, and sheds of Basin Street to Hattie Hamilton’s palace. He pointed for Nate to go in through the front door and then leaned against the gate
in an attitude of alert waiting, hands in pockets, one bare foot cocked over the other.
The entranceway to the sporting house was flanked by two life-size statues of disrobed women, each holding in her outstretched hands live gas torches, and Nate followed after a man in evening dress, surprised that the door was not locked but rather opened readily on its oiled hinges.
The reception hall led to a grand parlor the likes of which Nate had never before witnessed. Seated on velvet couches and satin chairs were women of such confounding, artful beauty, their near nakedness reflected in infinite tides through the gilt mirrors filling every wall, that Nate was stunned to immobility, and a feeling of confined desperation swelled in him when several of the women looked in his direction and smiled through parted lips.
He removed his hat, and a shadowed motion caused Nate to turn. A tall black man had come to stand at one shoulder, but before Nate could take a step back, the man placed a restraining hand on Nate’s right arm. The man’s other hand was hidden under his long coat, gripping what Nate was certain was a knife concealed in the waistband of his trousers.
He said, “No guns allowed, sir.”
The man relinquished his hold on Nate’s arm, and Nate handed him the Dance. The man pointed up the stairs. “Miss Hattie will see you directly.”
Nate walked across the parlor, his boots striking loudly on the marble floor, conscious of the women and their customers watching him with hooded eyes. Before he had stepped onto the first riser, a woman joined him and led him up to the second floor. Her dress, what there was of it, was nearly transparent and cinched broadly with a corset of scarlet whalebone, the back laces falling between the curved, swaying cheeks of her backside. Nate took a steadying intake of air, breathing in the musk of her body, and he let her gain a few steps before following after her again. She led him to a door, opened it, and gestured for him to go in alone.
He walked into a spacious room, heated with an elaborately painted corner stove, and saw a large rawboned woman smoking a small cigar seated at a man’s desk, both her feet propped up on a tufted stool. She rested her elbow on the desk, and gestured for him to sit in a chair facing her.
She looked him over and tipped the ashes of the cigar into a crystal bowl. She said, “Sam has asked me to help you find someone.”
She squinted at him for a minute through the smoke and Nate heard the door open and close behind him, and he sensed, without seeing, that the tall black man had stepped softly into the room.
“What will you do when you find him?” she asked.
“I’m going to kill him,” he said. “Given the chance.”
She ducked her mule’s jaw into her neck and smiled at him in a way that might at one time have been considered coy. “What makes you think Bill hasn’t offered me a lot of money to keep that from happening?”
For the first time, Nate saw a Colt on the desk within arm’s reach, and he calculated the likelihood of his reaching the gun before the madam could. She was as big as a man, and from the size of her thighs and shoulders, he guessed her reflexes might be as quick as a man’s as well. Nate listened for movement from behind but heard nothing.
“He has, you know,” she said, brushing more ashes into the bowl. “Offered me money to be his eyes and ears. Quite a bit of money.” She drew on the cigar and waited.
Nate reached into the pocket of his jacket and tossed a coin onto the desk as he stood up, saying, “You might as well go ahead and take all your clothes off. A whore is usually naked when she’s diddling with a man.”
He heard the rushing footfalls of the black man approaching, but Hattie yelped with laughter and held up one hand to stay him. She waved Nate down again and wiped at her streaming eyes with the back of one hand. She said, “When you get to my age and stage in life, you can’t put a price on peace of mind. I want William McGill gone. He’s bad for business. He scares the customers. And he ruins my girls.”
Nate said, “And he scares you as well, doesn’t he? Which I’m guessing is not easy to do.”
Hattie’s mouth tightened, and Nate jerked a thumb over one shoulder. “Why don’t you send your man to do the job?”
“I need Lucius here. He never leaves this place.” She said it with her chin raised, as though Nate would challenge her.
“Then it’s on me.” Nate stood up again. “You know where McGill is?”
“I know where he’s going to be. McGill’s girl is setting up a client to be robbed tonight. I’ll tell you where the client is, but I want something in return for it. Or, rather, I want something returned to me that’s mine. Lucinda has a contract to fulfill.”
“A contract,” Nate said.
Hattie stood up and came around the desk to face him. “I invest quite a bit in my working girls, Mr. Cannon. I want her brought back here afterwards.”
“She’s going back with me to Texas.”
She shook her head. “It never fails: a man with a stiff prick always wants to rescue a whore.”
“I’ve never even met the woman.”
She crossed her arms, propping one meaty thigh on the corner of the desk. “Goddamn me,” she muttered. She cut her eyes to Lucius and then back to Nate, as though making a decision. “My loss, then. The client’s house is on First Street. Number twenty-three.”
Nate put on his hat and turned to face Lucius, who stood barring the door.
Hattie waved the black man away. “Mr. Cannon,” she said. “One last thing. The client requested another of my girls earlier today. She should have returned by now. I’d go in wary if I was you.”
Lucius followed Nate down the stairs and across the grand parlor, the big man making no more noise on the marble floor than a woman in evening slippers. He opened the front door, his face as expressionless and smooth as the statues fronting the entranceway. He handed Nate his pistol and closed the weighted door.
Chapter 29
Lucinda was alone with the man in the bed, which was massive and ornate, like the rest of the furniture in the room. A fine sheen of sweat covered his naked pale body. He was blindfolded with a silk handkerchief, his hands tied to the elaborate headboard with soft leather straps. He told her to stand closer and described how he wanted her to touch him. He began his customary rhythmic grunting as she stroked him, muttering for her to slow down or speed up or grasp him more firmly.
She turned her head towards the door, looking for Tartine to return. As much as she hated the woman, her presence made the time spent with the fish less frightening, less repugnant. What she had experienced in the past few hours was something she could never have imagined in even her most depraved moments. She thought of his flesh under her hands and envisioned gouging the skin with her nails the way her own flesh had been peeled away by the leather straps.
It could not be much longer before Bill would slip into the house and take his pick of the rare, jeweled objects that lay scattered about, the money carelessly piled on the man’s desk, and then she could put on her clothes and leave.
The man shifted impatiently under her touch and she worked her hands more forcefully and he exhaled with pleasure.
She pulled her thoughts away from the room and thought of Bill and his erratic treatment of her the past few days. She had known for some time that he was a killer but had willed herself to believe that it had always been in self-defense. Just as she had willed her mind to separate his charm from his character, his facile warmth from his cold efficiency, his ready passions from his utter incapability to feel love or even liking for another.
But he had cared for her, had promised her that he always would—until her disobedience regarding May, and his discovery that there was no gold in Middle Bayou. His coldness and threats had worsened ever since. Even her recent illness had made him impatient and distant. Her constant need for reassurances was weakening her and pushing him farther away.
She again looked impatiently towards the door and saw a form in the doorway that was not Tartine. It was a man lingering in the half-light of the
hallway. At first she thought it was one of the servants loitering, spying on them, but the man stepped into the room and she saw it was Bill.
He quickly put a finger to his lips and she continued stroking the man on the bed, but she was suddenly acutely aware of her own dirty, matted hair, the film of old sweat on her face and body, the scratches on her arms with their ugly crisscrossing patterns. Bill watched her at work, his eyes as steady and emotionless as a serpent’s, and then the features of his face changed. A look of distaste, even disgust, shadowed his mouth, and in that moment she knew he was going to leave her.
She had become motionless, staring at Bill, and the fish shifted on the bed and said, “Don’t stop. I didn’t tell you to stop.”
Bill pulled a long slender object from his pocket, and as he approached the bed, the object caught the light and resolved itself into a folding shaver’s blade, which he opened gracefully in one fluid movement. He slipped it into Lucinda’s hand and closed her palm over the handle with both of his hands, and when she looked at it there was already blood drying on the blade.
Pushing Lucinda onto the bed, Bill leaned over her and whispered, “Do it. Prove to me you’ll do anything for me.”
The fish, startled by the sudden pressure on the bed, began to protest. Bill quickly removed the blindfold, and, seeing the intruder, the man began to scream.
Lucinda, crouching on the bed, looked at the blade, unable to move. Bill knelt behind her, reached around, and grasped her hand in his own with a crushing grip to guide her movements. He directed the blade at the fish’s throat and made a rapid, sweeping pass. The fish stopped screaming in that instant, his eyes wide in terror, and began thrashing violently, a thin wash of blood starting to seep through the shallow wound.
She could feel Bill’s breath in her ear and he said to her, “Look at him.”
But she closed her eyes, her hand still gripped tightly in Bill’s own, the bed bucking with the fish’s struggles, and he made another pass with the blade and she felt it catch and progress haltingly, as though it were cutting through something denser than flesh. She felt the warm wash of blood over her hands, but still she kept her eyes closed, heard Bill’s voice saying, “Look at him…look at him.”