Creole Belle

  “You already know this is a waste of time, don’t you?” I said.

  “Probably.”

  “You’re here anyway.”

  “One toggles from place to place and carries out his little duties. I’m sure you do the same.”

  “Have you chatted up Lamont Woolsey of late?”

  “He and I are not close.”

  “I hear somebody stomped his face in.”

  “Woolsey has a way of provoking people.”

  “Ever hear of a guy by the name of Ozone Eddy Mouton?”

  “No, I can’t say that I have.”

  “A couple of people were found incinerated inside a car trunk in St. Bernard Parish. I hear even their teeth were melted by the heat.”

  He didn’t blink. I watched his eyes. They had a translucence about them that was almost ethereal. They were free of guilt or worry or concern of any kind. They made me think of blue water on a sunny day or the eyes of door-to-door proselytizers who tell you they were recently reborn.

  “If you worked for us, you would be free of all these things,” he said. “Why not give it a try? You seem to have the benefits of a classical education. As a soldier, you walked in the footprints of the French and the British, and you know how it’s all going to play out. Do you always want to be a beggar of scraps at the table of the rich? Do you enjoy being part of a system that instills a vice like gambling in its citizenry and placates the poor with bread and circuses?”

  “The guys who died on that rig are going to find you one day, Mr. Donnelly.”

  “When all else fails, we whip out our biblical dirge, do we?”

  “Maybe you’ll have better luck dealing with the dead than I. They go where they want. They sit on your bed at night and stand behind you in the mirror. Once they locate you, they never rest. And you know what’s worse about them?”

  He smiled at me and didn’t reply.

  “When it’s your time, they’ll be your escorts, and they won’t be delivering you to a very good place. The dead are not given to mercy.”

  He did something I didn’t expect. He leaned forward in his chair, his elbows splayed on my desk. “I was once like you, determined to impose my moral sense on the rest of the world. I was in Sudan and Libya and Turkistan and Rwanda and the Congo. I was repelled when I saw peasants buried up to their necks and decapitated by earth graders, and women disemboweled with machetes on the roadside. But I learned to live with it, as I’m sure you and Mr. Purcel did. Don’t rinse your sins at the expense of others, sir. It’s tawdry and cheap stuff and unworthy of a good soldier and a knowledgeable man.”

  “Clete Purcel and I have nothing you want.”

  “When you cross the wrong Rubicon, you enter a harsh and unpredictable environment, Detective Robicheaux. It’s not a country where you can depend on the kindness of strangers or those who seem to be your friends. Do you get my drift?”

  “No, not at all,” I replied.

  “That’s too bad. I thought you were a more perceptive man. Good-bye, sir,” he said.

  GRETCHEN HOROWITZ DID not deal well with emotions that involved trust or deconstructing her defense system. Her program had always been simple: Number one, you didn’t empower others to hurt you; number two, when people didn’t heed your warning signs, you taught them the nature of regret; number three, you didn’t let a man get in your head so he could get in your pants.

  Her ongoing conversation with herself about Pierre Dupree was causing her problems she had never experienced. The more she thought about him, the more power she gave him. The more she shut him out of her thoughts, the more she lost confidence in herself. Since she was sixteen, she had never run from a problem. She could also say she had never been afraid, or at least she had never let fear stop her from doing anything. Not until now. She was obviously losing control, something she’d believed would never happen to her again. She felt weak and agitated and ashamed, and she felt unclean and refused to look directly at herself in the mirror. Had she secretly always wanted to be in the arms of a large and powerful and handsome man who was rich and educated and knew how to dress? In this case, the same man who had almost broken her fingers in his palm. Did another person live inside her, someone whose self-esteem was so low that she was attracted to her abuser?

  She felt her eyes filming, her cheeks burning.

  There was no harm in listening to what he had to say, was there? You kept your friends close and your enemies closer, right?

  Don’t think thoughts like that, she told herself. He wants you in the sack.

  So I won’t let that happen.

  Who are you kidding, girl?

  He did a good deed for the little cripple boy. I didn’t make that up. There was no way he could know I’d see him taking the little boy into the church.

  He’s a con man. He’s probably having you surveilled. Tell somebody about this. Don’t act on your own. You’re about to sell out everything you thought you believed in.

  She went into the bathroom and washed her face and sat down on the stool, her head spinning. She could not remember when she’d felt so miserable.

  Pierre Dupree was not her only problem, and she knew it. The man named Marco had given her ten days to kill Clete Purcel and Dave and Alafair Robicheaux. Gretchen’s mother was no longer a hostage, but that would not change what was expected of her. She would either deliver or get delivered, along with Clete and his best friend and Alafair. Though her enemies knew where she was, she had no idea where they were, just as Clete had warned her. How could all of these things be happening right when she thought she might be beginning a new life, one that offered a chance at a career in filmmaking?

  These were her thoughts when she glanced through the front screen and saw Pierre Dupree pull into her driveway early Thursday afternoon and begin fishing something out of a paper sack. Why was it that everything about him had become a mystery? Even his arrival at her cottage seemed unreal, like part of a dream that had detached itself from her sleep and reappeared during her waking hours. Leaves were drifting down on top of the Humvee, the sunlight on his tinted windows like a yellow balloon wobbling inside dark water. She could hear the heat ticking in the engine and the sprinkler system in the neighbor’s yard bursting to life.

  Dupree leaned down and picked up a bouquet of mixed roses and opened the door of his Humvee. As he walked up on her porch, he was so tall that he almost blocked out the trees and the sky and the church steeple across the street. Even though it was not yet two P.M., his beard had already darkened, as though he had shaved in the predawn hours; a strand of black hair hung down over his forehead. There was a dimple in his chin and a dent in the skin at the corner of his mouth, as though he wanted to smile but did not want to be presumptuous. In his left hand, he carried a box wrapped in gold foil and red felt ribbon.

  “I was on my way back from the airport in Lafayette and stopped and bought these for you,” he said.

  She had rehearsed a reply, but she couldn’t remember what it was.

  “Miss Gretchen, I don’t blame you for being suspicious of me,” he said. “I simply wanted to drop these by. If you like, you can give them to someone else. It’s just a small gesture on my part.”

  “Come in.”

  Had she said that?

  “Thank you,” he said, stepping inside. “You have such a nice spot here. It looks so comfortable and restful. I hope I’m not bothering you.”

  “It’s all right. I mean the place is all right. I rented it. The furniture came with it.”

  “Can I put the flowers in some water?” he asked. He was peering into the back of the house, but he was so close she could smell the heat that seemed to exude from his skin. “Miss Gretchen?”

  “Can you what?”

  “Put these in a vase. They’ll go well on the dining room table, don’t you think? You know, add a splash of color? Here. You like dark chocolate? You’re not on a diet, are you?”

  She couldn’t keep up with what he was saying. Her face was hot,
her ears pinging as though she were deep underwater, her air tanks empty, the pressure breaking something inside her head. “There’s a glass jar in the cabinet,” she said.

  He walked through the dining room and began filling the jar at the sink, his back to her, his shoulders as broad as an ax handle inside his dress shirt. “I went on a private plane to Galveston early this morning and dissolved my business connections with a company I never should have been involved with,” he said. “I also settled some financial affairs with my ex. I’m going back to painting full-time. I’m getting rid of my ad business as well.”

  He turned around, drying his hands on a paper towel. He crumpled the towel and set it absentmindedly behind him on the drainboard. Then he picked up the towel and began looking for a place to put it.

  “Under the sink,” she said.

  “Are you going to the musical revue in New Iberia this weekend?”

  “I’m making a documentary of it.”

  “That’s wonderful. My ex is sponsoring one of the bands, a western swing group of some kind.” He continued to gaze into her face, his eyes locked on hers. “You’re not a fan of my ex?”

  “She said some ugly things to me.”

  “What did you do about it?”

  “Nothing.”

  “That doesn’t sound like you.”

  “I didn’t have to. Alafair Robicheaux did. She popped her in the mouth. Your ex is a cunt.”

  “Good Lord, Miss Gretchen.”

  “I don’t like people calling me ‘miss,’ either.”

  “That’s what Varina says. She hates that word.”

  “Good for her. She’s still a cunt. Are you holding your breath?”

  “No. Why?”

  “Because your face is red. Men do that when they want to seem innocent and shy.”

  “I grew up here. Most women here don’t use that kind of language.”

  “You’re saying I’m not as good as they are?”

  “No, it’s the other way around. I admire you tremendously.”

  “Oh yeah?”

  “You know how to put the fear of God in a man. On top of it, you’re beautiful.”

  “Beautiful?”

  “I’m going to be a little personal here. Let’s put the nonsense aside. You’re an extraordinary woman, the kind every man wants to be with. You radiate a combination of power and femininity that’s rare. I’m very drawn to you.”

  “Yeah, that is a little personal,” she replied. She could feel the blood rising in her chest, her breasts swelling. “What do you think you know about me?”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “My background. Who do you think I am? What do you think I do for a living?”

  He shook his head.

  “You don’t know?” she said.

  “I don’t care what you do for a living.”

  “I have an antique business. I’ve done other things as well.”

  “I don’t care about your history. You are what you are. You have the statuesque physique of a warrior woman and the eyes of a little girl.”

  “Why are you here today?”

  “To bring you these small gifts.”

  “Don’t lie.”

  “I’m here to do whatever you want.”

  He touched her on the cheek with his fingertips. She was breathing through her nose, her nipples hardening. She searched his eyes, her cheeks flaming. “Call me later,” she said.

  “What’s your number?”

  “I just got my phone. I don’t remember what it is. Call information.”

  “You don’t have a cell phone?”

  “I lost it.”

  “You still don’t trust me, do you? I don’t blame you.”

  She wet her lips. She couldn’t take her eyes off his. Her cheek seemed to burn where he had touched her. “You called me a kike while you almost broke my fingers.”

  “I’ll be ashamed of that for the rest of my life.”

  “I have to go into the bathroom.”

  “Do you mean for me to stay? I don’t want you to do something you’ll regret later. I’m going to leave and let you make some decisions while I’m not around.”

  “I didn’t say you had to leave.”

  “No, I don’t want to be a source of anxiety or guilt or conflict for you. I’d better go. I’m sorry for any offense I may have given you.”

  After he walked across the gallery and out the screen door and across the grass to the Humvee, oak leaves tumbling out of the sunlight onto his hair and dress shirt, she was so weak that she had to hold on to the doorjamb lest she fall down.

  “WHAT’S THE MATTER?” Clete asked her. He was sitting in his swivel chair behind his office desk, one corner of his mouth downturned, his eyes veiled.

  “I feel pretty stupid,” she answered. “No, worse than that. I hate myself.”

  “Over what?”

  “Pierre Dupree. He was just at my house,” she said.

  Clete showed no expression. “Want to tell me about it?” he said.

  She talked for ten minutes. His eyes looked into space while he listened. Through the window, she could see the bayou and, on the far side of it, a black man cutting the grass in front of the old convent. The grass had already started to turn pale with the coming of winter, and the flowers in the beds looked wilted, perhaps from an early frost. The cold look of the shade on the convent walls disturbed her in a way she couldn’t articulate. “I don’t understand my feelings,” she said. “I feel like something died inside me.”

  “Why? You didn’t do anything wrong,” Clete said.

  “I liked it when he flattered me. I didn’t want him to go. If he’d stayed longer, I don’t know what would have happened. That’s not true. I would have let him—”

  “You don’t know what you would have done, so stop thinking like that,” he said. “Listen, it’s natural to feel the way you do. We want to believe people when they say good things about us. We also want to believe they’re good people.”

  “Something happened to me in the park in Lafayette. A little boy almost fell into the pond. His father was supposed to be watching him, but he had fallen asleep. Maybe I saved the little boy from drowning. Then I drove the family home. They’re real poor and having a hard time. I felt different about myself afterward. There was something about the family that made me feel changed inside. Or maybe it was because I helped them that I felt changed inside, I’m not sure.”

  Clete put a stick of gum in his mouth and chewed. “Then Dupree shows up, and you don’t know if you’re supposed to forgive him or kill him?”

  “That pretty much says it.”

  “Don’t trust him. He’s no good.”

  “He says he’s changed.”

  “He had a woman at his house in the early A.M. today.”

  She stared at him. “How do you know?”

  “I was looking through his kitchen window with a telescopic sight at four this morning. The woman had a gold belt on. I couldn’t see her face. I don’t know who she was. She left with Dupree.”

  “She was at his house all night?”

  “That’s what it looked like.”

  “What were you doing there?”

  “I was thinking about taking out the old man. I was thinking about taking out Pierre, too. Right now I wish I had.”

  “You’re not like that.”

  “Don’t bet on it,” he said.

  “I think maybe I should leave town, Clete.”

  “Where will you go?”

  “It doesn’t matter. I’m causing trouble between you and your best friend. I made Alafair mad, too. If I stay here, eventually I’ll be arrested. I feel like my life is permanently messed up, and there’s no way out.”

  “You’re worried because of the Jesse Leboeuf shooting?”

  She nodded.

  “Leboeuf was in the act of raping a female sheriff’s deputy. Whoever popped him probably saved her life. Don’t look out the window, look at me. Jesse Leboeuf was a bucket of sh
it, and everybody around here knows it. End of story.”

  “You think Pierre was lying to me, all those things he said to me?”

  She could see Clete trying to think his way around her question. “You’re beautiful and a great person on top of it,” he said. “He’s not telling you anything that anyone with eyes doesn’t already know. Don’t go near the bastard. If I see the guy, he’s going to have the worst day of his life.”

  “I don’t want to hurt people anymore. I don’t want to be the cause of them getting hurt, either.”

  “I let you down, Gretchen. There’s nothing worse than for a girl to grow up without a father. I’ll never forgive myself for letting that happen. This guy isn’t going to get his hands on you.”

  She stared emptily at the floor. “How do you think all of it is going to play out?”

  “The guys who are behind all this think Dave and I know something we don’t. The same people think you’re a threat to them. If they have their way, we’re going to be bags of fertilizer.”

  He took a Kleenex from a box on his desk and spat his gum in it and put the Kleenex in the wastebasket.

  “Do you have bleeding gums?” she asked.

  “Yeah, sometimes. I never brushed enough.”

  “What are you hiding?”

  “You’re worse than Dave. Look, the Bobbsey Twins from Homicide are forever. Now you’re one of us. That means you’re forever, too.”

  “No, I’m not one of you. I killed people for money, Clete.”

  He leaned forward on the desk, pointing his finger. “You did what you did because men molested and raped you as a child. You’re my baby girl, and anyone who says you’re not a wonderful young woman is going to have his voice box ripped out. Are we clear on this? Don’t let me hear you running yourself down again. You’re one of the best people I ever knew.”

  She felt a lump in her throat that was so large, she couldn’t swallow.

  FROM THIS POINT on in my narrative, I cannot be entirely sure of any of the events that transpired. It started to rain hard Thursday night, the kind of winter rain that in Louisiana is always followed by a cold front, one that descends out of the north as hard as a fist and limns the tops of the unharvested cane with frost and flanges the edges of the bayou with ice. It was the kind of weather I looked forward to as a boy, when my father and I hunted ducks down at Pecan Island, rising out of the reeds together, our shotguns against our shoulders, knocking down mallards and Canadian geese whose V formations were stenciled against the clouds as far as the eye could see. But those days were gone, and when Molly and I went to sleep at ten P.M. that Thursday, my dreams took me to places that seemed to have nothing to do with southern Louisiana and the barking of retrievers and the sounds the geese made when they plunged through the sheet of ice that surrounded our duck blind.