Nikki suddenly realized that the other men all wanted Brent to fall flat on his face. There was a little bit of a testosterone thing going around the table. Patricia seemed to be a bit in awe. Brent Blackhawk was definitely an imposing presence.
“That’s not how we do this, putting someone on the spot,” Nikki said uneasily.
“There, see?” Julian stated.
Apparently no one needed her approval anymore.
Brent was staring hard at Julian. “No problem,” he said, taking another sip of coffee, his green eyes hard. “You’re on.”
11
“In New Orleans, you’ll often see references to ‘cities of the dead.’ And I’m sure, as you walked through the gates to Lafayette Cemetery Number 1, you felt like you were entering a city, a city filled with structures representing an amazing range of architectural styles. The word cemetery actually comes from a Greek word meaning ‘to put to sleep, or to lay to rest, a resting place.’ We often see the words Rest in Peace etched on headstones, and that is what we pray for for those we lose, that they will rest in peace. In New Orleans, for many reasons, we let our dead rest in peace in magnificent structures that rival those we plan for the living.”
Hanging at the rear of the group as Brent conducted the tour, Nikki glanced at Julian, who shrugged, lifting his hands with a we’ll-have-to-see-how-he-finishes gesture.
“He looks good up there,” Patricia whispered to her.
And he did.
As Nikki had known, Brent didn’t disappear in any crowd. It wasn’t just his height but his carriage that made him such an imposing figure.
“Let me say,” Brent continued, “that a great deal of the history that makes New Orleans unique can be seen and felt as we wander here. Some call it the most northern of the Caribbean cities. Others consider it the most European of all American cities. This cemetery was established in 1833, created from plantation land that had been owned by the Livaudais family. By that time the city was already rich in French, Spanish and English culture, and others were pouring in, German, Irish and plain old mixed-American immigrants from the North. They all brought a sense of their pasts along with them, and combined that with the need to build aboveground here in this land where floods come all too often. Remember, we’re not in the oldest cemetery—that’s another tour. But besides the flooding, there were other factors to consider in building the many different kinds of tombs you’ll see here. The concept of ‘a year and a day’ wasn’t born because of water levels and heat—it goes all the way back to Judeo-Christian mourning rituals and the sense of what is proper. You’ll often see many names on a tomb, and that is because, after a year and a day—if in so short a time burial space is needed again—the earthly remains of a loved one are separated from the coffin, which is discarded, and interred in the rear of the tomb or in a cache below. In death, many families are thus joined as one.”
“Ugh,” a pretty girl in the crowd said. “You mean…they pull the bodies out? Get rid of the coffin and mix them all up?”
“Ashes to ashes, dust to dust,” another woman commented.
“Hey, you’d save big on people expecting you to buy a really expensive coffin,” a heavyset man offered, obviously considering that a major plus.
“True,” Brent told him. “But death is never cheap—we all know that.”
“There’s a fact,” the big man said, and they moved on.
Brent pointed out the many different surnames etched on the tombs, then went into a speech about the epidemic that had gripped the city soon after the cemetery’s establishment. After that he talked about the Civil War, pointing out a number of tombs where good Confederates had found their final resting places, and also those tombs where soldiers who had remained loyal to the Union had come home to rest.
At one point he talked about the fact that Lafayette Number 1 still served as a final resting place for many who passed away.
His eyes met Nikki’s across the crowd, and she felt a warmth despite the sudden breeze that rose, ruffling her hair.
As if they had somehow forged a special bond, something beyond the fact that she still felt, far too frequently, the urge to throw herself into his arms.
For comfort, security…
For much, much more.
She turned away. His voice became a drone as she found herself hanging back.
Cities of the dead.
This particular city…
Rows and rows of mausoleums, some decayed, fantastic angels, sad as they lowered their heads in prayer.
Her own family’s tomb.
A woman standing before it, head lowered.
She found herself slowly walking away from the group, toward the beautiful Grecian-style mausoleum where so many of her ancestors lay.
Mingled together now in death. Ashes to ashes. Dust to dust.
And a woman standing there, her back to Nikki.
Fear rose in Nikki’s throat. She looked at the dark hair, the slump of the woman’s shoulders.
She swallowed hard. “Andy?” she whispered.
The woman turned.
It wasn’t Andy.
She smiled at Nikki. “Sorry, I’m Susan Marshall.”
Nikki felt like a fool. “No, I’m sorry. I thought you were someone else. Excuse me.”
“This is a gorgeous tomb.”
“Thank you.”
“It’s yours?”
“It’s my family’s tomb.”
“Wow. To know that you’re a part of something so historic, it must be wonderful,” Susan Marshall said. She shivered then. “I mean…a little creepy, but still cool,” she said, smiling.
Nikki almost screamed when hands fell on her shoulders. She gulped back the sound and turned to see Julian standing behind her.
“You scared me to death,” she said accusingly.
“I was worried about you—you suddenly disappeared,” he said, scowling.
“This is Susan Marshall,” she said quickly, to distract him.
“Hi,” Julian said, offering a hand and introducing himself. Nikki suddenly realized that Susan was very attractive.
“You’re here by yourself?” he asked Susan.
“I understand it’s safe here in the Garden District,” Susan said.
“It’s safer in a group. Why don’t you join the tour?” he suggested.
“Oh, well, I couldn’t do that, I didn’t pay—”
“We’re more than halfway through. Please, just join us,” Nikki said. She glanced at Julian. He hardly seemed to notice she was there. All his attention was on Susan.
“Please, join us?” he said.
“If you’re sure…”
“Absolutely,” Julian said.
Nikki trailed slightly behind them. She was startled when she heard a rumbling in the sky. Looking up, she saw that the storm clouds were gathering.
“Good thing we’re more than halfway through,” she murmured.
Neither one of them even seemed to hear her.
They caught up to the rear of the tour. Mitch flashed Nikki a questioning smile, and she flashed a reassuring smile back.
The rain hadn’t begun, but the sky was darkening. Nikki didn’t think that it made scientific sense, but a mist was beginning to rise from the ground, which shouldn’t have happened until rain actually fell and the heat of the ground turned water to vapor.
“What a day for this tour, huh?” Nathan, an arm around Patricia, whispered to Nikki. “Even the weather complies to make him look good. He really is good, Nikki. The guy has come up with bits of history I didn’t know myself!”
“I think he’s terrific,” Patricia said.
Nathan gave her a little shake. “Quit looking at the guy’s butt, huh?”
“I am not looking at his butt,” Patricia protested, giggling. “Honestly, though, he really knows this place.”
“Snap him up for Max before he applies to one of the other companies,” Mitch suggested.
The mist seemed to sweep around Nikki. She
found herself suddenly tempted to look back, but like Lot’s wife, she was afraid that she would turn to salt if she did.
Yet…something beckoned.
She stood stiffly, refusing to give in to the inclination.
The others moved ahead, but she remained where she was, afraid to so much as breathe.
At last she gritted her teeth and turned.
The mist seemed to whirl along the path back toward her family mausoleum. Ghostlike in every way, haunting, mysterious, beckoning her to that place between light and darkness, life and death…
But there was nothing there.
No sign of Andy.
She turned back.
And jumped, a scream rising in her throat.
Andy was there. Just in front of her. Hovering away from the rest of the crowd, surrounded by the whirling gray mist…
She turned back, looked at Nikki.
Nikki shook her head. “No, no, no…please don’t be there,” she whispered. She needed to get Brent’s attention.
He was far ahead, listening gravely to a young brunette’s question as they stood next to one of the society tombs.
“Andy, go away,” she pleaded, closing her eyes.
She felt something, someone, coming closer.
Felt breath against her cheek.
She opened her eyes.
Julian. He had left Susan’s side and was staring at her, frowning in concern. “Who are you talking to?” he demanded.
Nikki looked past him.
Andy was gone, as if she’d disappeared into the mist.
“I’m not talking to anyone,” she lied.
“Nikki, you were just—”
“I stubbed my toe,” she muttered, and, brushing past him, hurried to stand at the front of the crowd.
Brent’s eyes met hers, and he frowned.
She forced a smile. Andy was gone. There was no sense in interrupting now to tell him that she had seen her friend.
Not now, in a cemetery, with a strange mist rising when it wasn’t even two o’clock in the afternoon.
“Wow,” Mitch said, congratulating Brent.
“I will have to admit, you’ve pretty much shown us up,” Julian had the grace to agree.
“How do you know so much?” Nathan demanded.
Brent gazed at Nikki as he replied, “I was born here.”
“But you’re an Indian,” Patricia interjected, then reddened, realizing how politically incorrect she had been. “I’m sorry…Native American.”
He laughed. “Partly. Part Irish. And my grandfather’s wife was actually of Nordic extraction. My father and mother happened to meet and marry in New Orleans, so even though we traveled a lot, I basically grew up here.”
“You feel like conducting the St. Louis Number 1?” Mitch asked.
Nikki was being silent, and her silence disturbed Brent. He held still for a minute, letting the breeze whisper around him. It was getting late for whoever was going to meet the group at the other cemetery.
He didn’t mind doing the St. Louis tour—though Huey might be a bit disconcerted to see him—but Nikki’s continuing silence disturbed him. She was smiling, but it was a forced smile.
She had seen Andy, he thought.
A flare not so much of anger but futility swept through him. She hadn’t told him.
He should have felt Andy’s presence. He had known that at least a dozen other haunts had been following the tour that day, intrigued. None that he knew, though, and none that could have been Andrea Ciello. She had no intention of making herself known to strangers.
He wanted to shake Nikki and tell her that she had to help him. He took a deep breath.
“Hey, where’d your new girlfriend go?” Patricia suddenly teased Julian.
“She had an appointment to meet her sister,” Julian explained.
“That’s what they all tell me, too,” Mitch said with a sigh.
“I have her phone number,” Julian told him, shaking his head.
“Hey, love and games later,” Patricia said, glancing at her watch. “Time for St. Louis Number 1, guys.”
“So will you lead that one?” Mitch asked.
“If it’s all right with Nikki.”
She shrugged. “Sure. The rest of you can follow Brent around.”
He was thinking of a way to protest, when Patricia beat him to it. “Oh no. You’re the one who talks to the boss. You know damn well that if you say to hire him, that’s exactly what Max will do.”
Nikki shrugged. “Max isn’t here, and we need to fill the slot. So Brent gets the job,” she said simply.
“Then let’s head out,” Mitch said. “I’ve got the van. I’ll drop you in front of Madame’s to greet the hordes.”
“All right,” Brent said.
“We’d better hurry before our group thinks they’re not going to have a guide,” Patricia said.
“I’m sure Madame is watching out for our interests,” Julian said. “But yeah, let’s get going.”
Brent had no chance to talk to Nikki in the van; they were pretty much packed in like sardines. But when they piled out at Madame’s, Nikki seemed to have regained her composure. “Nice job,” she said to Brent, her aquamarine eyes guileless. She even offered him a smile.
“Thanks.”
Julian moved ahead, announcing that they were ready for anyone interested in the St. Louis Number 1 tour.
Nikki started to follow the others, but Brent caught her arm. “You saw her, didn’t you?”
She looked at his hand on her arm, then into his eyes. “No.”
“Why are you lying to me?”
“I’m not.”
“You are.”
She let out a sigh. “Okay…I might have seen her. But so briefly, I’m not even sure.”
“You’ve got to tell me when she’s there.”
“Look, I just told you, I wasn’t sure. And you were giving the tour, you were busy. And you’re hurting my arm.”
He instantly released her. “Nikki, please—” he began.
“And this,” Julian was announcing, “is Brent, your guide through the streets down to the cemetery, and to the fascinating history and lore of the oldest of the cities of the dead.”
Brent stepped forward to lead the crowd of tourists: couples, families, a few loners, teens, one pair of silver-haired octogenarians, both with sparkling powder-blue eyes.
“Good afternoon, and welcome to the Crescent City, the Big Easy, N’Awlins. I’ll talk about the city’s history while we head on over to the cemetery, and please, stay with the group at all times, because as wonderful a city as this is, we have our share of pickpockets.”
Though the distance to the cemetery was only a matter of a few blocks, given the size of the group, progress was slow. Brent talked about the French, Spanish and English, and the Louisiana Purchase, the power and might of the Mississippi, and stopped in front of one of the old taverns, where it was said that pirates met and Jackson had assignations with men of ill repute before recruiting them to his cause. At a house at the edge of the canal, he told the story of a twentieth-century murder in which the perpetrator had been convinced he was a vampire and had drained his victim of blood. When the police convinced him that he was deranged, he shot himself. There were those, he said, who believed that his victim now stalked the streets in ghostly form, convinced that he was an after-life vampire and seeking to drain people of their very breath.
Other groups were in the cemetery when they arrived, but Brent had no trouble holding the full attention of his audience. He started out with the tomb of the famous voodoo queen Marie Laveau, then led the group to view the tomb of Homer Plessy, involved in the 1896 landmark case of Plessy vs. Ferguson, which established the concept of separate but equal. Certain that Huey was somewhere around, he decided to tell the haunt’s story. “In cases of epidemic or need, vaults could be used by those who didn’t own them. There’s no actual data on precisely where, but near here was interred a hardworking elderly slave, Huey, slain
by his master, some say through cruelty, some say through forethought and murder. It’s said that Huey haunts St. Louis Number 1, looking for justice. He can be playful or tough—he was bitter about his own death, but a fine old fellow, and he has it in for anyone who intends to vandalize this place.” He raised his voice. “Huey should know, however, that his wretched old master, Archibald McManus, died in horrible agony. Perhaps there is such a thing as retribution, and though we often wonder why it doesn’t seem to occur often enough in this life, in some cases, it does.”
He gazed around, letting his words settle with his audience and looking for Nikki. She was standing with Julian, whispering. She seemed at ease now, even entertained. Huey’s story was one they probably hadn’t heard before.
“Archibald McManus?” exclaimed an attractive young woman somewhere in her early twenties. She was on the tour with two other women.
“She’s a McManus,” one of her friends said.
“It’s a common enough name,” Brent said.
“No,” the girl in question said. She laughed. “I’m here because my roots supposedly go back to this area. My dad said that my great-great-grandfather was a plantation owner here, that something terrible happened, and his children moved away and all lost touch with one another. Do you know any more about this guy?”
Brent nodded. “Public library, though you may not like what you find out.”
“Every family probably has one inhuman wretch, huh? Ouch!” she cried suddenly, turning to the redheaded friend at her side. “What did you do that for?”
“What?” the redhead demanded.
“You pulled my hair.”
“I did not.”
Brent winced, wishing he hadn’t told the story. Now he could see Huey. Instead of being relieved and at peace with the satisfaction of knowing that old Archibald had gotten his comeuppance, he was angry with the girl who was a descendant of the man’s.
“Let’s move on,” he said quickly.
He started walking, leading the crowd through the maze of tombs in the city of the dead. He felt Huey at his side.
“You leave that girl alone,” he ordered softly.
“She comes from his blood. Bad blood.”
“The sins of the fathers are not visited upon the children,” he said.