“More like Titian, actually,” says Lenz, earning a snort from the SAC. “Frank Smith stretches his own canvases and mixes his own pigments. The mystery is what he’s doing in Wheaton’s program at all. He’s already famous in his own right. Wheaton has far more stature, of course, but I’m not sure what Smith could learn from him.”
“I’ll ask Smith tomorrow,” says Kaiser.
Lenz sighs and looks at Baxter, who gazes pointedly at the table. The blue light of the projector beam highlights the fatigue lines in the ISU chief’s face.
“Smith’s paintings now sell for upwards of thirty thousand dollars,” Lenz adds.
“Oh, I forgot,” says Baxter. “Wheaton’s currently working on a painting that takes up a whole room over at the Woldenberg Art Center at Tulane.”
“You mean a whole wall?” asks Kaiser.
“No, a whole room. Multiple canvases stretched over curved frames to form a perfect circle. He’s painted on curved canvases for years, to create a feeling that you’re walking into this clearing he’s painting. Monet tried this as well. But this new thing is a complete circle. Huge. Takes up half of a thirty-five-hundred-square-foot gallery.”
I know photographers who’ve tried this for exhibitions. It usually comes off as cheap and contrived, like some clunky diorama exhibit.
“Does Smith have a jacket?” asks Kaiser.
“He got popped a couple of times for unnatural acts in his twenties, during park sweeps. Nothing major. His parents made the sodomy charges disappear, but he’s mentioned the arrests in interviews. He seems proud of them. I got the old arrest records from New York to verify them.”
“What about alibis for these people?” I ask. “For all the disappearances? Is anybody checking that?”
“About two hundred cops,” growls Bowles. “Plus us. That’s something the police know how to do. But until they actually interrogate the suspects, they can only do so much. It’s all paper trails. Credit card charges, like that. So far, all the suspects appear to have been in the city during the kidnappings. After your interviews tomorrow, the gloves come off. These people will go under the hot lights. Then they’ll hire lawyers, and the whole thing will become a media nightmare.”
“What about the girl?” says Kaiser. “What’s her story?”
“Waste of time,” Lenz says. “There’s no precedent for a woman committing this type of murder.”
“We don’t know they are murders,” Kaiser says with restrained anger. “Until we find some bodies—even one definite—we don’t know what we’re dealing with. I’m not ruling out anybody based on standard profiling techniques. Look at Roger Wheaton. The guy is well over our age limit, but based on what I’ve heard, I have questions.”
“Thalia Laveau,” says Baxter, trying to tamp down the flaring tempers. “Born on Bayou Terrebonne in 1961. Father a trapper, mother a housewife.”
“What did he trap?” asks Kaiser.
“Anything that didn’t trap him first,” I answer.
Bowles belly-laughs again.
“You know about these people?” Baxter asks.
“We did a couple of stories down there when I was on the Times-Picayune. Troubles in the shrimp industry. It’s another world down there. The whole place smells like drying shrimp. You never forget it.”
“Chime in with anything relevant.” Baxter squints down at a file. “Racially, Laveau is part French, part African-American, and part Native American.”
“A redbone?” asks Bowles.
“No, that’s different,” I tell him.
“What’s a redbone?” asks Kaiser. “Like Leon Redbone?”
“Redbones are part black, part Indian,” I reply. “They’re settled all over western Louisiana and East Texas. Thalia Laveau is what’s called a Sabine.”
“That’s not right,” says Baxter, misunderstanding my pronunciation.
“Yes, it is. In Lafourche and Terrebonne Parishes they say ‘Sob-een,’ not Say-been or Say-bine, like the ones you learned about in Roman history. I have no idea why, that’s just the way it is.”
“That girl didn’t look black to me,” says Bowles.
“Or Indian,” says Kaiser, who grew up in the West. “Put her picture back up.”
“Let’s have Laveau, Tom,” says Baxter.
In the next photo—this one color—Thalia Laveau is not merely attractive but beautiful. Her eyes and hair are so black and shiny they seem to float off the screen, while her skin has the look of buttermilk.
“You’re the expert,” Baxter says to me. “Tell us about these people.”
“The Sabines are trappers and fishermen,” I answer, thinking back. “Shrimpers. They live in shacks along bayous that lead to the Gulf of Mexico. They’re not Ca juns, but at her age she would have grown up speaking French. They used to have to be taught English at school. They’re Catholic, but they have strange superstitions. There’s some voodoo in there, I think. Inbreeding, too. They range from white-skinned like this woman to very dark. They can have kinky hair, or straight like hers. They’re tough people, but they love to dance and play music. They’re clannish. Not likely to go to the authorities over trouble. In the eighties they had problems with Vietnamese refugees coming into their shrimping grounds to compete. There were shootings and boat rammings. It was big news.”
“That’s more than I have here,” says Baxter. “As far as we know, Thalia Laveau had no formal training as an artist. She just started drawing one day and showed a knack for it. Eventually she moved on to painting, mostly watercolors of the bayous and the Gulf. She quit school in the tenth grade and at seventeen went to New York.”
“Just like Wheaton,” I say quietly.
“Yes. And like Wheaton, she had no early success. She supported herself in various ways, from waitressing to working in art galleries. A female art professor thought she heard Laveau say something about stripping for money in New York, but later decided she’d misunderstood. Laveau has worked as a model for a graduate painting class at Tulane, and some of that is nude work. The most significant thing we’ve heard so far is that she’s a lesbian.”
“Is that rumor or fact?” I ask.
“Unconfirmed. We didn’t want to question students at this point. We’d like these people to be totally unprepared at their interviews tomorrow.”
“What does Laveau paint?” asks Kaiser. “Nude women?”
“No. She goes into the homes of strangers, lives there for a while, then starts painting their lives.”
“Like the documentary photographers of the sixties,” I think aloud. “Gordon Parks.”
“All her paintings are finished at one sitting,” Baxter goes on. “She’s attracted a lot of print media attention, but her work doesn’t sell for much. Not remotely in the class of Wheaton or Frank Smith.”
“How much?” asks Kaiser. “A thousand bucks apiece?”
“Ahh . . . Seven hundred is the highest sum paid to date.”
“Do Leon Gaines’s pictures sell?” I ask.
“Somebody paid five thousand for one. He could make a living at it, if he wasn’t so deep in debt. He’s borrowed to the hilt on student loans, and he owes bookies as well. One former cellmate said he picked up a serious heroin habit in prison.”
“I get the feeling Laveau and Gaines live pretty close to the bone,” says Kaiser. “So where are the millions earned from the Sleeping Women?”
“Good question.”
Dr. Lenz says, “Right now I like Wheaton or Frank Smith. They’re already wealthy, so they would have the knowledge to hide the money, or know people with that knowledge. Gaines is a violent, self-absorbed punk. The attempted rape is an indicator, but he’s too obvious. Too coarse for the crimes we’re dealing with. And Laveau . . . is a woman.”
“I’m not excluding anybody,” says Kaiser. “After visiting Cayman, I’m convinced Marcel de Becque could be behind it all. He could easily be commissioning someone to paint the pictures and paying them peanuts compared to the overall take. That i
ncludes Thalia Laveau or a skell like Gaines.”
“If de Becque is behind this,” Lenz counters, “why draw attention to himself by demanding that we send Glass to see him in exchange for photos of his paintings?”
“He’s a ballsy guy. He’s not scared of us.”
“Not one bit,” I confirm. “But what about Thalia Laveau? What would be her motive? Do you really think a woman’s going to paint dead women for money?”
“I haven’t talked to her yet,” says Kaiser. “So I don’t know. But the kind of people you described—Sabines—they tend to stay where they grow up, right?”
“Yes.”
“So why did she leave? Was she a brilliant kid with ambition? Or was she running from something?” Kaiser looks at Baxter without waiting for an answer. “How are we going to handle the approach? Who’s going in?”
Baxter walks to the wall and switches on the overhead lights. Lenz blinks against the brightness, but he looks set for battle.
“John,” says Baxter, “I know you’ve been point man on this thing for a long time, and against your own wishes, which counts for a lot in my—”
“Damn it,” Kaiser mutters.
Baxter implores Kaiser with his hands. “Listen, John. Because of Wheaton’s artistic stature, and because of his medical condition, I’m inclined to let Arthur take the lead on this one. He has a broad knowledge of art, and he’ll be able to question Wheaton intelligently on his disease, gauge his mental state related to it, and . . .”
Kaiser sits in silence as Baxter drones on. The decision has been made, and the medical angle makes argument pointless.
“Normally, I would be going in as well,” Baxter concludes. “But because I think you should be there, John, I’m going to send you in in my place. If you feel that some path is being left unexplored, you can go down it. You’ll be there. Okay? It’s just that Arthur will take the lead on the questions.”
“Where will you be?” Kaiser asks in a taut voice.
“Surveillance van outside. Arthur’s going to wear a wire.”
Kaiser’s mouth falls open.
“It’s a major break with Bureau policy,” says Baxter, “but the Director has personally approved it. The police insisted on live transmission and tapes as a condition of letting us handle the interviews alone.”
“And Glass?” Kaiser says without looking at me.
“She’ll be in the van with me until Arthur cues her. The code phrase is, ‘I’m sorry, our photographer was supposed to be here ten minutes ago.’ That’s the story for the suspects: we’re not confiscating their paintings, just photographing them. Once we’ve finished, though, NOPD will be confiscating everything in sight. These suspects are going to be totally alienated after that, and there’s nothing we can do about it. We’ve got one shot at each of them. Wheaton we treat with kid gloves. Gaines is second, and we go in hard. John, you’ll take the lead with Gaines, because you have more experience with convicts. Smith and Laveau we play by ear. But in every case, when Ms. Glass comes in—”
“Please just call me Jordan,” I cut in. “‘Ms. Glass’ is getting old.”
Baxter nods gratefully. “When Jordan comes in, she won’t look directly at the suspect. This will make someone who’s shocked by her appearance have to work harder to confirm what his eyes are telling him. The innocent people won’t look at her twice—though I’m sure Gaines will ogle her a little—but the guilty one should look like he’s seen a ghost. Which, in a sense, he will have.”
“Or she,” says Kaiser.
“Or she,” Baxter concedes.
“Gaines will ogle me a little?” I echo. “He looks like he’d walk up, lick my face, and dare me to slap him.”
“If he does,” says Bill Granger, the violent-crimes supervisor, “kick him in the balls.”
Baxter frowns. “If Gaines does do something like that, don’t overreact. We have no idea what could happen when you walk into these situations. The painter could be the killer—if the women are being killed—and he could decide the game is up the moment he sees you. He could do something totally crazy. For this reason, John will be armed going in.” Baxter looks hard at his former protégé. “Use your best judgment about force.”
This part of the plan clearly makes Lenz nervous. Even I see a mental image of Kaiser leaping over a metal prison table and trying to strangle the death-row inmate he told me about. But Baxter is showing clear support for Kaiser, and Lenz doesn’t question it. Not in front of him, anyway.
“If either of you comes out and says somebody’s dirty,” says Baxter, “we bring them in for interrogation before the police get in on the act.” He looks around the table. “Okay. We’ll have another strategy meeting tomorrow morning, here, seven A.M. From eight o’clock on, we’ll have police observers with us. Everybody good to go?”
Lenz sniffs and gives Baxter an ironic smile. I try to catch Kaiser’s eye, but he gives me nothing.
“I need a bite to eat and some sleep,” I tell them, rising from my chair.
“Take Agent Travis with you,” Baxter says, meaning Wendy.
“I will.”
“The Camellia Grill is still open,” Kaiser says in an offhand voice. “You know it?”
“I probably ate there a hundred times in my younger days.”
“What do you keep in that waist pack?” asks Lenz.
“It’s my genie’s lamp. I rub it, and whatever I need comes out.”
“It must weigh a lot,” SAC Bowles says dryly.
“It does. But aren’t you glad I had a camera in there during the gallery fire?”
“Yes, we are,” says Baxter. “Get some sleep, Jordan. Tomorrow’s a very big day.”
“I’ll see you here at seven.”
Kaiser gives me a wave as I depart, but Dr. Lenz only watches, his wise eyes missing nothing.
12
THE CAMELLIA GRILL stands at the intersection of Carrollton and St. Charles, with the river rolling past just beyond the levee. Like many New Orleans institutions, it’s a modest place, an old-time grill with pink walls, aproned employees, and stools at the bar. Agent Wendy and I have been here long enough to get menus when John Kaiser walks through the door and scans the room. He comes straight to us and looks down at Wendy, whose expression quickly morphs from surprise to discomfort.
“Could I see you alone for a minute?” he asks.
She gets up without a word and follows him outside. Through the window, I see Kaiser speaking, Wendy listening attentively. When they come back in, Wendy goes to the far end of the bar while Kaiser takes her stool beside me.
“That didn’t look very smooth,” I tell him. “What did you say to her?”
“That I needed to talk to you without Lenz hearing.”
“I see. She’s got a terrible crush on you.”
“I never encouraged it.”
“You think that makes it any better for her?”
Kaiser picks up a menu. “She’s a good girl, and she’s tough. She can handle it.” He glances up at me, and his eyes seem to hold more understanding than his words. The skin around his eyes is dark with fatigue.
“Okay,” I say, looking at my own menu. “What are we doing here?”
“This is our first date, isn’t it?” He says it deadpan, and I laugh in spite of myself.
“Come on. What’s going on?”
“Just what I told Wendy. I want to talk to you without Lenz around. Or Baxter, for that matter. I have a certain amount of anxiety that we’re behind the curve. That whoever’s running this thing is ahead of us. Maybe way ahead.”
I sense the disquiet in him, in the way he holds himself. “Okay. Tell me about it.”
“I can’t explain it. It’s a feeling. I want to do something about it, though.”
“What?”
“We’ll get to it. Let’s order.”
Kaiser signals a waiter, and he comes almost immediately. We order omelets and orange juice, and I ask for café au lait as well. It’s nice to be in a plac
e where they’d look at you like an idiot if you asked for some fancy latte or exotic extras. Glancing to my left, I catch Wendy watching us over her shoulder.
“What will Baxter say about you talking to me alone?”
“I don’t think Wendy will tell him. She’ll give us the benefit of the doubt this time.”
“But he wouldn’t like it, would he?”
“He trusts me, to a point. He wouldn’t like what I’m going to say.”
“Which is?”
Kaiser puts his elbows on the counter and rotates his stool so that he faces me more directly. “Have you ever fired a handgun?”
“Yes.”
“An automatic or a revolver?”
“Both.”
“If I got you one, would you carry it?”
“What would Baxter think about that?”
“He wouldn’t like it. And the Office of Professional Responsibility would probably fire me.”
“So why are you suggesting it?”
“Because I think you’re in danger. If the UNSUB wants you, he could shoot Wendy before either of you knew he was there. Then it would just be you and him. If you’re armed, you might have a chance to react in time.”
“You mean kill him?”
“Could you do it?”
“If he shot Wendy in front of me? You’re damn straight.”
“What if he just knocked her out and tried to pull you into a car? Would you shoot him then?”
A wave of discomfort rolls through me, flashes of memory that I thrust back into the dark. “I’ll do what I have to do to save myself.”
Kaiser’s eyes never leave my face. “Have you ever shot anybody before?”
“I’ve been shot before. Let’s leave it at that.”
“I get the feeling your life has been exciting even by the standard of war correspondents.”
“It hasn’t been dull.”
“Has it taken a lot out of you?”
I look away and focus on Wendy’s straight back. The more I watch her, the more I like her. The path she chose is much more regimented than mine, but she brings to it the passion I brought to mine when I was younger. “Yes, it has.”