Cities of the Dead (17 page)

“I've got them,” she said. “He kept all this stuff hidden up here, like his special recipes. He was scared to death of recipe thieves. People like that Harris Hampton wimp drove him crazy. He was always planning some sort of cookbook, and he said his recipes were valuable. What I'm interested in is how valuable.”

“I'm not after recipes.”

“You don't think I ought to ask for money, do you?”

“On the contrary, it warms my heart to see a daughter bargaining over her late father's secrets.”

“Look, I checked up on you. I knew I'd heard your name. You're rich. You were in this movie I saw. At least everybody says you were. I don't recognize you.”

“That's the nicest thing you've ever said to me.”

“Bullshit. You come from a filthy rich family and you're a goddamn movie star. People like you don't understand about money.”

“We know what it buys. And what it doesn't buy.”

“Oh, yeah,” she said, and the sarcasm was heavy enough to turn the “yeah” into a three-syllable word. “Tell me about it. Money can't buy you love.”

Spraggue kept his voice flat and low. “Or a single second of your life to live over again.”

She tapped a green fingernail against the manilla folder she had slid out from under the desk blotter. “It's gonna buy whatever's in here. Sight unseen. Unless you'd rather watch it burn.”

“I take it you've looked through the folder.”

“Skimmed through.”

“No curiosity? I might be able to explain some of the obscure parts to you.”

“I'm curious—to see how much you'll offer.”

“Let's start the bidding at the top then. I offer one book of matches.”

“Huh?”

“You'd sell me yesterday's newspaper for a dollar, wouldn't you?”

“With pleasure,” she said, her face as implacable as the bird mask. “People like you deserve to be taken.”

“Yeah, we're so much more reprehensible than the honest poor who'd sell their father out for a few bucks.”

Her hand went for the drawer. He swept the papers off the desk with one hand and caught her arm with the other. The desk chair spun her helplessly for an instant, then she jammed her feet against the ground and fought back. He pinioned her right arm behind her, and jerked up until she cried out.

The folder fell to the floor. All the sheets of paper inside fanned out across the carpet.

Blanks.

“There
were
papers,” she said faintly. “There
were
—I came to get them, but they were already gone. Momma must have gotten rid of them.”

“Would you have sold them if you had found them?”

“You bet.”

“No matter what they said?”

“Joe didn't waste any time trying to protect me. I don't owe him.”

No point in shoving her elbow higher. No point at all. Somebody had already hurt her more than he ever could.

“I'm going to let you go,” he said. “You can holler police; you can do whatever you damn well want, but I'm going to search this room.”

“Okay,” she said. “Fine by me.”

She didn't rub her arm when he loosened his grip. One corner of her mouth shifted in a faint grimace, but that was all the outward show she allowed her pain. “There's nothing here. Anything he'd kept secret would have been in this file at the back of the locked drawer. He kept his recipes there, like I said, and that was as sacred as anything got with him, a recipe. I've been through it, and that's all there is.”

“And of course, I believe you, but I'm going to look anyway.”

“Of course.”

There was one item that Aimee hadn't noticed. It wasn't a recipe, but a cutting from a newspaper, folded and scrunched up at the bottom of the drawer.

“What's that?” she asked quickly.

Spraggue pocketed it. “You want it, you get it,” he said.

Aimee folded her arms across her chest. The green talons made half-moon dents in the bare flesh of her upper arms.

In the top desk drawer was a penknife. Its open blade was not quite three inches of rusty steel. Just long enough to make him glad he hadn't taken Aimee Fontenot up on her offer.

Just long enough to make him wonder where she really was the night her father died.

SEVENTEEN

The message at the Imperial Orleans' front desk said simply:
Napoleon House
.

Spraggue changed his sweat-soaked T-shirt for a short-sleeved sport shirt, and made sure the newspaper clipping was still in his pants pocket. He left his trench coat tossed over a chair.

It was hardly a walk, just to the corner of Conti and Chartres, pronounced “CONT-eye” and “CHAR-ters” to trip up the tourists. The rain had ceased; a faint Mississippi River breeze brushed against his bare arms. It felt clean after Joe Fontenot's stuffy den, Joe Fontenot's angry daughter.

Napoleon House was a bar he had frequented during that apprentice-actor summer. The peeled-paint walls, the orange glow from the hanging lamps, the spinning Casablanca fans were the same, like a set from an old film that had been carefully preserved. In spite of the heat, he shivered. He felt like he was walking into a scene from his past, from some other life he'd once lived, and he wondered if actors from that old company would rise and spout lines from
Cat on a Hot Tin Roof
, then invite him to join them at the round wooden table. Would they recognize him, see Spraggue, the earnest young actor-to-be, in Spraggue, the middle-aged snoop? Or had he altered completely, in both appearance and attitude? If he took a new name, the way Fontenot had, would anyone know him?

Strains of Vivaldi drifted through the room and the music seemed to come out of the past as well. The arched mirrored bar still held an ivory bust of Napoleon. Pictures of the Little Emperor covered one wall, highlighted all the others. Some long dead mayor of New Orleans had offered the house to Napoleon, a refuge for the exile. But Napoleon had died on St. Helena before his escape could be engineered, and only the memorabilia made it to the bar.

He couldn't see Aunt Mary. He crossed the room and peered into an alcove by the telephone. Two gray-haired men studied a chess board. He tried the niche next door, and interrupted young love. The two heads bent over the table, one dark, one blonde, didn't even acknowledge his presence, so hypnotized was each by the other. A private room opened off the far wall, next to the dark wooden sideboard. Mary wasn't alone.

“Hi,” Spraggue said. “When did you get back?”

Sergeant Rawlins turned, grinned his easy, deceptive grin. “Just a while ago.”

Spraggue had a feeling that they hadn't been discussing the case. “Sorry to interrupt,” he said, raising one eyebrow.

“If I hadn't wanted you to join us,” Mary said dryly, “I would hardly have left you a message.” She drew a waiter to her without lifting a finger, using the mysterious power she exerted over restaurant personnel. “Another glass, please,” she said. “You'll have brandy?”

“I'm sure Napoleon would approve.”

“Rawl has been telling me about his trip to Angola,” she said.

Maybe, Spraggue mused, but they'd gone on to other things.

Like a mind-reader, Rawlins answered the unspoken thought. “Didn't take too long 'cause I didn't learn a whole lot.”

“Nonsense,” Mary said. “You did a marvelous job. Can I tell him the best part?” Spraggue couldn't see her right hand—or Rawlins' left. He hoped they were holding hands under the table.

“Sure.” Rawl grinned. “Then I'll know what the best part is.”

“Joseph Fontenot did not acquire his chef's training in France. He—No.” She caught herself, and smiled brilliantly up at the sergeant. “You tell it, Rawl. You got it from the horse's mouth.”

“Well, the horse's mouth would be the warden, old Jason Beaumont,” Rawl said. “But come to think of it, he's often mistaken for some other portion of a horse's anatomy.” He was enjoying himself and his drawl got lazier and more pronounced. “Same warden as was up there when James French was inside.”

“And,” Mary said, “he remembered French right off.”

“He sure did.” One corner of Rawl's mouth turned up. “It's funny, I thought he'd have to look it up or somethin'. But no, his eyes bugged out and he got kind of excited. I only realized a little later that he was droolin' over the thought that I might have brought this here French fellow back with me for another dose of prison.”

“Huh?” Spraggue made the noise to get Rawlins' attention away from Mary.

“You know what task they assigned poor James French when he was in jail?” Rawlins continued. “He was the cook. And old Beaumont says he never had it so good as when French was head cook, and if he'd known how bad the cooks were gonna get after him, he never would have okayed time off for good behavior. He would have framed him for something, and kept him in jail forever. I mean, it's been twelve years, and the warden's mouth still waters at the thought of the meals he had when French was doing the cooking.”

“Jailed for natural life on grounds of gourmet cooking,” Mary chimed in. “No appeals.”

“Warden said they about had a riot when the rest of the jailbirds realized French was gone. They'd gotten into taking him for granted.”

“Did the warden talk about anything besides food?” Spraggue asked.

Rawlins sighed. “He said that French kept to himself. That he played poor dumb Cajun for all it was worth. That he cooked, period. That he didn't have a close friend. That he didn't write letters or get letters. That he didn't get money from the outside. That he was stubborn and uncooperative, and the damndest fine cook.”

Mary set her glass down on the table with a bang. “Listen. If the rumor got around that Joe Fontenot was a graduate of Angola State instead of Cordon Bleu, it could have been more than embarrassing for him, especially with a new restaurant opening up and a cookbook deal on the horizon. Maybe he was being blackmailed.”

Rawlins considered it, sipped brandy. “If he were bein' blackmailed, why would the blackmailer kill a goose busy doin' the golden-egg bit?”

“Self-defense?” Mary suggested. “Maybe Fontenot was trying to kill the blackmailer.”

“No signs of a struggle at the scene,” Rawlins said. “Lab's got no evidence that Fontenot marked his killer. No scrapin's of skin under his fingernails or anything like that.”

“And,” Spraggue added, “Fontenot was making large cash deposits at the bank, not withdrawing money to pay blackmail.”

“Was he, now?” Rawlins murmured.

“Damn,” Mary said, “I forgot about that.”

“Did you get anything else at Angola?” Spraggue asked Rawlins.

“I checked more prison files than you'd believe. I got names and addresses of guys who did time with French. Some of 'em are back in prison, some on parole, some have gone arrow-straight. But, according to the warden, none of them were James French's particular pals.”

Mary poured brandy into Rawlins' glass. He smiled at her, took a drink, and went on.

“The warden says French never spoke a word about that holdup, and never said squat about the money or who his pals were. They tried to make a deal with him. If he'd split on his buddies, he might have gotten away scot-free. He wasn't the one who'd fired the shot. If they'd gotten the money and the killer, they might have released him on time already served. The warden put that to French in person, and French just looked at him and never said word one.”

“Which gives us a lot to go on,” Mary said gloomily.

“Well,” Rawlins said, “there was one odd incident …”

“Rawl, have you been holding out on me?” Mary's look didn't match the severity of her voice.

“Just saving the best for last. Evidently, a son of the armored-car guard, the man who was killed in the robbery, tried to visit James French in prison.”

“Why?”

“Said he wanted to assure his daddy's killer that he forgave him, that he wasn't interested in revenge, that vengeance belongeth to the Lord. Also wanted to convert French, believed that if he could convert the killer of his father, his own flock would regard him with greater respect.” Rawl was reading bits and pieces of this from notes he'd scrawled on the backs of business cards.

“His own flock?”

“He's a sort of a preacher. Name of Archibald Renner. They had a bit of a problem with him. He hung around one day until French was out in the exercise yard, then started an open-air revival meeting, which the rest of the prisoners didn't find too amusin'. They all hooted him down, which brought about a general revocation of privileges for the population.”

Mary lifted the brandy snifter to her mouth. “I wonder if the preacher ever found out who French really was. And if he was as forgiving as all that.”

“I've got an address for him. And it's local.”

“Now that's wonderful,” Mary said. “Very promising.”

Rawlins sighed deeply, shook his head. The dim overhead lights gave his white hair a reddish cast. “It's farfetched and unlikely,” he said gently, staring at Spraggue to avoid looking at Mary. “I hate to say it, believe me, but let's face facts. Sergeant Hayes left a report on my desk. He checked out Harris Hampton's statement.”

Mary knew he was really talking to her, and she answered. “Harris Hampton said, among other things, that my nephew tried to kill him. So I don't intend to believe any part of his nonsense.”

“Your privilege, Mrs. Hillman.” The atmosphere chilled. Spraggue knew they were long since past the formal address stage. “But all the same, Hayes did check, and a stillborn child was born to a Dora Forte in St. Savior's Hospital about the same time James French was beginning his tour as cook of the state prison at Angola, which means he not only left her, but he left her pregnant. She may have blamed the baby's death on him. A long time ago, yes, but some things time doesn't heal, in spite of what folks say.”