Flight of the Stone Angel (20 page)

“The prisoner told you she was from New York?”

Lilith nodded, secure in the belief that she lied very well.

“If she talked like a New Yorker, I think the sheriff would’ve picked up on that,” said Riker. “He spotted my accent five words into the conversation.”

“But she doesn’t have any accent. She sounds like the television news-people from Nowhere USA.”

“Deputy, I hope you’ll excuse me for being rude and pointing out the obvious. The sheriff tells rne her prints haven’t come back yet. Now that should tell
you
something, unless you’re a rookie fresh out of the slot. If the prisoner was law enforcement, they would’ve had a match on her prints a long time ago.” He drained his beer glass and set it on the table less than gently. “That’s it, kid. School’s out.” He was looking toward the door.

“She’s a cop,” Lilith insisted.

Riker shook his head. “The sheriff would’ve known. Take my word for it, that bastard is smart.”

“Not where she’s concerned. He still sees her as a little girl. She used to live in this town with her mother.”

“I know. The sheriff told me the whole story. In fact, he told me a lot more than I ever wanted to know about this town. Ask me any damn question about Dayborn. No, really, go ahead. I even know
this
is the freaking bar where Babe Laurie had his famous syphilis party – quaint custom.” He slumped back against the padding of the booth and spread his hands, palms up with questions. “No trivia quiz? You don’t wanna play? Okay, let me ask you one. Did you ever tell Jessop this theory of yours about the rogue cop?”

“Detective Riker, do you trust the sheriff?”

“So you didn’t tell him.” There was a slight disapproval in his voice. “Why tell me? What are you after, kid?”

“I might be looking for a job in New York City. So I help you, and you help me.”
Slow down,
she told herself,
you’re gushing.
She took more time with her next words. “You don’t know this part of the country – I do. I can find her, and you can’t.”

He looked so tired when he smiled, as if he had heard all of this before. “Deputy, I don’t think you’d like New York City.” His voice was softer now. “Whatever mess you’ve made here, I’d advise you to stay and clean it up.”

She sat up ramrod-straight. Her lips parted, but nothing came out.

He shook his head. “No, kid, I didn’t read your mind,” he said, reading her mind. “Rookie cops think every screwup is the end of the world. I guess we’ve all been there. Whatever it is you’ve – ”

“I can help you, Riker.” Was that high pitch in her own voice? “You need me.” Did she sound a little desperate?
Shit!
She lowered her tone. “The sheriff won’t have to know I’m working with you.”

“Stupid move, kid. If the sheriff can’t trust you, why would I? Why would
any
cop trust you?”

And now that he had hit her between the eyes with that bat, he leaned in close to complete the kill. “You’re young, Deputy. I guess I can overlook one small indiscretion. We’ll just keep this between the two of us. The sheriff doesn’t have to know you were gonna sell him out. I think we understand each other, don’t we, kid?”

Yes, she did understand.

She had just sold herself to the cop from New York City, and she had gotten nothing in return. But Riker had not done so well either, for he was only getting sloppy seconds from the feds, who had bought her first with promises – all lies, if Mallory could be believed.

He was rising from the table, gathering up his cigarettes and matches. “If you do run into Mallory, ask her where she got the gun. Tell her I’ll make a statement at her arraignment on the jailbreak charge. It’s a standard deal. Any judge will give her points for cooperation.” He pulled a dollar bill from his pocket and dropped it on the table for a tip. “And if I need anything else from you, I’ll let you know.”

She followed his progress across the bar and through a bright rectangle of daylight. Then the door closed behind him, and despite the crowd, she was alone in this place, dim and dank as a cave, watching clouds of smoke expelled from the lungs of men. She inhaled their secondhand breath with the mingled smells of their bodies and the leavings on their plates. The music from the jukebox died.

Lilith stared at Riker’s half-filled glass and then slid it over to her own side of the table. She sniffed the liquid.

Bourbon.

She tasted it.

Cheap bourbon.

Over a graduation drink in a New Orleans bar, her father had told her that cheap liquor was the mark of an honest cop. And Guy Beaudare had this on the word of his old friend, Tom Jessop, so he knew it must be true.

Lilith downed the glass in one long draught.

It wasn’t the stifling air of the bar or Riker’s bad bourbon that made her sick.

Jimmy Simms passed through a patch of soggy ground, but one of his father’s overlarge shoes had not moved on with him. It was stuck fast in the mud. He dropped a bulky laundry bag in the grass at the side of the road, and then he did a crane dance on one foot as he pulled the shoe out of the muck and slipped it back on. He settled down beside the cloth bag on the grass and tightened the shoelaces, as though that would help much.

And now he eyed the heavy bag, a gift from Darlene Wooley. If there was a God in heaven, there would be a pair of Ira’s castoff shoes in there.

He had helped Darlene change the oil in her car, doing all the messy work at her direction. Then she had taken him into the house and cleaned his hands, as though she thought he could not do this for himself. Or maybe she thought he was as lame as Ira.

And perhaps he was.

No matter. He had relished this warm, mother contact, closed his eyes and made believe that his own mother was doing this small service for him. Darlene had scrutinized the oil spots on his clothes, lamenting that those stains would never come out. She had then sat him down at the kitchen table and made him a cold lunch. She had admonished him to drink all his milk, while she stuffed the bag with laundry-faded clothes, saying Ira wouldn’t wear them anymore. All of Ira’s shirts and socks must be bright red, she told him, and her boy would only wear dark blue jeans.

Darlene had also given him a crisp five-dollar bill. He had used part of it to buy a treat for Good Dog. A fine square of cooked meatloaf from the Levee Market was still warm in his pocket.

Jimmy riffled the bag, hands roaming over Tshirts, jeans and socks. He grasped one white leather running shoe and pulled it out, examining it in amazement. There was not one sign of wear. It was not even scuffed. He quickly found its mate, but there was nothing amiss with that one either. What had Darlene Wooley been thinking of? This pair was just a few months shy of new. He pulled off one of his father’s shoes, and slipped on the new-old shoe of Ira’s.

It fit. It was nearly new and
just the right size
.

He didn’t want to muddy them, so he put his father’s shoe back on and carefully tucked Ira’s pair into the bag with the rest of his treasure.

Jimmy was unreasonably happy, and he was crying. Not wanting the dog to see him this way, he wiped his eyes as he made his way along the dirt road, limping on the foot with the worst of the blisters.

When he was standing in the yard of Cass Shelley’s house, he found the bowl of food and the pan of water were empty. The dog was nowhere in sight.

“Good Dog,” he called, over and over.

No response.

But the dog never strayed from the house – never. Well, Kathy had broken out of jail. Maybe the animal had gone off with her for a while.

He left his gift in Good Dog’s bowl, regretting that it would be cold when the dog found it, and hoping that the old black Lab would know where the meatloaf had come from.

And now Jimmy wondered about the commotion in the cemetery. The voices were excited. Prayers and hallelujahs carried through the trees and up the winding road.

A few of the remaining people from the tour group were still snapping pictures of the statue. Betty had quit the scene, running past Charles and Henry and not even noticing them.

Henry explained,
“She has to be first to tell the story of the miracle. Her reputation for gossip hangs on it.”

Charles stole a quick glance around the corner of a tomb. More people were coming into the cemetery, and some had brought rosary beads. “This is going to upset Malcolm – a miracle with no admission charge.”

Henry handed him a piece of cold meat from a wicker picnic basket Charles bit into the crispy cold skin and he was reborn. “This is wonderful. Is it one of your own chickens?”

Henry nodded.

“Does Augusta know you’re killing birds?”

Henry put down his lunch to talk with his hands, to tell Charles that as a bird lover, Augusta was no purist, not when it came to chickens.
“She doesn’t recognize them as true birds. She calls them ‘gumbo ingredients.’ One thing Augusta and I agree on
–
the only good chicken is a dead one.”

Charles was looking at the roof of Trebec House and seeing it in the new light of Betty’s tour ramble. “I had no idea Augusta’s father disinherited her. But still, I can’t believe she’s allowing that beautiful mansion to decay just for spite. Was Betty right about that, or is there more to it?”

Henry shrugged.
“The house is Augusta’s business. She can do what she likes with it.”

“Can you at least explain Augusta’s animosity toward the sheriff?”

“She blames him for the death of an old friend.”

“And who was that?”

“The man Tom Jessop could have been, if only Cass had lived.”

“There was something between them?”

Henry nodded.
“Ira’s not the only one who communes with the angel. I’ve seen Tom out here late at night. And I’ve heard him too
–
sloppy drunk and sorry for all the things he never said to her. But he’s said it all to the angel. In a way, there is more between Tom and Cass now than there was when she was a living breathing woman. But the love of stones is highly unnatural, and from what I have seen of it, I don’t recommend it. I hope nothing happens to Kathy… for your sake.”

Charles pulled his long legs back behind the stone house as another straggle of pilgrims passed down the alley of tombs on their way to a miracle. And now he noticed one woman standing alone at the edge of the cemetery.

For a moment, his eyes had been fooled into believing that she was real. The statue stood well apart from the other monuments, deep in the lush shadows of dense foliage, picking up a green cast of life in refracted light. This was the statue of a wingless, mortal woman, small and slender, wearing a long dress and standing on a broad pedestal. She lacked the angel’s drama and the baroque quality of motion and flowing robes. She appeared to be only pausing among the trees. So great was the sculptor’s talent, her stance evoked the feeling that she might eventually continue on her way through the woods.

Charles pointed to her. “Henry?”

“Augusta’s mother. She committed suicide. The church wouldn’t allow her to be buried in consecrated ground. That’s why she’s out there on the edge. Originally, there was only a slab of concrete. Jason Trebec wouldn’t pay for a tomb or headstone.”

“She seems more delicate than Augusta.”

“Nancy was a very gentle woman. Augusta is more like her father, ruthless and hideously single-minded.”
He regarded the statue with loving eyes. “I
entered that piece in a competition and won a scholarship to study in Rome for four years. It was a wonderful time to be young and alive. I think of Rome almost every day.”

“Why did you come back to Dayborn?”

“
I was born in the rear bedroom of my house. The pull of home is very strong. Look at Trebec House. That place is Augusta’s
raison d‘ètre.”

“But she lives for its destruction.”

“I
was the beneficiary of some of that destruction. Did you see the broken tiles in the ballroom? Augusta ordered new marble for repairs. The bank trustee didn’t know the difference between a receipt for marble tiles and a solid block of stone. She gave me that block and my first commission
– Nancy
Trebec’s monument. I was only fifteen years old. Augusta changed my life.”

“But her own life was ruined by revenge.”

“Ruined? What gave you that idea? Augusta has had more than her fair portion of fine wines, good lovers and fresh horses. She always had a wonderfully greedy appetite.”

“But the house and all those beautiful, irreplaceable things.”

“You look at her house and you see the ruined ballroom floor. You don’t see a young girl riding her horse through the rooms, breaking the marble at a gallop. 1 was there.”

With his hands, Henry made Charles see Augusta as she was, half a century ago, her face flushed with heat, her blue eyes unnaturally bright. She made the horse dance on two legs, then on four, pounding, crashing across the marble tiles, cracks opening in the wake of hooves. The horse seemed to step in time.
“And I believed that I heard music, I swear. But it was only Augusta laughing. I would not part with that memory for the whole earth. Augusta has nothing to regret.”

It was Charles that Henry Roth felt sorry for. This was not imagination; he could read that much in the artist’s face. This was the second time that Henry had suggested something might be passing Charles by, some portion of a life.

A gunshot was fired behind them, and then another shot and another. It seemed as though the leaves of the trees were being blown away, but it was only clouds of birds taking flight from every branch. A man bearing Laurie features was shooting the statue.

The sightseers ran along every path leading out and away from the cemetery. Deputy Lilith Beaudare rushed through the line of trees. She put the muzzle of her gun to the man’s mouth while she held a handful of his blond hair and made him scream until he dropped the rifle.

Where had she come from? Had she been watching –

“That makes eight,”
said Henry, unfazed by the violence, as though he had been expecting it. He wrote the man’s name on a page of his notebook.

After the deputy had taken the handcuffed gunman away, Charles was about to rise, when Henry restrained him with one hand on his arm. The sculptor pointed to a figure on the path leading into the cemetery from the bridge road. It was Alma Furgueson, the woman with purple highlights in her black hair. A few days ago she had run from the square in tears, and now she was slow-stepping toward the angel, and her face was a study in horror. The woman fell to her knees and said. “I’m so sorry, so sorry . . sorry.”

And now a young man, clutching a cloth bag in his arms, entered the cemetery. He was gaping at the angel, moving closer, flapping his oversized clown shoes. His rolled up pantlegs were coming undone.

“Oh, Jimmy, she’s crying.” Alma extended a hand to this young man. “Come pray with me, Jimmy. We’ll ask her forgiveness.”

“I’ve seen that man before,” said Charles. “He was at the tent show. Do you know him?” He looked down at Henry’s notebook as the artist was adding the name Jimmy Simms to the list. Henry slipped the notebook back in his shirt pocket so his hands could speak.

“He’s a small-job man. Every town has one. He washes windows and sands floors. Most of the time, he just walks around the town, waiting for the day to end.”

“He’s homeless?”

“No, the sheriff arranged a room for him in the back of the library. I think he sweeps the floors for his keep.”

Jimmy Simms reminded Charles of Ira: both were young men walking on the edge of a life.

Once more, Alma begged the young man to join her in a quest for atonement. The man seemed more like a child in his oversized clothes and his shattered face – a child who had just been brutally slapped. And now he did what all children do when they are badly frightened – Jimmy ran away.

And Charles died a little.

Alma went after him on her knees for a bit, and then she stood up and came back to the angel. Her legs were unsteady, and now she fell.

What had he done? Charles was moving toward her when Henry blocked his way and shook his head.

“Now what’s that all about?” said a familiar voice behind them.
Riker?

Charles whirled around to see his old friend standing there. The detective was staring at the prostrate woman, and he was not happy. “Charles, why do I think you’ve been picking up bad habits from Mallory?”

The three men watched in silence as the woman made an awkward stand and walked aimless through the city of tombs, careening toward the perimeter, arms outstretched, seeking balance, crying.

Now Riker reached up to tap Charles’s shoulder, and in his face was the question
Why?
He was probably alluding to the maiming of an unarmed woman.

Riker turned his face away from Henry Roth and spoke in low tones. “I told the sheriff I never heard of you or Mallory. Will the little guy play along with that?”

And now Charles realized that Riker had been watching them long enough to see Henry use sign language, and he had assumed the man was deaf as well as mute. Charles didn’t correct this impression when Riker turned his back on Henry to hold a more private conversation.

“Henry is an old friend of Mallory’s,” said Charles. “He wouldn’t do anything to – ”

“Good.” Riker put one hand on Charles’s arm and guided him over to the angel. There were chips in the marble. One ear was gone and the tip of a wing had been blown away by the recent gunfire.

“What a travesty.” Charles looked down at Henry. “It was a beautiful piece of work.”

“Oh, I especially like the tears,” said Riker, staring up at the angel’s moist eyes. “I know a guy in SoHo who specializes in weeping icons. Only two bills a miracle. So what did you use – calcium chloride?”

“No, nothing that sophisticated. My secret ingredient is beef fat. In a proper mixture, it liquefies in the first hour of sunlight.”

“So you timed it for the tour group?” Riker turned to see Alma at the edge of the cemetery. She fell down again and did not get up this time, but crawled down the path on her hands and knees. “Very effective, but a bullet would have been quicker and cleaner.”

Charles jammed his hands into his pockets, and lowered his tell-all face to hide his thoughts from Riker. He stared at the ground, as though he might find salvation there.

“I understand,” said Riker, sounding almost genuine in his consolation. “It’s not your fault. The devil made you do it, right? And just where is our little Princess of Darkness?”