The Kindness of Strangers (Skip Langdon Mystery #6) (The Skip Langdon Series) (33 page)

“Maybe not.”

“What you got in mind?”

“Well, if the phones are out, who cares if the alarm goes off? Sure, we have to work with a lot of noise, but who’s going to call the cops? All the phone lines’ll be out.”

“I am majorly impressed. You got a great criminal mind on you.”

Steve said, “You know what they say about cops and crooks. So all we have to do is wait, huh? And hit the church at nine-thirty?”

“How you going to get in?”

Skip said, “I’ve got picks.”

Rodney shook his head. “I don’t know. What if something goes wrong?”

“Nothing will.”

“I better go with you.”

* * *

The hardest part was waiting. But at nine-fifteen, they were assembled at Skip’s, all in dark clothes, Skip with her burglar tools and Steve with a backpack full of disks.

It was barely drizzling when they left the French Quarter, but raining hard by the time they got to Metairie. There was hardly anyone on the streets.

Rodney was exultant. “Man, would you look at this? I’m gonna pray for a hurricane every day.”

“How do we make sure the alarm’s disabled?”

“See? I knew you were gon’ need me.” He produced a flashlight, which he shined through a glass pane in the side door. “See that? It’s a dead key panel.”

“Meaning?”

“If the alarm were on, the red light would be blinking. Ergo, Rodney rules.”

“Hope you’re right.”

“Ah, ah, ah. Dis Rodney, and I don’t help you when you can’t work those picks.”

In fact, she couldn’t work the picks, though she was convinced it was because she was nervous, having a genuine burglar there. Expertly, Rodney took over and then said he’d stand guard.

Once inside, Skip again felt like a fifth wheel. She and Steve found what appeared to be an office, and Steve immediately set to work at the computer, cool as a master criminal. Skip busied herself with files, but she didn’t have much hope for them.

“Skip. Look at this.” Steve had turned up a list of church properties.

“Can you copy it?”

“Already have.”

Desultorily, wishing she had a skill for the occasion, she began to go through desk drawers—the property, she suspected, of some innocent secretary.

But there, right in the middle drawer, waiting to be mailed—was an envelope addressed to Potter Menard, with a Post-it attached. It was unsealed; the Post-it read: “cut check for hit.” Inside was a note: “Daddy asked me to send you a little bonus for a job well done. He wants to thank you for keeping the unpleasantness in the family.”

She was beside herself. Who would leave a record of a hit?

Someone so confident she’d gotten sloppy. Someone a little out of touch with reality, which of course was what happened to cult members.

And someone in Jacomine’s confidence. She’d have to find out who this secretary was.

The thing just might be real, and it might refer to Noel Treadaway—in fact probably did, given the timing. But she could think of absolutely no way—considering her own criminal status—of getting it into evidence. Yet it certainly told her where to look. Somehow it might be proved later on that Menard had gotten a bonus right after Treadaway was killed—there might be a record in the church checkbook, for instance. With other evidence, it might add up to something.

And the secretary might be squeezeable.

Steve said, “Oh, wow.”

“What?”

“Pay dirt. Check this out.”

It was a list headed inactive members. “As in ‘ex,’ “ Steve said. “Or anyway, let’s hope so. Anything else we need?”

“Sure. Let’s scour the whole damn system.”

“I more or less have.”

“You’re kidding.”

“It’s this way—Rodney just said we had sixty seconds at the outside.”

“Sixty seconds till what? Till he calls the cops?”

“Let’s go, dammit.”

I hate democracy.
But she went.

And Rodney was having a small conniption. “Do you know how long you were in there? Five and a half minutes. I can’t believe it—five and a half!”

It had seemed like half an hour, at least.

Rodney said, “ ‘Course nobody came by—who’d be out in this?”

“Then what are you so upset about?”

“Rules is rules. We do it again, and you toe the line or I spank you.”

Chapter Twenty-Three

THEY DROPPED RODNEY off and started calling names on the “inactive” list. After two hang-ups, one “fuck-you,” and three “don’t-know-what-you’re-talking-abouts,” Skip decided to go visiting.

“How can you do that?” Steve protested. “It’s after ten o’clock.”

“I’m a mother whose child is missing. Is that an emergency or not?”

He shrugged.

“You want to be the father?”

Again, he tried to conceal his pleased look.

First they tried Betty Landry, who lived in Mid-City. It was pouring rain as they walked to her front steps.

A man opened the door, a black man about fifty-eight, Skip would have said, starting to go gray at the temples. He was a huge man, and the fact that he wore only jockey shorts made him look like a sumo wrestler. His belly was like a great black cauldron, so smooth and round it was all Skip could do not to reach out and touch it.

“We’re looking for Betty Landry. I know it’s late, but our daughter’s missing and …”

“She don’ know nothin’ ‘bout that.”

They heard a voice behind him: “Lemme talk to the people, James Allen.”

“You don’t want nothin’ to do with this.”

“Well, how do I know till I find out?”

He stepped aside for a woman in a pink flowered robe.

“Oh.” She looked very surprised. “I thought you were a lady I used to work for.”

Skip saw she was losing interest fast. “Our daughter’s only fifteen, and she’s been missing a week. We’re terrified, Ms. Landry. Somehow she got involved with this church that we understood—”

Landry’s eyes turned to hard, nasty black beans. “Who give you my name?”

“I told you …”

“Shut up, James Allen.” To Skip, she said, “You tell me who give you my name ‘fore I call the po-lice.”

The po-lice were the last people Skip wanted to see. She made her voice as soft as she could. “Nobody. I got it off a list.”

“What list?”

“Look. My daughter’s been missing a week.”

The eyes turned harder still, to glittery glass.

“I don’t know nothin’ about your daughter.” She slammed the door.

Steve said, “I get a feeling people who’ve been involved with Jacomine would just as soon you didn’t bring it up.”

“I liked it better when I was a cop. Warmer welcome. On the other hand, the next address is in Metairie. Tonight I don’t have to worry about jurisdiction. It’s a couple—maybe they have children.”

“Hot dog—the lights are on,” said Steve when they found the house.

A white woman came to the door, looked out through a peephole.

“Mrs. Todd?” Skip repeated the little speech she’d given Landry.

“I’m sorry, my husband’s not in right now—he’s gone out for candles. For when the power goes.”

Skip had a brainstorm. She said, “Sheila’s never been in a hurricane. She’ll be so scared. You see, she got mixed up with this crazy church—”

“Did you say church?”

“Yes, ma’am. Something about a lamb.”

“Get out of here. Get off my property
now!
”

A car turned into the driveway. A man got out carrying a paper bag. The woman flung open the door. “Paul! They’re from Daddy.”

Without hesitation, he shouted, “Call the police! Now!”

The woman slammed the door shut. Steve whispered, “Let’s get out of here,” but Skip shouted, “We’re not from Jacomine. He’s got our daughter and we’re desperate. We’ll do anything we can to find her.”

“You get away from here.” There was no mistaking the expression on his face: it was terror.

* * *

The good-looking black dude locked Sheila in with Torian. Torian had been alone till then, ushered upstairs when Sheila ran away. She wasn’t even in her own room, she was in Sheila and Adonis’s. She was so scared she’d have called Lise if she’d had a telephone.

Torian ran to her. Though they’d been separated only a few minutes, the two girls hugged. “Sheila, what’s going on? The Rev acted like a maniac. What did I do wrong?”

“I think trusting these people was the only thing we did wrong. Auntie Skip’s always thought he was crazy. But Paulette! She seemed so nice.”

“Oh, so did he! He called me ‘Miss Gernhard.’ He treated me like a real person. I thought he was the greatest man I’d ever known.”

Sheila walked to the window.

“What are you doing?”

“‘Trying to see if there’s a way out. Look, I’ll bet I could get down that drainpipe.”

Torian went over to look. “You’ve got to be kidding. I couldn’t do that in a million years.” She was overcome with the sadness of feeling unequal to the situation.

“‘Too bad. I could do it, but it might not hold my weight.”

She snapped her fingers. “You know what? I’ve got a better idea—why not just open the window and yell? If I’d yelled a few minutes ago, the cops would probably be here now.”

She tugged at the sash. Torian bent to help, but the window didn’t budge.

Sheila said, “Damn. Painted shut.” She turned around and sat on the bed.

“Why didn’t you yell out there?”

“At first I didn’t think of it, and by the time I did, I needed everything to keep breathing. I thought if I did, it would slow me down, and all I wanted was to get away.”

“I wonder if Jacomine and the mustard dude are still downstairs?”

They could hear very little from where they were.

After awhile Paulette brought them some sandwiches and milk. She opened the door and stood there blocking it. “Torian, take this.”

“I’m not hungry.”

“Take it, you little shit, or suffer the consequences.”

Not wanting to find out what she meant, Torian took the tray.

Paulette said, “When I come back that stuff better be gone.”

When she had left, Sheila took a sandwich and held it up—not quite ready to eat, but working up to it. “Look at it this way,” she said. “If they’re feeding us, maybe they’re not planning to kill us.”

“Maybe that stuff’s poisoned.”

Sheila shrugged and ate. When she didn’t keel over, Torian did too.

Paulette came back and took Torian’s arm. “Come with me.”

She locked the door behind her, holding tightly. “Okay, I want you to go to the bathroom.”

Torian didn’t believe what she was hearing. “What?”

The woman shoved her in the right direction. “Get in there and pee. Leave the door open.”

She did the same thing with Sheila, and then she left again.

When she came back, she had some lengths of clothesline with her. “Sheila. Tie Torian’s arms behind her back.”

Sheila had that sullen look she got. “Why should I?”

“Because I’m going to beat the living hell out of you if ya don’t.”

Sheila got up and walked over to Paulette. But instead of taking the clothesline, she kicked Paulette in the shin.

Torian saw instantly that it wasn’t the wisest tactical move—it warned Paulette that Sheila wasn’t going to cooperate, yet it left her undamaged. Paulette lunged forward. It was the first time in her life Torian had seen her friend look frightened.

But Sheila fought. Torian could see her suck in her breath. She doubled up her fist and landed it on Paulette’s arm.

I should do something. What should I do? The lamp! I’ll bash her with the lamp
. Torian picked it up and prepared to smash it on Paulette’s head, but the cord was too short. She tugged hard, but the plug wouldn’t come out.

Panicked, she bent down and tried to unplug it. Behind her, she heard a crash, and looked back to see Sheila down on the floor, Paulette straddling her, holding Sheila’s head in her hands. She started to bang it against the floor, and then stopped. Very deliberately, she doubled up her fist and socked Sheila in the jaw.

Sheila’s eyes closed. Her head hit the floor, hard. Torian thought she was almost certainly unconscious.

“Sheila!” she yelled, but her friend didn’t respond.

Paulette did instead. “Torian, get up off that floor.”

Torian noticed that she was still down there, where she’d been trying to get the lamp plug out of the socket so she could unplug it.

Paulette went over to the door and locked it. “Listen, baby, I’m gonna have to tie ya up. I know that scared ya, what I did with Sheila, but I wouldn’t hurt ya for the world. You gon’ be okay, ya know that?”

Torian was frozen with terror. She was still while Paulette tied her hands behind her back and she sat quietly, watching Paulette turn Sheila over and truss her as well. “I had to do that, ya know, girl? You be okay; I swear.”

She was different from the way she’d been a few minutes ago, before she knocked Sheila out. As if she’d calmed down—or simply changed tactics.

She left and came back with some water, which she sponged on Sheila’s face till the girl came around. “Ya gon’ have a sore chin, baby, but ya be all right.”

Sheila said, “Oh, sure. I’m sure I’ll be just fine.”

“You shut up, girl, and do what ya told. Turn around.” She tied a bandanna around Sheila’s mouth, so she couldn’t make much noise, and then she did the same thing to Torian.

“Okay, girls, y’all come on now, one at a time.” She herded them into her van, which had been drawn up close to the house. Torian was first. She saw that Faylice was already there, feet tied as well. Paulette tied Torian’s feet. Then she left, came back with Sheila, and tied her feet, nearly suffering a nasty kick for her trouble.

“Y’all lie down now, the best way ya can.” When they were jackknifed to her satisfaction, she covered them with blankets. It was raining hard, but still fairly warm— the blankets were smothering. Torian was so unhappy she almost forgot to be scared.

They drove a long time, start-and-stop at first, then fast. Paulette turned the air-conditioning up high, possibly to offset the heat from the blankets. Now it was so cold Torian’s teeth chattered, but it was better than the stifling heat.

Paulette played the radio loud, listening to the country music Torian and Noel thought so trashy. Sometimes she sang along.