Blessed Assurance (46 page)

“Del, I'm not a girl just out of school.” Meg fought tears. “This is life and death for you. Do you think this is the first time I've faced death?”

A strange expression passed over Del's face. He stared back at her, then bent his head. “Do you ever think of my grandmother?”

Meg knew he was remembering the day they lost her…Aunt Susan, the day they'd faced death together.

“Meg, do you ever pray anymore?”

The question had startled her, but she had to admit the truth, “Yes.” New Orleans had forced her to her knees. But her prayers had no power in them. She poured out her anguish and anger to God. Hadn't she and Del suffered enough?

Del stared at the floor. “I've been praying. I know my grandmother's offering prayers for me at the throne of God. I know God doesn't judge us here for what we do, but I think sometimes he tries to get our attention. Well, he's got mine now.” His glance asked for her understanding.

She nodded, moved by his confiding in her.

“Would you find a church and ask for prayer for me?”

The question startled Meg. Del hadn't attended church since a few years before France. But she replied, “Yes.”

Gabe walked into the breakfast room, shadowy in bleak morning light, and sat down near his father. “What does the
Times Picayune
say today?”

“Prohibition is coming in days.”

“I know. We're invited to the Demon Rum Ball.”

Father made a face. “The
Picayune
barely mentions it. This Eigh
teenth Amendment should never have been passed. It will create an enforcement nightmare. New Orleans is a world port. Liquor will be shipped in illegally—by the fleet. The city should be hiring new officers right and left.”

Gabe shook his head. “I don't see that happening what with the post-war depression we're in. Nobody would dare raise taxes to hire more police and that's what it would take.”

Frowning, Father lowered the paper, his eyes pools of worry. “The body of an unidentified young black woman has been found in an alley behind Mitch Kennedy's club. She was shot in the back of the head.”

Gabe put his coffee cup down. “An unfortunate coincidence.”

“I don't believe in coincidences.” Father tossed the paper onto the table. “Miss Wagstaff must go see that body.”

Gabe came up out of his chair. “No!”

Without a backward glance, Father rolled out of the room with one wheel squeaking as though mocking Gabe.

 

Two hours later, between Meg and Gabe, Father pushed his chair the few yards to the imposing brick building. Gold-leaf lettering read, “Morgue.” They entered and the coroner in a white lab coat glanced up over gold-wire glasses. Gabe hoped this ordeal wouldn't be too much for Meg. She seemed all skin and nerves. A tenseness grew in him, keying him up. He tried to shake it off.

The bleak, unadorned room was making Meg's heart skip in funny little jerks.
Please, Lord, don't let this be LaRae.

“Shall we get this over with, then?” Sands asked.

His heels tapping on the cement floor, the coroner led them over to a high metal table, which had been covered with a dingy white sheet. He folded back the sheet enough to expose the woman's head.

Meg forced herself to look. Dark, bloodless skin against white cloth. LaRae lay silent on the cold, metal table. Black spots wavered and danced before Meg's eyes.

Gabe caught her. She didn't push him away. The side of her slender body pressed against him, her perfume overriding the clinical odor.

“Miss Wagstaff, I take it you are able to identify this unfortunate young woman,” the corner asked her.

“Her name is…was LaRae.”

“Her surname name?”

She shook her head. “Del…”

“Del would know?” Sands supplied, looking stern.

She nodded.

“Just because they knew each other,” Gabe objected, “that doesn't mean the two deaths are related. It's just a coincidence.”

Father looked to Gabe. “Not deaths, murders. I told you, Gabriel, I don't believe in coincidence. I'll go over to see Del now. If he and this young woman were more than mere acquaintances, I think it would be better if he heard the news from me. Would you take Meg Wagstaff back to her hotel?”

Though Gabe nodded, he expected Meg to insist on going with his father. Instead, she remained leaning against him. Outside once more in the mist, Gabe sat in his car, his nerves spinning like a propeller. Beside him, Meg sat huddled next to the passenger door. Where had his sleek cat gone?
I can't leave her like this
. Or did he need her, too?

He started the engine and headed away. How much more could happen before Mardi Gras 1920?

“I saw her just days ago. So lovely,” Meg murmured.

Death had made a mockery of the young black woman's beauty. No sweet words could rub away what they'd seen today.

“I'm so afraid I caused her death.”

He sent her a sharp glance. “Why do you think that?”

She rubbed her forehead. “I spoke to her…about Del. Maybe someone saw us together.”

“Why would that have caused her death?”

“I can't speak about this anymore. Not to you.”

Gabe understood. Meg believed someone other than her friend, Del, had killed Kennedy and now she believed that same mysterious someone had killed Del's friend. Why?

“Don't you have to be at your office or court?” she asked, sounding half asleep, so unlike the decisive Meg Wagstaff he'd come to know.

“It's Saturday.”

Closing her eyes, she leaned back. “Saturday. My days have all lost their identity. I don't have a life here.”

Her sentence put into words what he had been feeling since he returned from France. Gabe glanced ahead. “Do you want to go back your hotel?

“No.”

He drove west. The reason he wanted to keep her with him still fluttered vague, insubstantial in his consciousness. Somehow this woman had become key, but to what? “I'm taking you to Over the Rhine, a restaurant. It will take us out of, away from—”

“From this place of death?”

He refused to respond. Death happened everywhere, not just in France. Pushing away thoughts of Lenore in her lonely grave, he drove on. He parked his car to the rear of the restaurant, a one-story building in the Louisiana style—many chimneys and a low porch across the front of the white restaurant.

Gabe gripped her arm and drew her inside. Seated at a table for two beside a cozy fireplace, Gabe ordered coffee for him and tea for her. He waited for their drinks to come before he spoke to her again. He didn't know what he wanted to say to her yet, but she drew him irresistibly.

Meg sipped her tea and, finally, looked up into his face. “Thank you.”

He nodded. Did he want to speak to her about Lenore, Marie? Words floated just beyond his reach. Instead of opening this painful topic, he reached for her. She let him fold his fingers around her black kid-gloved hand. Touching her took the edge off his need. “You're cold.”

“How is Belle?”

The question caught him off-guard.

“Is your mother still angry over Belle's haircut?”

He said honestly, “I thought the whole fuss was ridiculous. Belle's bob is not world-shattering news.”

She smiled at him.

This was the first true smile she had ever given him—not mocking, not teasing. It warmed through his heart down to his toes. He yearned to draw her fingers to his lips. With his thumb, Gabe traced the soft flesh beneath Meg's thumb.

Meg slipped her fingers between his, weaving their two hands together. This took his breath away. She craved his touch, too.

She leaned back in her chair. “Do you know of a Negro church? Del wanted me to find him a church and to ask for prayer.”

With his fingertips, he traced her knuckles in circles, the kid leather like butter. “I believe the largest black church in New Orleans is the Mount Zion A.M.E. I believe that's where our servants worship.”

The waiter brought their generous bowls of rich creamy soup and a basket of warm hard-crusted rolls, white and pumpernickel. “You seem to know all the best places to eat,” she teased.

“I was hungry.” More words, intimate ones ribboned through his mind. Finally, the reason he'd wanted her with him stood out in his thoughts. She drew her hand from his. He felt the loss of her touch. He watched her draw off her gloves, finger by finger. For the first time, he recognized how intimate this simple act could be. He asked, “Who was Colin?”

Shocked, Meg searched Gabriel's intense gray eyes.

“I asked you a question that evening.”

“You asked, ‘What was her name?'”

“And?” Meg prompted, hoping he'd be candid.

“You won't tell me who Colin was, then?”

All right. I'll go first
. “Colin Deveril was a son of Viscount Lynton of Derbyshire.”

Lenore Moreau was from Versailles near Paris.
“Did he make promises to you he didn't keep?”

Her heart skipped a beat. Had Gabriel made promises he hadn't kept? “Gabriel, talking about Colin is too deep for casual conversation over lunch.”

He nodded. “I apologize. Eat. My mother says a light breeze could blow you away.”

“For once, I agree with her.” Meg closed her eyes, savoring the chicken soup with its celery and sprinkle of nutmeg. Maybe after lunch, she'd be able to think about how to help Del, how to judge what was evolving between her and Gabriel, Del's adversary.

Only a few other couples had driven out on the soggy Saturday. Meg watched a young couple sitting at a table behind Gabriel's left shoulder. Their hesitating movements and forced chatter broadcast their uncertainty about themselves and each other. She'd been a better actress. Colin had thought her older and experienced in flirtation. At present, the boldly handsome, but secretive man across from her wanted to know her secrets, but would he divulge his?

Soon he helped her on with her black coat. Lingering with her back to Gabriel, she didn't want him to remove his strong hands from her shoulders, but Del stood between them. And Gabriel's secrets.

Outside in the sodden cold, she walked close beside him again. He glanced down at her. “Are you still interested in buying your own vehicle?”

She couldn't believe her ears. “Do you mean it?”

“Yes.”

She nodded. Soon they were driving back into town. Gabriel parked near a classy car dealership. Inside the windowed showroom, she walked beside him down a line of three shiny black new automobiles.

“What can we do for you today, sir?” a well-dressed salesman with his hair slicked back with Brilliantine asked Gabriel.

“Miss Wagstaff would like to buy a runabout for town use.” Gabriel nodded to her.

“Well…well, how about that?” The salesman firmed his square jaw, evidently ready to sell his first car to a lady. “How about a Cadillac? It's reliable and easy to drive.”

Meg said, “I'd like to take it for a drive first.”

This also seemed to throw the salesman off-stride. “Of course,” he recovered. “The gentleman would be accompanyin' you, wouldn't he?”

Meg grinned. “Gabriel, do you trust me to drive you around the block?”

Gabriel grinned back at her. “That depends, Miss Meg. How long have you been driving?”

Meg recognized the subtle teasing in his tone. “My father began teaching me when I was fourteen and I drove a YMCA truck all over France.”

“Then, I'll be happy to accompany you.”

The salesman goggled at them.

Meg bought the Cadillac. Outside, as she and Gabriel walked back to his car, she said, “I'll have to ask the hotel manager where I can park my new car.”

“I think you should hire a driver, then he could park it near his residence and pick you up in the mornings.”

“I can drive myself.”

He smiled. “You drive excellently. But just think how hard it is to find a parking place in New Orleans.”

“I hadn't thought of that.” She studied him, trying to judge his motives. She was sure it was about more than finding a parking spot.

 

The evening of the Demon Rum Ball had come. In her newest black evening gown purchased at Maison Blanche, New Orleans's foremost department store, Meg dragged herself through the country club entrance. She was nearly two hours late; she'd not been the same after LaRae's funeral that afternoon. And to make her feel even worse, when she had asked for her key, the hotel clerk had presented her with her first poison pen note—anonymous, of course. The note had warned her about staying where she wasn't welcome. Who'd sent it?

The ballroom had been strung with black crepe paper streamers and red-gold silk draped along the walls and overhead like a canopy. Walking inside felt like stepping inside a blazing sunset with the cool, risky fingers of night just closing around her throat. The unusual decorations tightened Meg's already raw nerves.

As she gave the hat-check girl her wrap, Meg noticed Dulcine in a demure cornflower blue dress approaching. Miss Dulcine's scheming sweet-butter-wouldn't-melt-in-my-mouth mask was beginning to wear thin. Meg was starting to think Gabriel didn't deserve such a conniving woman as his wife.

“Miss Wagstaff,” Dulcine greeted her with a prim smile.

Meg's frustration bubbled up and loosened her reckless tongue. “Call me Meg—please. After viewing your unmentionables, I don't think we need stand on ceremony.”

Dulcine's eyes narrowed, but her evening-gala smile stayed tacked in place.

Meg started away, her silken gown rippling around her as she moved. A Frenchman had advised her—in order to catch a man's eye—always to judge a dress in motion. Would Gabriel prefer chaste cornflower blue or sinuous black silk?

Dulcine followed along beside Meg.

“Is there something you wanted to ask me?” Meg paused. LaRae's funeral had left Meg edgy, moody.

Dulcine's pretty eyes widened. “Oh, my mother is giving a tea party in two weeks. If you'd still be in New Orleans, she wants to send you an invitation.”

“Well done.” Meg gave Dulcine a measured look. “You veiled your curiosity about my departure perfectly.” Meg began walking again. “Thank your mother. I may still be in town, but everything depends on my friend Del's case—”

Dulcine pulled her face down into a moue. “I don't know if you realize—”

The insinuating tone Dulcine used made Meg halt. “What don't I realize, Dulcine?”

“Your involvement with that jazz musician, a Negro charged with murder, is affecting how people view the Fourchette and St. Clair families.”

“You're making that up.”

“I know what I'm talking about.”

Meg longed to wipe the sanctimonious, pseudo-sympathetic expression off Dulcine's face. “You know.” Meg leaned close to the blonde. “I was going to say, ‘Take him. I don't want him.' But this is too much. You don't deserve Gabriel St. Clair.”

Dulcine's pouty, pretty face burned fiery red.

Meg sauntered away, churning with unspoken insults. The fanfare of a trumpet stopped Meg, along with everyone else in the ballroom, and she turned to view the entrance.

With an empty liquor bottle in his hand Corby entered, dressed all in black except for a crimson sash across his chest that read “Demon Rum.” Was Prohibition something to laugh about?

The band began to play, “When the Saints Go Marchin' In.” Corby swaggered around waving his bottle. Other young men dressed as policemen with nightsticks, bartenders, obvious drunks, and one man in an old-fashioned dress and bonnet with a hatchet impersonating Carry Nation, pushed in behind him. All converged on
Corby either to protect or attack him. People laughed and shouted encouragement to the broad slapstick.

The scene from LaRae's funeral came back to Meg full force. After the funeral service, she stepped out on the top step of Mount Zion church. Gabriel had appeared at her side. He had walked beside her the whole way to the peculiar above-ground cemetery. As the funeral procession made its way to the cemetery, a New Orleans band had played jazz, ragtime, and spirituals she learned as a child.

“Miss Wagstaff.”

Interrupted, she looked up into Gabriel's unwavering eyes. “I was just thinking of you,” she murmured. Why had he come to LaRae's interment? Had he come as her friend or as the parish attorney?

Gabe could tell from the haunted look in Meg's eyes that she was recalling the funeral. After LaRae's funeral, he had found a telegram from Paul waiting for him at his office. He needed someone to talk to. In his mind, Gabe practiced an opening, “Meg, I have a problem. I need some advice…” But no matter how he told the story, it made him sound like a shirker.
I wouldn't have left if I'd known. Will Meg believe that?
“I don't think we're in the right mood tonight for this.”

Meg pressed a hand to her forehead. “Doesn't anyone here understand that this is real life?”

Could he speak to her of Lenore and Marie tonight? The telegram sat in his pocket, a stick of dynamite to his life. “I don't think anyone here believes that there will really be no more liquor after tonight.”

Squeals of laughter exploded behind them. “Don't they realize that this means alcohol will…become more expensive, dangerous?”

Gabriel had gone to France looking for danger. He understood its lure for Corby and the other young men here. “Let's go out onto the terrace. Fresh air might help—”
Let me tell you about Lenore.

Gabriel eased her through the clusters of people laughing over Corby's antics. Outside, she stood beside Gabriel. “I shouldn't have come tonight, but I couldn't just sit at the hotel.”

“I'm glad you came.” Knowing Meg would be here had made him come. If anyone in New Orleans could understand about Lenore and Marie, she could.

“I'm glad, so grateful you came this afternoon to the funeral.” Meg touched his sleeve. “But why did you come?”

He put a hand over hers, keeping her near.
To protect you
. “I was curious to see who would show up for the funeral.”

Meg frowned at him. The glow of electric light from inside illuminated his tense face. Pete Brown and LaVerne Mason had come. LaVerne had watched her from afar with the same fascination one would concentrate on a cobra being piped from its basket by a charmer. Both had steered clear of her until…

“I have someone in mind to take on the job of driver for you. Have you given my advice any thought?”

She stared at him. When she had come to New Orleans her mission had been simple, she would get things cleared up and take Del home. How had matters gotten so complicated? She no longer felt equal to the task. “Yes.”

“Yes, you want a driver?” he asked tartly. “Or, yes, you thought about it?”

“Both.” Was she doing more harm than good in New Orleans? Had she triggered someone to kill LaRae or was it just a coincidence? She must to talk to Sands about what she'd been told at the funeral, and something she'd noticed.

“Good. I'll have Jack Bishop report to your hotel tomorrow morning.”

Meg saw again LaRae's coffin being slid headfirst into a stone mausoleum in the above-ground crypt. The mourners around her had sung, “Crossing over Jordan, what did I see, comin' for me for to carry me home? A band of angels comin' for me—coming for to carry me home. Swing low, sweet chariot…” A cheer rang out from inside the ballroom. Meg's eyes flew open. Demon Rum, Corby, had been shoved into the coffin. The policeman lowered the lid.

“No,” Meg gasped.
I don't want anyone else to die
. “I'm so frightened.”

“I know,” Gabe whispered.
I must tell her, she'll help
. His impossible desire to hold Lenore gripped him.

He pulled Meg to him. Holding the back of her silken head in his hand, he bound her to him with an arm tight around her tiny waist. He gently brushed her soft lips. Tears he hadn't shed for Lenore in France trickled down his cheeks.

She pressed closer to him.

His arms felt how frail, how delicate she was. This took the edge from his need. His hold on her gentled to a sheltering embrace. “Lenore,” he whispered.

“Gabriel?” Belle's voice came from behind him, shocking him back to the present and to what he'd just let slip from his lips.

Meg looked up at him with startled eyes. Still, with her gloved hands, she wiped away the evidence of his tears.

He let her go and turned to see his sister blushing in the doorway. “What is it, Belle?” His voice sounded funny in his ears.

“Dulcine says mother wants you.”

Gabe excused himself and, without meeting anyone's eyes, went back in through the French doors.

“I'm so sorry,” Belle stuttered. “I would never have come out if I had known Gabe was kissing you.”

Meg stalked past Belle. “He wasn't really kissing
me
.”