Chasing the Devil's Tail (21 page)

It was also a perfect Storyville tableau; the crib girl could perch there all but naked, offering entry to any opening in her body for small change, but always sideways, because the law said facing the street was a "wanton display" and could bring a fine.

Valentin kept his eyes from the places in the garment that exposed the woman's pale body. "Alice Kane," he said finally. "I haven't seen you since you were up with Bertha Sullivan."

The crib girl spat on the sidewalk. "Bertha can kiss my ass, for sure." She fixed an eye on the detective. "And what are you doin' out here, Mr. Valentin?" she said. "I heard you got yourself stuck onto some young brown one uptown."

Valentin smiled and said, "I guess I got lost," and turned to move on.

"You caught him yet?" Alice asked. Valentin stopped and gave her a look. "Maybe you ought to pay your quarter and
come inside," she said, then chortled at her pun. The laugh descended into a rheumy cough. "Maybe you oughta just do that," she said, her eyes watering.

"A dollar, if I can I get you to cover up a bit."

Alice Kane laughed again and held out a bony hand. Valentin dug into a vest pocket and produced a dollar coin. The crib girl took it and with slow fingers made it disappear between her legs. "If you want change, you can help yourself." She let herself down from the window and motioned him inside.

It was an eight-by-ten foot room, with rough-hewn clapboard walls and a single candle for light. A narrow iron bed with a stained mattress was pushed to the wall just inside the door. Next to it was a washstand that held a basin, a few rags and the usual bottle of purple permanganate of potash. There were thick spider webs in the corners and shiny black water bugs scurried along the baseboards. It smelled bad, all close and gamy, a mixture of sweat and sex and a heavy, too-sweet perfume, so that he had to hold his breath for a moment.

Alice Kane sat down on the stained mattress, the sash of the kimono tied loosely around her middle. Valentin leaned against the wall, his face half-hidden in flickering shadow. The woman reached under the bed and came up with a bottle of Raleigh Rye.

"Drink?" she said, offering the bottle. Valentin shook his head. "Don't blame you," the woman said. "No tellin' what I had in my mouth." She laughed again, then became suddenly serious. "I asked have you caught the one been killin' them girls?" she said.

Valentin tilted his head slightly. "Why, you worried?"

The crib girl crossed her legs and studied her broken fingernails. "Funny, ain't it, how they all come outta houses?"

"How so?" Valentin said, suddenly impatient. It was late, and after the scene at the morgue, he was more than weary.

"No streetwalkers," Alice Kane was saying. "Nobody outta no crib."

"Yes, so?"

"You think women is gonna be gettin' murdered, it's gonna be round here," the crib girl said. "We ain't got no madams mindin' us. We ain't got no pimps stavin' off trouble." She attempted an expression of wide-eyed innocence and came up looking like a carnival doll. "Just us little lambs out here, all by ourselves. If you wanted to do somethin' right now, who'd stop you? You get your hands around my throat or make one little cut with a straight razor or you pull out that pistol you got in your pocket and ... no more Alice. But all them that's getting killed, they all bitches outta one house or another."

"Do you know something?" He was abrupt.

"You asked was I worried," Alice said. "I'm tellin' you I ain't, because whoever's doin' this is doin' it for a reason. Not just to be killin' women. This ain't no Jack the Ripper cuttin'-up whatever whore he can grab aholt of. This man's got himself a plan." The crib girl nodded, agreeing with herself.

"Do you know something?" he asked her again.

She slouched on the mattress, propping on one elbow. "Naw, I don't know nothin'. I'm just sayin' what I think. And what I think right now is that you ought to put that coat down and shed them trousers and come and get some. Y'already give me a whole dollar." Valentin leaned away from the wall and stepped toward the door. Alice reached out a languid arm, but her hand fastened on his thigh like a claw. "Maybe you like some suckin'-off instead," she offered. Valentin peeled her bony fingers from his leg. "No? How come, Mr. Valentin? You get all you need from that little brown one? Is that it?" She sat
up, letting her kimono fall open once more. "Well, you go ahead. You don't know what you're missin'. I ain't lost nothin' since I got run out of Bertha's. But you go on ahead."

He stepped through the doorway and onto the street. The air was fresher there, but only slightly. Alice's voice called from the shadows of her crib. "Hey, now, you watch her, Mr. Valentin," she said. "I believe she's in a house, ain't she?"

Instead of heading south to Magazine, he rounded the block and made a beeline down Conti to Antonia Gonzalez'. When he strode into the parlor, the girls got up to greet him, then sat back down when they saw who it was. The madam stepped up. "Valentin," she said, "what is it?"

"Justine," Valentin said. "Is she...?" He pointed a finger toward the upstairs room.

"She's not here," the madam said. "She left. Must be an hour or so now."

"Where?" He was feeling uneasy.

"She didn't say."

"With someone?"

"No, I don't think so," Miss Antonia said. "I was working on the books and when I came out for a glass of brandy, she was gone." She caught the look on Valentin's face, turned to the girls who were lounging on the couches and went about questioning them. One said simply that Justine had left without a word. And yes, she had been alone. Valentin turned for the door. "If she comes back, send her to my place. And send someone with her."

"Yes, of course," Miss Antonia said.

He hired a hack and offered the driver a quarter extra to crack the whip. Once again he found himself scouring the streets, trying to catch sight of a. familiar figure. After a half-hour, he directed the driver out of the District and twenty
minutes later, they turned onto Magazine. In the light of the lamp outside Gaspare's front door, he saw her waiting.

He went into the bath and scrubbed himself until his skin glowed red. After he dried off, he walked through the shadows cast by a candle to the bed. She had already slipped between the sheets. He lay down beside her and studied her face. "What?" she said.

"Please don't ever do that again."

"But you didn't come by. You said you would come by."

"I know. I was held up. But, please."

"I'm sorry."

He laid his head on his arm. They were quiet for a long time. Justine watched the flickering flame of the candle as Valentin studied the patterns it cast upon the wall.

"I don't want you going back," he said at last.

"Oh?" The statement flustered her and she tried to make light of it. "And how will I eat?"

"I'll take care of that."

She laughed, but her tone was tinny. "So you're a rich man now?"

"Just until this is over," he said in a terse voice.

She was silent for a few moments. "And what then?" she asked.

He didn't answer. He reached over and snuffed the candle.

Windin' boy, don't deny my name
Windin' boy, don't deny my name
Well, I'm a windin' boy, don't deny my name
I'll pick it up and shake it like Stavin' Chain
Windin' boy, don't deny my name

He took her to a proper café for breakfast, boudin, eggs, biscuits and coffee. Lost in his thoughts, he spoke barely a word while they ate. As they were finishing their coffee, she touched his hand. "Are you still cross with me 'cause of last night?" Valentin gave her a small smile and shook his head. "What, then?" She looked wary and a bit sad, as if the light of day was erasing what he had said in the candle-lit bedroom.

She watched a shadow cross his face and she was about to save him the trouble and offer to leave when he said, "I want you to go to Miss Antonia's and get your things. I'll come by later to collect you." She saw a blush rise to his olive cheeks. "So you can stay with me."

It was all quite a surprise. She hesitated for a moment or two, and then nodded.

The cleaning woman ushered him into Hilma Burt's parlor just at noon and he found LeMenthe at the white grand. It
was the piano man's habit to use the early hours of the day, when there were no girls working and no customers, to practice new tunes that he had written or stolen. The grand was the only one of its kind in New Orleans and he was possessive about it, so he was the last to play it at night and the first to touch it in the morning.

Valentin almost greeted him by calling out his given name, then remembered his new moniker, "Jelly Roll Morton," an assembly of family appellation and street lingo. LeMenthe told his friends that he was a performer and a performer needed a stage name, but since the only true "professor" in the District was Tony Jackson, he couldn't claim that title. So "Jelly Roll" it was. Valentin figured there was more to the story, but it was none of his business. Who was he to question a fellow who wanted to change his name?

LeMenthe—
Morton
—waved a free hand from across the parlor. "Mr. Valentin. Listen to this here..."

As Valentin stepped up to the piano, Morton began a stately ragtime pattern, as crisp and clean as Scott Joplin himself might play it, and he sang in a rough, high tenor.

I'm a windin' boy, don't deny my name
Windin' boy, don't deny my name
Well, I'm a windin' boy, don't deny my name
I'll pick it up and shake it like Stavin' Chain
Windin' boy, don't deny my name

Valentin grinned crookedly. All the rounders and sporting girls would know that a "winding boy" was one who could fuck all night long. And most would recognize the name of Stavin' Chain, a black hero like John Henry, reputed to have the sexual strength of a plowhorse and the physical equipment
to match. Morton flashed a smile—one gold tooth glinting—and sang on.

Mama, mama, look at little sis'
Hey, mama, mama, at little sis'
Mama, mama, look at sis'
She's out there on the levee and she's shakin' her tits
Windin' boy, don't deny my name

Morton was a kid, only nineteen or twenty, but the lyrics were whiskey raw and Valentin let out a laugh. "Wait a minute, one more," the piano man called.

Sister, sister, dirty little sow
Sister, sister, dirty little sow
Sister, sister, little sow
Tryin' to be a bad girl, but ya don't know how
Windin' boy, don't deny my name

He brought the song to an end with a descending cascade of notes. "Think they'll like it?" he said.

Valentin gave him a laconic smile. "I think so, yes."

The gold in Morton's mouth glittered some more. "Yeah, people love it down and dirty, don't they? 'Specially them gals. They sure do." He fell to playing about the keys with one finger as he watched the detective. "What brings you round this mornin'?"

"I want to visit your godmother," Valentin said.

Morton stopped his doodling. "Why?"

"I want to ask her some questions."

The piano man pursed his lips, considering, then began another pattern, a slow gutbucket. It sounded a lot like something
Bolden would play. Valentin said, "Where's she living at, Ferd?" He collected a sharp look. "Sorry, I mean Jelly."

"Out on the lake. St. Charles Parish." Morton stopped playing again. "Now, you tell me exactly why you want to see her and I'll tell you where exactly she stays."

Valentin leaned against the piano. "Truth is, it's this business with these murders. I just want to see—"

"—if some voodoo woman can help you?" Morton said, grinning broadly now. Everyone who knew Valentin knew of his disgust with the subject. "That don't sound like you at all," he said. "What is it? Somebody callin' a tune?" He laughed softly, shaking his head as he resumed the pattern on the keys.

"How many people you seen murdered round here?" Morton asked him presently.

Valentin shrugged and said, "Plenty."

"Plenty is right." He gave an emphatic nod. "Just so happens I'm right now working up a little song about Aaron Harris. You know 'bout him? Horrible man. First he killed his own brother. Then his little sister, a sportin' girl. She displeased him and he cut her throat. His own sister. There was more after that, but he got away with them, too. You know why? 'Cause his woman, Madame Papaloos, she was
voudun.
" Valentin opened his mouth to steer the conversation back to the subject at hand, but Morton plunged on. "She knew all the tricks. She'd rearrange his furniture, mess up his house, so's the police never could hang nothing on him. She'd stick needles in beef tongues, so's no one could testify against him. It's a fact. That evil fellow that committed ten, twelve killings, didn't do one day of time." He shook his head in wonder.

Valentin had heard these stories and a hundred more like them. He was not impressed. Anyway, he didn't need reasons
to visit the voodoo woman; he didn't have a choice. "What about it?" he said. "What about Miss Echo?"

"Well, yes, of course you can go see her."

"You'll call her? Make arrangements?"

Morton came down the scale, a trickle of dirty blue notes. "She's hoodoo, man. She'll know you're comin'."

He lowered his gaze and started to play hard then, the same pattern, full of ragged tones that echoed through the empty, sunlit room.

He collected Justine after one o'clock and they carried her possessions—two satchels full—back to Magazine. He was going to leave her there to stow her things, but then he changed his mind and asked if she wanted to go along. It would be quiet out by the lake.

They walked to Union Station and bought two second-class tickets on "Smoky Mary," the small-gauge rail that served as something akin to a circus train on the weekends, carrying bands and revelers to and from the lake resorts and dance halls. Justine was delighted to have an afternoon out of the city, though when Valentin told her where they were going, she looked startled. She was a good Catholic, better than he by far, but along with the cross around her neck, she wore a dime on a thong around her ankle. Now, calling directly on a hoodoo woman, even a good one, made her uneasy.