Kent Conwell - Tony Boudreaux 08 - Death in the French Quarter (8 page)

While I had close to sixty thousand miles on my twoyear-old pickup, it was still in excellent condition, both
the engine and the body. There were the usual dings on
the doors from parking lots, but no crumpled fenders,
bent bumpers, or cracked windows.

I had the sinking feeling that some of that was about
to change in the next few minutes. I kept it on a steady
seventy on the straight stretches of the winding two-lane
highway, dropping to a reasonable speed on the curves,
waiting for the jokers behind me to make their move.

I had been four years since my boss, Marty Blevins,
paid for us to attend the five-day Department of Public
Safety driver’s course at the old air base outside of College Station, Texas. And the truth was, since that time, I
never had occasion to practice any of the moves.

I doubted if I could do a 180 turn at sixty miles per
hour and remain in one lane like I did back at the school.
And now wasn’t the time to test any rusty skills, but there
was one move that I felt I could manipulate, I hoped.

The Ram pickup pulled out to pass, but oncoming
cars sent him darting back behind me. He pulled out
again, and I sped up, forcing him to back off. I slowed
my truck, and again, he pulled out, and again I sped up.

The big Dodge roared up beside me, then backed away
as an eighteen-wheeler Peterbilt barreled down on us.

Leroi frowned at me. “What are you doing? Stop
playing games and get us out of here”

Flexing my fingers about the wheel, I muttered,
“Don’t worry. I’ve got him just where I want him.”

Leroi gulped. His skinny fingers gripped the safety
handle on the dash until his knuckles turned white.

I held the wheel tight, my eyes on the Dodge. Suddenly, the road ahead was clear. Like a pouncing mountain lion, the big Dodge leaped forward. I touched my
brakes, then jammed the accelerator to the floorboard
and cut to my left as he shot past.

He tried to cut in front of me, but my front right
bumper caught his back fender, sending the back end of
the Dodge Ram spinning around as we shot past.

I glanced in the rear-view mirror to see the Dodge
make a complete spin and sink up to the front doors in
the water-filled ditch.

Leroi whistled. “Hey, cuz. Where’d you learn that?”

“All in a day’s work,” I said with a broad grin, but secretly, I was amazed the trick had worked.

Back in Opelousas, Leroi and I went through the
same argument we’d had back in Melungo. I could understand a father’s anger, his rage, and subsequently his
thirst for revenge over the death of a child, but such
emotions are difficult, if not impossible to control. “I
won’t take the chance, Leroi.”

He glared at me, a frail likeness of the strong, deter mined man with whom I had commiserated at Stewarts’s funeral last December. “Then I’ll go by myself.”

“That could do just as much damage, Leroi. Look,
give me a week. I’ll call and let you know how I’m doing. I want to find the ones who killed Stewart just as
much as you do. A week. That’s all I ask.”

He studied me a moment, then nodded. “A week”

I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve visited
New Orleans over the years. It’s a city of charming history and of gloomy mystery with a large helping of
frolicking sin thrown into the mix. But it can also be a
forbidding city, and I don’t mean the ghosts everyone
parades about.

East of Baton Rouge, 1-10 forks, the left branch,
1-12, heading on down the coast, and the right fork
leading directly to New Orleans, still an hour or so
away. But even at such a distance, the unique melange
of old and new world beckons with the irresistible siren
songs of temptation.

I found a third-floor apartment at the La Maison des
Fantomes, the home of ghosts, on Toulouse Street, half
a block west of Bourbon Street and about two blocks from Rigues’ on the corner of St. Peter and Chartres
Streets.

A slight black old man with curly gray hair, who
could have been anywhere from fifty to a hundred years
old, shook his head. “We all full up, mister. Gots no
more rooms excepts de one dat is haunted”

Familiar with many of the ghost stories throughout
the French Quarter, I joked, “That’ll do. As long as he
doesn’t want to sleep in my bed, I can handle it.”

He hesitated, his brow knit. “Don’t you wants to hear
about de haint? Most do”

I decided to humor the old man. “Sure. Tell me about
the `haint.’ “

Gesturing to the floors above us, he replied, “Dis
used to be where de slaves, dey was brung to be punished. After de Civil War, all de slaves, dey was freed.
But at night, people hear cries come from up above.”
He pointed a bony finger at the ceiling. “Dey look, but
dey never find no one. De building was sold, and when
de new owner, he tear down wall in dat room, he finds a
hidden room with skeleton bones hanging from chains
on de wall.”

“And,” I noted with a wry grin, “that must be the
only room you have left”

He nodded.

“That’s okay. I’ll still take it.”

He eyed me a moment, then slid a registration card
across the counter. “Dere you be. Room three-threeseven”

There were no elevators. I had the choice of going onto the patio and taking the outside stairs or ascending
a narrow, steep flight of stairs behind the registration
desk. I took the outside stairs, enjoying the sight of a
swimming pool surrounded by lush vegetation, and
breathing in the delicate aroma of blooming jasmine
and dwarf gardenias.

La Maison des Fantomes was not a five-star hotel.
From the looks of my small, plain apartment, one or two
stars would have been a noteworthy accomplishment.

Yet, it was clean although the red carpet was worn.
The bed was comfortable, and the sheets were clean.
Two white wicker chairs were under a round wicker
table, and a small TV sat on a severely plain desk that
looked like a castoff from a Shaker workshop. A ceiling fan moved the warm air about.

French doors opened onto a balcony with wrought
iron railings that overlooked the patio. Next to the balcony was a wooden trellis covered with flowering
vines, emitting a warm, sweet aroma that conjured up
images of antebellum mansions, southern belles in
glamorous ball gowns, and icy mint juleps.

I tossed my sports bag on the bed and peered out the
window overlooking Toulouse. The narrow street was
filled with tourists and locals, all bent on having a good
time in the City That Care Forgot.

From past experience, I didn’t rely on the security of
the hotel. I opened the closet door, and jumped back a
step, staring at the manacles and chains hanging from
the brick wall in the back of the closet.

I shook my head in appreciation at the hotel’s little gimmick. If the truth were known, probably every
closet in the hotel had manacles and chains in them. I
stepped inside and looked around, spotting a trap door
in the ceiling.

Pulling a wicker chair into the closet, I peered into
the attic, satisfied that my laptop, my cell phone, and
my handgun, a .32 Smith & Wesson snub nose, would
be safe up there.

After donning running shoes and a T-shirt over my
washed-out jeans, I headed downstairs, but not before I
slipped a snip of gum wrapper between the door and
jamb. An old trick, but one of the most effective I’ve
ever found.

Downstairs, I parked the Silverado in the hotel parking lot and joined the milieu of laughing tourists on the
street, soaking up the miasma of Bacchanalian excitement that floated on the warm air like the sweet scent of
southern jasmine.

Glancing around at the laughing faces surrounding
me, I reminded myself that I had to be careful. I’d always been taught not to corner anything that I knew
was meaner than me, and from everything I’d heard
about Bones Guilbeaux, he was one heck of a lot
meaner than me.

I paused on the sidewalk in front of Rigues’ Restaurant and Bar, savoring the sights surrounding me. The
bar on the corner of St. Peter and Chartres was separated from Jackson Square by a wide promenade of
flagstones, shaded by huge oaks. Beneath the oaks was
an eclectic collection of tattoo artists, Tarot readers, sellers of voodoo charms, fortune-tellers, and artists.
With just a little imagination and effort, you could capture the romance of the nineteenth century in the air.

Like many of the French Quarter businesses,
Rigues’ not only kept its doors wide open, but also kept
the air conditioning going at full blast, well aware that
its exorbitant prices would cover all expenses with a
sizeable chunk of change left over.

Floor to ceiling windows lined the outside walls of
the restaurant. The other two walls were paneled with
what appeared to be ash. I climbed upon a stool at the
bar along one wall and ordered a draft beer, and while I
sipped it, casually studied the crowd milling about in
the bar. Bones was Melungeon, and according to
Calinda’s description, he had a reddish-brown complexion and long black hair.

Since she didn’t describe any Negroid features, I
guessed he probably had the high cheekbones dominant in Melungeons, cheekbones like those of Emerente Guidry.

I spotted no such person, but just before I gave up
and wandered outside, a well-muscled man around
thirty or thirty-five and a couple inches shorter than my
five-ten emerged from the rear of the bar and headed
for the door. He had black, curly hair, and his T-shirt
had no sleeves.

Punky?

Turning back to the bar, I picked him up in the mirror. He paused just inside the door to speak to a slender man with long red hair pulled back into a ponytail, and
who looked to be in his early twenties.

Red nodded, and Punky left, turning the corner down
Chartres Street. As casually as I could, I followed him,
making sure to take my cup of beer so I wouldn’t look
out of place on the street. Just as I turned the corner, I
spotted him disappear into a narrow gateway half a
block away.

I crossed the narrow street and strolled lazily past the
various shops, appearing to idly peruse the windows,
but actually utilizing the reflection until I was directly
across the street from the gateway down which Punky,
if it was indeed Mancini, had disappeared.

Several happy tourists brushed past. I nodded to
them, and then headed directly across the narrow street
toward the gateway-a dark, vaulted corridor with a
wrought-iron gate securing its entrance.

At the end of the corridor, I spotted lush plants lit by
the sun. I was peering into one of the hundreds of New
Orleans’ hidden courtyards, all of them connected to
adjacent streets with similar corridors.

Making my way back to Rigues’, I ordered another
draft beer and then found some shade in Jackson
Square where I could keep my eyes on the bar. A
wrought-iron fence ringed the square, and every night
at sundown, the gates were locked.

West of Jackson Square sat the blocky Cabildo Museum, separated from the St. Louis Cathedral Basilica
on its north by Pirate’s Alley. The museum, the very structure in which the Louisiana Purchase was signed
in 1803, always fascinated me.

While I sat in the shade on a park bench sipping my
beer and watching Rigues’, dark clouds burgeoning
with rain rolled in cooling the air a few degrees.

From the southwest came the rumble of thunder, an
almost daily occurrence in New Orleans during the hot
season, a season which usually lasts eight or nine
months.

Moments later, a few drops of rain fell, and a cool
wind swept across the park, swirling loose paper about
the base of the statue of Andy Jackson.

Cued by the first raindrops, the vendors around the
square hastily collected their goods and covered them
with plastic tarps.

Having experienced New Orleans’ weather, I knew it
was time to seek shelter, so I hurried across the promenade to the porch of the Cabildo, which stretched the
half-block length of the former armory.

I darted under the porch just as the dark clouds
opened, spilling a blinding rain across the French Quarter. Moments later, a dozen vendors raced onto the
porch, gathering at the far end of the Cabildo in a riotous cacophony of laughter and curses, all encouraged
by copious amounts of beer and hits from cigarettes being passed about.

A bare-chested man with rings in his eyebrows
carrying a card table draped with green plastic stumbled in from the rain and plopped the table next to the
wall a few feet from me.

I nodded to him. “Bad for business, huh?”

He chuckled. “You know it.”

More concerned about Punky or Bones, I moved a
few feet to my left so I could squint through the sheeting rain at Rigues’ in case one of the two showed.

In the middle of Jackson Square, a sprinting figure
emerged from the white veil and splashed through the
water rising over the promenade. I spotted a red ponytail flopping against his back as he leaped on the porch
and slid to a halt beside me. He wore leather sandals
and what must have been the latest fashion in torn
jeans. He was the one speaking earlier with Punky.