Murder in a Minor Key (6 page)

“Oh, sure. They’re over here.”

She bent down, lifted the bottom of the tablecloth, revealing a pile of boxes and packing materials stowed beneath the table, dragged out a big carton, and folded back the flaps.

“I’ve got some felt hats from the end of the season, but it’s too hot for those now. Here are some straw hats. I’ll be getting more in next week, but of course that doesn’t do you any good right now. Do you like this one?”

She held up a straw hat with a wide brim and yellow checked ribbon around the crown. I tried it on and adjusted the brim so it was snapped down in front and up in back.

Stanley pointed to a small hand mirror hanging on the fence. “You can use that,” he said, “but I’ll tell you right now, that hat looks great on you.”

I scrunched down a little so I could see my reflection in the low-hanging mirror.

“Thank you. I like it, too.”

I straightened up. “How much is it?” I asked.

“For you...” Stanley said with a wink.

“Oh, Stanley, cut it out. Just give me a hand with this box.”

They wrestled the box back under the table and Stella stood, clapping the dust off her hands.

“I don’t suppose they change that much,” she said, “but it’s really last year’s hat. I could let you have it for half off.”

We agreed on a price and I paid for my purchase, leaving it on my head. Stella clipped the string holding the label, saying, “So you won’t walk around looking like Minnie Pearl,” referring to the country music singer-comic who always wore a hat with a dangling pricetag.

“Sure you don’t need anythin’ else?” Stanley asked, waving at his laundry line of colorful shirts. “Got any friends back home who’d like—you know?—a souvenir from New Orleans?” He pointed to his chest, and I noticed for the first time that he was wearing a shirt advertising the Jazz and Heritage Festival. Beneath the dates was the image of a curly haired man playing the trumpet.

“Is that a picture of Little Red LeCoeur?” I asked.

“Stella, we got us a live one here. How do you know about Little Red? You must be a ringer. You’re not a tourist after all. Only New Orleanians know about Little Red, New Orleanians or true jazz buffs. Which are you?”

“Neither one actually. It’s interesting to me that Little Red is so well known here in New Orleans, but his reputation never carried outside the city.”

“He deserves more attention, no doubt about it. He was a musical genius. But he never left his roots, never played nowhere else.”

“A good friend of mine is doing research on Little Red LeCoeur,” I said, “and looking for recordings he may have made around the turn of the last century.”

Stanley shook his head from side to side. “Never happen,” he said.

“What do you mean?”

“He’ll never find any recordings by Little Red.”

“How can you be so sure?”

“Because I’m an expert on Little Red LeCoeur. Been hearin’ about him from the old players since I was a little tyke in the bayous, huntin’ alligators and trappin’ crawdads. Read everthin’ I could find about the man. Never saw nothin’ about recordings.”

“Just because there’s nothing written doesn’t mean—”

“Oh yes it does.” His voice was louder now, and we were starting to attract observers.

Stella tapped her husband on the shoulder. “Calm down, Stanley. The lady doesn’t know what you do. Just tell her quietly, and patiently.”

“Yes, Stanley, please tell me what you know.”

He took a deep breath, and blew it out.

“Sorry about that. I get a little hot when people challenge my knowledge. Don’t have any fancy degrees, but I know my jazz. And I know my Louisiana jazz the best.”

“And I don’t know much about either. I didn’t mean to offend you.”

“That’s okay. I’ve got a big mouth. Don’t mind me.”

“Please continue, Stanley. By the way, my name is Jessica Fletcher, and you’re correct. I’m not from New Orleans. I’m from Maine. My friend, the one interested in Little Red LeCoeur, is Wayne Copley, the music critic.”

“Well, at least he’s a hometown boy. But he ought to know better. I could set him straight.”

“Okay. I’ll suggest he come here and speak with you. But in the meantime, won’t you tell me why you’re so certain Little Red never recorded?”

“LeCoeur came from a long line of Rada Houngan, voodoo priests, that’s why.”

Stanley leaned over to a man looking through his pile of shorts. “What size do you need?” he asked. The customer told him and Stanley turned away from me, pulled out a pair of red shorts, and lay them on top of the table.

I peered over Stanley’s shoulder.

“I’m afraid I don’t see how that proves—”

He turned around abruptly.

“I don’t know if you know voodoo, Mrs. Bletcher.”

“It’s Fletcher.”

“Huh? Oh, right. Mrs. Fletcher.”

“You were saying?”

“Voodoo. I don’t know if you know it, but it’s a very spiritual religion. I guess all of ’em are. But with voodoo, there’s lots of variations. It’s like each person kind of makes up his own version. You know? Anyway, over the years, some things stay the same, but other things, they just die out. Like LeCoeur’s. His kind of voodoo just died out.”

“What was different then?”

Stanley’s customer had drifted down to the next vendor, and I knew he was anxious to be rid of me.

“Well, for him, music was one of the most important parts of voodoo rituals. Still is, actually. But for Little Red, music was an expression. You know? Of his spirit. It wasn’t supposed to be commercial. It was for ceremonies and communing with the loa—those are the voodoo gods. There wouldn’t have been recordin’s, photographs, drawin’s. Anythin’ that captured the soul and bound it to the earth was bad.”

I pointed to his shirt. “How would you know what he looked like if there weren’t any photographs or portraits of him?”

Stanley dropped his gaze to his shirt, pulled the hem down, and angled his head.

“An educated guess, maybe. Ever‘one says he had hair like cayenne pepper and a temper to match. Lots of the old timers knew ’im, so this is probably based on their descriptions.”

“And you say recording was against Little Red LeCoeur’s religion.”

“Absolutely!”

“But Wayne’s been hearing about these cylinders for years. Couldn’t someone have secretly recorded Little Red without his knowledge?”

“Wishful thinking. Equipment in those days was big and bulky. You had to play or speak right into the microphone. You couldn’t hide behind a rock and record somebody from a distance.”

“Then you’ve never heard the rumors about these recordings?”

“Oh, I’ve heard them, all right, but I know they’re nonsense. Just another wild-goose chase for the uneducated.”

“Well, I don’t think Wayne is exactly uneducated.”

“Didn’t mean to insult your friend. Copely knows his jazz, that’s for sure. I read his column all the time. But this time, he’s being taken in. Tell ’im not to pay good money for bad karma. He’ll never find recordings of Little Red LeCoeur. Not genuine ones anyhow.”

“I’ll certainly tell him what you said. And thank you for taking time from your work to explain all this to me.”

“You’re very welcome, Mrs. Fletcher. Jazz is my favorite topic. I hope you’ll get a chance to come out to the Fairgrounds Race Track while you’re here, and—you know?—listen to some world-class playing.”

“I intend to do that very thing tomorrow.”

“We’ll be there, too. Maybe we’ll see you again.”

“I’ll look for you.”

I saw that Stella was busy with a customer, and asked Stanley to say good-bye to her. Leaving their booth, I scanned the work of the artists and craftspeople that lined the park, but my heart wasn’t in it. My mind was full of what Stanley had told me.

Was Wayne simply the victim of false rumors, leading him on a vain chase for a prize that didn’t exist? I hoped not. He was so sure those recordings could be found. Maybe Stanley didn’t know as much as he thought he knew, I comforted myself. But he was acquainted with Little Red’s religious beliefs, and if Little Red had been a devout man, as he was assumed to be, then Stanley could be right, and the wonderful music of the famed trumpeter might never be heard by his successors. Even though I was not knowledgeable about jazz, I felt the loss for this generation not to have access to the genius of a talented musician of another era.

Mulling over the possibility of Wayne’s disappointment, I walked between the iron filigree stanchions that served as streetlights, and through the open gates into Jackson Square. The peaceful setting inside the park was an odd contrast to the frivolity outside its iron boundary, and I welcomed the opportunity to walk quietly without being jostled by my fellow visitors to the city.

I reached the far side of the park and crossed Chartres Street, entering the flagstone passageway called Pirates Alley, which borders St. Louis Cathedral and the Cathedral Garden. Distracted by my thoughts, I almost missed the vibrant multicolored palette—yellow, red, green—of the brick and wooden buildings with fanlights, iron lacework galleries, and other decorative structural details so unlike the spare New England architecture my eyes were accustomed to seeing. The cheerful aspect of the buildings, and the smiling faces of the young people who passed me on their way to the Square, raised my spirits, and I arrived at Royal Street intent on not permitting Wayne’s worries to become mine.

Royal Street was an avenue of beautiful buildings, fashionable boutiques, fine restaurants, and elegant antiques shops. One store in particular appealed to me because among the gold pocket watches, silver candelabra, framed etchings, and snuff boxes arrayed in the window was a highly polished mahogany gramophone. A bell tinkled overhead when I pushed open the door to Simon West’s Antiques.

In the center of the shop, a gleaming brass-and-crystal chandelier hung over a walnut table, its surface covered with small decorative pieces. Recessed lighting in the ceiling, obviously on a dimmer, was kept low to allow customers to observe the effect of the antique fixture.

I pulled off my new straw hat and fluffed my hair. My eyes swept the shadowy perimeter of the room, taking in the beautiful seventeenth- and eighteenth-century chests and sideboards, each with its complement of gold-edged china and cut crystal goblets, or silver epergne and other lovely mementos of another age.

A breeze wafted through an open door at the back of the shop, carrying the delicious scent of barbecue smoke. My stomach rumbled. Since it was less than four hours since Wayne and I had left Antoine’s, I was surprised to find myself feeling hungry. I followed my nose to the source of the tempting smell and reached the door. Outside was a courtyard of red brick paving on which sat an elaborate wrought iron chair, its peeling white paint revealing the original black of the metal. Nestled next to the chair were large pottery planters filled with red geraniums and trailing ivy.

“Do you need any help?”

“Oh, I didn’t see you,” I said, startled at the voice.

“It takes a while till your eyes adjust to the light.”

“Are you Simon West?”

“I am.”

Marking his place in a book and rising from his chair at a highboy secretary tucked in a corner was a thin, dour-faced man who I judged to be in his forties, despite hair that was completely white, although thick eyebrows revealed he’d had dark hair in his youth. He wore a powder-blue shirt, the same hue as his remarkably blue eyes. He pulled a navy jacket from the back of a chair and shrugged into it, frowned, and slipped the book he’d been reading into a side pocket.

“There’s a lot more upstairs if you care to look,” he said, standing at the desk and pointing to a narrow flight of stairs adjacent to the back door. He didn’t move from his place, perhaps hoping that I would disappear above and leave him in peace to continue reading.

“Or did you have something specific in mind?” he asked.

“I saw your gramophone and thought I’d see if you had any old cylinder recordings.”

Obviously agitated, he pulled at the cuffs of his shirt, and came to where I stood.

“You’re the third customer to ask me that question today,” he said. “What in heaven’s name is going on?”

I told the irritated store owner about Wayne’s announcement that morning and his campaign to bring to light recordings of Little Red LeCoeur.

He huffed softly and tugged on one ear. “I should thank Copely,” he conceded. “I sold a fireplace fan and a set of andirons this afternoon to a couple who came in looking for cylinders. By the way, that gramophone plays records. A cylinder player is a different machine altogether.”

“I know, but since you had one thing related to old recordings, I thought it was worth asking you about another.”

“I did have some old cylinders at one point, but it’s been quite a while since I’ve seen any in the marketplace. Collectors pick those up pretty quickly.”

“Do you know if any of them featured LeCoeur?”

“Not that I recall. They were mostly classical compositions or opera singers. Copely should check with local collectors and see if they can help.”

“I’m sure he’s already done that. He’s been searching for these recordings for a long time now.”

West squinted at me, and cocked his head to one side.

“Have you been in my shop before?” he asked. “You look familiar.”

I introduced myself and we shook hands. I told him that I’d been on the panel with Wayne that morning. “You may have seen my picture in the paper,” I offered.

“That must be it,” he said, brightening. “I like a mystery now and then myself. Right now I’m reading P. D. James. You know this one?” He pulled the paperback from his pocket,
Cover Her Face.

“I know both the book and the author. Phyllis is a good friend and a wonderful writer. Practically by herself, she’s changed attitudes toward mystery writing, or ‘crime writing’ as they say in England, and inspired a new level of appreciation.”

He smiled for the first time. “Please tell her when you speak with her how much I’m enjoying this book.”

“I’ll be sure to let her know. She’ll be delighted you’re reading this particular one. It was her first novel.”

West pulled up his cuff and glanced at his watch. “Look, it’s just about closing time,” he said. “Can you stay awhile? I’d love to talk more about mystery writing. I can offer you some iced tea and cookies. Or a glass of brandy if you prefer. The patio is pleasant this time of day.”