Raiders of the Lost Corset (39 page)

He hung up, and Lacey looked at the expectant Donovan.

“This is actually kind of hard to explain,” she began, and realized she hadn’t really expected to get permission to open the tomb.

Her explanation to Vic had only gotten as far as the incident with the urn and the envelope from Drosmis Berzins and its contents.

“Let me guess,” he said, “
The Eye Street Observer
pulled some strings, perhaps made a sizable contribution to the upkeep of the historical St. Louis Cemetery Number One, and all so that Lacey Smithsonian, ace fashion reporter, can look inside a tomb.”

“Wow, it’s so much easier when I don’t have to explain anything.” Lacey laughed. “You must be psychic or something.”

He took a last swallow of chicory coffee. “Or something. Probably crazy.”

“You’ll watch my back, won’t you, Vic?”

“Your back, your front, and everything in between.”

The clouds gave way to a brief rain, darkening and cooling the interior of the café. The street musician collected his earnings and headed for shelter. Lacey thought she had a chance that this day would go all right, if only she could keep Nigel Griffin away from her. She dialed a number on her cell phone and let it ring. It rang for quite awhile before someone picked up.

“What!” Stella yelled into the phone, her voice heavy with sleep.

“Hi, Stel. Gosh, did I wake you?”

“Duh! What are you, a farmer or something? What the hell time is it?”

“It’s just after ten o’clock in the morning.”

“Like I said.” Stella yawned and whispered something to someone sharing her pillow. “So go milk the cows, why don’t ya. Plant some corn.”

“I’m sorry to wake you, but look, Stella, Vic is in town, he just flew in, and we really wanted —” She looked at Vic, who winked in response. “We need some time alone. You know?”

“You woke me up for this? Gee-whiz, Lacey! You go, girl, knock yourselves out.”

“Thanks, Stel. You go back to sleep. We’ll meet this afternoon for a drink, okay?”

“Fine by me.”

“I’ll call you. Later,” Lacey said. “I’ll be turning off my phone while we, you know —”

“Whatever.” Stella clicked off.

Lacey smiled and tossed a crumb to the hungry birds attending their table. She leaned over the table and kissed Vic.

“The coast is clear, darling, I just fed the lovebirds a big fat fake crumb.”

Chapter 36

The rain had stopped, but the air was still moist and thick, and their breath came out in wisps of steam. Lacey and Vic met the man named Dante at the front gate of St. Louis Cemetery Number One.

Dante was a short, wiry-looking young man with muscular arms.

He didn’t talk much. Lacey showed her press pass for identifica-tion. He nodded. She produced the cemetery map she had pulled from the urn, along with the deed with the number of the crypt.

“Old map,” he said. “Ah’ll find it for ya. All ah need’s the number. Right this way, ma’am, sir.” He tilted his head toward the cemetery, and they followed him inside the white-walled City of the Dead. They passed a large white tomb with the name ROUSSEAU

carved in block letters. It gave Lacey a sudden chill, as if Magda were there overseeing the project. Magda’s last words,
Find the
corset
, kept echoing in her head. She sniffed the air for the old woman’s familiar perfume,
Forêt de Rose
, but she smelled only the damp soil and decaying leaves. They passed a tomb with a large opening through the red bricks and she peered in. Inside she saw a pile of vandalized statuary, including a plaster statue of a headless angel praying. The thought struck her that maybe it wasn’t such a good idea to hunt for good news in a graveyard.

Dante stopped in front of a clustered tomb of crumbling red brick with twelve crypts for coffins. It looked as if it had been abandoned years before. The whitewashed stucco had fallen from three sides, exposing the bricks to the New Orleans sun and rain.

The crypts were stacked four across and three high. Only a couple of them had nameplates still attached.

Their guide pointed to one in the middle and waited for Lacey to confirm the number. She read a fading inscription on the nameplate: BERZINS. HERE IT ENDS. She had a small moment of panic. Did she really want to find out what lay behind it? Was she disturbing the peace of the dead? But the dead were only echoes of the past, Lacey told herself, and she had come too far to stop now. Drosmis Berzins had practically dared her to follow him here.

Lacey looked at Vic. He smiled and put his arms around her.

“Go on, dragon-slayer,” he whispered in her ear.

“Yes, this is it,” she told Dante. Vic took her hand. It was cold and trembling, and he rubbed it to warm her up. They stepped back to make room for the man to work.

Dante unscrewed the nameplate from the front of the crypt and set it on the ground. The mortar between the bricks was loose and crumbling, and it took only a couple of blows with his hammer to break through. He enlarged the opening, then he stood back to let Lacey peer into the crypt. There was something in there. She nodded to Dante, who reached in and withdrew a dusty and battered metal lockbox, larger than the one she had seen in the coal room in France.

“No bones?” she asked. She wasn’t sure she was disappointed.

The man shrugged.

“Ah ain’t surprise by nothin’ this here graveyard. No, ma’am, bones or no bones.” Lacey reached out to take the box from Dante’s hands.

“Not so fast, Smithsonian.”

She turned at the sound of Nigel Griffin’s voice. He was hefting a long, rusty iron bar as if it were a club. It looked like a piece of the railing that surrounded some of the tombs. “Ha. I knew you were holding out on me! I offer a partnership, being the nice chap that I am, but
no,
you want it all for yourself. No sharing with good old Nigel. All for Little Miss Priss here. Well, I don’t bloody well think so!”

“Put that bar down,” Vic said quietly, “you look like an idiot.

Never pick up a weapon you don’t want rammed down your

throat.” Griffin swallowed and took a step back. He looked wild-eyed and out of control, swishing his rod at them like a broadsword. Vic seemed very calm, but Lacey could see he was alert and watchful, waiting for the right moment.

“I’ll hurt you, Nigel,” he said. “I mean it. But I’m not going to hurt you unless I have to. Now drop that thing.”

Dante took this advice to heart and dropped the box and his tools on the ground between Vic and Griffin, vaulted a low railing, and disappeared over the cemetery wall. Nigel laughed at his good fortune and reached down to pick up the box. Vic took one step, drop-kicked him in the jaw, and pulled the iron rod from his hands.

He rolled Griffin over, slammed him to the ground facedown between two tombs, pulled one arm up behind his back, and planted one knee in Griffin’s back. Griffin sprayed invective into the gravel.

“Blasted bugger! Damn you, Donovan, you bloody —”

“It’s not like I didn’t warn you, Nigel.” Vic shook his head, took a pair of handcuffs from his belt, and swiftly cuffed the cursing Brit. “When are you going to learn? You’re no good at this stuff.

You should stick to stealing from Mummy’s purse.”

Lacey looked at Vic. “Where did those handcuffs come from?”

“Just part of the tool kit,” he said. “They come in handy more often than you’d think.”

“Oh, my God, Lacey, did you have to kill him?” Stella wailed, running up the pathway in her faux-leopard high heels. She stopped short at the sight of Griffin on the ground complaining with his hands cuffed behind his back. “Oh. You didn’t kill him.

Never mind then. I know he’s a rat, but I kind of like him, and I swear to you, Lacey, I really tried to keep him busy.”

“Fine job you did too, Stella luv,” Griffin leered from the ground. Donovan lifted his knee from the Brit’s back and Stella helped him sit up. His mouth was bleeding a little. “I say, let’s do last night again soon, shall we, doll?”

“Will you just shut up, Nigel?” Vic said.

“Not bloody likely. Free country, you know. You’d have to kill me. Anyone got a smoke?”

Lacey picked up the box and blew the dust from the top. She tried the lid, but it was rusted shut. She was about to take a deep breath and pry it open with Dante’s screwdriver when a gunshot rang out. It echoed through the whitewashed tombs. The entire City of the Dead seemed to freeze for a long moment, then Vic grabbed Lacey and pulled her roughly down to the ground behind the tomb. Lacey in turn grabbed Stella, who reached for the handcuffed Griffin, but she missed him. Vic, Lacey, and Stella crouched behind the crumbling brick wall of the tomb, leaving Griffin lying on the path in front. “We gotta go back for Nigel,” Stella whispered, but Vic hushed her.

“Smithsonian!” A voice boomed out with a faint but familiar Russian accent. “Come out. We must talk. No use running. Difficult to talk while running.”

“It’s Kepelov,” Lacey whispered to Vic. He looked disgusted.

“Keep him talking,” Vic whispered to her, pulling out his cell phone. Stella’s eyes were as wide as saucers.

“Kepelov, is that you?” she shouted. “I thought you were supposed to be dead?”

Kepelov laughed. “Not everyone you meet in a cemetery is dead, Smithsonian. Come out.”

“Somebody shot you. In Paris. Griffin said you were dead,”

Lacey yelled. Vic nodded encouragement and put his finger to his lips to silence Stella.

“Griffin. Such a liar. It takes more than bullets to kill Gregor Kepelov. Come out, come out, Smithsonian!” His voice was getting closer. “You have something I want. The box. I have something you want. Your freedom.”

“Who shot you?” Lacey demanded. “Your girlfriend? The woman with the perfume?”

“Ha! Who cares? The bitch is not important.” His voice came from right on the other side of the tomb now. “Ah, my friend, the liar Nigel Griffin.” Lacey heard a sound like a boot kicking a body, followed by a grunt. “Poor Nigel. Handcuffed again. Tell me again what it is you are good for?”

“Gregor, old man, lend us your handcuff key?” Griffin whined.

“Come on, get me out of this, mate, we’ll work it together, I’ll sell the stuff for you, the two of us can —”

“No, no, sit, Nigel, I like you just the way you are. Hey! Smithsonian!” he shouted. “I have a burning curiosity to know what is in that box you are holding.”

“It’s not a Fabergé egg!” Lacey hugged the box tightly and grabbed Stella’s hand. “Stay right here! Don’t move!” Vic whispered to Lacey and slipped away around the corner of the tomb.

“We shall see. Give it to me,” Kepelov demanded. “Then we will all find out together.”

“Why did Griffin say you’re dead? You two are still partners?”

Lacey asked.
Where did Vic go? What the hell is he up to?

“So many questions! I have a question. Who will shoot poor Nigel Griffin if you do not come out and give me the box? One guess. Say bye-bye to the nice lady, Nigel.”

“My God, Lacey,” Stella squealed, “he’s gonna shoot poor Nigel!”

“Kepelov! Good God, man, we’re partners! Partners don’t just go around —”

“No one cares for you, poor Nigel,” Kepelov said. “And one less bite out of the Fabergé egg, eh? What do you say, Smithsonian, do I shoot poor Nigel? Up to you!”

“Go ahead and shoot him, Kepelov!” Lacey shouted. “I can’t stand him either!”
Please God,
Lacey prayed silently,
let this be a
bluff, not a death warrant.
Stella’s jaw dropped.

“Lacey! What’re you doing?! Oh, my God —” Stella pulled loose from Lacey’s hands. She scrambled out from behind the tomb and snarled at Kepelov like a bull terrier.

“You big bald Commie bully! Who said you could go around shooting people? An unarmed man? Look at him! He’s handcuffed for pity’s sake! Who the hell do you think you are?!”

Kepelov was laughing. “Smithsonian! You are doing this all backwards! You are sending me
more
hostages! You want me to shoot both of them? For one little box?”

Lacey looked at the box in her hands and considered it for a moment.
It’s not worth it, whatever it is. Sorry, Magda.
“Nobody’s shooting anybody, Kepelov, I’m coming out.” She stood up and walked around the edge of the tomb, the box hugged tight to her chest. “Put down the gun.”

“Ah! There she is, the girl reporter, the little solver of mysteries.” Kepelov smiled and leveled his gun at her, a black pistol that almost seemed lost in his big fist. Stella was crouching over Griffin, fuming. Vic was nowhere to be seen. “Much better. I do not want to kill you, Lacey Smithsonian,” he said. “You have spirit. You amuse me. And now the box, please.”

“I amuse you?”

Kepelov gestured expansively. “You amuse me. You try so hard. You and your little game. All over now. I win. Give me the box!”

You amuse me.
Somehow that offended Lacey even more than the attack in the coal room, or being robbed at gunpoint. Kepelov took a step toward her. Lacey held the box in both hands and took a deep breath. Kepelov reached for it, keeping the gun pointed at her.

Lacey hurled the metal box as hard as she could right in Kepelov’s face. He had no time to react. The box struck him hard across the forehead with a crack. He stumbled back and waved his gun hand wildly for balance, wiping at a stream of blood from his face with the other hand. Vic stepped out from behind a tomb and swung Griffin’s iron rod down on Kepelov’s gun arm like an ax.

The gun went flying over the tomb, Kepelov grunted, and Vic put one fist in the big Russian’s belly, then another. He folded in the middle and went down. Vic landed on him and levered one arm up behind his back until the Russian bellowed in pain.

“Damn it, I’m out of handcuffs!” Vic growled. “So if you even twitch, I’m gonna rip your arm off and beat you with it. You got that, Kepelov?” Kepelov groaned and tried to nod, his mustache jammed hard against the dirt. Lacey snatched up the box, her heart beating wildly.

“Oh, well played, partner,” Griffin said to the downed Russian.

“Insult the lady and get your head handed to you. Very smooth.

You’re the old master at this spy stuff, aren’t you?” He leaned his head back against the crumbling tomb. Stella dabbed at his cut lip with her handkerchief, making “poor baby” noises.