Sweetsmoke (24 page)

    It
seems that I would.

    "In
the midst of a furious war, where dead white men are common and the death of a
free black woman carries less weight than that of a horsefly, for when the
horsefly meets its end it ceases to be an irritant, you imagine that you will
find her killer?"

    Cassius
placed his hands on either side of the edges of Emoline's table.

    No
one cares who did this to her, said Cassius softly. She nursed me back to
health, taught me to be a man when the world treats me like a boy. The one who
did it took a life worth something. If he sat where you sit now, I'd take his
life in return this very moment.

    Cassius
realized that for all the quiet in his voice, he gripped the table rigidly and
the legs agitated against the floorboards. He let go and his vision cleared and
he was looking in Logue's extraordinary blue eyes. Logue was leaning back, an
expression of alarm on his face.

    Logue
said nothing for a moment, then his expression lightened.

    "I'd
say it's a god damned good thing I ain't the one who killed her. Lord, I'd love
to be a fly on your shoulder when you chase down this man. I do believe you
would be an investigator of the most peculiar variety!"

    Logue
laughed, but when Cassius did not, Logue cut it short.

    "Do
you have any plausible suspects?"

    Beyond
her spy connections, she also had clients.

    He
drew the three pages from his pouch, leaving the W York scrap in place.

    "Look
at you, Cassius, you're like that fellow Dupin in those Edgar Allan Poe
stories, no wait, he was based on a real person, Frenchman, that detective of
police, what was his name? Eugene something. Eugene Vidocq, that's it. But
Monsieur Vidocq had an advantage over you, he began life as a criminal. Show me
this list."

    She
read their fortunes, said Cassius, sharing the list.

    Logue
shook his head. "You waste your time here, she provided the gullible with
a service, when did a conjuring woman envision futures fraught with
misery?
No, these were paying customers, she'd want their return business, her visions
would have been hopeful and mysterious. You hold here a list of the only people
who might actually mourn her loss."

    You
make sense, said Cassius, but he knew he would venture to see them, to know for
certain.

    "Any
other suspects? How about the patrollers?"

    Patrollers
are fond of ropes and trees.

    "I
suppose you're right, cracking skulls is not their style. Who else?"

    Telegraph
man. He will have more information. Or he gave her up to the Confederates, said
Cassius.

    "And
you insist on finding him?"

    Cassius
said nothing.

    Logue
thought for a moment. "All right, allow me to offer you some small
direction. Say you know something I don't, and you got some idea where this
telegraph fellow does his business." Logue glanced at the secret hiding
place, as if he knew there had been more information therein. "I don't
know how a negro could do it, but let's suppose you get to him. He'll be a
Union intelligence man hiding out near railroad tracks, as the telegraph lines
run alongside. The first question you ask is: Was Emoline revealed as a spy? If
so, then her killer was Confederate."

    If
she was revealed, then the Union telegraph man might be revealed, which would
put him in a Confederate prison, said Cassius.

    "Then
you'll never find him. But they might have left him in place so that Emoline
and the rest of the intelligence team could be rounded up without being
forewarned. Cassius, this is a massive undertaking."

    Maybe
the answer comes more quickly than we expect, said Cassius. "Eh?"

    If someone
out in the rain awaits you, then you were also betrayed.

    "Hah.
Yes. Time to find out," said Logue soberly. He stood and put his hat on
his head. Cassius saw him shiver as the cold wet band met his forehead.
"You are very much like her."

    Like
Emoline? said Cassius.

    "Not
so irritating, but she too was strong and determined."

    Yes,
said Cassius.

    "Perhaps,
one day, yond Cassius, the peculiar investigator, will do what she did and
search for his name."

    Cassius
took that as a compliment, Logue suggesting Cassius might one day be free to
choose his own name. He understood now that Gabriel Logue had known Emoline a
long time, longer than he had suspected. It answered a question he had not
known to ask. How had they known to trust each other with intelligence
material?

    Lucky
you already got yours, said Cassius.

    "My
what, my name?"

    The
Angel Gabriel, said Cassius.

    Logue
bowed from the neck in acknowledgment, collected water rolled off his hat brim
onto the toes of his boots, and he swept his heavy, saturated coat around to
cover his shoulders, this time sending a fine circular spray across the
floorboards.

    Cassius
suddenly found himself saying: Gonna find the mongrel son of a sour bitch.
Don't care what it takes, I will run him down.

    Logue
looked at him with wonder and, Cassius thought, awe.

    "Perhaps
we will meet again," said Logue, and he stepped into the rain and was
gone.

    Cassius
waited, hearing intense rain against the window, listening for a shout, a gunshot,
horse hooves. When he heard none of that, Cassius thought The Angel had safely
flown away.

    Cassius
needed to sit, and found Emoline's favorite chair. He had not known that his
commitment went so deep. He sat a long time and embraced the emotion with fear
and satisfaction.

    He
did not know how long he sat, but he roused himself, took his lantern, and
returned to the muddy road to slog his way back to Sweetsmoke. He estimated
that it was after midnight. The journey home would be slow going.

    As he
walked, his mind brought forth suspects and he tested them for motive and
opportunity. He did not care for Richard Justice, but that did not make the man
a killer. If Richard had known where to find the money, Cassius might have seen
it differently, but that would mean he was counting on finding the money after
her death. Her money was well hidden, and Richard would have known how
difficult, unlikely even, it would be to find. From Richard's perspective,
Emoline might have hidden it in the deep woods. No, for reasons of his greed
alone, Cassius did not think Richard Justice had done it. Maryanne had been in
town the night of her murder. Cassius dismissed her as a suspect. Logue had
rejected the idea that one of her white clients was guilty, and his reasons had
been sound. Cassius's thoughts fell to Gabriel Logue. If The Angel saw an old
woman as a danger to his freedom, he would not hesitate to kill her. But
Cassius had seen the man's face when he had been informed of Emoline's death.
As clever as Logue was, that instant of shock was near impossible to conceal.
He put Logue to the side, thinking him unlikely. Hoke Howard had been on
Emoline's list. Try as he might, Cassius simply could not conjure a motive for
his master to have killed her. If her death was connected to her spying, then
his best chance for information was the telegraph operator, but to find him, he
would need to understand Emoline's map. He began to formulate a plan and
realized he would need Hoke's help, albeit indirectly.

    The
steady rhythm of rain gradually drummed his thoughts away. He was exhausted and
as the intensity of the day released, he felt his energy drain. He was cold, he
was wet, and he'd had little sleep. His pace had grown slow in the persistent
rain, and he estimated he had yet to reach the halfway point home. Reality set
in. How could he possibly find her killer? He tried to push that thought aside,
renewing his effort, forcing his legs to move faster, but after some two dozen
steps his concentration waned and he drifted back to his original trudge. The
weight of his sodden shirt and trousers dragged on him. He lifted his feet and
his shoes fought back, thick with water as mud sucked them back into the road.
His hat brim scraped the back of his neck and drooped so low in front that it
blocked part of his vision. He felt as if he was being swallowed whole by
despair. He did not know what it would be like to be free. He yearned for that
knowledge, and knew it would never come to pass. He was acquainted with free
blacks, Emoline and Richard Justice among them, and they could go where they
chose, work when they chose, they
knew
they were free. But they still
lived in the South, they were compelled to carry their free papers, and if any
random white man was to take those papers or destroy them, they could be sold
again into this ferocious life.

    Freedom.
He had grown to despise the word, tantalizing him with flimsy hope, shimmering
in the mocking distance. It meant everything to him and brought him
irresistible anguish. He would have preferred to know nothing about the state
of freedom, to live in ignorance and hopelessness rather than be tempted by
something so odiously out of reach. And then a terrible thought crawled through
his body: Suppose freedom did come, what then? He considered himself, Cassius
Howard, as a man, and in a blaze of clarity realized that he did not believe
that he deserved to be free. What had he done in his life that freedom should
be awarded to him? He did not envision himself as a kind man or even a decent
man, quite the opposite when he listened to the bitter rage that crusaded
through his mind. He helped no one and allowed no one to help him, as he would
be obligated to no one. But he feared the true reason: He was pridefully
incapable of gratitude. Cassius bemoaned his weakness, and the thought of
hunting down Emoline's killer now struck him as pathetic. He cast his eyes down
and followed the tiny shaft of light from his lantern as it revealed the muck
ahead, puddle surfaces frothing with thick-falling raindrops.

    He
didn't hear them in the relentless drumming of rain. They came up behind him
and he was suddenly surrounded by horses, their hooves splashing water up
against his calves and thighs, their lanterns angled into his face.

    "He
the one?"

    "I
dunno, turn your lantern more."

    "It's
turned, damnit!"

    Three
of them. Cassius barely had the energy to look up, but he knew them,
patrollers, Otis Bornock, Isaac Lang, and Hans Mueller. Big, ugly, stupid men
who had him, they had him and there was no escape. A small voice cut through
his resignation: What the hell were these men doing out in this ungodly
weather?

    "Don't
much matter if he is or not, we got him. What you doin out here this time of
night, boy?"

    Got a
pass, said Cassius.

    "Oh,
you got a pass, well let's see it, boy, we don't got time to waste on
you," said Otis Bornock.

    "He
say he got a pass," said Hans Mueller in his German- accented English.
"Give him the minute."

    Cassius
wearily moved his right hand to his pouch and realized that the three folded
sheets were there with Emoline's map and nothing else. He reached for the band
of his trousers but found nothing. Now he was awake, realizing he had not
remembered to bring the forged pass.

    "Give
him the pass," said Hans Mueller.

    Seems
I lost it, said Cassius.

    "I
told you this boy was askin for it. Been askin for it a long time. You gonna
get yours now, you black bastard."

    "Aw,
hell, we don't got time for this," said Isaac Lang.

    
"Das
ist richt"
said Hans Mueller. "We need find the other one."

    "We
always got time to teach our nigras a lesson," said Bornock.

    Why
you out tonight? said Cassius.

    "Runaway,"
said Lang.

    "Shut
up, Lang, don't answer him, what're you answerin him for?" said Bornock.

    "Friend
a' yours," said Lang.

    Who?
Who's running? said Cassius.

    "Y'see,
that's what I hate," said Bornock. "This darky always had a sass
mouth, never knew his place. This is it, we teach him a lesson right now."

    "Joseph,"
said Mueller. "Joseph run off tonight. Call us outta beds in the
rain."