The Tangled Bridge (49 page)

Madeleine said, “Alright. But you're going to have to answer some questions.”

“Anything you care to know.”

“Wait,” Jane said, and the irritation had vanished from her face.

She was staring down the boardwalk toward the silhouettes. The voices had gone exuberant.

“Get inside!” Gaston said.

Madeleine heard someone singing,
“Once I built a railroad, now it's done…”

Another voice joined in:
“Buddy, can you spare a dime?”

Jane's expression had gone to pure shock. Her lips opened. She looked at Gaston, then back at the silhouettes.

Gaston reached for her elbow but she tore away from him and broke into a run toward the group.

“Patrice!” Gaston called.

Madeleine started after Jane but Gaston took her by the arms. “Not this time, Madeleine!”

A splash. A woman screaming. Jane was calling out, too, but because her back was toward Madeleine the words were unclear.

And then, in the moonlight, Madeleine could see that one of the men had grabbed another from behind, pulling his arms backward and exposing his midsection while a third man jabbed a blade into his gut.

Madeleine gasped. There were shouts from the group. The one who was stabbed fell into the water. Jane threw herself at one of the attackers but he shrugged her off like she was a doll.

Madeleine tried to make for Jane again but Gaston was lifting Madeleine and dragging her to the shanty. He shoved her in and slammed the door.

Madeleine stared sightlessly at it. Black as pitch in here now that the roof was repaired. Beyond the walls, women were screaming, Jane among them. Madeleine was heaving, stunned.

She tried the handle. It wouldn't move.

She pounded against the wood. “Gaston! Please just get Jane!”

“Stay out of it!

She pounded again. The brutal image of that man getting stabbed screamed through her mind. And yet Gaston's throwing her into the shack like this, it seemed like it wasn't just for her safety. Something else was going on.

She turned around in a blind circle, said aloud, “Alright,” and then felt her way to the pallet.

Zenon knew how to project his ghost to wreak havoc. Madeleine had done it with Severin, too, several times now. Seemed like Madeleine ought to be able to project her ghost fifty damn feet and see what the hell was going on out there.

 

sixty-two

HUEY P. LONG BRIDGE, 1933

INASMUCH AS IT HAD
been startling to see the partially constructed bridge looming over the Mississippi River, the work camp in its shadow was the biggest shock. Patrice did recognize it from before—an open space beyond the ferry dock, bordered on one side by a levee berm with woods surrounding the rest. But this time there was no smell of beans or johnnycakes at the campfires. Folks were huddled in groups of one to six around modest possessions, and the outer perimeter gave off an unpleasant odor. Before, there had been only a handful of workers. Now, they were so numerous that they filled the entire clearing. They looked scant of muscle and fat, and their clothes were overworn. Many looked too feeble to work. There were women and children this time, too. Not as many as the men. No one smiled.

“All these men work on the bridge?” Patrice asked.

Ferrar shook his head. “They want to. They all come here looking to get on the work crew.”

“But why so many?”

“Things have changed since you've been sleeping.”

He paused, his expression grim. “It's hard times. Real hard.”

She looked across at the faces, afraid to make eye contact because it felt like she was peeping into their homes somehow, into their private troubles and desperation, just by looking at them. But somewhere among them she might find Mother. And so she looked, searched the faces, scanned deeper into hearts and intentions. No sign of her mother.

The sun was sinking low in the sky. Not sunset yet, but close.

Ferrar said, “Now with the strike, some of these folks is hoping to get on as scabs. Workers don't like it. There's been fighting.”

Patrice could guess which were the striking workers by the simple fact that they were muscular and looked like they'd had steady meals, about half the men in the perimeter.

She swept a quick look over the crowd, and her gaze fell on a familiar face: Hutch.

He was bigger than most anyone there, and then Patrice realized Simms was with him, too. She'd looked right past him. Were it not for Hutch, she would have missed him altogether. They were both sitting on a blackened log about forty feet away.

“I know those two,” she said.

“Simms and Hutch,” Ferrar said.

“You know them?”

“Yeah, from way back when I used to run hooch for your mother.”

Patrice gave him a sharp look. “When we first came to New Orleans looking for you, Simms said he didn't know you.”

“I didn't know Hutch until recently, but I've known Simms for about ten years. I think they both workin for your mother now.”

She didn't like it. Too much of a coincidence that they were here. But her mother was nowhere to be seen, and maybe she'd sent these two as liaisons.

The white sunlight was just beginning to turn golden. Finally, Simms looked her way and his posture immediately changed. He clearly recognized her despite the fact they'd only met the one time six years ago. She could tell by his expression that he'd been expecting her.

“I imagine we'd better talk to them,” Ferrar said.

Simms and Hutch rose as Patrice and Ferrar walked toward them. She noted how different the two looked in comparison to the others in the camp. They wore the same types of clothes—caps, white cotton shirts, trousers with suspenders—but Simms' and Hutch's clothes were new and freshly laundered. Their hands were clean as a banker's. They lacked the muscle definition of the workers or the hollow cheeks of the hobos.

Simms called out to Patrice as she and Ferrar stepped within earshot. “My, my, my. You have grown up to be quite a doll. Quite a doll.”

“What do y'all want,” Ferrar said.

Simms ignored him and said to Patrice, “I see you finally found the boy with the blood-shined eye. Where your brothers and sister at?”

Patrice replied slowly and quietly, “Don't play with me.”

He went quiet and looked away, obviously trying to affect an air of nonchalance, but Patrice could tell she made him nervous. Hutch wouldn't even look at her.

Patrice said, “I need to speak with my mother.”

“Alright young lady, your mother sent us to talk to you instead. This ain't no place for a woman like her. Ain't really even a place for men like us, we gotta try to blend in.”

“Where are Gilbert and Marie-Rose?”

“You'll get to see them. That's not a problem. Your brother Guy, is he here with you?”

Patrice took a heavy breath to ward off her fury, and she felt Ferrar touch her elbow. Simms knew good and well what happened to Trigger. She saw the intent inside him, saw the knowledge, even the nerves.

But her anger seemed to encourage Simms because he said, “Look, honey, you make it out of this alive, you oughtta come work for me. You could make a lot of dough.”

Ferrar leaned forward. “You better just tell us what you doin here.”

“Or what? You gettin sore at me? She gonna throw everyone in the water again, drown us all?”

Hutch finally spoke, “Come on boss, take it easy.”

Simms and Hutch were scared out of their sense. Patrice might have probed deeper into their intentions but all she wanted to do was sweep them aside and get to her mother.

Simms said, “Look, I could have helped y'all out all those years ago. Y'all didn't show me no respect. So I decided to help your mother instead. She and me, we always make money together.”

Patrice said, “I will discuss this with my mother only.”

Simms cut his eyes toward the woods and then looked at Patrice again. “You figure you can have your way, don't you? I figure you're right. I seen how y'all do. I seen lotta voodoo in my day, but, damn! You people take the absolute cake! You do! You ain't tryin to take money to tell no fortune, you the real McCoy!”

Simms chuckled, and Hutch started laughing, too, though he kept his eyes nervous.

“Get to the point,” Ferrar said.

Simms stopped laughing and eyed him, then looked at Patrice. “The point is, I heard about what happened yesterday in Bayou Bouillon. I want you to think very carefully before you go throwing people in the water here. Your mother got people right here in this camp—you won't even know who they are til it's too late. You might be able to face off against some of them but probably not all. You turn them against one another, well that'll just look like a good old fashioned rumble out here. People here so sour they take any excuse to lay into one another.”

Ferrar rubbed his thumb against her skin. “It's true. One hint of a fight around here and all the strikers and the scabs'll go at it.”

Simms looked at him and nodded. “That's right, Blood-shine.” He regarded Patrice again. “Now maybe you care about that or maybe you don't, workers and scabs tearing each other apart. Me, I personally don't see any reason to cause trouble here.”

Hutch had his hands in his pockets and was staring at his shoes.

Simms continued but his manner of speech slowed, became more careful. “You might like to know that your mother, Miss Chloe, wanted me to go after y'all out at Bayou Bouillon. I told her that wasn't a good idea. That old man with the eye patch knows how to hold down the fort. She told me to kill him, and she wanted me to kill one a y'all and bring the other one back. Said it's the only way you'd listen, know she's serious. But see, that ain't me. I'm a businessman. I didn't do any of that.”

“Someone did.”

“Well, Miss Chloe, see, she gets things done one way or another. Found some deadbeat owed her money who knew the signal in Bayou Bouillon. He brought in a boatload of her people to go after y'all.”

Patrice's throat was clamped shut. She wanted Simms to hush it, to stop talking about what happened, because her mind kept bringing back that look in Trigger's eyes. That awful look. But she herself was unable to speak and so she said nothing.

“Why are you telling us this?” Ferrar said.

Simms opened his hands wide. “Because. I want you to know, I'm on your side. You can tell if I'm lyin, can't you, honey? Am I lyin?”

Patrice could not reply. She just kept swallowing. Ferrar was holding onto her and she was gripping him back. But it was true. Simms was telling her the truth and she didn't need to seek inside him to know it—if he'd been one of the thugs who'd come after them in Bayou Bouillon he'd be dead by now. She could go deeper, learn more, but that would put her at risk of entering the briar and stirring the river devils. And they would certainly attack Ferrar.

“So now you understand. I ain't here to hurt you. I just come to pass along the message from your mama.”

“Which is?”

Simms adjusted his posture so that his feet were spread and his hand was gesturing out in front of him, four fingers splayed. “Four LeBlanc children. One is old enough to know. One is dead. Two are in hiding. Your mother says you take a little walk with Hutch and me at sunset, she let the other two go. She say if you don't, they die. Those're her words.”

“So you're here to take me to her,” Patrice said.

“Well yes and no. I'm here on good will, little lady, so I'm gonna do you one better. I just gave you the message your mama wants you to hear. Now I'm gonna pass along the message she
don't
want you to hear.”

Ferrar said, “Spit it out!”

Simms didn't reply. He looked at Ferrar, then looked at Hutch. And then he nodded at Hutch.

“No, please, Boss.” Hutch's face had crumpled to fear.

“What is this?” Patrice said.

Simms glanced at her and then took Hutch by the shoulder, gently pushing him down to the black log where earlier they'd been sitting. The evening sun was just turning peach behind the bend. Not full sunset yet.

Hutch pursed his lips together like he was about to give someone a kiss and then started to cry. Openly—tears streaming, sobbing low in the throat.

Patrice frowned.

“I don't want to,” Hutch mewed.

“What's he doing?” Ferrar asked.

Hutch started coughing, soft little puffs, then he was hacking and finally, gagging. His massive body heaved like he was going to vomit on the grass down between his knees. But he didn't. Instead he went to salivating, clear ribbons of spit dangling toward the dirt, his lips and tongue working as though there were an invisible hard-boiled egg in his mouth that he wished to eject.

Patrice took a step closer. If she dared, she would have helped him do this, but she knew she couldn't. Could only wait and listen.

Hutch's tongue was clucking. It sounded like it started at the back of the throat as a g-g-g and clucked its way across the roof of his mouth to his teeth, where it stayed, hitching, then reversed the passage of air so that it made a T sound, over and over again.

Patrice caught her breath, listened.

Hutch moaned out a syllable that did not form beyond the throat.

He gagged, spat a cascade of something that looked like frothed corn oil, and then tried again, leading up to it with the same hitching clucks:

“T-t-t-t-t-Treese.”

 

sixty-three

BAYOU BOUILLON, NOW

BRIAR LIGHT FILLED THE
room. Madeleine could see rusted chips of tin from where they'd mended the roofing. Sprouts bloomed from the pile of debris, black thorns, curling around and up, stretching beyond the ceiling. Towering black trees hovered above the gap where the roof ought to be.