Crescent City Connection (23 page)

Yet he had to get to the gallery, he had to paint, he had to do the things he had to do. There were rules, and they were rules he’d made himself. He had to follow them, or the other thing would take over his brain.

It seemed as if a dark, fierce magnet, maybe even a spirit, were trying to hold him to his bed, stick him there like a wad of chewing gum, bitten and discarded.

It took all his strength to get out of bed, throw on a white robe, and slip quietly into the street.

The morning was overcast—sunlight would have been an insult on a day like today.

He was passing St. Anthony’s Garden on his scooter when someone hailed him. “Hey! Whitey!”

Only one person called him Whitey—the other artist who wore white; the one who was black. They knew each other because of their clothing. They always nodded.

The Monk raised a hand and lowered it quickly, a salutation of sorts, but one that said, “Not now, if you don’t mind.”

“Whitey! Come here! I got somethin’ to tell you.”

The Monk kept going, but the traffic was heavy, and he couldn’t get away fast enough.

The other artist was chasing him. “Goddammit. Goddammit. Shit, man! I’m too old for this shit—I’m gon’ have a heart attack.”

Reluctantly, The Monk pulled his scooter over. “Listen to me, man. I got somethin’ to tell you. A woman’s lookin’ for you.”

The Monk closed his face and, as well as he could, his brain and his ears. One woman was more than enough.

“She says she’s a cop.”

He shrugged his shoulders and pointed to his chest. “Me?”

“They want a white dude dressed in white. Think you an artist. Hey. You an artist, brother?”

The Monk stopped and nodded slightly, raising a hand again, like a priest, to acknowledge the warning. It was as close as he got to saying thanks.

“Shit, Whitey, you trouble. I don’ know why the fuck I bother.” He headed back to his spot.

The cop wanted Lovelace. The Monk knew hardly anyone, talked to no one at all, and had broken no laws. Therefore the cop wanted Lovelace.

Fear clawed at The Monk’s stomach, squeezed at his chest. He ducked around the corner, where no one could see him, and dropped to the curb, taking in air, finding his center.

When he had stopped hyperventilating and could breathe once again from the diaphragm, some oxygen finally got to his brain, along with a good shot of adrenaline. His mind raced.

This was about his father. Daniel had kidnapped Lovelace for his father—why, The Monk had no idea—but somehow the cops had found out. They thought, perhaps, that Lovelace would lead them to Errol.

More likely they’d lead him to her.

It would mean breaking the rules, but he couldn’t go to the gallery now. He had to go home.

Lovelace was gone when he got there.

LOVELACE WAS HUMILIATED at the way she’d acted. She should never have asked Larry over, should have been more respectful of Isaac’s space. And she should never, ever have tried to hug her uncle; she knew how he’d take it, she could sense it. He’d probably had to stay up half the night taking showers.

She was also depressed. She wasn’t going to get the job, that was obvious. The Royces were going to call Remoulade and ask for Larry, and he was going to say he’d never heard of her—if, in fact, he worked there at all. It occurred to her that he might not, since he’d tried to collect on his fabulously generous gift before she even had a chance to claim it.

She lay in bed, on the futon The Monk had bought for her, cheeks flaming because she’d been so stupid, tears flowing because she had no prospects, unable to budge. She heard her uncle open the door and slip out, which was unlike him. Usually she could hear him making breakfast. Clearly he didn’t want to risk her waking up, didn’t want to see her or speak to her; probably just wanted her out of there.

She would have stayed in bed all morning, except that she had to pee so bad. Isaac had the only bathroom on the side of the door he had so abruptly closed the night before.

Once she was up, she saw that it was overcast, but there was a lot of humidity, and that excited her, made her blood flow. She might as well go get some coffee—but at PJ’s, not Cafe Marigny. The last person she wanted to see was Larry.

As the caffeine entered her bloodstream, she began, against all odds, to feel optimistic. She bought a Times-Picayune and looked at the ads.

It isn’t the end of the world
, she thought.
I can apologize. I can simply say I’m sorry and we can go from there. If he wants me to go, I can… what? Borrow money from Michelle. I can just call her up and get her to send some and then check into a cheap hotel. I can go back to doing temp work.

There were ads for sales jobs, some in good stores; even one in a little gallery. Maybe one of those. That might be better than filing. The Royces’ ad was still running. She felt it pull on her. Was there a chance Larry wouldn’t sell her out?

None, she thought.

I could do a free tryout. Why don’t I just call them before they have a chance to call him? Why don’t I
say I’d be glad to work a week, free, and see what they say. Who could resist an offer like that?

While the fit was on her, before she had a chance to think it over, she found a phone and called “Mrs. Royce? Jackie Daniel.”

Brenna spoke before she had a chance to finish. “Jackie. We’ve been trying to call you. Someone picked up the phone, but didn’t say anything. Are you home?” She opened her mouth to answer, but Brenna kept talking. “We want to offer you the job.”

“You do?” Surely it couldn’t be real.

“We like your credentials and we like you. When would you like to start?”

Real or not, she was going for it. “How about tomorrow?” It would take her a day to get some cookbooks, get some recipes together.

“Fabulous. It’s Saturday—the kids will be home.”

All she could think about was telling Isaac. If he wanted her to leave, she’d leave, but she had to tell him. He was odd; he was a very peculiar man, but she thought that, deep down, he had affection for her. After all, he’d kept in touch all those years. And he was the only one in the world who’d understand what this meant to her. Michelle was the only other choice, and she couldn’t possibly relate to it.

The thought shocked her. It seemed about a century since she’d left Evanston. She was a different person now.

Michelle was a cosseted college girl who had parents to take care of her—and who couldn’t begin to understand what it meant to have to fend for yourself.

Lovelace hadn’t even taken a shower, had just pulled on shorts and a T-shirt (for which Isaac had given her money on her first day in New Orleans). She went home to get ready to face the day, to plan meals, to think about parents who were vegetarians and children who weren’t.

Someone had been there. She knew it as soon as she entered the house, though what signals she read she never figured out. All she knew was, the hair on the back of her neck stood up.

She backed out of the house, and when she locked the door, it occurred to her she’d had to unlock it to get in, but she didn’t stop to analyze; she just ran.

Isaac wasn’t at the gallery. That terrified her still more.

She couldn’t call the police. That was the last thing she could do.

Isaac had told her about Revelas. Perhaps she could get him to go back to the house with her. But she found her knees were weak, and she couldn’t face it, couldn’t talk quite yet. Maybe if she went back to the house…

No. Not that.

She went outside to try to get her bearings, think what to do. Someone touched her arm—a bald, clean-shaven man in jeans and a black T-shirt.

She gasped and pulled away. “Get away from me.”

The man laughed and pointed to his eye, then his chest: I. Me.

“Isaac?” she said. The man looked like a pirate.

He nodded and gave her the come-here sign. They walked together to La Marquise, where he borrowed a pen and began to write.

“The police are looking for me—but they want you, I think.”

“You were the one at the house.”

“I heard you come in, but I couldn’t catch you. I was cleaning up after this.” He touched the top of his head.

“I don’t understand.”

“They were looking for a guy in white—with hair and a beard, I presume. What do you think of the new look?”

“How can you be The White Monk without your robes?”

He shrugged. “Monks have shaved heads. Listen, they must know what you look like, too. You need to turn into a brunette or something.”

“But… what’ll the Royces think?”

“The Royces?”

“Oh, Uncle Isaac, I forgot to tell you! I got the job.”

“That’s wonderful. What’s wrong with a dark-haired cook?”

“I can’t be a whole different person from the one they met.”

“Lovelace, listen. I think this involves my dad. Do you realize how serious that is? He’s a murderer.”

In the end there was nothing to do but what he said. He gave her money, and she called hair salons until she found one that would take her. When she came out, she was nearly as bald as Isaac, with a quarter-inch or so of crow-black hair, like a gutter-punk.

It did cause comment at the Royces’.

Brenna said, “Jackie? Jacqueline?” as if she weren’t sure. “Kind of a new look?”

Lovelace couldn’t help laughing at the way she was trying to be tactful. She said, “Awful, isn’t it? I could just kick myself. A couple of girlfriends were doing it and they talked me into it.”

“I’m glad you didn’t look like this the day before yesterday. Charles is waaay conservative.” She rolled her eyes, then she leaned back and gave Lovelace a long, assessing look, an artist summing up a subject. “But I kind of like it. You have great bones, you know that?”

A boy of about ten came into the kitchen. “What’s for lunch?”

“Tim, can’t you say hello? This is Jackie.”

“Hey, Tim. How about a burger?”

The kid’s eyes widened. “You’ve got to be kidding.”

The other kid came in for a burger as well. Paul, his name was. Both of them were blond cherubs, as skinny as their dad was chubby. Bottomless pits. Next time she’d make fries to go with the burgers, and maybe a pie for dessert. She gave the adults some salad and vegetable soup she’d made at home, and then she started making a list for dinner.

Brenna came in again. “We just asked some friends over for tonight. Could you manage four?”

Lovelace shrugged, feeling in control. “It’s just as easy as two.”

“How about six?”

“Sure, no problem. Want me to make anything special?”

“Whatever you want. And could you stay to serve it? We’ll pay overtime, of course. And cab fare home.”

“I’ll be glad to.” Lovelace was liking this a lot. “How about something Asian? Japanese, maybe.”

“Perfect.”

She grilled salmon with teriyaki sauce, served some rice and spinach on the side and a few other little tidbits—what could be simpler? Not being really up to speed yet, she gave the kids macaroni and cheese. But the Royces acted like they’d discovered gold, and she was it.

She enjoyed the work, but she absolutely basked in the admiration. She was deeply in love.

She liked their friends, too—a psychiatrist and her husband, who was a house painter; a math teacher and his wife, who was a fund-raiser.

What enormously normal people they all were. And fun. After dinner, they went into the living room and put on old R&B albums and danced.

Lovelace couldn’t believe people could live like this.

* * *

It took Daniel a long time to get over being angry. At first he couldn’t believe his father could pull something like that—springing a long-gone mother on him—but in the end, he had to admit it was exactly the sort of thing he would do. How could you be mad at a person for being who he was? Besides, as his dad would say, he had bigger fish to fry.

“Why, Daddy?” he had asked. “Why’d you call her? Why’d you make me get on the phone with her?”

“Well, I think she might just be an asset to the movement. What do you think?”

“What do I think? I think you must be out of your mind—with all due respect, sir.”

He was mad enough to speak like that, but he knew his father was going to hit him. He was braced for it and he didn’t care. This mother thing was not an everyday occurrence.

When Errol just laughed, threw back his head and guffawed big-time, that was when Daniel began to doubt his father’s sanity. Something about this woman robbed him of his senses.

“I’m going to go see her, son.”

“What do you mean you’re going to go see her? Police in fifty states are looking for you.”

“The lady lives in Dallas and I’m going there. They got this kind of VIP room in the airport. We’re just gonna meet there—I’ll fly in, fly out, nothing to it.”

“If someone recognizes you, you’re dead—and so is the movement.”

“Who’s gonna recognize me? I’ll just be another dude in a baseball cap and shades.” He hee-hawed again, and it was enough to make Daniel throw up. The Reverend Errol Jacomine in a baseball cap! Hell seemed to have frozen over.

Daniel shook his head. “Dallas isn’t that far. Get Pete Joseph to drive you. A lot fewer people’ll see you.”

His dad considered. “Lot of wisdom in that, son. But I got a better idea. I might need a bodyguard—I’m gon’ take you.”

“Ohhh, no! I got things to do here.” God knew what his dad had in mind once they got there.

“You’re going, boy. Don’t even think about getting out of it.”

The idea was, the woman—that was how Daniel thought of her—would meet Daddy at the airport. Daniel would get him to some VIP lounge kind of shit and say his name, which was Mark Mathews on this occasion, and some flunky would whisk him to some private room where the woman would meet him.

Daniel had never been in one of those VIP kinds of things. It turned out this one wasn’t strictly private. He got his daddy in and took him to a bar where there were tables that looked out on the runway. The woman was sitting at one, and he was astonished at how pretty she was.

His daddy said, “Come meet your mama, son.”

“No way.”

“Come on, goddammit.”