Imogene in New Orleans (2 page)

“Hey there, Imogene,” Neil said, opening his arms to her. Neil looked the same as he always did, sporting a jet-black mustache, a golf cap, blue jeans, and a loose-fitting shirt.

“Hey, shug. I ain’t seen you in a year. You losin’ weight?” Imogene patted him on the shoulder.

“No, ma’am. You can’t lose weight in New Orleans.” Neil smiled. He stood with his arm around Imogene as Goose sauntered over to him. “Goose, what do you think about the city, bud?” Goose heaved in the humid air. “Let’s get you inside.” Neil took the leash from Jackson and then hugged his friend.

“I’ve missed you guys and Imogene, of course. I don’t know what’s wrong with Glenway. I spoke to him two days ago. He didn’t show up to our usual dinner last night, but you know how he is. He’ll find some guy and get obsessed with him and we won’t see him for weeks on end. We call it his ‘disappearing act.’” Neil fidgeted with his mustache, patting it down with his thumb and index finger. He stood close to eye level with Jackson, just under six feet tall.

Jackson noticed the concerned look in his eyes as he clenched his lips.

“So, you haven’t talked to him today?” Jackson rubbed his friend’s neck.

“No. I don’t know what’s going on with him. Of course, it doesn’t bother Allen a bit, but I hate when Glenway runs off like this.”

“Maybe he’s just workin’, son. He makes pretty pictures.” Imogene looked around the street at the ferns hanging from the balconies. A carriage passed by, and Imogene pointed at it. She took half a dozen pictures of the horse and driver. “This place ain’t like nowhere else, boys.”

“Yes, ma’am. I noticed Glenway’s car parked behind the studio. Let’s go see if he’s here.” Neil swung open the door and held it for Imogene. There was a tall step into the gallery, which Imogene struggled to make. She winced as she lifted her leg, slapping Billy’s hand away when he tried to guide her upward.

“Well, ain’t this something? Cool as a cave in here, boys, and look at that.” Imogene pointed at the paintings hanging on the gallery’s walls. Glenway had created vignettes of his favorite streets and courtyards and spaces in the city. If the painting included people, Glenway always used his friends and lovers and acquaintances as models.

“Hey, there y’all are,” Imogene said, pointing to a painting of Neil and his partner, Allen, riding a Mardi Gras float and throwing beads. She took a picture. They walked in front of another one featuring a brass band with Billy painted as the drummer, his straight blond hair raised off his head as he beat the drums. Jackson stood beside him, playing the trumpet.

“Y’all should’ve told Mama you were in a paintin’. I would’ve bought it and put it on my wall at home.” She raised her voice to say it, almost like a kid will do in a quiet library. Jackson watched several customers in the store turn to her. Billy prodded her toward the back of the long gallery, which stretched a half block from the front door to the back. Tract lighting illuminated the paintings. The gallery felt every bit of its nineteenth-century age but was well kept, clean, and preserved. Plants hung from the exposed brick, and an enormous bouquet of flowers sat on the desk next to the cash register. Neil nodded at the clerk and went to speak with her.

Imogene and the boys walked carefully out into the courtyard, an enclosed space with walls thirty feet high. She had to take pictures of the fountain in the center and the exotic ferns spilling out of enormous planters in all four corners, where Carnival beads hung from the green branches and leaves. Instead of pennies in the fountain pond, there were doubloons and trinkets from parades past.

“Sights and wonders, boys. Ain’t this place magic?” She scanned the tall enclosure. Goose took a seat in the shade of the fountain and let the water splash his red fur.

“It looks like something from an Alexandre Dumas novel. Like the prison for the
Count of Monte Cristo
.” Jackson admired the sandy, 1840s brick.

“Prison? Naw, Jackson. This ain’t no prison, son. This here’s a fancy place.”

He heard several clicks from Imogene’s camera. After a few minutes, Neil returned and led them to Glenway’s work space. He withdrew a set of keys and began searching for a specific one.

“Does Glenway keep his studio locked?” Jackson asked.

Neil unlocked the glass French doors hidden at the back of the courtyard. “When the gallery’s open, he keeps the doors locked so he can work undisturbed. Plus, there are valuables in here.”

The artist’s studio was a mess—paintings, art supplies, easels, and bottles of wine scattered along the concrete floor. Imogene started picking up the trash. “Lord, he’s worser than y’all. With all those fine pictures and such, he ought to hire some help, boys.”

She found a box of pralines and stuck a couple in her pocket while Jackson watched. He noticed her stashing a piece of paper in her purse too, as she kept an eye on Billy who had his back turned. She snapped pictures of a curio containing exotic figurines carved from jade and some sparkling blue gemstone. The figurines were fashioned to look like Carnival participants, musicians, voodoo priests, nuns, revelers, and other fanciful characters from Glenway Gilbert’s imagination. The door to the curio was ajar.

Jackson watched Imogene shuffle over to a calendar on the desk with Glenway’s personal and gallery business. She mumbled the scribbled names written down. “Neil and Allen and then Rogers, Catfish, Lena, Blue Moon, Canebrake, TH, and Pirate.” Her voice trailed off as she photographed the calendar.

“Mama, don’t mess with his stuff.” Billy walked over to her. He was sweating in his polo shirt and shorts.

“I ain’t messin’ with it. I’m admirin’ this desk here.” The antique rolltop desk suited her fancy, apparently, well enough to inspire her to click the camera a half dozen times. She took two more shots of the calendar, and Billy went to sit on a bench.

Jackson cupped his hands around his mouth and called out, “Hey, Glenway, you here, bud? We came to see you. We brought Imogene.” There was no answer from any of the shadowy nooks in the studio.

Neil said, “Hey, Glenway, it’s the middle of the afternoon. Surely you’re not asleep. Remember, you’re coming to dinner tonight with the boys and Imogene?” Neil frowned at the silence and then turned to the boys. “You know he has that place over in Algiers. He stays there a lot with his current beau. That’s probably where he is, which means he’ll cancel dinner tonight.” Neil patted his mustache again and then jerked his head, as if he had just run into a cobweb. “It pisses me off when he acts like this.”

“Wonder what he was paintin’ here?” Imogene pointed to an empty easel in the corner. It was set up for a project. She went over and sat in the stool in front of it and picked up a brush. “Look, boys. I’m the
arteest
now. One of y’all come over here and I’ll draw ye.” Goose feasted his eyes on the brush as if it were a long piece of beef jerky she was waving before him. “Just being honest with you, boys, but this place don’t seem like somewhere to sleep. ’Course, y’all know him better than me, but I don’t suspect he’s here. Not a bed nowhere.”

Neil patted her shoulder. “You’re right, Imogene. He really only stays here when he’s working late or out late at the bars, but then again his car is outside.”

Behind where Imogene sat on the stool, the back corner was dark. She scooted over to it and scraped the wall. “Boys, surely there’s a light. Goose, where’d you get to? I can hear you huffin’, but I can’t see you for nothing.” Goose sauntered over to her, breathing heavily. His paws scraped the floor. “Don’t let the boys step on you, Goo.”

Imogene made her way to the corner of the room. The only light Jackson could see came from the automatic flash. She limped around the far wall as her flash lit it up. “There’s a window, boys. Covered with a shade. Here.” She pulled it, revealing Glenway’s car in the alley, as well as Neil’s. She pointed to what looked like a gigantic sheet covering a nook in the corner. “Hey, what’s this cloth here for? It ain’t a shower curtain?”

“Oh, no, there’s no bathroom back here,” Neil said. He slid the screen and revealed an enclosure large enough for a futon, a coffee table, and a chair. A terrible scent flooded the room.

“Good God, cover it up, boys. A polecat’s got loose in here.” Imogene pointed at the screen with one hand and smothered her nose with the other.

“It does smell like a skunk, Mama. What happened here?” Billy slid behind her and leaned over her shoulder, as if he could use her as a shield in case of an attack.

The alcove was in shambles, broken bottles, candle wax everywhere, and magazines strewn on the table and floor. Glenway lay facedown on the futon. Jackson felt an uncomfortable tingling in his stomach.

“Hey, boys, there he is.” Imogene pointed at Glenway, but they had all seen him. Jackson hurried past her. “He’s not moving. Hey, Glenway, what’s going on? Why didn’t you answer us?” Jackson felt cold all over. He flipped on a light switch, which revealed his friend Glenway Gilbert’s limp, motionless body.

Now that the light illuminated the area, Billy walked past his mom. “Something doesn’t look right about his color,” Billy said. As a registered nurse, Billy was ever concerned with health, and he had a keen eye for irregularity in appearance. He knelt beside his old friend and felt his skin. “He doesn’t have a normal body temperature. He’s cool.” Billy glanced at Jackson with sunken eyes and then moved his fingers under Glenway’s jaw and felt for a pulse. He kept his fingers there for what seemed like an hour. He took a deep, audible breath and then sighed. “He’s dead. Glenway’s dead.”

Two

“Dear God.” Imogene leaned over Glenway. “Poor boy. Deader than four o’clock. What done it to him, Billy?” She studied the body, from the bottom of his casual shoes to the top of his red head.

Billy pulled Glenway’s collar down and revealed bruises leading from Glenway’s back up to his skull. His usually perfect red hair was tussled, and part of it was clumped up in a dried patch. “I don’t know what killed him.”

Imogene took a picture of Glenway’s body.

“Mama, stop taking those pictures. He’s dead.”

“Shoot. You already said that. You the nurse. Can’t you tell what done it?” She covered her nose to block the stench that was coming from the body on the futon.

“I know I’m the nurse. He has bruises on his neck.”

“Hey, sweetie, I don’t see any blood.” Jackson touched Billy’s shoulder, and Billy jumped back.

He turned to Jackson and then pointed at Glenway’s head. “I thought that was dye in his hair, but it’s not. It’s blood. And there’s some sort of indentation there on the back of his skull. Looks like something struck him or he fell on something. I don’t know.” Sweat beaded up on Billy’s sideburns, which he wiped with his shirt.

“Shouldn’t we call the police, Neil?” Jackson said. He turned around to see Neil shaking in the corner.

“Son of a bitch. Glenway.” The whiskers on Neil’s mustache trembled. He struck the wall with his fist. “I
told
you this would happen. Dammit.” He glared at Glenway’s body. “Why?”

Imogene limped over to him. “Son, stop causin’ such a fuss. They’ll think you done it.”

She helped Neil over to the stool in front of the easel. “Yeah, boys, we ought to call the constables and let ’em handle this.”

“Yes, of course,” Jackson said, grabbing his cell phone.

Neil removed his golf cap and rubbed his face with it. His black hair stood on end. “No, wait. Wait a minute.”

Jackson watched Neil take a deep breath and fix the front pocket on his shirt. He looked like a public speaker preparing for his audience. Goose shuffled over to him and started licking Neil’s leg as if to lend moral support.

Neil stood up straight and said, “Okay, I need y’all to take everything you can carry from this studio. I mean everything.”

Imogene looked at him closely. “You ain’t using sense, Neil. Whatchya say that for? That ain’t our place to carry off the Gilbert boy’s belongings, ’specially not with him dead.” She took a handkerchief from her purse and wiped his red eyes.

“Imogene, Glenway’s been complaining all summer. We thought he was just paranoid. He said folks were stealing from him. Said they were out to get him. He told us the police canceled several appointments to meet with him about his missing work. He starting hiding away even more than usual, avoiding me and Allen, which is why we invited him today and why we wanted him with us last night.”

“He met some hustler named ‘Buddy.’ I told Glenway the guy was no good, but Glenway never listened to my advice about his lovers. He’d fall for a river rat if he was shown attention. He had the worst taste. And no sense of safety. Since he wouldn’t listen to my advice, I didn’t listen to his complaints. And
now
look at him.”

Glenway’s cold body was paler than usual. His naturally fair skin had an ashy look to it. Billy continued to stand over the body, observing medical details. “You see, his fingernails have that purplish look. They’re just starting to turn.”

“How long do you think he’s been dead?” Jackson rubbed Billy’s back.

“Probably less than eighteen hours. I think it happened sometime last night. Or maybe…maybe this morning.” Billy started scratching his head. Jackson saw the scratching and he squinted at his partner as he recognized a familiar look in Billy’s eyes, an obsessive look found in sanatoriums across the country. Billy had furrowed eyebrows and complete concentration as he rubbed his cranium. Jackson knew that look. Billy was having some disturbing medical thoughts. Jackson had discovered that nursing was not the best profession for his partner and had often mentioned that during these manic moments. Billy obsessively ran his fingers through his blond hair. Jackson watched and then whispered, “Are you imagining getting your head clobbered?”

Billy stopped immediately and put his hand by his side. “No.”

Jackson nodded. “Oh, I think you are. Don’t worry, though. I wouldn’t let something like that happen to you.” He pulled Billy away from the futon and hugged him. “We need to get your mama out of here.”

Between caring for Neil and taking pictures of the scene, Imogene was stooping over and putting things in her purse. Jackson didn’t like it at all. “Neil, why are we doing this? If someone finds out we’ve taken things from Glenway’s studio, we’ll get in serious trouble.”