Postcards from the Dead (20 page)

“He might have wanted her out of the way.”

“Jeez,” said Ava. “I’d say that’s . . . significant.”

“I think so, too,” said Carmela.

“The thing is,” said Ava, “are you going to tell Babcock about this latest wrinkle?”

Her question gave Carmela pause. “I’m not sure.”

“Well you better decide fast,” said Ava, “before somebody else gets whacked!”

Chapter 22

C
ARMELA
walked with her shoulders hunched and her head thrust forward, headed for Memory Mine and the start of what would probably be a very busy day. But scrapbook albums, rubber stamps, and cute embellishments were the last thing on her mind right now. She was thinking about Whitney Geiger, the prominent real estate developer who’d been hailed as a business leader by the chamber of commerce, and quietly pointed out to her as a man who was known to dabble in shady deals. And, after getting an earful from Dickie last night, Carmela was still pondering whether Whitney Geiger might be a legitimate suspect in Kimber’s murder.

Could Geiger have been worried sick that Kimber was planning to do an exposé of his real estate schemes? It was possible, she decided. So the next question was, could Geiger have donned a costume and slipped into the Bonaparte Suite? Yes, that was possible, too. But now came the biggie. Could Geiger have sneaked out on the balcony and strangled Kimber?

That was where it all got elusive and fuzzy for Carmela. She could imagine any number of people doing exactly that. But who was numero uno? Who was the killer? That, unfortunately, was still up in the air. Which meant the killer was still free as a bird.

Shivering against a cool breeze, Carmela spun around a corner and turned onto Governor Nicholls Street. She sailed past Oddities, thinking briefly of the strange Mr. Joubert, then smiled at her own display of party invitations and cigar box purses in her front window.

Just as she punched her key in the lock, Carmela noticed a piece of paper stuck in the door.

Oh no. Not another . . .

Oh yes, it was. Another postcard.

Snatching the postcard from where it had been stuck, she pushed her way into her shop. Feeling nervous, like someone might be spying on her and relishing her nervousness, she flipped on the lights. Their reassuring glow and the warmth of her shop helped calm her.

Carmela shrugged out of her corduroy jacket and set the postcard on the counter.

Okay, let’s take a look.

It was the same type of postcard that she’d purchased yesterday at the Dreamland Gift Shop. And this one had writing on it, just like the previous two postcards she’d received. This message read
I’m still waiting
. And it was signed
Kimber
.

Isn’t this just ducky.

A rattle of the brass doorknob sent Carmela’s heart lurching and a shot of adrenaline speedballing through her veins.

“Carmela?” called a voice. Then Gabby’s smiling face appeared.

Carmela stood rooted to the spot, unable to answer, looking more than a little stunned.

“Sorry we didn’t make it last night,” said Gabby. “Stuart had to—” She suddenly noticed the look of fear on Carmela’s face and put two and two together. “Oh, don’t tell me. Another one turned up?”

Carmela nodded wordlessly.

Gabby hastily latched the door behind her. “Please don’t tell me somebody broke in here again.”

“No,” said Carmela, “it was stuck in the door.”

Gabby grimaced. “Let me see.”

Carmela handed her the postcard.

“Same kind,” said Gabby. For some reason, she was a lot more composed. Maybe she was getting used to these crazy postcards. “Who the heck is doing this?” She gazed at Carmela. “Do you have any idea at all? Does Babcock?”

“Not really,” said Carmela, “though the suspect list does seem to be growing.”

Gabby waggled her fingers. “Who else? Tell me.”

So Carmela told her about the information she’d gleaned about Whit Geiger and how Kimber had been planning an exposé on mortgage fraud and now she obviously wasn’t.

“Whit Geiger,” murmured Gabby. “I know that guy. I mean, I’ve
met
him. He’s on the board of the Riverview Pediatric Hospital. We even attended their charity gala.”

“That’s nice,” said Carmela. “And I found out from Jekyl that Davis Durrell is on the board of the City Opera.”

“So what are you saying?” asked Gabby.

Carmela shrugged. “Rich people behaving badly?”

“I’d say it’s more than just behaving badly. And it’s not all rich people, just . . . one.”

“That’s all it takes,” said Carmela. “But, the rotten thing is, I seem to have hit an impasse. In other words, I’ve narrowed it down to a handful of suspects, but have no real proof on anyone.”

“What does Babcock think?” asked Gabby. “He’s the pro, he should have figured something out.”

“Ah . . . he’s not exactly a happy camper right now. After the smoke bomb Saturday night, he’s pretty sure somebody is trying to tell me to back off. So we’re not on the best of terms.”

“He’s right about sending a warning,” said Gabby. “And they didn’t just
try
to, they did send it!”

“Point taken,” said Carmela, giving a half-smile.

“Speaking of the smoke bomb,” said Gabby, “how is your place?”

“Coming along,” said Carmela. “The cleanup crew left a bunch of fans and ion machines cranking away and they seem to be doing the trick. I checked this morning before I came in.”

“When can you get back into your own apartment?”

“I don’t know,” said Carmela, “maybe a couple of days?”

Gabby took off her coat, then said, “This situation is getting serious. You must be on to something.”

“Maybe,” said Carmela, “but for the life of me, I don’t know what it is.”

* * *

BY NINE O’CLOCK, CARMELA HAD TATE MACKIE ON THE
line. The owner of Byte Head Computers, Mackie was a jack-of-all-trades. He fixed computers, set up computers, and did a booming business in computer security and computer special effects.

“Do you know anything about setting up a teeny, tiny little camera?” Carmela asked Mackie.

“For your store?” Mackie asked her.

“That’s right. I want a camera to cover the front door. And I guess there should be another one at the back door, too.”

“I take it you’re worried about Mardi Gras hoodlums breaking and entering?”

“Something like that,” said Carmela. “The important thing is, can you do the installation?”

“Of course I can,” said Mackie. “Piece of cake, really. If you want, I can even link the camera feed to your computer or smartphone.”

“Are you serious?” said Carmela. “If you can make that happen, it’d be phenomenal.”

“Technology,” said Mackie, “you gotta love it.”

* * *

“I’M HAVING CAMERAS INSTALLED,” CARMELA TOLD
Gabby. “The guy from Byte Head is coming over in a few minutes.”

Gabby put a hand to her chest and patted it gently as she breathed a sigh of relief. “Excellent. Maybe we’ll even catch the perpetrator in the act.”

“If some idiot delivers more postcards, we might,” said Carmela. She picked up a package of gold brads and worried it with her fingers. “This is getting stranger and stranger.”

“I know you’ve got an entire roster of suspects, but tell me, who’s your front-runner?”

“For Kimber’s murder or the wacky postcards?”

“Mmm,” said Gabby, considering her words. “I’ve been assuming it’s one and the same.”

“Maybe it is. Probably it is. That scenario feels right anyway.” Carmela thought for a few seconds. “If I had to venture a guess at this point, I’d say Davis Durrell.”

“The boyfriend,” said Gabby, pouncing on her words. “I knew it! It’s always the boyfriend. Haven’t you noticed that whenever some poor girl falls down a flight of stairs or takes a swan dive off a cruise ship, it always comes back to the boyfriend!”

“Not always,” said Carmela, as the phone on the counter started to ring. “Sometimes it’s the husband.”

“Oh, you!” said Gabby as Carmela reached for the phone.

“Memory Mine,” said Carmela.

“Carmela?” came a girl’s voice. “This is Beth at Grand Folly Costume. I don’t know if you’re still interested, but we rented that costume again. The clown costume.”

“Oh! Do you know who rented it?”
Could it have been Sullivan Finch? The man who painted the clown portrait as well as Kimber’s?

“Sorry, I don’t,” said Beth. “I wasn’t here and whoever came in paid cash again.”

Carmela thought for a moment. “You said
again
. That implies it was the same person.”

“Oh,” said Beth. There was a moment of silence, then she said, “Now why would I say that? Why
did
I say that?”

“Think hard,” said Carmela. Was there a reason? There had to be a reason.

“Maybe because the whole outfit was rented,” said Beth. “The silk clown costume, the mask, and the shoes. Even the white silk gloves.”

“The whole shebang,” said Carmela, fervently hoping that Canio’s smiling, leering face wasn’t about to turn up at her shop. “Thanks, Beth, I appreciate your call.”

* * *

CARMELA WAS BUSY PULLING SHEETS OF YELLOW AND
gold banana leaf paper for a customer when Tate Mackie showed up. “Excuse me,” she said to her customer, then quickly slipped away to greet Mackie. “Hey,” she said, “thanks for coming over right away.”

“No problem,” said Mackie. With his close-shorn head, green army jacket, blue jeans, and pierced eyebrow, Tate Mackie looked like a slacker. But he owned his own shop, moonlighted in movie graphics, and had built quite a reputation for himself in the French Quarter.

“Got any film gigs going?” asked Carmela.

Mackie gave her a wide grin. “Oh yeah. Since I got myself listed on the New Orleans Film Commission’s Web site under production services, I’ve worked on a couple of features. A movie called
My Spy
and another one as yet untitled.”

“That’s fantastic. You’ve gone Hollywood.”

“Don’t I wish,” said Mackie. He opened a battered leather messenger bag and showed her two small cameras.

“Amazing,” said Carmela. “They don’t even look like cameras. More like cigarette lighters or something.”

Mackie winked. “That’s the whole idea. Like a nanny cam. Heck, these days you can get smoke detectors, thermostats, wall clocks, and silk flower arrangements that masquerade as cameras.”

“I’ll remember that next time somebody sends me flowers,” said Carmela.

Mackie glanced around the store and pointed. “How about I tuck a camera right up in that front corner? That way we’ll have a good shot of the cash register, the door, and most of the store.”

“What I really need,” said Carmela, “is tight surveillance on the front and back doors.”

Mackie’s brows shot up. “You’ve had problems with break-ins?”

“You could say that.”

“Tough,” said Mackie. He scratched his nose and wandered over to the front door. “Inside or out?” he asked.

“Outside would be better,” said Carmela. “Can you do that?”

Mackie thought about it. “I can run a wire through . . .” The rest of his words were lost in a ruminating mumble. Then he turned and said, “Yeah, I can do that.”

* * *

WHILE TATE MACKIE WAS WORKING ON THE CAMERA
installations, Carmela pulled Gabby aside.

“I don’t want to freak you out or anything,” said Carmela, “but I wanted you to see these.” She pulled the cemetery postcards out of their flat brown bag.

Gabby
was
freaked. “Don’t tell me you’ve been holding out on me!” she squealed, her eyes suddenly the size of saucers. “Don’t tell me you received a whole raft of these cards!”

“No, no,” said Carmela, quickly trying to put Gabby at ease. “I bought these. Three from Dreamland Gifts down the street. Six more from their other shop over in the Faubourg Marigny.”

“Really?” said Gabby. She peered at the cards, as if they possessed magical properties. Black magic. “You think that’s where your mysterious pen pal purchased his cards?”

“I don’t know, but I think so. That’s what I’m trying to figure out.”

Gabby frowned. “How are you going to do that?”

“I’m going to start with the printer and hope I get lucky.”

* * *

BUT WHEN CARMELA FINALLY GOT HOLD OF DEVOUX
Printing, they weren’t much help.

“We’re not doing that line any more,” said the woman who answered the phone.

“Because it wasn’t selling or . . . ?”

The woman cut her off. “Because we just change designs every couple of years. We have tons of images archived already, stuff that’s in the public domain. Plus photographers are always trying to peddle new stuff to us.”

“I see,” said Carmela. “So . . . do you think you’ll be doing more cemetery images?”

“I don’t see why not,” said the woman. “They’ve always been perennial best sellers.”

“Just not that same line and not for a while,” said Carmela.

“That’s right,” said the woman. “We’ve still got a couple cartons of our current antique cemetery cards in the warehouse.”

“Do you know . . . have you had any large orders for those particular cards?”

“Not that I know of,” said the woman. “And I’d be the one the order would come through.” She paused. “I don’t know what you’re looking for, but I’m sorry I couldn’t be of more help.”

Carmela hung up her phone and thought for a moment, as images of the gritty black-and-white postcards flitted through her brain. If someone had been sending her a not-so-subtle message, had it been Whitney Geiger?

Flipping open her phone directory, Carmela dialed KBEZ-TV and got Ed Banister, the station manager, on the line.

“Carmela!” he said, greeting her with great enthusiasm. “I talked to your friend Baby Fontaine and she’s agreed to let us film at her party tonight!”

“That’s terrific,” said Carmela.

“It’s fantastic!” Banister raved, “and I owe it all to your good connections. It isn’t often we get to film in the Garden District’s inner sanctum.”

“You won’t be disappointed,” Carmela promised. “Baby puts on a terrific masked ball and the food is to die for.” She paused, then said, “I have a question for you that may or may not be related to Kimber’s murder.”

“Okay,” said Banister.

“I was wondering,” said Carmela, “if you guys are still doing that investigative report on Whit Geiger?”

There was silence for a moment, then Banister said, “On who?”

“Whitney Geiger,” said Carmela. “The Royale Real Estate guy who built a slug of mega mansions over in Lake Vista.” When there was more silence, Carmela added, “Apparently, Kimber was working on some kind of exposé?”