Revenant (15 page)

“Do you remember her friends?”

He shook his head. “When they found the bodies in that grave, the police came around, and I tried to remember.” He shook his head. “I was working two jobs. I'd come home tired and sleep, then get up and go to work. I didn't pay attention to Charlotte's girlfriends. The last thing I needed to do was get sweet on a girl, so I ignored all of 'em.”

“If you think of anything, would you call me?” I gave him my card. “One last thing. What kind of man is Joe Welford?”

He looked at me, immediately catching what my interest was. “He's a man in mortal pain. He loved Pamela Sparks and don't get ideas that he'd hurt her. You stay away from him with your questions and inferences. He got enough of that from the police.”

I nodded. I had stories to write back at the office, and I'd had all the pain I could take for one day. Joe Welford was safe from me.

I
was absorbed in my work when my phone rang. I'd just sent the copy to the desk, and I was surprised to hear Avery Boudreaux's voice.

“We got the tests on Pamela Sparks's blood. She was drugged, and you were right. She'd been given Thorazine.” There was a pause, and I hoped he wasn't remembering what I'd said at the time. “Carson, we need to keep this information quiet. It's a good lead. One of our few.”

Avery called because he had a favor to ask. He wanted me to hold information again, and he realized that if I got the facts on my own, I could print them or not. If he gave them to me, I might feel that I owed him.

“Did you check the drugstores I suggested?”

“Every pill they've sold is accounted for. This had to come from somewhere else.”

“Stolen?”

“We're looking into it. Once we find the source, I'll tell you.” There was a pause. “I can't believe I'm going to ask you this, but I promised my wife. Our daughter thinks she wants to be a journalist.” There was actual pain in his voice—a father torn about accommodating his daughter's wishes when she wanted something he disdained. “Would you consider talking with Jill? She's read all of your stories. She thinks you're ‘wicked cool.' That's a direct quote. My wife said I wouldn't receive any marital pleasures until I got a yes from you.”

I'd never met Avery's wife, but I liked her. “Just understand that the last budding journalist I spoke with immediately grew a forked tail and belched fire.”

“Ah, that's a relief. I thought it would be worse.”

We laughed, and I agreed to meet with Jill the following morning at 9:00 a.m.

I checked my messages at home while I waited for Hank's corrections. I watched him read the story while the phone messages played in my ear. I sat up a little at the sound of Mitch Rayburn's voice. I'd deliberately not thought about whether he would call or not, but I realized I'd subconsciously wondered.

“Sorry the week has gone by,” he said. “I had a good time at the Brown Raisin. Good enough that I'd like to do it again. How about dinner tonight? This time I pick.”

Fridays were my night to go to Lissa's Lounge for martinis, karaoke and cigarettes. I didn't want to share that with Mitch or anyone else. Saturday evening I was obligated to go to Leakesville. I'd worried my parents nearly to death. The least I could do was show up and dance a few choruses to my mother's tune. “Rush Limbaugh has already booked me, but I'll cancel him.”

“I'll pick you up at eight.”

I hung up. Out in the newsroom, Hank gave me a thumbs-up, effectively releasing me for the rest of the day. I picked up my purse and stopped at his desk. “That fifth body. I just can't leave it alone. I have a hunch I'm going after.”

“The cops are at a dead end, huh?”

If they had something real, they weren't sharing with me. Of course, dinner with Mitch might be more about work than pleasure. “I talked with Avery. He says they have nothing new except the toxicology on Pamela, which he asked me not to print. There was Thorazine in her blood. I said I'd hold off on printing it while they try to track down where it came from.” I didn't tell him that I'd suggested they screen for that substance. In a larger crime lab, such a test would have been automatic. Biloxi, though, wasn't a den of murder. Such blood tests weren't always mandatory.

Hank's eyebrows rose. “You're being awful accommodating to the local law.”

I was. But I had my reasons. “I'm trying to act as a counterbalance to Brandon. On the whole, Avery has been very forthcoming with me.”

“And Mitch? Has he been sharing a little pillow talk?”

I had to smile. Hank had some excellent sources, obviously. “I'm afraid I haven't lured him into bed so that I could later blackmail the story out of him. But that's on my to-do list.”

“My advice is to fuck him so hard he yells out everything you want to know. Blackmail is so tedious, and it takes too long.”

I laughed and blushed. “That's grounds for a sexual-harassment suit.”

He made a concerned face. “And I thought it was a compliment.” He grew serious. “You're looking better, Carson. Got some pink in those cheeks. Must have slipped down from your eyes because they're clear.” His hand moved across his desk and touched mine. “Get out of here before I assign you more work.”

I frowned. “I haven't seen Brandon today.”

“He's been at the country club with the bigwigs from the newspaper chain. Negotiating.”

I could see the worry on Hank's face, but I had nothing reassuring to offer him. Chances were that Brandon would sell. Everyone else had. Running an independent paper was hard work and expensive. The larger chains could homogenize the news and distribute it over their own wire services, pander to politicians to gain favors and reduce lawsuits and overhead by printing pabulum designed to inform and offend no one. It was the way of the world, or so I'd been told.

“I'll see you later.”

“You turned in an excellent story, Carson. It goes beyond reporting to show the horror of those murders. The repercussions continue to damage those families. You have a real talent.”

“Thanks,” I said, glad that I was facing out of the newsroom and giving the curious only my back.

The storm clouds that had gathered earlier in the day were massed to the west. I ran to my truck and considered going home to change clothes. I'd be a lot more comfortable in jeans and boots, so I drove east. Lightning forked to the north, and the smell of rain was heavy and mingled with the slightly brackish scent of the Sound. The rain hadn't begun to fall, but it was imminent as I hurried in my side door.

The cats were dozing in preparation for night, when I would want to sleep and they would want me not to. I roused them by rubbing their bellies. I put on my favorite old jeans, a cotton sweater and some black cowgirl boots. Daniel called them roach stompers because the pointed toes were perfect for corners and other tight places where bugs loved to hide. Florida had waged a campaign to refer to the disgusting black insects as palmetto bugs—a more socially acceptable sounding term. Right. They were huge, flying roaches that could live a week with their heads severed. I was the unofficial death squad.

The traffic had thinned by the time I got back on Highway 90 and headed across Biloxi Bay to Barnacle Bill's. It was one of the few pre-casino bars left along the water, and it had a loyal clientele. I was looking for someone. I wasn't sure who, but if anyone could help me, it would be the crowd at B.B.'s, as it was fondly called.

B.B.'s was a shack on stilts that jutted out into the Sound and was a thumbed nose at the neon and grandiose design of the casinos. The parking lot was jammed at all hours, and just as I got out of the truck, the sky opened up. I made a dash for it but was thoroughly soaked by the time I got to the door. I walked in and felt a dozen eyes on my clinging sweater. I had two options; one was going home and I wasn't leaving.

The barkeep was too young and too handsome. He handed me some towels and I dried the pictures I'd protected in my purse and then my wet hair and face. There was nothing to be done about my clothes. I ordered a martini and the barkeep's gaze dropped down to the photographs of Pamela Sparks and the four girls killed in 1981.

“Are you a cop?” he asked.

“Reporter.”

He nodded. “I wasn't born when those girls disappeared. Even if I had been, I would have been stuck on a farm in Nebraska.”

“What about this one?” I pointed to Pamela.

He shook his head. “Most of the crowd here is older. Boat people, those who lived here before the casinos. They talk about how good it used to be all the time.”

“Boring, huh?”

“Things change. That's progress.” He shrugged and pulled a beer for a customer. “No point clinging to what's gone.”

I studied him, seeing the lack of pain in his handsome face. He'd yet to lose anything worth clinging to. I had no desire to warn him of the road ahead. Besides, he wouldn't listen. Youth was wonderful in that way.

“I'm looking for some of those old-timers. Maybe folks talking about the Gold Rush bar.”

He mixed a tray of cocktails before he had time to answer. “See that woman in the red dress?” He nodded to a pretty brunette who was in deep conversation with a man.

“Yeah.”

“Her name's Babette. Ask her. I've heard her talk about that bar and how they had dancers, drugs and other things.”

“Thanks,” I said, leaving a twenty on the bar to pay for my drink and the information. I approached Babette's table with caution. The conversation looked intense and personal, and not all that happy. The brunette looked up with a frown—the man with curiosity.

“Excuse me.” I introduced myself. I was holding the photos in my hand.

The woman reached up for them, an eager look on her face. “Yeah, I saw them in the newspaper. That was awful. I used to hang out at the Gold Rush.” She glanced at her friend.

“Do you recognize any of the girls?” I'd put Pamela's photo back in my purse. The Gold Rush had been razed by the time she was killed.

She looked at the photos closely. “That one.” She pointed at Maria Lopez. “I remember her because she could really dance. She was underage, I'm pretty sure, but nobody cared. They didn't bust places back then like they do now. Alvin Orley ran the club and he either paid off the cops or had something on them so they left him alone.” She shrugged. “It was a different time. Now they'll put you in jail for driving home from a bar. Pigs.” The last word was uttered under her breath, causing me to wonder how many DUIs she'd acquired.

“Do you recognize any of the others?”

She looked again. “I can't be sure. We were all that age back then, young and full of life.” She handed the pictures back, turning to her companion in an abrupt dismissal of my questions.

“Excuse me one more time,” I said. “If you remember the Gold Rush, would you remember anyone who worked there?”

“What are you implying?” she asked hotly. She started to stand but the man touched her arm.

“I'm not implying anything.” I suddenly understood her antagonism. She'd worked at the Gold Rush, and not as a bartender. “I thought maybe you knew someone who worked behind the bar or a musician. Like that.”

Her ruffled feathers were slightly soothed. “Everyone knows Stella Blue. She's still around. She danced there, did some bartending. She was the most beautiful woman on the coast back then.”

“Do you know where I might find her?”

“Try McBeth's. It's off Thirteenth Avenue in Gulfport. It opens at noon. It's a bartenders' bar, but Stella is there at three. Business interests.”

“Thanks,” I said, heading for the door. I had a lot of time to kill, and I didn't want to do it sitting at a bar. One thing I'd promised myself was that I'd never work drunk. Hungover, maybe, but not drunk going into an interview. There had to be some standards, even if they were minimal.

The rain had let up and the heat from my own body had begun to dry my clothes. Leaping mud puddles, I made my way across the parking lot. The casinos had put in little trolleys to haul suckers from one casino to the next, and I hopped one and rode the half mile to the Grand. It was a huge building with bright colors and a small theater that semiresuscitated the careers of aging performers. It wasn't uncommon to see shows by Michael Bolton, David Allen Coe, Tom Jones and even a couple of the famous tenors.

My parents had been to a few of the shows, and it was good for them to get dressed up and go out. The casinos had raised the level of entertainment, and even made it affordable. They'd also perfected the art of spinning dreams from dust. Trouble was, dust returned to dust.

I walked into the deafening roar of the slot machines and human jubilation or defeat. People milled everywhere. Some looked lost and others on a mission from God. Banks of slot machines were against every wall and in stands. A swiveling red stool was in front of each machine. It wasn't uncommon to see someone playing three machines at once. To approach was a declaration of war.

A thick haze of smoke hung over the room, even though it was well ventilated. The craving for a cigarette was instantaneous. My fingers curled at the need for another drink but I brushed that back. I was working. I had to hang on to that thought.

I moved down the brightly colored carpet, taking in the gaiety and desperation that marked such places. When I'd first heard that Las Vegas casinos were coming to the coast, I'd had a mental image of James Bond, the real one—Sean Connery—in a tuxedo with a pair of dice in his hands. Reality was a bitter draught. This was Club Corpulent in khakis and polyester.

Stopping at the blackjack tables, I watched a few hands. It was a simple game, if you could count cards and calculate odds in a matter of seconds. Most people played with the hope that Lady Luck would see them through.

I'd heard the buffet in the Grand was delicious, and I decided to eat a snack to absorb the alcohol. I got in the long line and inched forward with everyone else. If the glitz and glamour of the casinos was hollow, the buffet was replete. There was enough food to feed a Third World country, which used to be what Mississippi was considered.