Tempter (12 page)

It is difficult for me to get out of my armchair without help these days, and I knew if he began to beat me there was no way I could avoid his blows. Yet, as he lifted his walking stick, I grabbed my own cane and shook it at him and said: ‘Do your worst! I’m not afraid of you anymore!’ Donatien drew back as if I’d thrust a red-hot poker in his face. He then turned and hastily exited the room.

That’s when I was finally free to weep for my poor little Mignon. I cried and cried until there were no more tears, only hatred for the man I must call my husband.

***

February 3, 1850:

I have a new maid. She is a strange little Negress (little more than a pickaninny, really) who goes by the name of Jazrel. She is a very serious child, but otherwise of a pleasant disposition. She claims that she can do miracles with arthritis. When she saw my cane resting against my bed, she announced that she would see to it that I would never have to use it again. What a peculiar girl!

***

April 6, 1851:

Felt well enough to walk down the stairs for the first time in years. The downstairs maid gaped at me as if I was a ghost. I was winded before we reached the bottom banister, but otherwise there was no pain worth mentioning. Jazrel was at my side, of course, in case I should lose my balance. It has been so long since I was able to leave my chambers, I felt like a stranger wandering the once-familiar rooms. Since my accident, my world has been restricted to the second floor, and the suite of rooms that constitute my personal quarters in particular. I have Jazrel to thank for bringing me back to the land of the living. Her herbal teas and ointments, foul-tasting and odd-smelling as they may be, have worked wonders with my hip.

It was difficult, at first, to surrender the numbness that the laudanum offers, but Jazrel has been a great help in weaning me off it. A few weeks ago, when my pain was at its worst, Jazrel took my laudanum and refused to give it back. At first I threatened her, and then cajoled her, before finally breaking down and weeping like a baby, begging her to give me the drug. Even though the sight of me in pain brought tears to her eyes, Jazrel remained firm in her resolve. She then began feeding me her ‘healing tea’. I have not felt the need to resort to laudanum since.

***

September 17, 1859:

I must be free of him and his warped affection. At first all I wanted was his touch. Even when he twisted my love for him into something dirty and abhorrent, I still wanted him. But when he killed our baby, he killed my love for him; and when he murdered my beloved Mignon, I finally came to hate him. Since then all I have wanted is to be free of him. But now I know there is no refuge from his terrible, blighted love, except in death. I am so horribly tired. Most Heavenly Father, forgive me, but I do not consider what I am about to do a sin. I am sure the finer points of my logic will be lost on Father Jean-Luc, but I am beyond caring. I was killed by my husband, Donatien Alexander Legendre, as surely as if he placed a gun to my head or arsenic in my tea.

And what was my sin against him? What did I do to provoke such undying animosity from this man? The simple fact that I exist is enough to warrant torment, as far as I can tell. Anything that brings me happiness or pleasure enrages him. First it was our baby, and then it was my poor Mignon, and now, finally, my beloved Jazrel.

Even as a child, Jazrel has detested Donatien, and never bothered to disguise her dislike of him. Recently he has taken a more lustful interest in the girl. Jazrel informed me that Donatien had tried to seduce her more than once, but had failed miserably each time. Last night Donatien approached her yet again, and she rebuffed him, only have him beat her within an inch of her life and then rape her. It has been fifteen years since I last shared a bed with my husband, but I remember his appetites all too well. You could hear the poor girl’s screams echoing throughout the house, yet no one lifted a finger to help. How could they, without risking their own lives? After all, Donatien is the law within the walls of Seraphine.

This morning I found Jazrel gone. When I confronted Donatien, he told me he sold her to a sporting house in New Orleans! I was too dumbstruck to do anything but stare at him. He seemed displeased that I did not break down in hysterics, but I will be damned if that man ever sees me cry again.

I can no longer abide living in this house another day, yet I know there is no life for me beyond Seraphine’s gates. I am as much a slave to this horrid place as any field hand born in the shacks. Even if I could escape, Donatien would continue to make my life miserable.

I still have some laudanum from the days before Jazrel came into my life. I always suspected it would come in handy. My one regret is that I will not be able to bid a proper farewell to Mr. Lucien. I sent him a note, but by the time he reads it, I will be gone. Just as well. To be rescued from an unsuccessful suicide is the kind of indignity that Donatien would wish on me.

I must get on with it, now. Just stop writing and drink the bottle down, Eugenie. I hope it will be a relatively painless death. It would make a nice change from everything that has gone before.

Jerry sat at the table for a long time, studying the plain-looking woman trapped in the locket. Although he knew what was coming, part of him had still hoped that things might end differently for poor Eugenie Legendre.

Congenital madness, domestic abuse, murder, sexual depravity, Satanism...Donatien Legendre had been one fucked-up asshole, no two ways about it. But he was also dead...and had been so for well over a century. What the hell did all this have to do with his own weird dreams and the vision of Charlie being slaughtered?

He was suddenly aware of Mrs. Kresse watching him from her desk. Jerry pushed away from the table and hurried from the reading room. The thought of returning to Mad Aggie made his stomach tighten, but he knew he had no choice. He had to know. It wasn’t until he reached the bus stop at the corner of Freret and Broadway that he realized he was still holding Eugenie’s locket in his hand.

Chapter Sixteen

Aggie was sitting on one of the public benches in front of the Cabildo. She had long since finished with the voodoo fetishes and was busy stuffing buckeyes and chicken bones into hand-sewn mojo bags. She barely glanced up as Jerry sat down beside her.

“You read the file?”

“I read it. But what does it mean? What the hell does it have to do with Charlie and me?’

Aggie sighed and folded her hands in her lap. “It’s a long story. Longer than I like thinkin’ about. You read the journals. You know how the Legendres built their fine, grand plantation house on the bones of slaves. You know the evil that lived in Donatien Legendre.”

“You mean about him going mad and killing children?”

Aggie's laugh was without humor. “He was crazy all right! Crazy like the devil!”

“You talk like you knew him.”

“Well enough to hate him.”

“How is that possible? If he were alive today, he’d be almost two hundred years old!”

Aggie fixed him with her good eye. “Did you see his death certificate?”

“No...But it’s simple logic. He
has
to be dead by now.”

“What if I tell you Donatien Legendre ain’t dead?”

“You mean he’s still alive?”

“I ain’t sayin’ that, either.”

“Well, if he’s not dead and he’s not alive, then what the hell is he?”

“He is one of the J
e-Rouge
; what some call
Les Damnes.
He is known by the name Tempter now.”

“That’s impossible.”

“That is what your head says, but your heart knows it lies. Let me tell you a story, my young friend. Then after I have said my piece, you can decide if I am indeed as mad as everyone says I am.

“Long ago there was a woman named Jazrel…ah, I see you know the name. Jazrel was the daughter of a mambo, who was herself the daughter of a powerful
babalewe
back in Africa. Jazrel’s flesh was born a slave, but her spirit was that of a priestess. She possessed the ways of healing from early on. When she was twelve years old, she came into the service of Eugenie Legendre, mistress of Seraphine.

“Eugenie was a very sad woman, crippled by her husband’s cruelty, in spirit as well as body. Jazrel took pity on her mistress and used her healing ways to ease Eugenie’s pain. She, in return, taught Jazrel how to read and write. In time their friendship developed into something far beyond that of mistress and slave.

“But Legendre could not stand to see his wife happy. When he discovered he could not turn Jazrel against her mistress, he brutally raped her and sold her to a brothel. She never saw Eugenie again. It was not long after Jazrel was sold that she came up pregnant. But the baby did not belong to any of the johns from the sportin’ house.

“Jazrel birthed her daughter in the whorehouse attic and named her Agatha, in honor of the madam. That’s right, son. I was born in 1860. And, like my mama before me, I was born a slave—but not for long.

“After Mr. Lincoln freed us, Jazrel quit whorin’ and took up midwifin’. She also started a business in healin’ charms and love potions. She taught me all she knew, just as her mama had schooled her. I wasn’t half as gifted as she was, but I got the hang of it after awhile.

“In 1870, my mama was approached by some coon-asses from Redeemer Parish. Seems they were in dire need of a conjure woman. The bayou down around the old Seraphine plantation was being haunted by a boogey man they called Tempter.

“For years there had been numerous disappearances, mostly of small children and young girls. Some of them, just before they disappeared, told their parents of seein’ someone--or some
thing
—lurkin’ outside their windows. Whatever it was that was prowlin’ the swamps, it had the power to spirit its victims out of their beds without a sound.

“Mama rolled the bones and called upon the Loa, who revealed to her the true nature of the evil that plagued Redeemer Parish. The Loa told her how Legendre yearned for power and eternal life. They showed her how Legendre, while in Europe during the war, had found a book of spells that gave him the power to turn himself into a thing of evil. Legendre became a necromancer—one who uses the bodies of the dead to work the blackest of magic. He used the kidnapped children as sacrifices to summon forth the Darkest One, who remade him in his image.

“Jazrel knew she did not have the power to kill Legendre, for his mojo was indeed strong, but she knew it was possible to trap him. She took me with her to Seraphine, which was fallin’ to pieces even back then, to serve as her assistant. Her plan was to lure Legendre from his lair while I went inside and stole his book of spells. Without it he was helpless to combat Jazrel’s magic.

“It worked almost as planned, except Legendre got wise to what she was up to and doubled back to the house in time to catch me as I ran out the back door. I was never so scared in my life, then or now! Legendre’s hair was all dirty and matted, like the Wild Man I saw at the circus, and his skin was like the underbelly of a mushroom. He had long, yellow fingernails, just like animal. That’s how I lost my eye, by the way.

“I put the pain out of my mind and ran as fast and hard as I could. Legendre tried to follow me, but it was too late. Jazrel had cast her first spell. He collapsed into a deep coma right there on the doorstep. Jazrel dragged him back inside and locked him in a room on the second floor of the house. She spent the next seven days and seven nights workin’ bindin’ spells, weavin’ a cage of magic around Seraphine as strong as any forged of iron.

“Her spells kept Legendre in suspended animation so that he could not work his will through others. But she could only keep him that way as long as the house remained empty of human life. If anyone else entered the house, Legendre would be free to move around for as long as they remained within Seraphine’s walls. But even if he should awaken, he would remain relatively helpless, as long as the book of spells was kept out of his hands. ”

“So what’s the big deal?” Jerry asked. “You just keep the book away from the house...”

“I haven’t finished tellin’ my story!” Mad Aggie snapped. “Now hush your mouth and listen! Like I was sayin’...time passed. I grew up and became a hairdresser. Many of my clients were high-tone Creole women in New Orleans who had need of love potions and get-rich-quick candles. When I was sixteen, I had me a baby girl named Celine. Her daddy was a dockworker that got himself crushed loadin’ cotton in one of the barges. I tried to teach my baby just as my mama taught me, but she didn’t want to have nothin’ to do with the old ways.

“Jazrel died in the scarlet fever epidemic that swept the city like a broom in 1888. Just before she passed, she laid a curse on me. The curse was that I would not die until I had passed on my wisdom to one of my blood. I know what you’re thinkin’. Why would my own mama do such a thing? I reckon she had her reasons.

“When Jazrel died, she was holding my hand, and I felt this tingling sensation travel up my arm, like I had grabbed a live wire. After that I became a full-fledged mambo, tending to folks like my mama had done, and her mama before her.

“In 1890 I made the acquaintance of Samuel LeBoeuf. Mr. LeBoeuf was a very rich old gentleman who came to me in hopes of curin’ his impotence. He had caught some grapeshot during the war, and his nature hadn’t worked proper since. He’d spent a fortune on quacks and was finally desperate enough to seek me out. I told him I would heal him only under the condition that he marry me.

“I might have been what they called ‘a woman of color’ back then, but I weren’t half-bad lookin’, if you can believe it. And seein’ how the old gent was in his seventies and so rich he could do as he damned well pleased without beggin’ pardon, Mr. LeBoeuf married me and I fixed his nature.

“Mr. LeBoeuf was mighty grateful for the service I’d done him, but he drew the line at adoptin’ Celine. While I was light-skinned, Celine was far too dark to pass. However, Mr. LeBoeuf was amenable to buyin’ her a little cottage on Rampart Street and settin’ her up in business as a seamstress, just as long as she didn’t come around the house.

“But my Celine was a proud girl, and headstrong at that. I told her that as soon as Mr. LeBoeuf died I would move her in with me, but she wouldn’t have no part of it. There were words between us, after which she stole Legendre’s spell book and run off with some good-for-nothin’ trash. Mr. LeBoeuf died in 1895, leavin’ me one of the richest widows this side of the Rockies. I kept thinkin’ Celine would come back once she heard the news, but she never did.

“I’ve lived longer than a mortal woman has the right. It ain’t that easy pretendin’ to be my own grandchild, but the Good Friday Flood of 1927 ruined most of Orleans Parish’s records, which helped me out some. And once you get past a certain age, you can’t tell one hundred and fifty from seventy-five. Old’s old, far as most folks are concerned.

“Like I said, Legendre’s not dead. Well, perhaps the part of him that was Donatien Legendre is dead, but the part that is Tempter is still very much alive...and in danger of being set free.

“The spell-book Celine stole from me was important because it holds the power to break the magic that has kept him a prisoner inside the plantation house. There are rituals that involve the use of blood, torture and the desecration of the dead...” The old woman shuddered. “Recently, someone used the book to visit the realm where Tempter is being held captive. Legba, Guardian of the Cross Roads, traced the path back to its source: the man in the leather jacket who left the Gris Gris Club with your girl.”

“Alex Rossiter?” Jerry asked, dumbstruck.

Aggie nodded. “I tried to contact your friend before Tempter could sink his hooks in deep, but I ran into difficulties that night, as you recall. I fear Rossiter is already Legendre’s horse—although, in this case, a better word would be puppet.”

“And what do you want me to do about it?”

“I may have the power of the Loa on my side, but my bones are brittle and my muscles weak. I must reclaim the book. It is far too dangerous to have it wanderin’ about loose. Its sheer luck that Legendre had not been freed before now.”

“That makes sense, kind of. Alex was always into mystical shit,” Jerry said sourly. “I can see him getting hold of some weird-ass Lovecraftian crap and not realizing what was up.”

“Do not judge your friend too harshly,” Mad Aggie said gently. “Tempter is adept at identifyin’ and exploitin’ the frailties of others. There’s not a man born who is free of weakness.”

“What about women?”

“We are rotten with it: it is called love.”