by Ellen Byron
Maggie was revolted by the malignant narcissism of the woman but masked the feeling. “I know it must have been hard on you, and I’m sorry.” She stopped herself from adding, But these are insane reasons for killing people.
Pauline stared past Maggie. “My father drummed it into me—‘Never forget where you come from,’ he’d say. He held his status over my mother’s head because her family didn’t go as far back in Louisiana as his did. He had disdain for Denise’s family because her mother married an out-of-stater, and then Denise did too.”
Maggie remembered what she’d told Gerard Damboise when he’d declaimed about the impressive bloodlines of Pauline’s family. “Names from a hundred years ago shouldn’t matter now.”
“They do when they’re the one thing you’re famous for in this town.”
Keep her talking, Maggie. Appeal to her ego. “Pauline, you have fantastic taste and style. You’re a great decorator. This stuff about your family history being the only thing you’re good for—it’s all in your head.”
“Argh, enough. I got totally off track.” Pauline searched the pouch on her costume with her free hand. “Where are those sleeping pills?”
“I’m supposed to pick up Bo at the airport. He’s going to figure out something’s wrong when I don’t show up.”
For a minute, Pauline looked worried. “Did you tell them anything about me?”
Maggie’s heart sank. She’d figured out Gerard wasn’t trying to say please when he’d clung to her. If he’d had the strength, the puff of air he’d managed to issue would have formed the name Pauline. But in her fear of making a mistake and accusing the wrong person of murder—especially a respected citizen like Pauline—Maggie had never named her as a suspect. “Yes,” she lied. “I told him all my suspicions about you.”
Pauline snorted. “No, you didn’t. You should have seen your face when I just asked you that. Anyway, it doesn’t matter. By the time they figure out there’s a problem, you’ll be in the Atchafalaya Swamp. Where are those flipping pills?”
“Maybe they fell out of your pocket like my phone fell out of mine.”
Pauline groaned and let out a string of unladylike profanities. “I’ve got to go find them.”
“See if you can find my cell while you’re out there,” Maggie said, her tone acerbic.
“You have miserable luck with phones, don’t you?”
Something dawned on Maggie. “My first phone. You’re the one who broke it. Why?”
Pauline shrugged. “I guess there’s no harm in telling you now. Gerard was wearing a Tremblay heirloom tie clasp I gave him, hoping it would get him off my back and make him go away. He mentioned you took photos of the judges, and I didn’t want anyone to see the tie clasp and get ideas. Especially you.” Pauline stood up, hovering over Maggie. “You can blame your current situation on Eula Banks. I knew you were snooping around, but it wasn’t until the Courir meeting at JJ’s, where she yelled that she’d sent you records from the foundling hospital, that I realized you were a genuine danger to me.”
“I’m guessing Gerard found out about your family’s past from Ira Stein and was somehow using it to get something from you. But I can’t figure out what.”
“Our home, Maggie.” There was a catch in Pauline’s voice, and for a moment she sounded vulnerable. “He threatened to tell everyone the real story of my family if I didn’t sell him Camellia Plantation for his stupid Historical Society. He’d already picked out the furniture he was going to take from us to put on display.”
“The pieces at your house marked with red dots. You weren’t changing them out with items from your attic. Those were antiques Gerard laid claim to.” Of course, Maggie thought. It all makes sense now. Gerard’s own obsession with controlling Pelican’s past through the Society had brought about his present-day death.
“I can’t let anyone find those pills. I’ll have to retrace my steps.”
It dawned on Maggie that there was no lock on the secret door. Pauline’s hunt for the sleeping pills offered her a chance to escape. Unfortunately, this also dawned on Pauline. “But first…”
Pauline picked up a discarded liquor bottle. Before Maggie could shield herself, she cracked the bottle over Maggie’s head, and the world went black.
* * *
Maggie slowly opened her eyes to a blurry world. She was disoriented, her head throbbed, and she felt like she was suffocating. It took a moment to realize the reason for this—her mouth was duct-taped shut. She instinctively moved her hands to pull the tape off, but they were bound with the tape, as were her ankles. She tried to roll onto her feet, but failed. She wriggled up against a wall and using her back, shimmied up it to a standing position. The world swirled and Maggie fought back the urge to pass out. She hopped her way to the room’s small window, her head pounding with each step. The window was covered with brown butcher paper. Maggie rotated until her back faced the window, reached for the paper with her manacled hands, and used her fingernails to tear off strips of it. She then rotated around again to face the window and stared through the holes she’d managed to rip. The view stretched over Grove Hall’s endless sugarcane fields to the bayou and swamp beyond. Not a soul was in sight. Maggie would have to escape on her own.
She hopped to the room’s door, but it swung inward, not outward. Maggie was desperately trying to maneuver the door open when she heard sounds from below. She froze, assuming Pauline had returned. Then she heard giggling and murmuring from two voices, one male, the other female. She tried to scream, but the tape muffled her voice. Maggie heard footsteps on the manor house staircase and was about to jump up and down, but stopped herself. The sound might scare off the visitors. She’d wait until they got closer and could recognize her muted pleas for help.
“You sure this is okay?” the male voice asked.
“Yeah,” the female voice responded. “A lot of kids come here. Nobody’s living in this old place yet, so nobody bothers you if you come at the right time, when the workers are gone.”
Maggie heard the couple approaching the secret room and hopped backwards. The door flew open and Kaity entered, with Jayden right behind her. All three screamed the instant they saw one another, although the duct tape over her mouth made Maggie’s cry sound more like a chicken being choked.
“Miss Crozat, what the…”
Kaity was in such a state of shock she let the sentence trail off. Jayden went to Maggie and ripped the tape off her mouth. She cried out from the pain.
“We weren’t going to do anything bad,” Kaity, who had found her voice, blabbered. “We were going to hang out, and I’m eighteen so it’s okay and—”
Jayden held up his hand and Kaity stopped talking. “Thank you,” Maggie said, grateful to the vet. She tensed as she heard the sound of a galloping horse growing closer. “No time to explain. I need your help. Pauline Tremblay will be here any minute.”
“Belle’s mom?” Kaity exclaimed. “Seriously, what the—”
Jayden held up his hand again. “Go on, ma’am.”
“There’s a closet in the other room. Hide inside. The minute she comes in, Jayden, jump out and tackle her. But be careful. She has a gun.”
“Got it. Kaity, come.”
Jayden took Kaity’s hand, and they exited to the bedroom. Maggie hopped into the room behind them while the couple hid in the closet. The manor house front door opened and shut. There was the sound of footsteps hurrying up the staircase and onto the landing. Maggie, whose head still throbbed, heard a loud thumping noise. It took a minute to realize the sound came from her own heart.
The bedroom door opened, and Pauline entered the room. She froze at the sight of Maggie standing in front her, hands and feet still duct-taped. “How did you get out of there?”
“Now!” Maggie yelled.
The closet doorknob turned, but nothing happened. Pauline collected herself and pulled the purse pistol out of her costume pocket. She aimed it at Maggie. Suddenly the closet door flew open, and Jayden, with a b
attle cry, tackled Pauline to the ground. She fought back, but he subdued her. The roll of duct tape rolled out of Pauline’s costume pouch. Jayden grabbed it and used the tape to bind the murderess.
Kaity ran to Maggie and began pulling the tape off her hands as the air filled with the familiar, comforting sounds of police sirens. “I texted 911 while we were in the closet,” Kaity said. “Sorry we didn’t come out right away, but the doorknob inside the closet got stuck.”
“Remind me to tell Kyle and Lia to put that on their punch list,” Maggie said.
And then she collapsed to the floor in a faint.
Chapter 26
EMTs Cody Pugh and Regine Armitage made Maggie sit up during the ambulance ride to St. Pierre Parish Hospital, where the ER doctor on call diagnosed her with a slight concussion. She was checked in for observation and wheeled off to a hospital room, where, after being hooked up to a variety of monitors, she was deemed not to be at risk. Given the okay by her doctors, Maggie fell into a much-needed sleep.
She woke up a few hours later with a sensation of being watched. It wasn’t her imagination. Surrounding her bed were Ninette, Tug, Gran, and Bo. She greeted the group a touch warily. “Hello? You’re not on some kind of death watch, are you?”
There was relieved laughter, and then everyone began talking at the same time.
“Thank the Lord Almighty you’re all right.”
“We were so worried.”
“Craziest Mardi Gras ever.”
“You need some water, bébé?”
Maggie waved her hands in the air. “Stop, y’all are giving me a headache. And yes to the water.” Ninette poured her daughter a glass and handed it to her. “First of all, does Pelican PD have Pauline in custody?”
“Yup,” Bo said. “She’s under lock and key in Baton Rouge.”
“How’s poor Belle taking it?”
“Her reaction was strange, to be honest,” Ninette said. “Jules and Denise broke it to her and asked me to be there for support. When we told Belle, she seemed almost … relieved.”
Maggie wasn’t surprised by Belle’s reaction. The girl was absorbed in her own drama, and in her eyes, a mother being arrested on charges of kidnapping and suspicion of murder trumped news of a teen pregnancy. But since Belle had yet to reveal her secret, Maggie simply said, “She was probably in shock and not quite sure how to respond.”
“Probably.”
Gran gave her granddaughter’s cheek a fond caress. “Now that we know my beloved petite fille will be all right, why don’t we leave her and Bo alone for a bit? I think they deserve some time to themselves.”
“Hint taken, Mama,” Tug said. “No need for the nudge in the ribs.” He bent down and kissed Maggie on the forehead. Her mother and grand-mère did the same. “Just rest. You’re safe now, chére. We all are.”
The three started for the door. “Wait,” Maggie said. “Who won the gumbo cook-off?”
“It was postponed,” Tug said. “Everything except the parade was; the kids and tourists would have been too disappointed if that didn’t happen. Still, it’s hard to go on with Mardi Gras celebrations when one of the town’s most storied citizens turns out to be a murderous madwoman.”
“The postponement turned out to be a godsend for your father,” Ninette said while Tug motioned for his wife to be quiet.
“Dad.” Maggie’s voice held a hint of admonishment.
“I was so busy trying to figure out Cal and Art’s secret ingredient, I burned my roux,” Tug sheepishly admitted. “The good Lord taught me a lesson, I’ll tell you.”
There was a long bout of Southern Door Syndrome as the family’s goodbyes stretched out, and then they were gone. Bo took the room’s 1950s era Eames chair and pulled it next to Maggie. He placed a hand on hers and kept it there. “How are you feeling?”
“Like someone cracked a liquor bottle over my head.”
Bo chuckled. “A little advice from when I had my concussion.” Only a few months prior, Bo had also been injured by a murder suspect. “Rest as much as you can. Don’t strain your brain, because you’ll get a killer headache.”
“But I want to know everything, starting with how you made it back to Pelican.”
“When you weren’t there to greet us and there was no message, I knew right away something was wrong. I called a friend of mine who’s an officer with the New Orleans force. Ru took his own car and Jonathan picked me up in a patrol car. He turned on the siren, put the pedal to the metal, and we got here real fast.”
“Did you find evidence incriminating Pauline in New York? In Gerard’s datebook? Is Quentin MacIlhoney her lawyer? Don’t bother answering that last one; I know he is.”
Bo put a finger to her lips. “No brain strain, remember?”
“But—”
“Shh. Rest.”
She nodded and closed her eyes. Bo remained where he was, his hand on hers. I have no idea what our future is, she thought as she drifted off. All I know is I want him here now.
* * *
Tug and Ninette picked up Maggie from the hospital the next morning. It was her turn to recuperate in the Rose Room, which had been vacated by Gran’ after her bout of walking pneumonia and was empty of guests post–Mardi Gras. Maggie followed Bo’s advice and took it easy for a few days, using the time to heal as well as track the unfolding saga of Ira Stein and Gerard Damboise’s murders. She also gave Pelican PD a detailed statement of the conversations she’d had with Pauline while being held captive. The masterful maneuverings of Louisiana’s best defense attorney, Quentin MacIlhoney, would be challenged by this case, especially after the NYPD’s computer forensics expert came through with what he discovered on a computer in the Upper West Side library.
“He dug up an email thread between Pauline and Ira Stein, laying out a timeline for Pauline’s plot,” Bo explained during a break from making a test batch of gumbo with Tug. The night air was soft and silky, and the family had convened for cocktails on the manor house veranda. “Once Stein established his genealogical link to orphan Jacob and by default to Pauline, he eagerly shared this information with her—and also the details of the trip he’d already booked to meet his newfound relative in person. Knowing Ira could reveal her real lineage, Pauline tried to talk him out of the trip. When that failed, she arranged a ‘reunion’ the day before the floods that eventually deposited Ira’s body in your backyard.”
“But how on earth did Gerard Damboise get involved?” Gran’ asked, taking a sip from her second Sazerac of the early evening.
“Ira got in touch with him to see if the Historical Society had any information on Bridget and Jacob. Gerard didn’t, but directed him to the Hall of Records, where the records just happened to be ‘missing.’ Our crime scene guys found evidence they’d been shredded and then burned in the backyard fire pit at the Tremblay manse. Anyway, Gerard appears to have been very interested in Ira’s story. His datebook showed he was supposed to meet with Ira the day of the flood. Ira never showed, of course, because he was dead by then. But the datebook also revealed Gerard had several meetings with Pauline, including one on the day he died. Now that Quentin’s handling her case, she’s not talking. But putting together that meeting with what Pauline already blabbed to Maggie, we’re guessing Gerard figured out our John Doe was Ira, and hoped to use this to blackmail Pauline.”
“She must have been stunned when she came upon you and Gerard on the River Road,” Ninette said.
Maggie nodded. “She was. I thought she might faint when she saw Gerard. At the time, I assumed she was in shock. Which I guess she was, but not because of his death. It came from realizing Gerard had survived his gunshot wound long enough to drive and try to get help. But it’s interesting; she never asked me about what happened when I found him, like whether he was still alive or not. Or whether he said something to me.”
“I’m not remotely surprised,” Gran’ said. “You’ve developed a bit of a reputation for nosing around, so she was probably afraid it would make you suspi
cious.”
Bo grinned. “It wasn’t until you started full-metal nosing that you became a threat to her.”
Maggie made a face. “Okay, I think we’ve all used the word nosing enough for one day.” She stared at the Pimm’s Cup in her hand. Her father had made the drink stronger than usual, so she was consuming it in small sips. “It’s so hard to believe anyone would judge Pauline harshly for her family’s roots in this day and age. But she believed they would, and that’s all that matters. Her identity, her business—she thought everything would be destroyed if anyone discovered the secret of her family tree.”
“It does seem an antiquated way of thinking,” Gran’ acknowledged. “Although it wasn’t long ago that no amount of success or money could get your daughter onto a New Orleans Mardi Gras court if she didn’t sport an esteemed surname. I know families that didn’t have a black pot to pee in, if I may be crass, but took out loans for their daughters’ Mardi Gras gowns so they could make their debuts at a Rex or Comus ball.”
A pickup truck made a right from the River Road onto Crozat’s long drive and meandered toward the house. “I wonder who that might be,” Ninette said, peering into the darkness.
The truck parked, and Allie Randall jumped out of the driver’s seat, dressed in her uniform of ripped jeans and flannel plaid shirt over a black tank top. She waved to the family and ran up the steps to them. “Hey. Hope I’m not disturbing y’all.”
“Of course not, chére,” Ninette said with a welcoming smile. “Tug, would you get our guest an iced tea?”
“Oh, that’s okay. I won’t be long. How’re you feeling, Miss … Maggie?”
“Very close to a hundred percent better. Thanks for asking.”
“I’m … I’m super sorry about my aunt. I knew she was kind of rigid and judgy, even though she hid it well. But seriously, none of us knew she was so messed up.”
“No one did, Allie,” Maggie reassured the teen.
“Anyway…” Allie hesitated, embarrassed, then summoned up the courage to continue. “Writing the essay for the contest kind of got me interested in history, especially the history here. You know, in Pelican. When I heard about the secret room at Grove Hall, I was, like, wow. What is that? So, I did some research at the Historical Society, which is a really cool place, by the way. I found a bunch of old papers and stuff about Grove Hall that someone donated—”
