Cold Blood

by Lynda La Plante

  ‘Mrs Page, I said before that if Robert Caley harmed a hair on that little girl’s head I’d get a gun and shoot him, not just for myself but for Elizabeth. That said, I do not believe for one moment that the man I have known for twenty-odd years would have any such inclination towards his own daughter. The thought is sickening, degrading and unjust. He’s not a great man, but he’s a hard worker and has earned his money the hard way. I am one of a number of advisers who take care of Elizabeth’s money and investments, and a trusted family friend, so much so I feel that I must make sure you leave this house with no aspersions cast on Robert Caley’s name.’

  Lorraine retrieved the photograph, slipping it back into the envelope. ‘Do you know that Elizabeth Caley has a very serious drug habit?’

  ‘No, I won’t believe it.’ Lloyd got up and stared arrogantly into the mirrors behind Lorraine’s head, as though finding confirmation of his beliefs in his own image. The purpose of the mirrored wall was more than clear – it allowed Lloyd to enjoy the sight of his reflection as well as the sound of his own voice.

  ‘I can give you the address of the clinic she is in right now.’ She waited as he sat down, his face concerned and confused. ‘I am sorry if what we have discussed disturbs you, and obviously I must ask for your total—’

  ‘I would never divulge what you have told me, Mrs Page, not to anyone, so help me God. I am stunned, stunned . . . shocked, because if what you say is true it means that those nearest and dearest to me are nothing but liars.’

  ‘Not necessarily.’ She smiled.

  ‘What?’

  Lorraine snapped her briefcase closed. ‘Perhaps they chose for you not to know. As an investigator, it is my job to find out what lies beneath the surface.’

  ‘Isn’t your job, Mrs Page, to find Anna Louise?’

  She nodded, walking to the door. ‘Yes, Mr Dulay, it is, but if during my attempts to trace her I uncover certain discrepancies or illogical statements, then I have to follow them through. If you have nothing to add or nothing that can help me, then I thank you for your time.’

  ‘Robert Caley is a good man,’ he said lamely.

  She turned at the door. ‘Yes, I think he is, but I have to make certain that he is in no way connected to his daughter’s disappearance so I can eliminate him as a suspect.’

  He rose slowly from his chair, moving towards her. ‘Is he suspected by your agency?’

  ‘Everyone I meet is a suspect until I get to the truth, Mr Dulay. If there is any way you could find out for me if Mr Caley has been using his daughter’s trust fund, I’d be very grateful if you could let me know. May I call you again?’

  Dulay agreed. He didn’t say goodbye as Lorraine closed the door behind her and found her own way out. The big man sat in a dazed, uncomprehending state, feeling outraged and betrayed. He decided there and then that he would withdraw from the Caley development. He wanted to confront Robert Caley to his face, but first he wanted to know if the bastard had touched a cent of Anna Louise’s trust fund. He more than anyone could check it out – the hundred million dollars had been his.

  Lorraine felt used up and disgusted with herself at the same time. She knew what she had just done was wrong and unprofessional. Part of her didn’t know why she wanted to put so much pressure on Dulay but perhaps in reality it was a roundabout way of putting it on Robert Caley because of what Tilda Brown had said. She hated him to be under suspicion, wanted him to be innocent. At the same time she was sure he was guilty, but of what? She refused to believe that it was now more than likely that he had murdered his own daughter.

  Rosie at last found the sign for the Voodoo Museum on Dumaine and entered the building nervously to find a group of eight other people, mostly women, standing in a small reception area buying a variety of charm powders, novelties, dolls and candles offered for sale, while they waited for the tour to begin. Behind the young woman at the desk was the portrait of an imposing woman dressed in the costume of the last century; she wore a kerchief on her head and gold hooped earrings, while her skin was a rich yellow-brown with just a hint of copper, her eyes a fathomless black. Even in painted form her gaze seemed to penetrate the years, and her presence dominated the room. When the tour guide appeared, it was to this painting he first drew their attention.

  ‘This, ladies and gentlemen, is a portrait of Marie Laveau, the most powerful queen of voodoo this city has ever seen, called the Popess of Voodoo by the time she was forty years old because she was consulted by the gentlefolk of that time, as well as by her own people, and even by royalty, so that her reputation was known all over the world. Her powers were legendary, and when she walked in the streets the crowds would stand silent and hold up their children to catch sight of her: it was as if they knew people would still be talking about her for a hundred years after she died. She held her rituals near the Bayou St John, and people said they saw her walk on the water; she could make the sun go dark and call down the spirit of the storm, and she could call up the spirits of love, and, of course . . .’ he stopped and smiled, ‘of destruction too.’

  Rosie looked into the ageless eyes of the great sorceress: she felt certain she had seen the face before, but she racked her brains to remember where.

  A hush had now fallen on the gaggle of tourists as the guide led them down a narrow passageway in which hung the portraits of a number of voodoo queens, none, however, of Marie Laveau’s pre-eminence, some she had been taught by, and then vanquished or eclipsed. The guide stopped in front of a portrait of another light-skinned young black woman in a formal, old-fashioned dress, with black ringlets knotted at the back of her head and arranged in front of her ears: these eyes were cruel.

  ‘This, people say, is Marie’s daughter, Marie II, if you want to call her that, said to be more drawn to the darker side of her powers than her mother. People said they saw Marie Laveau up to 1918, 1919, and it was more likely Marie number two they saw, though there are people say Marie her mother never died: you go rap on her tomb and she’ll hear you.’

  ‘Did Marie Laveau have any other family – like, are there any of her relatives living today?’ asked one of the group with interest.

  The guide laughed. ‘There’s a lot of voodoo practitioners say they can trace a connection to the bloodline of Marie Laveau, but the strongest claim is that of the Salina family – there are two sisters who were both practitioners at one time, and those of you who are staying for Carnival will have the opportunity to see a daughter of the family, Ruby Corbello, who will be queen of a new black krewe that has been formed this year.’

  The guide ushered them further down the passage to a room from which issued a rhythmic and strangely tranquillizing drum-beat; the group stepped hesitantly inside to find themselves surrounded by an eerie collection of carved masks and statues, some decorated with beads and jewellery, and with dishes containing offerings of various kinds and lighted candles arranged in front of them. One corner of the room was separated from the rest by old iron cemetery railings: inside were tombstones and animal and human bones that made Rosie shudder despite the guide’s explanation that, for a religion believing in communion with the departed ancestors, signs of death were not to be feared, but cherished for protection. He pointed out one glass case of drums and other shamanic instruments to facilitate the journey to the spirit world, and another containing a wide variety of bones, dried animal claws and skins, roots, powders, beans and barks: each one of these, he told them, was a mojo, and their combination by a skilled practitioner yielded a gris-gris, a powerful protective amulet often worn in a sealed bag around the neck. In the final corner of the room was a large number of small statues and dolls, for the most part crudely made of a handful of straw or dried grass tied around two crossed sticks and covered with a few scraps of material, with tiny, oddly fierce skulls and faces then painted on. Some of these, the guide said, were to enhance fertility: he said nothing about any other use.

  The sweet smell of incense greeted them at the door of the next room: her
e the masks and statues were brightly painted and seemed joyful and celebratory after the shadows next door. Richly worked hangings and religious paintings showed many signs of Christian influence and images of Catholic saints were pinned up over a cloth-covered table on which stood more candles, statues and a bottle of rum. In front of them a picture of the crucifixion faced a small prie-dieu, and the guide proceeded to explain how voodoo was not a set of evil spells, but a religion which had been the only link with their own culture black people had been allowed to retain in the days of slavery, and which had sustained the people through those harsh times. It saw God latent in the whole of creation and later had blended easily with Christianity, the loas, or individual spirits, becoming identified with the angels and saints.

  Marie Laveau herself, he went on, had attended mass regularly at St Louis Cathedral, had friends among the clergy and had done much charitable work among condemned prisoners and during the fever epidemics. None the less there was a frisson of unease when the guide indicated that the small wooden structure in the corner housed a python named after Marie Laveau’s famous snake, Zombi, symbol of the bridge between spirit and material planes, and a few members of the group craned their necks to peep nervously through the glass panes.

  The tour was officially over, and Rosie stepped closer to the altar while other members of the group looked at the snake or examined the old tree-stump into which Marie Laveau’s followers had dropped prayers and petitions, and saw four more of the disturbing dolls arranged on a rack above the candle flames. The presence of a world she did not understand, but which still lived in the city around her, filled her with awe and a touch of fascination, and she bought some souvenirs and a booklet describing the career of Marie Laveau before she left. The beautiful and commanding face seemed to haunt her, provoking a persistent feeling of déjà vu, but perhaps Marie Laveau had made everyone who had ever seen her feel that they had always known her, that in her the mysterious and the familiar met.

  Rooney sat sweltering in his rental. He’d been parked outside the designated meeting point for over half an hour, and felt a little uneasy to be sitting in the tough downtown waterfront area with a rental firm’s sticker in the back window, someone obviously off his home turf. He was about to give up the wait when he saw the patrol car cruising slowly behind him. He adjusted the driving mirror to watch his contact approach. He shook his head. Men, and cops in particular, come in all shapes and sizes, but he had never seen one that resembled Harris J. Harper.

  ‘You Rooney?’ Harper said at the car window. Close to, his face was as weird as his fat, wobbling body. He must have been one of those beautiful bonny babies with an upturned nose, rosebud mouth and bright blue eyes, because whereas the rest of his body had grown, his face had remained the same size, his cheeks puffed out, and his layered chins gave him the unfortunate appearance of having no neck whatsoever.

  Rooney nodded, and Harper waddled his way round to the passenger door. When he sat inside the car it felt like the springs would give way.

  ‘You been waitin’ long?’

  Rooney nodded. ‘Yep, since ten, but that’s okay.’

  ‘Could do with a beer, huh?’

  You said it.’

  ‘Okay, Captain Rooney, you follow me, I know a bar a block away, just stick on my tail.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  Harper eased his blubbery body out and then leaned in. ‘Er . . . five hundred bucks okay with you?’

  Rooney hesitated. ‘Hope it’s worth it, that’s a lot of dough.’

  Harper shut the door and patted the top of the rental. ‘Be worth it, Captain, be worth it.’

  Rosie continued. ‘Voodoo is a religion as serious as any other. There’s a lot of occult, kinda dark stuff that’s got associated, but that’s not the point. It is a way of connecting with positive, spiritual parts of experience, and is very natural, an important part of a lot of people’s lives . . .’

  ‘It’s all bullshit,’ Nick said, yawning.

  Rosie leaned forward. ‘I don’t think so. Everyone thinks it’s a lot of evil stuff about killing people and turning them into zombies, you listening, Nick?’

  ‘Yeah, it’s rivetin’ Rosie.’

  ‘What making someone a zombie actually is is a form of sanction against people who committed some very serious crime, like murder maybe—’

  Nick rolled his eyes. ‘Give me the good ol’ electric chair any time, baby.’

  Rosie looked at him in irritation. ‘I won’t tell you if you mess around. The priest could give them a kind of nerve poison that would produce a state a Western doctor would think was death, and the person would be what they called “passed by the ground” – buried and then dug up again. That’s why white people call zombies the walking dead.’

  Nick looked up and saw Lorraine heading towards their table. ‘Here comes one now.’

  Rosie looked up. ‘What?’

  ‘A zombie. It’s Mrs Page.’ Lorraine slumped into a seat beside Nick and Rosie in the shaded garden of the hotel.

  ‘Listen, we maybe need to rethink a few things. I paid a call to an old pal, used to be in the drug squad with me, Leroy Able. In fact, I’ve not been in contact with him for more’n ten years but we used to get on . . .’ Nick drained his beer before continuing. ‘Okay, you know there are high priestesses in the voodoo church, they are pretty powerful women, and the top of the heap in the voodoo pile is always, you will be pleased to know, a woman. It’s a big deal, Lorraine, they are like royalty down here and very powerful.’

  ‘I’ve been to the Voodoo Museum,’ Rosie began, but Lorraine cut her short. Neither of them had given her a moment even to say hello.

  ‘Christ, Nick, what has this got to do with our case?’

  He snapped, ‘I’m gettin’ there, all right? There are two sisters who are real big-time, very dominant with the potions, whatever the hell they do. Rosie’s got some stuff from the museum you can read for yourself. According to Leroy, Juda Salina and her sister are the top dogs.’

  Lorraine was stunned. She reached for a Coke can and shook it – empty. She looked over the table for something else to drink. The thirst had started.

  ‘Why didn’t you tell me that?’ Rosie asked.

  ‘I was getting to it, Rosie.’

  ‘Juda Salina’s sister, Edith Corbello, still lives here in a real low-grade area, though she’s not so active now. Remember you wanted Raoul checked out? Well he is Edith Corbello’s son, Juda Salina’s nephew. There are another two boys, called Willy and Jesse, and two daughters, the youngest called Sugar May and last but not least, Ruby Corbello, hairdresser, wannabe model, who is going to be a queen in the Carnival this year.’

  Lorraine now really did need that drink – her mouth was dry, and her head throbbed. ‘Okay, now let’s piece all this together because my hair’s standing on end, Nick – oh, and can you pour me some water?’

  Rosie poured a glass of water for Lorraine, her attention on Nick.

  ‘Just forget all this voodoo crap and look at Juda Salina. She had a hold on Elizabeth Caley, knew her from here, they even brought her back here to try and help trace Anna Louise.’ Nick lit a cigarette and passed it to Lorraine, then lit one for himself. He had seen the way she had gulped at the water Rosie had passed to her, noticed that her hand was shaking visibly as she drained the glass.

  ‘All along we’ve been looking for a motive, a reason, what if it was blackmail? I mean, you found those pictures of Anna Louise, you dug up stuff on Elizabeth Caley . . .’

  ‘Wait, wait, Nick, not so fast. You suggesting the motive all along was blackmail and it went wrong?’ Lorraine frowned, rubbing her temples as she tried to assimilate everything that was being said to her.

  ‘Yeah, led by that fat bitch Juda Salina. She’s got enough family down here to move a body, she may have even gone to them . . .’

  Lorraine dragged on her cigarette. ‘I better see this, what was her name, Corbello? Any more water, Rosie?’

  Nick took her han
d. ‘A second, I don’t believe in all this shit, right? An’ my pal Leroy said he doesn’t, but what he does believe is that these people are dangerous, not with the spells and that crap but they’d kill you soon as spit in your eye. And he warned me to go very carefully because they got a whole army. They beat them drums and you’re never seen again.’

  ‘Like Anna Louise Caley?’ Lorraine said softly, her hand already reaching for the glass of water Rosie was pouring for her.

  ‘Exactly, but this moves Robert Caley into second position now because we got something outside, something that maybe makes more sense, nothing to do with his casino or his money . . .’

  ‘Drugs?’ she asked, gulping at the liquid.

  ‘Could be. We know Anna Louise boozed and got stoned with her little friend Tilda Brown. Maybe on that night she disappeared she went to the Corbello woman’s house to score and saw something? Say that Juda Salina, whom we know she went to see, was drug-pushing, not just here but in LA.’

  Lorraine ran her hands through her hair. It was wringing wet – she was soaked in sweat. ‘Shit, Nick, I think you’re right, we’ve been on the wrong fucking track all along.’

  Nick nodded. ‘And I don’t think Elizabeth Caley’s involved either. Maybe she’s just one hell of a good customer and we know she needed to score drugs, so the link is Juda Salina and her family.’

  Rosie left the table and made her way out of the courtyard: Lorraine hardly seemed to notice that she had got up.

  ‘Where are you going?’ Nick called after her.

  ‘Going to get some more refreshments if it’s all right with you,’ she replied, without even turning round. Nick stubbed out his cigarette, looking sidelong at Lorraine.

  ‘What’s up, sugar?’

  ‘Nothing’s up, Nick, maybe I’m just tired.’ She hunted for another cigarette in her purse: Nick tapped another out of his own crumpled pack, lit it and passed it to her as before.

  ‘I hate this brand, like smoking something from out of the refrigerator,’ she said, none the less dragging hard on the cigarette, her foot tapping nervously against the table leg.