She decided she’d tell the truth, up to a point, and tell it fast. She felt immense relief that her mother had Nat there with her, in her life. That fact would help her be more honest. “It’s bad news. It is. Four cops were shot here today. They were ambushed in restaurants. Two of them were killed, two of them were badly hurt.”
“Oh my God. Oh my God. Where are you? Where are you calling me from? Are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” Maureen said, though she wasn’t and she knew her mother could hear it. “I’m calling from a parking lot. I wasn’t shot. I wasn’t hurt. I’m fine.”
She could hear her mother yelling for Nat. For once, Maureen didn’t want to talk to him; she wanted to talk to her mother. She wanted her mother’s attention. But she felt her throat closing, acid rising from her belly to the back of her throat. She had to get the story out, had to finish telling it quick, before she lost control of herself. Hysterics on her part would only make her mother more upset, and she wasn’t sure how many of her fellow officers could see her. The conversation couldn’t last. Only one key piece remained to tell. She choked out the words.
“Mom, Preacher got shot. He got shot. He could die. They shot Preacher.”
With that, the levee broke.
Dizzy, weeping, her nose running, exhausted beyond reason, Maureen eased down onto her knees as best she could before she collapsed. Everything that had held her upright since she’d spotted Detillier outside of Dizzy’s crumbled underneath her. She could barely hold the phone to her ear. She could hear Nat’s confused questions in the background. She could hear her mother’s voice. “Oh, my baby. Oh my God.”
On her knees in the Walmart parking lot, Maureen wept, her mother’s voice in her ear, the sobs coming hard like kicks to the stomach.
24
Shortly after nine that night, Maureen stood outside the front gate of a two-story apartment building on Coliseum Street, across from Lafayette Cemetery.
Before lighting the cigarette between her lips, she offered the flame to the tall woman standing next to her. The woman, named Beatrice, was thin as a cocktail straw, her mahogany bob streaked with gray. She leaned down to the glow in Maureen’s cupped hands. Her long wool coat reached the tops of her tennis shoes. She wore heavy makeup, and her waxy lipstick left a crimson ring on the filter of her long white cigarette. She had wine on her breath.
She exhaled to the sky, asking Maureen, “Will it be much longer?”
“The detective is on her way,” Maureen said. “It’s been a long day.”
“Of course, of course,” Beatrice replied, looking away, resting her elbow in her palm as she held her cigarette close to her face. “I only meant, if there’s a better time…”
That afternoon Beatrice had called the Sixth District wanting to talk about something she’d seen the night before, something possibly related, she thought, to the murder in the cemetery. Her message had been lost in the chaos following the shootings, and had only been passed along to Maureen a couple of hours into her patrol shift. Beatrice, returning home after walking her dog, had been quite surprised to find Maureen waiting for her at the gate more than four hours after her original call. Maureen had conducted a brief preliminary interview, deciding the woman could have something useful to offer, and had called Atkinson to let her know they’d found a witness. They’d been waiting nearly half an hour.
Beatrice turned and looked up at her dog, a serene white shepherd mix watching from the metal staircase that led to the second-story. “A few more minutes, dear.” She looked at Maureen. “He always gets a treat after a walk. He’ll sit there and wait all night for it.”
“I know the feeling,” Maureen said. A white sedan turned the corner and headed their way down the potholed center of Coliseum Street. “Here she comes now.”
Atkinson parked close to them and climbed out of the car. She wore faded black cords that flared over her cowboy boots. Her broad shoulders stretched the limits of her bright red down jacket. Her huge hands were bare despite the cold. She carried her radio in her left hand and extended the other to Beatrice as she got closer. She offered Maureen a curt nod. “Officer.”
“Detective Sergeant,” Maureen said.
Atkinson shook with Beatrice. “I’m Detective Sergeant Christine Atkinson, Homicide.”
Beatrice released Atkinson’s hand. She glanced at Maureen then dropped her gaze. “Someone did die. There was talk in the neighborhood, I was hoping it was wrong.”
“She was alive when we found her,” Atkinson said. “Unfortunately, she’d lost so much blood from the murder wound, she died before we could get sufficient help. Really, though, the wound was so catastrophic, a terrible gash to the throat, I don’t know if there was any saving her no matter when she was found.”
Beatrice, who had turned pea-soup green, dropped her cigarette and grabbed the fence, steadying herself. Atkinson, thankfully, stopped talking. The dog trotted down the stairs and barked once at Atkinson. Then he wagged his tail while growling at her, as if simultaneously scolding, forgiving, and warning Atkinson for making his owner feel bad. Atkinson looked at Beatrice, trying and failing to raise a fake smile. “He’s a wonderful animal.”
She’s so much better with the dead, Maureen thought, than she is with the living. It’s the one hole in her game.
“The reason we found the victim when we did,” Atkinson said, “is because someone called the nonemergency number to report a dead person in the cemetery. Was that you?”
“No,” Beatrice said. “I didn’t call anyone until this afternoon.”
“Can you tell me,” Atkinson asked, “what you saw that caused you to call us today?”
“I have a studio downtown,” Beatrice said. “I’m a painter. I work odd hours, sometimes until dawn. I always take Cosmo out for a walk when I get home. Usually, he’s been alone a long time by then, and it helps me unwind. I like the Garden District best late at night. It’s rather mysterious and beautiful, especially when there’s a good heavy fog coming in off the river.”
“So you were coming out of the gate here,” Atkinson said, “when you saw? What?”
“As I told Officer Coughlin,” Beatrice said, “I was coming through my gate with Cosmo, around midnight, and I saw two people hopping the wall there by the entrance, climbing into the cemetery.”
“Two people?” Atkinson asked.
Beatrice turned, gesturing toward the cemetery gates. “I saw two people go over the wall. Maybe others went before them and they were the last two, but I saw two.”
“Why didn’t you call anyone last night?” Atkinson asked. “Neighborhood security? The police?”
Beatrice shook her head. “I didn’t think anything of it. I see people, kids mostly, sometimes tourists, climb over the wall constantly. It’s so short there.” She shrugged. “For mischief, to smoke some pot. For sex. For the creepy thrill of it. The tour guides are always going on about vampires in this neighborhood. There’s hardly trouble from it, not even vandalism, really. The neighbors know it happens. Nothing bad has ever come of it that I’d heard of. Until last night.”
“And these two people,” Atkinson asked. “What did they look like?”
“One was a woman. Thin, long hair. Baggy clothes but definitely a woman. She climbed over second. Her friend stood atop the wall and helped her over. A boy, it looked like, if I had to guess. A young man, maybe. I couldn’t see his face. He was short, slender, wearing a long coat with the collar turned up. He seemed to have short hair.”
“Would you know the male,” Atkinson asked, “if you saw him again?”
“That might be difficult,” Beatrice said. “I didn’t see his face, the woman’s, either.” She slid another cigarette from her pack. Cosmo let loose a short howl. “I swear he knows these mean we’re staying outside.”
Maureen offered her lighter again and Beatrice lit up. She said, “Do you think the boy was the one who killed her?”
“That’s where we’ll start things,” Atkinson said. “Did
you hear voices? Did either of them seem frightened or angry? Like maybe they didn’t want to go over the wall.”
“They didn’t speak that I could hear,” Beatrice said. “Although, once they were over the wall, the woman started singing.”
“Definitely a woman?” Atkinson asked.
“Absolutely,” Beatrice said, nodding, proud of her certainty. “More than anything, that voice told me one of them was female. I was walking away with Cosmo by then, and I don’t remember the song, none of the words or anything. But I stopped to listen, just for a few seconds.” She pressed one hand to her heart, her eyes getting wet. “He cut her throat? Excuse me.” She coughed into her fist. “The woman had the most extraordinary voice. Mesmerizing. It’s such a shame. Such a terrible shame. Horrible.”
“It is,” Maureen said.
“Do you think you’ll catch the man who killed her?”
“I like our chances,” Atkinson said. “Thank you for calling us. You’ve been very helpful.”
Beatrice seemed startled the interview was over. Maureen could tell her mind was lingering on the singing she’d heard coming over the cemetery walls. “All right, then. I’m sorry I couldn’t give you more. Officer Coughlin has my information if you need to speak with me again. I keep my phone off when I’m at the studio—I can’t be disturbed while I’m working—but, as I said, I keep odd hours, so call anytime.”
Atkinson handed Beatrice a business card. “Same goes for you. You remember anything else, if you see that man again, please call me. Day or night.”
“Of course,” Beatrice said. She pulled open her gate. “Well then, good night, ladies. Good luck.”
“Thank you,” Atkinson said. She waved at the dog. “Good night, Cosmo.” He growled at her before trotting up the stairs to wait for his owner at their apartment door, his tail wagging.
“Oh, Beatrice,” Maureen called, “I forgot one thing. Please tell the detective about the object.”
“The object?” Atkinson asked. “That sounds ominous.”
“I’m so sorry, of course,” Beatrice said. “Before she climbed the wall, the woman passed something up to the boy, for him to hold so she could climb. I saw him bend down and take it from her.”
“Any thoughts on what it was?” Atkinson asked.
“I couldn’t really see it,” Beatrice said, “but there was this musical tinkling. I swear it sounded like wind chimes. I didn’t think anything of it at the time. People often leave gifts for the dead in there. Helps with the guilt of going on living, I suppose.”
25
Three hours later, Maureen sat in her patrol car, chain-smoking.
She was parked under a big magnolia tree and between two streetlights, having positioned the car in a convenient pool of shadow. Her location, unknown to her fellow cops, put her not far from Audubon Park and not anywhere near where she was supposed to be at that hour. In addition to the cruiser’s engine, Maureen had turned off the lights and the radio. She needed to concentrate. An hour ago, word had gone out that Preacher had survived his surgery. He had been moved into recovery. He certainly wasn’t well, but he wasn’t dying. Wasn’t close to it. Earlier reports, Maureen had learned, had exaggerated the direness of his condition. With the news about Preacher, the emotional scaffolding inside her had collapsed, leaving her physically wobbly and mentally zombified.
To resharpen her focus, she’d rolled down the car window, inviting in the damp nighttime chill. She turned her face to the wet cold, breathing it deep into her lungs. Between drags on her cigarette she blew into her cupped hands. Running the engine so she could use the heater tempted her, but the steady warmth would put her right to sleep. She needed to be cold. Also, she needed to remain inconspicuous. Better if no one saw her sitting there. She wasn’t on a street, or in a neighborhood, that the common street cop often visited, not without an invitation.
This particular short, narrow, smoothly paved dead-end street existed to access the two enormous homes on it. Homes that faced the park. One of them, the brick behemoth in Maureen’s rearview, belonged to a retired federal prosecutor. The other home, the one she watched, was the regal antebellum mansion belonging to Solomon Heath.
The house was dark, and had been since Maureen had arrived. If Heath was home, he either slept or was sequestered deep inside the house. A lone gas lamp burned beside the back door, the reflected flame igniting glowing crystals in the door’s cut-glass window. That was the same door Solomon had made Maureen use the night she’d met him, when she’d worked a security detail at this very house. That was the night he’d bribed her, or had tried to, depending on how she interpreted things. She’d done nothing for the man, but she’d kept his money.
Recalling that security cameras watched every inch of the Heath property, she had parked the cruiser beyond their range. She’d found a spot to be invisible, as she had in the Irish Garden. What she had to decide was what to do next. She wasn’t tucked in a barroom booth, a big sweatshirt hiding her appearance. She was in a police cruiser tonight, in uniform.
Maureen settled deeper into her seat, her arm hanging out the window. She fixed her gaze on the gas lamp’s dancing flame.
She didn’t know what she had expected to discover sitting outside Solomon’s house. Even if the lights were on, what did she hope to see? She felt he needed watching, so she watched. Her thought process hadn’t advanced much beyond that basic instinct. Did she think he’d have a late-night visitor arriving at the back door? Or did she think she’d be able to accost him as he came creeping home in the wee hours from nefarious doings about town, maybe with a young girl or young boy on his arm? She had tailed him on and off for a month and had found no indication of such behavior. If only he would make it that easy, she thought. If only he were that sloppy. That ordinary. But you didn’t get to where he was, and remain where he had managed to stay, by being sloppy. He wasn’t the kind of man to commit common sins.
After weeks of watching his house, of following him to work, she had witnessed no wrongdoing of any kind. She had gained no leverage against him, had none to provide to Atkinson or Detillier. She could sit outside his house a hundred nights in a row and Solomon would give her nothing. Anything useful she got from him, she was going to have to take.
26
Before ending up outside Solomon’s house, Maureen had visited the construction sites of the new jail and then the new hospital. She’d even smoked a couple of cigarettes parked by the demolition site of the Iberville projects. She stared down security guards who stared right back at her, hoping she’d move along so they could go back to sleep or smoke another joint.
As she moved from site to site, she had started wondering—as she stared at the deep holes and the rising structures, at the boards and the bricks and the girders, at the silent enormous machines that tore down and built up, at the placards on the fences with the Heath Design and Construction logo alongside their licenses and permits and their long list of worksite rules—about who was really in charge of the world she lived and worked in. Her house had been shot up, she realized, only days after she’d taken money from Solomon that he’d intended as a bribe, only for her to work against him in the end. Who had really given that first order to kill her weeks ago? Had it come from Caleb? That was hard to imagine. He was a spoiled punk. He had provided the Watchmen her street address, but he hadn’t picked up a gun against her.
A group like the Watchmen—angry, violent people who fancied themselves revolutionaries in their grandest, suicidal fantasies—wouldn’t look to a weak man like Caleb as a leader. He was the rich kid they let hang around the clubhouse because he had money to buy guns, because he knew people who had information and influence. They didn’t embrace him; they tolerated him. They would follow someone else.
Solomon wouldn’t lead the Watchmen directly, wouldn’t dirty his own hands with their particular brand of USA crazy. Were he involved with them, Maureen thought, whether for his son’s sake or for other reasons, he’d exert his authority throu
gh a proxy.
Maureen figured Leon Gage, despite his middle-school math teacher looks, was that leader Solomon used. He had the air of the pulpit about him. She could see him raging at a crowd, those blue eyes blazing. She knew she had no evidence connecting Solomon to the doings and dealings of the Watchmen, no proof that Leon took his orders from Solomon.
Light from inside the house suddenly filled the back door’s window and spilled onto the slate steps. Floodlights illuminated the yard and the back door opened. Solomon stepped out of the house. Maureen could see his breath as he pulled the door closed behind him.
He wore, as he always did, khakis and brown loafers. Against the cold he wore a thick down vest over a red flannel shirt. He had a wool snap-brim cap pulled low on his head and wore leather gloves. He carried something in his left hand. Maureen sat up straight for a better look. A thermos. He clutched it to his chest like a football as he walked in her direction.
Maureen zipped up her leather jacket, pulled on her knit cap, and got out of the car. Fuck it, she thought. She unbuckled her weapon. For weeks, you’ve been hoping to stumble into exactly this moment. And now there’s no one else around, no joggers in the park, no construction workers at the worksite. And no Preacher to rein her in and scold her.
Maureen decided as she stepped into the street that Solomon had ordered the hit on Preacher. She had seen Solomon recognize him in the park. And he had revived the kill order on her; she was sure of that, too.
With Caleb safely sequestered in the UAE and the NOPD working overtime to erase Quinn’s dirty history and look the other way at the circumstances surrounding his death, Maureen decided Solomon had convinced Leon Gage that now was the time for starting his war against the NOPD, using Gage to get rid of the cops that threatened his son. Gage was a leader to his men, but he was a weapon for Solomon—as Quinn had been, one of his countless tools.
Maureen figured that Leon, who was mourning a son who had crossed over much more than an ocean, hadn’t needed much prodding.
Let the Devil Out Page 21
