Fatal Cajun Festival

by Ellen Byron

  “She’s here,” Bo whispered, his tone intense.

  Maggie turned and saw Rufus running to them, pulling Zenephra along with him. “I didn’t want to turn on my siren and spook him,” the police chief said between gasps for breath. “Where we at?”

  “Your timing’s perfect,” Bo said. Then he turned to Zenephra. “Ma’am, he wants to see you. Let’s step this out. Maggie, give her the bullhorn. First you’ll—”

  Zenephra dismissed him with a wave of her hand. “I don’t need no steps or no bullhorn. I’ve known that child my entire life.” She strode across the street. Tension filled the air as the SWAT team took position. Zenephra stepped onto the old home’s rickety porch. “Toulouse? You in there?”

  “Yeah. Miss Z, that really you?”

  “Yes, it is, baby boy. Can I come in? I’d like to have a talk with you.”

  The front door opened a crack. Zenephra held up her hand to prevent the officers from making a move. Then she disappeared inside the house.

  “I sure hope we don’t end up with two hostages,” Rufus said, his expression grim. He looked around. “What’s that thumping sound? Where’s it coming from?”

  “My heart,” Maggie said, embarrassed. “Sorry.”

  The responders fell silent as they waited for whatever might come next. It was a kind of quiet Maggie had never experienced before—at once taut with anticipation, yet so mute she could hear the rush of I-10 traffic four miles away. The shack’s front door opened slightly again. Zenephra’s hand appeared, waving a torn white napkin.

  “Pull back,” Bo ordered, adding to a sharpshooter positioned in a tree, “Not you.”

  “We’re coming out,” Zenephra called from inside the shack. “Your friend first, then me and Toulouse.”

  The door opened wider, and Gaynell took an uneasy step outside. She saw Maggie, Bo, and Rufus, and relaxed. Bo motioned for her to come to them, and she did, slowly at first, then breaking into a run. Maggie opened her arms, and Gaynell fell into them. “Gay, chère,” Maggie said, hugging her friend hard. The young woman’s baby shower outfit was covered with dust, her hair matted with cobwebs. Tears left rivulets in the streaks of dirt that stained her cheeks.

  “I’m okay,” Gaynell said. “But man, was it gross in that house.” This engendered tension-release giggles from both women.

  “It’s gonna be us now,” Zenephra called, and all attention snapped back to the shack. Zenephra emerged, holding Toulouse by the hand. She held a gun down at her side.

  “He looks so broken,” Maggie couldn’t help murmuring.

  Cal and Artie approached Zenephra. Artie held up a pair of handcuffs, and the woman waved the gun at him. “Cuff him and I’ll use this thing myself.”

  “Sorry, ma’am,” Cal said. “We have to.”

  “It’s okay, Miss Z,” Toulouse said, a quaver in his voice, his tone defeated.

  He put his hands behind his back. Artie cuffed Toulouse, then escorted the musician to a police car. Gaynell wept, and Maggie put a reassuring arm around her friend’s waist. “I’m not crying for me,” Gay said. “I’m crying for him.”

  * * *

  Maggie drove Gaynell to Pelican PD headquarters, where she gave a statement to Bo and Rufus. “I didn’t want to press charges,” Gaynell told her friend afterward.

  “But kidnapping’s a felony, so the state has to bring them,” Quentin MacIlhoney, who’d joined them, explained. “The ADA’s also going to charge Toulouse in Pickner’s murder and the attempt on the drummer’s life. The cases are still circumstantial, but much stronger than the one they had against you, Gaynell.”

  Gaynell released a shaky breath. “I need to get home. I could use a shower and a rest. Maggie, you mind dropping me?”

  “Of course not. Let me tell Bo I’m leaving.”

  She headed down the hallway and found Bo in his office. He looked exhausted but smiled when he saw her. “Hey. Come on in.”

  Maggie did so, shutting the door behind her.

  “You heard about the charges Jerriere’s bringing against Toulouse?”

  Maggie nodded.

  “That’ll get Gaynell off the hook.”

  “Which is good news.” Maggie paused. “So why don’t I feel relieved? Why do I still feel so … unsettled?”

  “Because you don’t think Toulouse is the killer,” Bo said. “And neither do I.”

  Chapter 22

  Maggie dropped into the office chair facing Bo’s desk. “I’m so glad I’m not alone on this. But why do we feel this way? Tell me, oh Great Detective.”

  Bo pushed his own chair back and rested his feet on the desk. “Pony Pickner’s murder walked a line between spontaneous and premeditated. By that I mean the urge to kill may have been spontaneous, but the method wasn’t. Someone had to know that they needed to remove the safety ground connection. They also had to know when and where to place the water so that Tammy wasn’t electrocuted.”

  “Unless she was the target and they messed up the timing.”

  Bo lifted a corner of his mouth. “Thank you, devil’s advocate. No worries; we haven’t ruled that out. Still, no matter who was the target, the killer did some planning. Toulouse is a deeply damaged guy. Frankly, I’m amazed he’s held it together this long. There’s a lot at war inside of him. His faith versus his anger, his need to be a hero versus his past as an abuser. I think killing Pony would have broken him completely. And my guess is he would have confessed. Instead, he swears on a Bible he didn’t kill the guy or attack Bokie, and I believe him.” Bo took his feet off the desk and planted them on the floor. “So does Rufus. But that intel doesn’t leave this office. We want the murderer to think they’re free and clear. We make a lot of collars when overconfidence leads to sloppiness on the part of a killer.”

  “This is totally inappropriate,” Maggie said, “but you are really hot right now.”

  Bo burst out laughing. “We’re gonna have to do something about that once this dang case is closed.”

  * * *

  Maggie drove Gaynell home, then headed to Crozat. As soon as she parked, she saw Tammy stomping toward her in six-inch black patent-leather boots. Narcisse shadowed her as usual. Maggie got out of the Falcon and slammed the heavy car door. Just the sight of the nasty singer annoyed her. She ignored Tammy and trudged toward the shotgun cottage. Tammy didn’t take the hint. “So now my accordionist is in jail,” she yelled at Maggie’s back.

  “What do you care? You fired him,” Maggie said, continuing to walk.

  “Only because every crazy thing that’s happened here made him lose his flippin’ mind. What is wrong with this stupid town? Where am I gonna get a Cajun musician in two hours?”

  Maggie, her last nerve worked, stopped and turned around. “It’s Cajun country,” she yelled back. “They’re all over the place.”

  “You wish. Everyone’s booked up for Jazz Fest.”

  “Yeah,” Narcisse said, tossing in his useless two cents.

  “You know what, Tammy,” Maggie said through gritted teeth, “if you’d been nicer to Gaynell, you would’ve had the best Cajun musician in the state by your side. Instead, you treated her like something you scrape off your shoe, you bullied her, and made her an outcast with her own band. You deserve every problem you’ve got.”

  “Who do you think you are, talking to me that way? Gaynell’s the dang reason I got all these problems. I can’t believe Toulouse went crazy for her. Probably because he knew he couldn’t get to me.”

  Narcisse puffed out his chest. “You got your security to thank for that.”

  Maggie’s face burned red with anger. “That’s it, Tammy, I have had it with you.” She took a step toward the singer.

  “No,” Narcisse yelled, jumping in front of Tammy.

  “Whoa,” the country star cried out. She tried to keep her balance and failed. Tammy tumbled to the ground, taking Narcisse down with her. She screamed as his elbow landed on her hair and pulled out an extension. “Get away from me!” She tried pushing Narciss
e away, then grabbed the chunk of hair. “This is American hair, not Pakistani. It’s worth a fortune. Ow!”

  “Sorry, my watch is caught on your ponytail holder.”

  “If you ever bully Gaynell again or try and pull some mean-girl act,” Maggie said to the pile of humanity trying to untangle from each other, “or say anything bad about her to Little Earlie or anyone else, I will go public with what a it-rhymes-with-witch you are. I’ll back it up with everything I’ve seen since you’ve been here, and believe me, I have seen a lot.”

  Maggie stormed off to the manor house front parlor. She poured herself a shot of bourbon and took a sip to calm down. Then she collapsed onto the room’s ornately carved settee, pulled out her cell, and called Bo. “You almost had a third attack on your hands. I was seconds away from decking Tammy.”

  Bo chortled. “Oh, that would’ve been great. Hey, we’ve had a development.”

  Maggie leaned forward. “What?”

  “Zenephra’s apparently the Toulouse Whisperer. I think she sees herself as a surrogate mother. And thank God for that, because she pulled a crucial piece of information out of him. What triggered the kidnapping was an anonymous note he received threatening Gaynell. And he had it in his pocket.”

  “So you have evidence that could get the charges dropped.”

  “We may. We sent it to a handwriting expert in Baton Rouge to confirm it’s not in Toulouse’s handwriting. With his mental state, we can’t discount the possibility that he wrote it himself. But my gut tells me he cracked because of the note, not before it.”

  “I hope you’re right.” Maggie closed her eyes and rubbed them. “Today’s been such a day, I almost forgot about Valeria’s manuscript. Have you found anything interesting in it?”

  “To be honest, I’ve hardly read it. Too busy, plus I’m a slow reader.” Bo paused. She heard him drumming his fingers on his office desk. “We’re running out of time. I’m sending you the manuscript from a secure account here.”

  “You don’t want one of the other officers to go through it?”

  “Between the crimes and the festival, every officer’s up to their thinning hairlines in police business. Besides, I don’t think a single one of them reads anything except Saints stats. I’m making an executive decision—you read Valeria’s book. If you spark to anything, let me know.”

  Bo ended the call, and Maggie finished her drink. She looked longingly at the bourbon bottle but summoned up the willpower to skip a second shot, instead taking a walk through the house to find her parents. Neither was around, so she texted her mother to see if she needed any help with dinner prep. ALL GOOD, Ninette texted back. DANCERS TOOK THEIR CIGARETTES AND BONY BODIES BACK TO NOLA FOR COSTUME FITTINGS.

  Off the B and B clock, Maggie left the manor house for the shotgun cottage. To her relief, Tammy and her sycophant were gone, so she didn’t have to worry about another confrontation. She went inside and found Grand-mère sitting on the sofa with yet more boxes around her feet. “No word from Carina,” Gran said, “so it’s business as usual.”

  “If you want to call shugernitzeroggen that.”

  “Döstädning. You weren’t even close. Come. Sit. You look stressed, as the kids say.”

  “I am,” Maggie said. Gran motioned to a spot next to her on the sofa, and she took a seat. “It’s been such a rough day that it feels like a week, and it’s only three PM.”

  She told her grandmother about Gaynell’s rescue.

  “My heavens,” Gran said. “A visit to Petite, a baby shower, and a kidnapping, all by midafternoon.” She furrowed her brow, a wistful look on her gently lined face. “Sometimes I feel like the world and I have parted ways. Become estranged. There’s too much I don’t understand anymore about why people do what they do.”

  “You’re not alone, Gran. Lots of people think that, including me.” Feeling guilty for upsetting her grandmother, Maggie decided to change the subject. She gestured to the boxes. “What are you going through today?”

  “The paraphernalia of yours and your father’s childhoods. I’m only keeping three of his school projects, ones that have meaning for me and I’d like to see live on after Saint Peter has welcomed me through the pearly gates. Stop making that face like you ate a bad crawfish, Magnolia.”

  “I’ll try, but it’s hard not to make ‘that face’ when you talk about the pearly gates.” Maggie picked up a construction-paper card that said Happy Mother’s Day above a rudimentary drawing of a bird. “Aw, this is so cute. How old was Dad when he made it?”

  “Fourteen.”

  “Oh.”

  “Yes, you did not get your artistic talent from your father, that’s for certain.” She took the card from Maggie. “Still, these are the items that are particularly hard to death-clean. Every one of them has a memory attached to it.” Gran’s tablet, resting on the coffee table, pinged an alert, and she picked it up. She read the message, then put a hand on her heart. “It’s from her. Carina. She’d love to see me.”

  “That’s … wonderful?” Maggie posed this as a question. She wasn’t sure if Gran meeting her husband’s old flame or even a relative of the woman was a good idea.

  “It is,” Gran said with confidence. “Like I told you, I have questions I want answered.”

  “All right then. Find out where she lives. For all we know, it could be a different part of the country—or world. If it is, you can arrange a phone call. If she’s local, I’ll make sure you meet in person.”

  “Thank you, chère.”

  Gran began typing a message to the mysterious Carina, and Maggie retreated to her bedroom. She took her laptop, then sat on her bed resting against its headboard, her feet straight out in front of her. She placed the computer on her lap. Bo’s email, with Valeria’s file attached to it, was in her inbox. Maggie opened the file and began to skim. The manuscript seemed to revolve around various A- to D-list musicians whose advances Valeria had or hadn’t fended off. Maggie raised her eyebrows at a couple of legendary names, wondering how the backup singer planned to skirt the “cease and desist” letters from lawyers that the book was sure to engender. Wow, have I had a dull life, she thought after getting caught up in a chapter involving the Greek island of Mykonos, a Dionysian music festival, a few members of the British royal family, and a hookup with rock star royalty.

  Focus, Maggie, she scolded herself. She entered the name PONY in the search bar. The word came up thirty-six times. She read each entry, deeply regretting one that involved an impromptu sexcapade at a tech billionaire’s Northern California alpaca ranch. I can’t unread that, but at least the alpacas weren’t involved.

  By the thirty-fourth PONY, Maggie was fighting to keep her eyes open. Numbers thirty-five and thirty-six repeated the story Valeria had told her about the manager hiring a private investigator to track down old flames. Frustrated, Maggie closed the file and powered down her laptop. She yawned, stretching out on the bed, hands clasped behind her head. Jolie jumped on the bed and burrowed under the covers. Gopher barked his displeasure at Jolie’s one-upping him for bed privileges. Maggie bent over the side of the bed and picked him up. “If I ever need back surgery, I know who to blame,” she told the basset hound. He ignored her, instead stretching out his full length alongside her as soon as she resumed lying down. Maggie stroked his silky coat, and he muttered an appreciative grunt.

  She heard Gran humming in the living room, the hums accompanied by the sound of papers being sorted. Maggie thought of the memories her grandmother was sifting through. Death cleaning was one way of sorting out a person’s affairs. She’d read about geriatric physicians who encouraged their patients to have end-of-life discussions with their families, which helped prevent nasty surprises after they passed. Both are good choices, Maggie thought. Still, there’s the bigger question … do you embrace mortality or run from it?

  Her mind began to wander, and she let it; stream of consciousness often led to revelations. She imagined herself as a mom admiring her child’s handiwork from school. No
t the extraordinary art young Xander produced, much as she loved everything he created, but the pipe cleaner flower bouquets and handprint Thanksgiving turkeys the average kid brought home, like her father’s primitive bird drawing. She recalled a comment East had made when she’d asked if Pony Pickner had children: “None that he knew about.” If the music manager had indeed been battling prostate cancer, had he made a choice regarding his mortality?

  She finally surrendered to her body’s plea for a nap. Her eyelids fluttered shut. A thought occurred to Maggie as she drifted off. What if Pony wasn’t paying a PI to find women he could pay off to avoid harassment accusations? What if he was looking for illegitimate children he sired?

  Then she succumbed to sleep.

  Chapter 23

  It was twilight when Maggie woke up. The alarm clock by her bed read six thirty PM, which meant she could catch the last few hours of Cajun Country Live!. The festival would culminate with Tammy’s closing set. The singing star wasn’t set to leave for Jazz Fest until the next morning, so Maggie estimated Pelican PD had about twelve hours to pursue her new theory that Pony might have been tracking down offspring instead of dodging sexual harassment lawsuits. She put a call in to Bo and shared it with him.

  “Interesting. We’ll definitely look into it.” He yelled to be heard over the raucous sounds of the festival’s final night.

  “You sound distracted.”

  “I am. I’m doing double duty as detective and festival security guard. Using my breaks to work the case from our mobile unit here. Same with Ru. Have I mentioned strong-arming our new mayor into hiring more officers? Hey,” he yelled. “Break it up, you two.”

  “I better let you go.”

  “Sorry, we got kids from both Pelican and Ville Blanc high school here. Apparently, there’s a lot of shade-throwing on account of the upcoming parish baseball playoff. But your idea is solid. Gotta go; I see a coupla kids drinking from brown paper bags, and I’m guessing they’re not hiding pop.”

  Bo signed off. Maggie changed into a clean Cajun Country Live! T-shirt. I’m looking forward to retiring these, she thought as her chest blasted yet another ad for the festival. She stopped in the kitchen, where she saw a note from Grand-mère, written on her personal stationery in her beautiful Catholic school handwriting. It was propped up against Maggie’s to-go coffee cup, which steamed with freshly poured chicory coffee. No update on Carina, the note read. I’m going to the festival with Lee, who wanted to have me carted around on a sedan chair like a pasha. I said no.