“That’s just it. I’m not precisely sure of your exact involvement, just that I highly suspect you know something about it at the very least. You see, I have a lot of questions that I think the government would want answered if only someone would apprise them of the information. Questions such as, ‘How did Baker have so much information about Booth’s whereabouts immediately after the assassination? And not just the whereabouts of Booth, but also of his co-conspirators immediately upon being tasked with the job by Stanton?’ Questions such as, ‘Why did someone familiar with Booth state that the body pulled from the barn did not resemble that of John Wilkes Booth?’ Questions such as, ‘Who was the mysterious lady seen with Booth reconnoitering the alleyway behind Ford’s Theater before the assassination?’ I believe that lady to be you, Loreta Janeta Velazquez. I also believe you have probably apprised your Confederate friend Broussard of most all of your activities. He’s also on my list for bagging. I hate to ruin your night of debauchery, Miss Velazquez, but I’m taking you in right now.”
From my secret spot in the dark foyer behind the door, I heard all of this and knew that the time for me to act had arrived. I reached deep into my cape, clutched my blades and stepped outside just in time to see Loreta, derringer in hand, blast Mr. Winslow to somewhere beyond the veil. The crack of gunfire filled the night, followed by an eerie silence.
Loreta and I locked gazes momentarily before I quickly lifted the body of the deceased over my shoulder and extracted him from the scene at once.
Having carried Winslow’s body deep into the darkness of a nearby alleyway, Loreta and myself emptied his pockets thoroughly so as to remove any items that could give away his identity.
“Loreta, get yourself and that derringer as far from here as you can as fast as you can. I will meet you back at the apartment when I have hidden this cargo.”
“What are you going to do with it?”
“Never you mind right now, but you will learn in due course. Just know that I intend that this body never shows again in the light of day.”
After retrieving our carriage from the valet at the main door of the theater, I drove it by hook and by crook to the alleyway where lay the unfortunately curious Mr. Winslow, loaded him onto the coach and proceeded to Lafayette Cemetery. Only a few times en route did reveling onlookers notice the slumped over body and ask questions. Each time I answered that my friend enjoyed the revelry of the evening just a little too much and that I endeavored to return him safely home before the gray light of dawn fell upon us.
Mr. Winslow and I entered the main gate of Lafayette Cemetery and proceeded to the same tomb housing the loot from the mint building heist. Looking first one way and then another to ascertain the possible presence of any unwanted company, and finding none, I worked open the backside of the tomb, crawled inside and rearranged as best I could the bags of treasure placed there by me so long ago. Having made room for our guest, I then crawled out, grabbed him up and hauled him to the opening. It took some doing, but I shoved him inside and made him as comfortable as I could, re-sealed the opening and made for home.
Along the way, I pondered the events of the night and my next course of action. I decided to come back to Lafayette Cemetery the following night, pull out the body from its temporary residence and transport it to a more permanent home.
I rested easy knowing no one would find the missing Mr. Winslow in the interim.
The following day I made arrangements for the work ahead that night involving Mr. Winslow’s permanent sequester. That involved securing a boat for passage across the river and a wagon with a false bottom awaiting me on the other side to use for a twenty-mile journey south of New Orleans to a point in the swamps known only to me and two very close friends, two brothers to whom we shall refer only as Armand and Thibaut.
Once the darkness of night had fully set in, I arrived at Lafayette Cemetery aboard the very same false-bottomed wagon Loreta, and I had used for the mint heist. I pulled the wagon to a spot as close to the back of the tomb as possible, opened the rear gate of the wagon and went to work. Having opened the rear passageway into the tomb, I then pulled Mr. Winslow from within and tightly wrapped his body in wide strips cut from bed sheets earlier that day. Once Mr. Winslow had taken on something of a mummified state, I knew the time had come. I hoisted him underneath the false bottom of the wagon, hitched the gate and looked all around in the darkness and determined the moment a most opportune time to make for the river.
I took a roundabout route to the river, using the loneliest thoroughfares, the darkest alleyways, through areas seldom frequented by police or by any number of unwelcome Yankee soldiers still roaming the city blocks.
Mr. Winslow and I made it to our spot on the river with no interruptions along the way. My river contact had been waiting on me and knew exactly what to do when we arrived. He helped me load the body onto his wooden boat, and we stepped aboard, shoved off and began rowing our way across the wide river.
Once on the other side, we pulled the boat aground, off-loaded Mr. Winslow and waited for my next contact to arrive with the second false-bottomed wagon of the night, an event which happened just a few minutes after our arrival, as he had been waiting and watching for us in the nearby brush and trees.
We carried our friend to the wagon parked some thirty yards distant. Mr. Winslow now lay concealed beneath the false bottom. Atop the false bottom, in public view, lay assorted fishing poles, nets and baskets—the everyday belongings of a Cajun fisherman living in the vicinity.
Thus began the longest leg of the night’s journey. The driver, who I shall call Everard, knew our next destination intimately, having grown up there some twenty miles from the Crescent City in the swamps alongside the alligators, water moccasins and swamp rabbits. We traveled along together in silence, each aware of the business at hand.
In spite of the unpleasant purpose of the night’s activities, the sights, scents, and sounds along the lonely road served as a welcome, but an all-too-brief get away from the recent ugly business and bustle associated with my hometown.
We made our way along the main road for many miles before veering onto a narrower, more desolate trace over which we traveled another five miles or so. Finally, at the end of the trail, we beheld a remote log cabin underneath the moonlight. Armand and Thibaut awaited inside, as evidenced by the dim lantern light within.
Everard approached the cabin and knocked on the front door. Armand and Thibaut answered at once, both their silhouettes showing against the background of the yellow lantern light shining from inside the abode. Once Armand and Thibaut knew the identity of their guests and the greetings had been exchanged, Everard and I were invited inside where the alligator and crawfish were served in abundance, and the bourbon flowed freely.
I told my old friends of life in the Confederate service in Indian Territory, and they allowed how happy they were to see me back home safe and sound. Of my life over the last several years, I informed them of the matters I could and refrained from divulging any particulars that I couldn’t. Everard, Armand, and Thibaut seemed to know I held back certain details, appreciating the information offered forth while not prying into certain concerns left only partially explained.
After several hours of catching up, dining on swamp food and swallowing bourbon, the time to finish the job lay upon us. We all walked out to the wagon and off-loaded the late Mr. Winslow and set him underneath an ancient live oak at the back of the cabin. Armand and Thibaut explained that the former national detective staffer should be close to perfect alligator food after percolating for nearly two days. They explained that he might have to season another day or so underneath the sun to arrive at just the right scent favored by a couple of man-eaters living nearby. Further, they both allowed that I could return to New Orleans assured of their expert supervision in the matter.
After bidding our adieus, Everard and I boarded the wagon and made our way back along the same indirect pathways as before, this time back in the direction of the rive
r and New Orleans. We arrived at the river and, once again, I stepped into the wooden boat, and across the river we rowed until we reached the other side. I eventually made it back to Loreta and the dark, dank alleyways of the Vieux Carre.
During the trip back to New Orleans, a strong premonition enveloped me, an awareness that somehow, in some as yet unknown manner, the ever continuing and unfolding story of Lincoln’s assassination lay before me in ways that jeopardized not only Loreta’s life but also my own.
Soon enough, the lights, laughter, and life of the Vieux Carre pressed those ominous foreshadowings from my brain as I found myself back on familiar streets and alleyways.
Even in the early hours of the morning, with the gray of dawn rapidly approaching, the sound of a tin-panny piano echoed from a distant saloon, and more than a handful of dedicated revelers showed themselves on the streets.
Now, lest one thinks I viewed the matter concerning Mr. Winslow a bit too flippantly, let me attest that I fully understood that the former national detective agency staffer only sought to expose the truth regarding the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. I will not deny the honor such an endeavor suggests for a man from the north, but not for one minute would I have allowed the right honorable gentleman to drag Loreta Janeta Velazquez before any Yankee officials in New Orleans to suffer any number of possible undesirable outcomes resulting from such an inquisition.
And I certainly did not intend that his body turn up again to raise the specter of that unfortunate incident outside the Gaiety-Variete Theater in the dark hours of the morning following a most memorable Mardi Gras ball of 1866.
If she hadn’t killed him, I would have.
13
Marie Laveau Predicts the Future
No further attacks from the darkness befell me for the time being. My blades had remained tucked in my cape, and it pleased me that the occasions requiring their use had ceased. Perhaps, I thought, no such further surprises lay in my immediate future.
The gris-gris Marie Laveau gave me had worked its magic. During my previous meeting with the elderly yet alluring mystic, she told me, “… you must kill them before they kill you.” Then she asked that I visit her again after the task had been completed.
I intended to pay the mystic grand lady of New Orleans a call not only because I promised to, but also because I wanted to out of affection and respect. My visit came to fruition about two weeks after Mardi Gras when I had grown assured that all loose ends related to the Winslow affair had been tied permanently.
Marie’s equally beautiful and mysterious daughter met me at the door of their residence on St. Ann Street and led me inside to the elder Laveau who smiled and motioned me to sit at the round table just inside the foyer.
“I knew you would call very soon and probably today. I know you have been busy, and I knew you would be after I saw you last time.”
“I have been.”
“You see fewer shadow people these days.”
“How do you know this?”
“Because as I grow older and my eyes fail me, my inner eye grows stronger all the while. I can barely see you sitting next to me, but I see much more than I ever have in the murky darkness.”
“You wanted me to see you after I felt certain I had finished those who waited for me in the shadows.”
“Yes, and I know you have completed your work well. I see and hear things while sitting here at night. I see visions. I even hear your curses as you work with your blades in the dark of night by the river.”
“The blades might become a habit. I don’t like it.”
“You should have little use for them in the coming years, but carry them regardless.”
“I also don’t like seeing the shadow people. I sometimes fear them more than those who once charged at me in battle not long ago.”
“And fear them you should. They bring nothing good to any man. But the shadow people are not done with you.”
“Why is that?”
“You will meet a man with the mark of death upon him, a man with no good end awaiting him. He seeks your help, and you will give it, but it does not change his final outcome. A man gets what he gives.”
“Should I fear this man?”
“No, but do fear the shadows who walk with him. They swarm around him in legions.”
“When will I see this man?”
“I do not know the date or the time or the place. But I have seen him in my dreams here as I sit and drink my chicory.”
Laveau’s daughter then broke in, handing me a cup from the same pot from which her mother drank.
“You missed our Mardi Gras celebration.”
“I’m sorry I missed it. I meant to drop by after I left the Gaiety-Variete Theater. Something came up unexpected.”
“Something related to what you and Mother discuss?”
“Perhaps.”
“You missed a wonderfully delicious and lively soiree. It was scrumptious. I’m sure you know many who were there. I know, you had to be at the Comus affair, but I’m sure it couldn’t compare.”
“Hearing your guests shriek with pleasure is more fun than doing what I did, I’m sure. Mine was a most tedious business that night.”
Just then, I paid notice to an assortment of photographs laying on the table before me. The very high-quality photographs showcased nothing but children of African descent dressed in their finest.
Leaveau the younger smiled as I held several of the images for closer inspection.
“Those are wonderful, aren’t they?”
“What are they for?”
“Those in the photographs are recently-freed slave children. We are selling the photographs to folks up north to raise money to school them.”
“How much are you fetching for a photograph?”
“Twenty-five cents for the small ones, as much as one-dollar for the big ones. Phillip Bacon is the man organizing this. Have you heard of him?”
I replied that I had.
The name Phillip Bacon began making its rounds in New Orleans some years previous. Originally from Connecticut, Bacon made his way to the Crescent City with the Yankee army that eventually occupied it. He had lately made a name as a cotton and sugar planter on two leased plantations and had done well up to that point. Many knew him as a friend to former slaves and as an advocate for their formal schooling.
“Drouet, Mama knows all about Mr. Bacon. He’s raising money for the new school. He knows folks up north who love buying these photographs.”
“I see why. They are of the highest quality, little works of art. How can one not love them?”
“Then you should buy some.”
“You convinced me. I think I will. How about I purchase everything on the table here?”
I set a gold coin on the table and told her to use it toward the school. Laveau the younger began stacking the photographs in orderly stacks.
“How about you keep those and sell them to another?”
Laveau the younger smiled, and I knew she stood well-pleased. I remember feeling pleasantly curious at both of the Laveau’s passion for providing schools for recently-freed slave children and for children of recently freed slaves.
Marie brought me another cup of chicory, this time laced with warm milk, and sat herself at the round table.
We spoke of many things—of my late father, of my forthcoming visitor, of shadow people, of schools for little African children formerly slaves, of our ever-changing New Orleans, of parties of old and those yet to come, and of the spell she had cast upon my enemies known and unknown when she had heard I left for the Indian Territory some years previous. She asked if I carried my gris-gris and I pulled it from my cape pocket to prove I did. She smiled at the sight of it, and I knew she felt well-pleased.
She then took the gris-gris and placed it upon the altar covered with a statue of St. Anthony and images of other saints. She set lit candles around the gris-gris and spoke words so softly and silently that I barely heard them. Its protective powers now enha
nced, she returned the gris-gris and said that I now walked with an even greater shield than before, but to keep my eyes opened and my blades sharpened nevertheless.
Then, once again, I remembered Father’s words to me concerning the K.G.C. shortly before he died:
“Just slither within its ranks as unnoticed as possible, play the game, play it smart, wait it out until the end, and, when the end comes, as it most certainly will come, have yourself situated on the other side of the world if possible.”
I had tried to carry out his instructions as best I could throughout the war and in its aftermath, a time which found the South weakened in defeat and the clandestine cabal that had successfully agitated for the great clash weakening with each passing day.
Laveau gave me to believe that the end of the game might be near, that certain matters might be brought to bear ending my involvement in this contest not of my making. From behind those dark and alluring eyes of Father’s mystic friend, a friend now also mine, the events of my future played out as if on a great theatrical stage, and that future included the specter of a mysterious visitor with the mark of death upon him and around whom swarmed a legion of shadow people.
For some reason, seeing the Laveau ladies induced a need for retrospection on my part. I thought back on many of the events of recent years, but most notably of The Circle and the great assignments it demanded of me, of near-impossible tasks such as robbing the mint building, which, had I been caught in that act, would have landed me in prison. Adding insult to injury, the secret order then issued me orders on how the money should be dispersed and when. The secret society had successfully enlisted the entire country to fight their war for them, and fight these men did until the finest of their ranks from both north and south ended dead upon the battlefields—a complete waste. I allowed myself no better or smarter than the unfortunate pawns from both sides who did their bidding.
Having grown tired of acting the pawn, I vowed just then that those days had ended.
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