House of Blues

by Julie Smith

  "I let him down and he's an ex-dog."

  "How terrible", She let the corners of her mouth turn up.

  "Try not to cry. Anyway, I'm still trying to think of a project that'll get me back here."

  "Did we talk about kids who get shot? Tynette's so pathetic; and you could find lots of others, I'm sorry to say."

  "I don't know if I could take it, I really don't."

  "Have the Mardi Gras Indians been done?"

  "Probably. Anyway, I'd like something a little dark, a little—you know—illuminating of the urban condition." He looked embarrassed.

  "I can see that."

  "Know who I'd really love to interview? That Delavon of yours. 'Portrait of a Sociopath'—do you like it?"

  "He already thinks he's a star. Don't encourage him."

  "I mean it."

  She could see by his expression, which was almost pleading, that he did. '"Well, you can forget that idea. If I ever get hold of him, I'm going to make sure he doesn't get out of jail long enough to talk to his fans."

  "Fans! I beg your pardon—how irresponsible do you think I am?"

  "This is a really great opportunity for an argument—"

  "Look, you jumped on me. I don't really think—"

  "—but I'm way too tired." She stood up. "Anything you say, dear. Time for my nap now."

  "I'll make dinner."

  "You will?" He'd never done this before.

  "Sure. Me and the Verti Marte." The local deli.

  "Good night, sweet prince."

  When he woke her, hours later, she saw that she hadn't undressed, and she could barely remember lying down. "Skip, wake up."

  Vaguely, she recalled the last thing he had said to her. "Is dinner ready yet?"

  "Dinner was hours ago—mine was, anyhow, but I didn't have the heart to wake you. You've got a phone call."

  "Who?"

  "Tricia."

  She grimaced.

  "I think you'd better take it." He handed her the phone.

  "Tricia? Is that you?"

  "Skip, I've got him."

  "I beg your pardon?"

  "I've got Dennis."

  She sat up. "You what?"

  "Come on, goddammit. I'm on Esplanade." A beautiful street, but not a safe one. "He came to Maya's—I followed him for you."

  "I'll be right there."

  She jumped out of bed, reaching for shoes, badge, radio, cuffs, and gun. "Back soon," she said to Steve, and left without even combing her hair, which was probably so matted from sleep she looked like a bag lady.

  She double-parked in front of the address Tricia had given her. Her friend was there, looking slightly the worse for wear. Skip didn't know whether Dennis had a gun or not, couldn't predict what would happen if he came out. The thing to do, she thought, was scope out the scene a little and then get some backup.

  But first, get Tricia out of there.

  She remembered the scene from the other night. If only she's not too loaded.

  Suddenly, Tricia pointed. "There he is!"

  A figure just emerging from the side of the building broke into a run.

  "Stay where you are," she yelled to Tricia, and took off after the runner, radioing as she ran. When she had given her location, she shouted, "Halt! Police!" aware that in shorts and T-shirt she didn't cut a very impressive figure.

  He paid no attention.

  "Halt or I'll shoot." Of course she couldn't, couldn't even fire a warning shot.

  It occurred to her to yell his name, but she thought that might make things worse. There was nothing to do but catch him. He was running away from the river, into ever darker and more dangerous territory, but right now she was about the most dangerous thing around.

  Feet, fly, she commanded. Come on, feet, do it.

  She thought he was slowing, and poured on a little more speed.

  He was slowing. The gap was closing.

  He's been to Maya's, and his drug of choice is heroin. If he's fucked up, I'm surprised he can run at all.

  She felt confident, drawing on the reservoir of energy her nap had created. It was almost fun, pounding down Esplanade at top speed in the middle of the night.

  She could hear him breathing now.

  "Give it up, Dennis," she said, and he couldn't resist looking around, shocked to hear his name. Her heart raced as she recognized the face in the picture she'd been carrying.

  He tried to speed up, but the backward glance had finished him.

  This is going to hurt, she thought, and threw herself down in a tackle. He managed one more step before he went down, and she fell full on him, not even scraping her bare legs on the pavement. He tried to fight, but she pulled her gun from the back of her shorts: "Don't even think about it."

  She identified herself.

  "Am I under arrest?"

  "I need you to come to headquarters with me. You're a suspect in the murder of your father-in-law."

  "Forget it."

  She shrugged. "Okay, then. You're under arrest."

  She cuffed him and read him his rights. Now how to get him to headquarters? She couldn't see frog-marching him back to her car. However, a figure came into view—Tricia, screaming and crying, who hadn't heeded her admonition to stay put.

  Just what I need.

  By now people were starting to peek out their windows, the boldest even venturing outside.

  She heard a siren, and then a district car came into view. An officer started to open the door, but seeing a wild woman with a gun, quickly jumped back inside. "It's okay," she shouted. "Langdon; Homicide. I need help with a suspect."

  Gingerly, the young man—very young, she noticed—opened the door again.

  "Let's get him in your car."

  Looking as if he might cry, he walked forward, apparently still not convinced she was a police officer. "For Christ's sake, my badge is in my pocket. Reach in and get it."

  He relaxed and helped her wrestle Dennis into the car.

  "I've got to check the building he came out of. Can you call for another car?"

  "Here comes one."

  Sure enough, another district car was arriving.

  "Okay, take this guy to Homicide, will you? Say he's Dennis Foucher, and they'll know what to do till I get there."

  "Dennis Foucher! You've got to be kidding."

  Without answering, she went to Tricia, who had thrown her arms around a tree and appeared to be howling at the moon.

  "Trish? Come on, babe. It's okay; I'll take you home in a minute."

  Tricia let go of the tree and transferred herself to Skip, getting her wet with tears and slobber. "Oh, Skippy, I fucked up again."

  Skip didn't know whether she meant by getting loaded or by shouting when Dennis came out.

  "Everything'll be okay."

  "Ohhhh, Skippy."

  Skip broke the grip Tricia had on her shoulders. "Can you walk? That's it; that's good. All you have to do is get to that car—you can wait there a few minutes."

  "I'rn not getting in any police car."

  "Tricia, could you cooperate, please? I'll get you home as soon as I can."

  Pouting, Tricia obeyed. She left with one of the newly arrived officers while Skip went with the other to check the building. They knocked, got no answer, and entered to find a rented room with a few personal items, but no Reed, no Sally, and no obvious clues as to where they were. She needed a warrant to do a real search. She asked the district officers if one would stay to secure the room until she could return with it. Then she got Tricia off her hands.

  "Vl/here do you live?"

  "It's okay; you can just drop me on a corner or something."

  "Now you know I can't do that. Are you staying at your parents' house?"

  "No, really, anywhere's all right."

  Skip sighed. "All right. How about Darryl's?"

  "Oh, no. I can't bother Darryl again. He'd kill me."

  "What's wrong with just telling me where you live?"

  "Well, I'm not going hom
e yet."

  So that was it. "You want to go to Maya's?"

  "No! Uh . . . no, of course not. I was only at Maya's for you, Skippy. I wanted to find Dennis for you because I fucked up so bad the other night."

  "Okay, where then?"

  "Listen, really. That's the only reason I was hanging there. I'm going into treatment right away, I swear; I just wanted to do this one thing for you."

  17

  Back in her car, her head beginning to clear, Skip realized she was barely disappointed at all not to have found Reed and Sally. She hadn't expected them. After Toni's story, she had known in her heart that Dennis was traveling alone.

  He was waiting for her at headquarters. She found one of the officers on the night watch. "Is his lawyer on the way?"

  "He says he doesn't want one."

  "You're kidding."

  "Looks like your lucky day."

  "I'm way overdue for one."

  Hours later, after she'd gotten her warrant and conducted her search, she joined Dennis in an interview room. "I've been looking for you."

  He didn't answer.

  "I hear you don't want a lawyer."

  "That's right. I just want to tell my story and go home."

  "Go home? You really think you're going home?"

  "I haven't done anything."

  "Oh, no? As it happens, I just searched your room. I found some white powder in there."

  "Are you trying to bully me?"

  "I'm trying to impress on you the seriousness of your position."

  "I told you—I want to cooperate."

  "Okay. First things first. Where are Reed and Sally?"

  "I don't know."

  "You don't know."

  A sob came out of him. "I feel like shit. I just feel like shit."

  "You kind of look that way too." He wasn't the Dennis of the photograph. He was thinner and he obviously hadn't shaved since he left home. Skip didn't think he'd bathed or changed clothes either. "And smell that way. "

  He looked surprised, as if personal grooming were something from a strange country that he could barely remember hearing about.

  "Dennis, what happened the other night?"

  He looked at her out of eyes that seemed surrounded by bruises, the skin around them was so dark. "Evie came. She took Sally."

  "Evie? Who the hell is Evie?"

  "Reed's sister."

  "Wait a minute. You're telling me Reed has a sister?" And nobody's mentioned it? Am I going crazy here?

  "Yeah. Evie. It's a long story."

  "Well, in that case, maybe you could just tell me some other time. I got things to do, you know?"

  "Huh?"

  "Start talking, Dennis."

  "She came in and tried to get Sally. Naturally, we resisted. I mean, Arthur did—he was closest to Sally. So Evie shot him."

  "How'd she get in?"

  "Rang the doorbell. Reed answered it, for some reason."

  "What reason?"

  He closed his eyes and thought. He opened them. "Arthur asked her to. He was always ordering her around."

  "Then what?"

  "Reed came in, with Evie behind her. Nobody'd seen her in more than a year. She said hello and Arthur didn't say anything—just went on eating as if she wasn't there. Then Reed asked her if she was hungry—and she said no, she just came to get Sally."

  "Came to get Sally."

  "Uh-huh."

  "Was she going to take her to the playground or what?"

  "Sugar didn't tell you any of this?"

  "Sugar was there?"

  "No. No. Sugar was gone. I mean, she didn't tell you about Evie?"

  "You tell me."

  "Well, she claimed Sally was hers."

  "Claimed. "

  "She was Sally's biological mother."

  "Ah. Maybe you'd better tell me all about Evie before you go any further."

  He looked down at the table between them. "I should know. She used to be my girlfriend."

  "Before you met Reed?"

  "Oh, God yes. That's how I met Reed. See, Evie was the bad sister. She and I were junkies together, and when we ran out of money, she said she had this rich family we could get money from even though they hated her. So we went to see them, and I saw Reed and—" He stopped, his eyes filled with tears. "She yelled at us. Both of us. She'd never seen me before in my life and she yelled at me. She really made me feel like shit." He shrugged. "But then I fell in love with her."

  "Just like that?"

  "Sometimes I think so. I mean, I was always attracted to her. She was healthy and beautiful, and Evie was wasted, you know? And so was I. But I got to know her over a long period and she got me to clean up. I mean, to want to clean up.

  "So I did. She got me into treatment. And that was it for Evie and me. She was a junkie and I was clean and sober—what could we possibly have together? But now Reed—she was another matter. I sometimes think that's why I went into treatment in the first place—so she'd notice me; maybe she'd consider me."

  "What happened?"

  "We fell in love and got rnarried." He laughed. "Just about over Arthur and Sugar's dead bodies. You know, I wasn't only a junkie. It wasn't only that. Half my family's black—did you know that? And then there's my accent."

  He spoke with the trace of a working-class accent. He had probably worked hard to get rid of it.

  He shook his head. "Mm mm mm. All that goddamn hard work. And now I'm a junkie again. Shit!" He looked completely dejected. When he spoke, his voice sounded as if he were about to cry: "One minute we were having dinner, and the next, there she was. With a gun."

  Skip wanted him back on track. "She's Sally's biological mother."

  "Yes. See, she cleaned up too—a couple of years later. She showed up at a time when we were kind of hoping for a baby, but we weren't bent out of shape because Reed wasn't pregnant—it wasn't like some big deal. But then Evie offered us this great opportunity—she was pregnant and she couldn't keep the baby. See, she'd gotten sober and converted to Christianity—she was in some group or other that she said was really different. Different from what, I never knew, but whatever keeps you sober. She was sober, she looked good, and she said she'd just gone back to school. But she wasn't going to be able to finish if she had to take care of a baby. So would her only sister and her ex-boyfriend like to adopt her baby? she said. Well, of course we would. Who wouldn't, in our position?

  "But we made sure it was all legal and perfect—a real adoption, none of this messing around. So little Sally came and we fell in love with her; we gave Evie some money for school, and everybody was happy—"

  Skip remained silent.

  "Till she walked in with a gun."

  "Okay. She walked in, said she'd come for Sally, and then what?"

  "Nothing at first, I guess. We all just stared at her. Then Reed said, 'What do you mean?' and she said, ‘She's my baby and I'm taking her back.' About that time Arthur grabbed her."

  "Evie or Sally?"

  "Sally. And then she started yelling." For a moment his face arranged itself in a half smile. "She hates that shit."

  Skip was quiet.

  "So then Arthur's holding her face—out, like she's a bag of groceries or something, but real tight, so she's crying, and Evie holds out her arms, like 'come-to-Mommy,' and of course the kid's never seen her before in her life, so not only does she yell louder, she balls up her fist and hits Evie." He smiled again, just for a second.

  "Then Evie says, ‘Put her down, Daddy,' and he says, 'You leave this house, young lady,' or something pompous like that, and all of a sudden she's holding a gun. I never saw her take it out of a purse or anything—just all of a sudden she was holding it. Reed said, 'Daddy, put her down—now.' You could tell she was scared to death, and so was I." He stopped. "You wouldn't have a cigarette, would you?"

  "There's no smoking in here."

  "Shit."

  Skip had a moment's sympathy for him. If his story was true, he'd been through hell.

 
"Forget it; I'll get you one."

  When she came back, having bummed one from another officer, Dennis was staring into space, as if trying to find his wife and child somewhere in the distance.

  "Then what?"

  "Arthur put her down. Evie reached for her hand, but she wouldn't take it. So there was nothing to do but pick the baby up, and while she was doing it was the perfect time to knock her off balance. I saw it, but I was too far away. I don't suppose Reed even thought of it. Arthur took a step forward and she looked up and shot him. Just like that. Like she didn't give it a second's thought. He was hit in the leg, I think. I don't know, she must have hit an artery—blood started spurting everywhere. You know what I remember? How furious he looked. Like he was going to kill her. He lunged for her, and somehow or other he pushed over the table. I guess it scared her, because she shot him again, and that time he went down.

  "Then all hell broke loose. I don't know, I just sort of went on automatic pilot. I went and bent down by Arthur and tried to help him. Evie must have picked up Sally. I heard her say she'd kill us if we tried to follow, but I was holding Arthur's hand and he was making these weird moaning sounds. I was kind of paralyzed, I guess, but I couldn't look up, I couldn't let go, all I thought was that he was dying right then and I needed to help him through. I mean, I didn't consciously think that, but when I look back, I don't really remember being aware of anything except Arthur. Then I heard Reed leave. I guess Evie must have backed out of the dining room, then when she got to the front door, she turned around and ran. And Reed followed, I guess. It was all sort of in my peripheral vision. I didn't really know anything except what was going on with Arthur; I just held onto him and said things like 'Take it easy' until finally he closed his eyes and died. And even then I sat there awhile.

  "By the time I realized I was alone, everybody was gone. And so was our car—Reed's and mine. I guess Reed followed her, but—" He stopped talking and took a puff of the cigarette. He held it for a long time, staring at the wall, as if trying to come to a conclusion.

  "But what?"

  "Well, she had her own car. If Reed followed her, why didn't she just call the police when they got there? I mean—where the hell is she now? This is what I can't get to the bottom of."

  "Why did you leave the crime scene, Dennis?"

  "The crime scene? Oh. You mean Arthur. Well, that's a real good question, officer. Why did I? Why did I do anything I've done in the last few days? Because all those years of being sober fell away, that's why. Because I couldn't think of anything at all except getting fucked up." He stopped and thought again. "No. No, I wouldn't put it that Way. I don't remember thinking of a damn thing. It was like I was comatose. I just walked till I got to a bar, where I got drunk enough to make it to the next one. It was like wasting good booze on a dead person. But of course that wasn't the half of it. What I really wanted was to chase that ol' dragon."