"I've heard stories about old Chauncey that'd keep you awake at night, but I never witnessed it firsthand. And I'm glad for that."
"So he's mean?" I asked.
"That's what I hear," Desi said, his eyes shifting toward the stage. "I better—"
Time to get down to it. "We think Chauncey had some backdoor deal going on with Slim Conner. It looks like Slim was stealing liquor from the resort and selling it out of the boathouse."
Desi shrugged. "For true? That surprises me. Slim seemed like a straight-up guy. But it ain't no big surprise about Chauncey. They say that cat's downright wicked."
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Desi had gone to the stage and was pounding out a Dixieland version of "Jingle Bell Rock" on his ivory-keyed sweetheart, Zelda.
Employees of the resort and friends and associates of Slim Conner clustered here and there, eating, drinking, enjoying Desi's excellent music, and spinning tales about our recently departed friend.
After he'd finished eating, Odeo stood awkwardly. "I jes' want to thank all of you for letting me share this most solemn occasion with you." The way his brows knit together and his eyes shifted, I had the impression it was something he'd practiced saying and was working hard to get just right. "I'll be taking my leave now." He raised his chin and gazed up at the ceiling. "You wasn't one of my most favorite folks, but rest in peace anyway, Slim."
We all watched him leave. He carried himself with a lightness of motion and agility that was unusual for a man his size—almost graceful.
"What do you think about him?" Jack's face was marked with concern, consideration, and maybe even suspicion.
"About Odeo?" I asked. "What do you mean?"
"You think maybe he's laying a false trail? Trying to lead everyone away from the scuffle he's already admitted to having with Slim?"
I thought about it. "No," I said slowly. "No way."
Not Odeo. As Grandmama Ida would say, "That man doesn't have an ounce of guile in his whole body." I figured that was certainly true about sweet, almost childlike Odeo Fournet. At least I hoped it was.
But what Desi had told us about Chauncey, the bar owner, was still on my mind, and I guessed it must have shown on my face. "Hmm," I muttered.
Jack laid his forearms on the table and leaned in over them, his eyes narrowed. "You're not thinking what I think you're thinking. Are you?"
Uh-oh. Caught in the act. I shrugged. "That depends on what you think I'm thinking."
He sat back. "You're hatching a plan to check out this Chauncey guy."
"Maybe."
"I'm not going to let you do it."
"You're what? Not going to let me do it?" I huffed. "Don't know how you boys talk to women up in Yankee country, but down here, them's fightin' words."
"Let me rephrase that." Holding up his hands, he was the very definition of contrition. "I'm hoping you aren't planning to put yourself at risk by traipsing off to some biker bar and confronting a man who's at best been described as a pirate." He closed his mouth and waited for my response. None came, so he added, "How's that? Any better?"
I patted his hand. "Much. Thank you. But I can tell I may have to take you to raise, city boy."
He frowned. "Take me to what?"
"It's what Grandmama Ida always remarks when a man says some bonehead thing. She'll say that he needs to be taken to raise. You know, taught some decent manners."
Jack smiled. "I see. Well, my mom did teach me excellent manners, just sometimes I forget myself and say some bonehead thing, like when I'm worried a person I care a great deal about might be thinking of doing something I consider foolish."
"Well," I said. "If that person has a dear friend who's in danger of being charged with murder, and if a young child's life also rests on whether or not Papa Noël's gift bag is recovered, traipsing off to some biker bar seems like the least she can do."
He shoved back his chair, stood, and took a couple of steps.
"Where are you going?" I asked.
"To get my coat and car keys," he replied. "I'll be right back. If I can't talk you out of it, the least I can do is go with you. Besides, I haven't yet had the pleasure of experiencing a real Loosiana"—he pronounced it the way we did—"biker bar." He turned away and took another couple of steps but stopped again and said, "Think I need to wear my moto jacket?"
I shook my head. "No. I've seen that one. It's Saint Laurent. I think you'd be better off without it."
Chauncey's Roadhouse was only a few miles away from the resort. I'd been by it a few times on my way to Gretna, but I'd never had the nerve to stop and go in.
As we drove there I admitted, "Jack, I'm excited about this lead."
"Why's that?" He didn't look away from the dark country road. I didn't imagine he'd driven many roads like this one in his life, being a city boy and all. At night roads this dark could be fairly nerve wracking. Nothing much was visible beyond the reach of the headlights, and in the bayou it was possible anything could jump out in front—like a swamp rat the size of a golden retriever, or a gator, or maybe even a rougarou.
"I was running out of suspects and didn't want to nail down anything on those who are our friends and couldn't nail down anything on the ones who aren't. I'm fairly hoping this Chauncey guy turns out to be the one."
"Guess we'll see."
We had to pull around and park at the side of the building because the entire front parking area was taken up by Harleys, all lined up like little tin soldiers. There must have been a hundred of them.
Jack sat behind the steering wheel, looking at the place and running his hands back and forth around the rim.
"Something bothering you?" I asked.
He shook his head.
"Yes," I pressed. "Something is bothering you. Out with it."
"I think this might sound silly. Do you promise not to laugh?"
"Of course." I was dying to know what he was about to say.
"I'm kind of a movie freak."
"Yes, Jack, I know."
It was true. Jack Stockton was a walking Wikipedia when it came to movies. He could summarize the plot, name the cast and crew, hum the soundtrack, and even quote lines from just about any movie imaginable. But what did that have to do with Chauncey's?
"I can't tell you how many movies I've seen where people, people like us, normal people, walk into one of these places and get the living daylights beaten out of them by a bunch of good old boys with long hair, bushy beards, arms as big around as phone poles, and tattoos everywhere." He stopped rubbing the steering wheel, took his hands away from it, and opened his car door. "It's not that I'm scared or anything. I'm just trying to psych myself up for it."
It took every ounce of self-control I could muster up not to laugh. After all, I'd promised I wouldn't. I opened the passenger's side door and got out. "Jack, like you said, movies. You've seen movies. That's not the way these places are in real life. Don't worry about it."
He nodded like he'd accepted my explanation, but his mouth was set in a hard line, and as we went around the building, it seemed to me there was more than a little of that John Wayne trademark swagger in his walk.
On the outside Chauncey's looked like an old-fashioned general store with a weathered wooden porch that had seen so much traffic the boards were no longer flush to each other. The front entrance was made up of barn-style wooden doors that were just as weathered as the planks on the porch. The door handles were real, and I hoped unloaded, six-shooters. The sign on the door read Smoke 'em if you got 'em.
"Look at that," I said. "Quaint."
"Yeah," Jack said dryly. "Charming."
We each took hold of a pistol handle and pulled, opening the doors to what could only be described as complete and utter pandemonium. It was exactly as Jack had thought, just like in the movies. Zydeco music so loud I could feel its rhythms in my chest. Laughter. Shouting. The clank of silverware, dishes, and glasses. The smells of burgers and fried fast food. Smoke thick as a fog bank in the air.
I'd have to take
a shower when this was all over.
Jack coughed. "Like I said"—he leaned close and spoke right beside my ear—"just charming."
The cement floor had been painted purple. The walls were sort of gold. The upholstery on the booths was green. Desi had said they prided themselves on being Mardi Gras 24/7/365. Here and there red and silver aluminum garlands were draped overhead. The support pillars were wound with strands of Christmas lights, the old kind with the big bright flame-shaped bulbs, like my grandparents used to string up when I was a kid.
We made our way through the place, weaving around dancers and waitresses wearing Daisy Dukes with tight red sweaters and Christmas tree-green knee socks in a nod to the season.
A couple of men who had to have been seven feet tall if they were an inch got up from their barstools and pushed past us. Both were heavily bearded with, I thought back to what Jack had said, "…arms as big around as phone poles and tattoos everywhere."
Jack squeezed my hand and sort of pulled me around behind him.
But instead of challenging us, they both nodded and smiled. "Merry Christmas," the first one said.
"Happy holidays," said the other.
"Back at ya," I said.
"Yeah, to you too," Jack said.
The two moved on, and we took their stools at the bar, each ordering a beer—drafts. The bartender, a tall, slim guy with the odd combination of long grey hair pulled back into a ponytail and a handlebar moustache so thick and black it almost looked as if it had been drawn on, set the glasses in front of us.
Jack shoved a twenty-dollar bill across the bar. "Keep the change." The bartender saluted as Jack went on. "Is the owner here?"
"Chauncey?" I added.
The bartender lifted his chin and pointed with the hand holding a bar rag. "Over there. Guy in the corner booth."
We both looked across the bar area to a darkened corner booth. There were two men in there, but it was so dark we couldn't make out anything about them.
We took our beers and made our way over there. Now that we were closer, we could see that one of the guys definitely looked, just as Odeo had said, like a pirate.
Jack reached for his wallet, making me wonder what he had up his sleeve.
When we stopped in front of Chauncey's table, Jack held out his hand. "Are you Chauncey?" he asked.
Turning his head, Chauncey, the man with the eye patch, nodded. "Da be fo sho, son. Whtcha bened?" His voice was gravelly, his Louisiana accent so thick even I wasn't quite sure of what he'd said. The nod of his head was enough to answer Jack's question. He must have been Chauncey, and he did look a little like an old pirate as Odeo had said.
The deep lines on his face were tracks of an interesting life. His salt and pepper but mostly salt hair was long and scraggly. The T-shirt he wore tonight was a gold one with Chauncey's Roadhouse—where Mardi Gras lives all year long scrolled across the front.
But he didn't accept Jack's offered hand.
"My name's Jack Stockton. I'm the manager over at The Mansion on Mystic Isle." Jack gave up trying to get the man to shake and held out a business card. Chauncey didn't reach for it. "We were wondering if perhaps you'd be interested in a joint promotion between Chauncey's Roadhouse and The Mansion."
Chauncey still wasn't looking at us. "Mmm." It was a growl, more like a grunt really.
The man in the booth beside Chauncey, who I'd hardly even looked at, reached out, took it, and stuck it in the pocket of Chauncey's T-shirt. "There ya go, Pops," he said.
Jack and I both turned toward the other occupant of the booth. He was young, only in his late teens or early twenties. He wasn't good-looking but wasn't bad-looking either, just a normal guy with a normal build, shaggy hair, and a face I probably wouldn't be able to remember tomorrow.
"Chauncey's my grandpops," he said. "We don't do—what'd you say?—joint promotions here. We got no need." He waved his hand around the room. "Plenty o' business just seems to kinda fall in our laps."
"Mmm." Chauncey grunted again. He still hadn't looked at us.
"Good boy," Chauncey grunted, one hand groping around the table until he found what appeared to be an old-fashioned monocle that was thick as a Coke bottle bottom. He held it up to his face, and finally for the first time he looked up at us.
"Der ya be." At least I thought that was what he said.
Jack and I both stared wordlessly.
"Oh," Jack said, turning away from Chauncey and back to the grandson. "I see. So your grandfather wouldn't be interested in anything like that?"
"Wut wrong wid you?" the old man said. "I blind not deef."
"Sorry," Jack said. "It was just…your grandson…I…" Finally, he just gave up and shrugged. "Thanks for your time, Mr. Chauncey. I can see—" He stopped, realizing what he'd said and cringed. "I can tell you probably don't need to garner additional business, so we'll just say good evening to you and thank you for your time."
The place suddenly grew much quieter as the band stopped playing. The bartender stepped up to the microphone. "Ladies and gents, it's time for our Friday night karaoke contest."
The grandson stood. "Pops needs you to leave now. He has to go be the judge for the karaoke."
"Judge?" I asked.
"Tree nights I is," Chauncey said.
"Tree nights." I repeated.
The grandson walked around in front of us and laid his hand on Chauncey's arm. "Three nights," he clarified. "Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays from six to ten are Chauncey's Roadhouse Karaoke Battle Nights. Pops is the judge, the only judge. He hasn't missed a night in what…"
"Fortu yar." Chauncey's lined face split into a huge grin. As close as we were, I could see he needed to spend some of the money a place like this probably brought in at a dentist's office.
"Forty-two years. That's right. Rain or shine. Hale and hearty or doing poorly. Pops is here to judge and award the prize, twenty steak dinners, to the winner."
I had to make sure what I was hearing. "Every Friday, Saturday…and…Sunday from five to ten, your granddaddy's here judging this contest?"
Chauncey slid over to the edge of the seat and placed his hand on his grandson's forearm.
"Never missed a night," the younger man said.
"Not even last Sunday night?"
"No damn way," Chauncey said.
I had no trouble understanding that.
"So nows I'm gwan judge. You g'on den," Chauncey's head was tilted in our general direction. "Git."
Jack and I went back out to the parking lot and got into the SUV. We sat looking at each other a beat before both bursting into laughter. When we stopped laughing, I said, "Well, I'm thinking Chauncey, who doesn't appear to be able to see his hand in front of his face, probably couldn't even find the van, much less manage to get it started and run over Slim not once but twice.
Jack hit the ignition, and the engine turned over. "That poor old guy'd be more likely to run it through a wall or into the river than be able to steer it straight enough to hit someone on purpose."
"But don't forget what Desi had to say about him. He said he'd heard how the old man is downright mean."
"Sure," Jack said, "And we know he was buying bootleg liquor from Slim who probably wasn't his only supplier."
I sighed. "Chauncey the pirate might not be one of the good guys, but I'm not thinking he managed to kill Slim and take the Christmas donations. With a place like this, I'm betting he's a rich old man, and what that bag held wouldn't be worth murder to him."
"Plus he seems to have an airtight alibi," Jack said. He put the car in reverse and backed out of the parking lot, heading back toward The Mansion. "Karaoke night, eh? We should come over some night and take a shot at it."
"You, Yankee boy, maybe you should come on over some night and take a shot at it. This southern girl can't sing a lick, and she knows her limitations."
"Yeah?" Jack reached across, took hold of my hand, and squeezed. "We'll see about that."
We rode the rest of the way in silence. I
didn't know what Jack was thinking, but seeing that we'd just come up another blind alley, I wondered if we were ever going to exonerate Valentine and get the money needed for Nicole's treatment.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
It was a little after six thirty when we walked back into the ornate oval lobby of the resort. I was glad to see Lurch in his usual somber black suit at his usual spot just inside the double doors. His only nod to the holiday season this evening being a headband sporting antlers, holly berries, and jingle bells. The antlers bobbed around when he moved his head.
Jack lifted a hand as we walked by him. "Lookin' good tonight, Lurch."
Lurch just groaned but did high-five Jack.
Over at the reception desk, a man's voice was on the rise.
Lucy stood in her designated spot behind the counter, arms crossed, trying to keep a smile pasted on her face.
The man in front of the counter, the man pounding his fist on the marble top, was none other than my current number-one suspect, the bookie, Zachary Jones.
"And why can't you tell me, Lucy? Fifty's not enough? Would a Ben Franklin do it for ya?" He reached for his back pocket.
Lucy shook her head and held her hands up, palms out. "Mr. Jones, please. I can't—"
Jack took four long strides, and he was there beside Zachary. "Something I can do to help you, Mr. Jones?"
The bookie turned, his eyes narrowed as if he was trying to remember. He pointed an index finger. "Stockton, right? You're the manager."
Jack offered his hand. "Is there a problem?"
Zachary shook with Jack. "I'm just trying to convince Lucy here to part with a little information I need."
Jack's smile looked so authentic, I was probably the only person in the room who knew it wasn't. "And what would that be?"
"She told me Diane Connor was no longer a guest here."
Jack glanced at Lucy. "That's right."
"Well, I need to know where she went." Jones said. "She's not at home. I checked." He lifted his chin. It looked a little bit like a challenge.
So, now the bookie was stalking poor, screwed-up Diane? I thought about it, considering that maybe Cat and I were lucky to have made it out of his sports book safely. If I had it to do over, I probably wouldn't have taken the risk. If Zachary Jones killed Slim and was looking for Diane, he was dangerous.
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