by Curtis, Gene
LeOmi sat up in the bed in the darkness. At one point, the light from the dream seemed soothing and as if it were happy that she had made the correct decision. She had waited for this all her life. But there was something horrible too. Something that she couldn’t quite remember—the horrible darkness and the squeezing of her chest were as bad as anything that had ever happened to her.
What did it mean? What secrets did it hold? –It was coming, and not so terribly far away.
She looked around. The room seemed too hot, but nothing seemed out of place.
Over the past year, she had made this room her own home away from home. There were odds and ends of things that her father had slowly shipped from home. Some of her book collection, her music and her computer.
All of her sports equipment was stowed in a large trunk that LeOmi knew was her dad’s from when he had been stationed on an aircraft carrier before he met her mom.
The smile returned to LeOmi’s lips. She laid her head back on the pillow and reached underneath it to pull out her mother’s scarf. She smelled her mother’s scent as she cupped it in her hands; tears spilled from her eyes dropping into the sheer cloth.
“I made it.”
* * *
The next day there was a call from her father. He asked, “Did you have a Magi visit you in your dreams last night?
Her father was at the house later on in the week. The last time he had been to her room, she had been in Virginia and a pair of scissors had been in her hand. This time he was actually smiling; not a forced smile to be polite, an actual smile. It was a little frightening actually. Maybe it was because she had let him in. Likely she knew that it was almost time for her to go. He was very polite too.
“May I speak with my daughter, alone?”
“Of course Jacob. Dinner is at eight. Will I need to inform Hannah that you will remain?”
“No, thank you. LeOmi, is it all right if I speak with you in private?”
LeOmi nodded and led the way to her tiny room. Her father closed the door and walked around noticing familiar things. His hands were clinched behind his back as he looked at her books and the trunk that he had sent. Cautiously he kept his distance and she hers in the small room.
“I was very happy to hear from Ruby, did she contact you directly?”
LeOmi looked surprised.
“No? She still may. I’m sure your sister and brother wanted to come, but they can never get away.”
“Why am I accepted now, in the family too?”
He abruptly turned and sat on the trunk facing her. He motioned for her to sit on the bed. The smile was no longer there.
“I know that the last few years have been very hard for you.”
She frowned and looked toward the door, wanting to run away, but she didn’t. It was time.
“Now that you have been accepted to The Seventh Mountain; your whole life will change. Are you ready for that?”
LeOmi nodded and her frown slowly faded.
“I remember the day I was accepted into The Seventh Mountain.”
“You went to the Magi school?”
“Yes, but I didn’t graduate. My vocation was in a different area.”
LeOmi just looked at him, her mouth gapping open.
“I can’t talk to you about that. There are a lot of things you must learn. Your brother and sister are at the school, and they are doing very well.”
Silence. LeOmi looked at a spot on the carpet, anything but his face.
“There is one other thing I must tell you.”
“Just one?”
Oh no, here it comes.
He fidgeted and snapped, “Why is it that I can talk to every man and woman that comes into my office, but I can’t talk to my own children?”
“Is that a rhetorical question, or are you really asking for that answer?”
His impatience jumped a level and he blurted, “I can’t afford to pay the tuition.”
Once again, her mouth gapped open.
“Don’t look at me like that. I couldn’t pay for your brother’s or sister’s tuition either.”
“Well then, how are they going?”
“They are working their way through. You would be surprised to know how many students work at the school to pay their tuition.”
“You can go to The Seventh Mountain, and work your way through. Or maybe you would like to come home to Virginia.”
“Home?”
“If you would like to.”
“The only thing I have ever wanted to be was a Magi. I have to go no matter what I have to do.”
“All right, then I will inform the school.”
There was an awkward pause. This time it was his turn to look at the pattern on the rug.
“There is one thing I must tell you. Magi depend on each other. Your greatest weakness is that you don’t let anyone in. You will need to change that.”
She could only look at him. “I don’t believe it.” She stood and started pacing back and forth following the patterns on the rug, the same patterns that they had been studying. Then the words just started coming out. “You have never been there for me. You were either gone, ministering to the flock or you were cloistered in your study.”
He hung his head down and listened, he seemed to prepare for the onslaught and that just seemed to fuel her already blazing anger.
“I don’t believe this. First you come in here and say ‘You made it into The Seventh Mountain.’ No congratulations or anything like that, which, by the way, I was never sure that I would make it. Then you say that you didn’t make it all the way through. Then the reason I never see my brother and sister is because they are working all the time to pay for their tuition and then you inform me that I will have to do the same thing. Then you have the nerve to tell me a little fatherly wisdom.”
He stood up. The room was too small for him to be standing and her to be pacing so she stopped.
“Congratulations.” He turned with a single stride and put his hand on the door knob.
“And by the way, I never had a doubt that you would make it.”
The door opened, tears were welling up in her eyes. All she could do was follow. She couldn’t say, But wait, I am not really accepted, I'm on probation—but not after what he said. So she followed. He went to Grand-Mère. She sat in the parlor waiting for him. He stopped in front of her.
“Thank you for all your kindness. I will enroll her into a private school and I will arrange transportation for her on the twenty-fifth of August.”
Grand-Mère acknowledged with a nod of the head and her father nodded in his response. At this, he turned and left through the front door.
LeOmi, Grand-Mère and Hannah all stared at the door. Hannah moved first, waking them all from their surprise, sadness and anger. She gathered his tea cup and saucer onto her tray unused.
LeOmi turned and went to her room—her sad and lifeless room—with no happy memories, something else for her to shovel into the basket of disappointments. She gently closed the door and through the sting in her eyes she saw on her bed where she had been sitting a moment before, a fresh twig—it looked like it was from an olive tree.
* * *
The next morning seemed like a new beginning for LeOmi. The only dreams she had that night, were of her mother, glimpses of happy times, Christmas and days at the beach.
LeOmi had a routine. She would get up early each morning, planning to be outside during the favorite part of her day. That was just about twenty minutes before sunrise. She would use that time for meditation and prayer. She always tried to be outside then. There was something about the newness of the day that always calmed her, seemed to bring things to a clearer light, kind-of back into focus and this morning was a new beginning in more ways than one.
All the houses in New Orleans had balconies or veranda type rooms that were in the north and south side of the house. Grand-Mère’s house faced south on Dorcus Street and the sunrise over the river was truly spectacular, but then the br
eeze would blow over the water and bring that smell. She could never understand the love that people had for this place, just as many couldn’t understand her love for the ocean, and oh how she missed the beach. The stench of the muddy river and stagnant marsh lands couldn’t hold a finger to the oceans sweet sounds and breezes.
Why? Why did her mother go away with that Julian Compton? It did seem like there were no answers. Only more questions. Sergeant Polaris said that she had gone to Calcutta. Why Calcutta? Why did she get that Journal? What did it all have to do with that signet? For that matter, what did her family have to do with the whole thing? Only more questions.
After the sun was fully up, LeOmi’s morning jog served as thinking and evaluating processing time. Some people pull weeds, some doodle on paper, some stack sugar cubes. Her mindless action was jogging. She loved running. It was private and there was just one foot in front of the other, breathing and thinking and being alone with her thoughts. This was sometimes good and sometimes bad, but there was always a feeling of moving a little closer to the goal –the finish line—whatever that may be. The wind in her face was always good as was the feel of the jolt of every thump as each foot hit the ground. It reminded her that there is always a sequence to things. Even going backwards is a step in the long process of getting to the finish line.
Generally, she jogged wherever she went. The library was down on Loyola Avenue, just a few blocks away and she spent a lot of time there. It was a spacious building that was almost all windows, the smoky type glass. It gave the entrance a sort of twilight look whether it was ten o’clock in the morning or five o’clock in the evening. The smoky atmosphere impression that seemed to be the look of most of New Orleans—which probably had a lot to do with the lazy-day type atmosphere that ran the whole city.
The public library archived all sorts of information and the Genealogy Department dated back to the 1700’s and probably before. The internet access computers were on the first floor in the center of the library surrounded by rows of reference books and a row of printers that were constantly and quietly pumping out information.
Mother had been in New Orleans, for at least a few weeks, before she was killed.
I wonder if Grand-Mère knew.
Of course she knew. That woman knows everything.
LeOmi’s research on Sumerian Mythology was complicated. There wasn’t much information available about the Sumerian Journal. The Journal itself had been photographed and documented with portions on the National Library of India’s website, but deciphering it required research on the cuneiform language which involved a lot of time, study and referencing.
Generally cuneiform writings were found on stones that had been created by a scribe. The stones were created by using moist clay and forming it into the shape of a tablet, and then a tool was used to make a pattern of marks. This formed the document. At one time there were 1200 different cuneiform representative impression marks.
The National Library of India in Calcutta had received the Sumerian Journal from a familial bequeath and the family wished to remain anonymous. The family had supposedly had the Journal for generations, but it was still only partially translated.
Time was short, less than three months until school started. Not much time to find out who killed her mother.
LeOmi knew that her grandmother had people around New Orleans; people that LeOmi called Grand-Mère’s spies. They were everywhere, generally obvious, and LeOmi mostly ignored them. Occasionally she would lose them only to have others turn up at another location. Most of the time, it was two eerie urchin-like small old men, full of endurance. They knew the streets and were impossible to lose. Every time she tried to stop and confront them they would disappear. They obviously had explicit instructions not to interact under penalty of whatever. The power the small woman wielded astounded her, and her Grand-Mère’s power was very far reaching. Even beyond the borders of New Orleans.
If only Grand-Mère would talk to me—we could work together.
Henry would have been upset about LeOmi playing detective. He would not have wanted her to go to The Celtic Wheel. He would have gone with her, if he could.
Sergeant Polaris could be a great help. We could help each other. I could be his eyes and ears in grandmother’s house and he could help me with finding out who shoved that dagger into my mother’s heart.
There was something about the way that Sergeant Polaris talked. There was pain in his voice and his existence, like he had known the pain that LeOmi felt.
He had made a point to ask her about the lighter with the emblem on it.
A Sumerian Journal was definitely a strange thing for her mother to be interested in. Where did she get the money for that?
Is it all connected?
It was no surprise when the Sergeant arrived. LeOmi could hear his booming voice at the information desk. She finished her information gathering and when he approached she was retrieving her printed pages.
“There you are. I should have known. Grab your stuff and meet me outside. Libraries give me the creeps.”
It hadn’t been a request. He just said it and turned, leaving no room for arguments.
He paused and turned to see if she had done what he had told her to do. LeOmi scowled at him. He simply pointed to her back pack and the things on the computer desk and mouthed, “Pick-up and go outside.” Then he turned and left. He went out the main door and stood by a bench just outside and under the shade of an old oak tree.
What was so important that he tracked me down at the library? She gathered her things, paying for the printed pages and taking her time, but she knew that he knew she would come. She had to know whatever he had to tell her.
“How did you find me? Are you and my grandmother in league with each other?”
“Oh please, can’t you just see that.”
She laughed at the thought of the two of them forming some type of alliance. Grand-Mère had given him the cold shoulder. Not just the regular cold shoulder either, this was the one that she saved for people who really annoyed her. It was truly amazing and worthy of any award that was given for that sort of thing.
“How did you find me? I guess you just used those detective skills that you spoke of at The Celtic Wheel.”
“More pleasantries.” He gave her a smile.
Then he made the gesture like –well just look at me, “Heck, don’t you know that anybody can be found now-a-days, you just have to follow their electronics and it don’t matter if the cell phone is on or off…in case you plan on cutting it off next time.”
LeOmi used the same scowl from a few moments before.
“And...What makes you think it is okay for you to come up to me, out of nowhere, and tell me to get up and come on? I don’t appreciate you taking that type of attitude with me. If we are going to be pleasant to one another, you need to be conscious of my feelings too.”
“Do you want to look at this or not?” He held up a file folder.
She grabbed it and went to sit down on the bench.
The label on the file read Yvonne Jones.
“Before you read that, I want you to be sure you know what you’re doing. I could lose my job over this, but it seems to me that you haven’t gotten a fair shake on this.”
He held his hand so that it hovered over the folder, “I also want you to know that you can’t erase these things from your memory after you’ve seen them, but you can choose not to view them at all. I can give you a summary of everything that this file contains.”
“Sergeant, I think you already know that I am going to look at this file.”
“I thought so, no matter what I said.” He moved his hand away, “But I wanted to give you the option.”
“You won’t get in trouble for showing me this?”
“What they don’t know won’t hurt ‘em.”
He remained standing and started the cigar ritual. This time, to light it he used a wooden stick match that came from a little square box about the size of a saltine crack
er. Every step was a performance, a distraction that left LeOmi little option but to watch in fascination as the man’s obvious showmanship demanded. It was almost as if he needed this time to gather his thoughts and to feel out what was the appropriate course to take. He probably did this for everything.
“I hate to see what your lungs look like.”
He pointed to the folder, “I took out some stuff...things that you don’t need to see. I know you’re tough and all that, but you’re still a kid.”
She scowled at him again, not saying a word, just opening the file and starting from the front.
“But there is a picture of the knife that I want you to look closely at.”
There was not much in the file, just a couple of sheets. Forms filled out and a little drawing of her mother’s body position when she was found, an autopsy report stating that she bled out from a knife wound to the chest, piercing her heart. A little box on the bottom of the report had a simple drawing of a body showing the wound location, things that she should not have wanted to see, but she did. She felt she needed to know all the facts, no matter how uncomfortable they made her feel, no matter how eager she was to be alone, running with the constant thump, thump, thump of her shoes hitting the ground.
He reached for the file.
She snatched it back, fully focused.
He waited while she read over it all, patiently letting her absorb all the facts.
She already knew almost all the information, except for the knife. The picture of the knife was the final page of the file papers. She hadn’t known that there was anything peculiar about the knife that was used to kill her mother, but there was. It looked like it was an antique with rubies and emeralds and in the top of the handle, on the very tip of the hilt was a large round ruby. The knife was fashioned to look like a flat ram’s horn, with a slight curve from tip to tip. It looked more like a long elegant letter opener than a knife. Someone had circled and labeled what the stones were and the value of 1.5 million dollars was written and circled on the bottom of the photograph. It was a delicate knife, as if it had been made for a woman—maybe hundreds if not thousands of years old.
