Crescent City Connection (Skip Langdon Mystery #7) (The Skip Langdon Series)

by Julie Smith

  “He’s a black man?”

  Dorise looked at her as if she were crazy. “Course, he black. You think some white man’s gon’ want a great big ass like mine?”

  “Ms. Bourgeois, the kidnapper was white.” She felt slightly guilty about withholding this salient fact even as long as she had. But she had wanted Dorise as upset as possible to keep her talking.

  “He white? The kidnapper white? Oh, thank you, Jesus! I didn’t kill my little girl. Oh, Lord, I didn’t do it!”

  Skip thought, Don’t be too sure.

  She and Shellmire got a more detailed description and the name of the church where Dorise had met Jericho.

  It came as no surprise that the pastor didn’t know him, and didn’t know who did. Jericho had attended church only the once, had cut a wide swath of admiration through the female congregation, and had never been seen again.

  He wasn’t listed in the New Orleans phone book or in the Monroe book, he had no criminal record and no Social Security number—in short, he appeared to have sprung from nowhere for the sole purpose of helping Jacomine snatch a little girl away from her mother.

  Skip felt her shoulders tighten again.

  She and Shellmire were working out of FBI headquarters. Abasolo joined them to report on the scene at the school. He had only one piece of pertinent information. “There was a driver, and the witness thinks it was a male. But she couldn’t say for sure if he was black or white. Or even, for that matter, that he was definitely male. Too busy getting the plate.”

  Skip said, “Bless her for that. The address on the registration didn’t check out, I presume?”

  “You presume correctly.”

  She turned to Shellmire. “Do you guys have someone watching Isaac’s house?”

  Shellmire shrugged. “Shore, honey. We’re the FBI. Doesn’t mean we got diddly, though.”

  Twenty-four

  TAKING THE PRECAUTION of leaving his scooter around the corner, The Monk hesitated, not able to make a decision to return to his house.

  He thought of walking by and checking out all the parked cars, but what if the cops knew what he looked like now? Maybe they’d talked to the neighbors—maybe Pamela had told them.

  Actually, he was pretty sure Pamela wouldn’t tell them anything.

  But then again she might if they told her he was in danger. Or if she suspected he’d killed someone.

  Did she suspect? Did other people suspect? Did he look as if he’d killed someone, or was it all internal?

  The Monk felt even more undecided and unable to think, and vulnerable to odd ideas than usual. I know, he thought. Actually, I really know. I know I didn’t kill anybody, but how can I be sure ? Maybe I did.

  The thought disappeared almost as soon as it surfaced. At the moment he had more immediate pressures, and he’d noticed that when he needed to focus on something, the crazy thoughts went away and he was better able to think with his real mind. He thought of it that way—he had a real mind and a crazy one. It was just that the crazy one took over so often.

  He suddenly had a thought: I could just call Pamela. I know her last name. Why not give her a call? She might know something.

  He got his scooter, went to the Cafe Marigny, looked Pamela up, and dialed before he had time to think about it.

  “Pamela? Hey. This is Isaac next door.”

  “Isaac?” She sounded utterly mystified.

  “The White Monk.”

  “You’re not The Monk. The Monk don’t talk.” Now she was mad.

  “Pamela, it’s me, honest—please don’t hang up. I talk if I have to. It’s been kind of a weird day—I need to ask you something.”

  “Where you callin’ from?”

  “Cafe Marigny. Why?”

  “Walkin’ or what?”

  “I’ve got my scooter.”

  At the word “scooter,” there was a change in her voice. “Well, maybe you are The Monk. I’m gon’ take a little ride. Meet me by Hubig’s Pies.”

  The Monk didn’t like this at all—Pamela almost never left her house. She hated to drive almost as much as he hated to speak. What in hell was she doing?

  It would take her longer to get to the meeting place than it would him. He decided to go right away and do what he’d been doing for days, it seemed like—hide and watch.

  But sure enough, along she came in her ancient Ford Fiesta, alone as advertised, making the car look like a toy. No wonder she hated to drive; it must be hideously uncomfortable, given the miniature car and the oversized body.

  He tapped on the window and slipped in beside her. “Darlin’, when I get rich, I’m gon’ buy you a Cadillac.”

  “Monkie! Baby, it really is you!” She leaned over and gave him a big hug, entirely forgetting to be solicitous of his touching problems.

  He realized suddenly what it had cost her to come here—if she didn’t think it was The Monk, who was she expecting? Whoever it was, she’d come out alone on a dark night to a block some people wouldn’t go to in broad daylight—and all for a man who’d never spoken to her, who’d been the beneficiary of her good will and never given a thing back.

  His eyes flooded. I really do need to buy her a Cadillac.

  “Hey, if you could talk, why didn’t you say so?”

  “It’s pretty hard to say anything when you’re not talking. I never mentioned my vow of silence?”

  “Monkie, you never mentioned a damn thing.”

  “Well, I always said I’d talk again if I weren’t confused about what to say. And right now only one thing comes to mind.”

  “What?”

  “Help me, Obi-Wan Kenobi, you’re my only hope. Help me, Obi-Wan Kenobi, you’re my only hope. Help me, Obi—”

  She was laughing. “I never knew you were funny.”

  “Never more serious. Pamela, I’ve got some problems.”

  “You’re not kidding, Monkie. The police are watching your house. Hey! Does this have anything to do with that pretty girl? I was so happy you finally got a girlfriend.”

  “I hate to tell you, that’s my niece.”

  She wouldn’t let it go. “You’re not in trouble with the law, are you?”

  He felt himself closing down. “How do you know it’s the cops out there?”

  “Well, I didn’t till a few minutes ago. A woman turned up and talked to them, and then—uh—she went in.”

  “How’d she get in?”

  “You don’t want to know, baby. I asked her what she thought she was doing, and she showed me her badge. That’s how I know it’s the cops.”

  “Big woman—crazy-looking hair?”

  “Yeah. How’d you know?”

  “You don’t want to know.”

  “So what can I do to help you?”

  “I guess you did it. I wanted to know whether it was safe to go home.”

  “I’d say come home with me, but that might be a little close for comfort.”

  He nodded.

  “You got a place to stay?”

  “Sure. I’ll figure something out.”

  “You need money?” She reached into her blouse and pulled out a ten-dollar bill. “It’s all I got but you’re welcome to it.”

  “No, no, I’ll be fine. Really.”

  “Come on. Take it.”

  “No, I can’t. But, listen, don’t forget.”

  “Don’t forget what?”

  “That Cadillac I owe you.” He managed to slip out without taking the money. But the memory of Pamela reaching into her bra for him almost broke his heart. Tears nearly blinded him as he chugged down Dauphine, having no idea where to go.

  In the end he went to a bar.

  Not being a drinker (but on the other hand, not being opposed to drink), he ordered a beer, then a Coke, then another beer, and on like that so that no one would throw him out.

  Since he still wasn’t talking except when he had to, he amused himself by watching television rather than talking to his fellow drinkers. It wasn’t something he often did, but you could
n’t really meditate in a bar, with half a six-pack inside you. And tonight he had a reason—he wanted news of the debacle on Maple Street.

  When the teasers started, he began to think he was going to get a lot more than he bargained for: “Exclusive tonight! Religious group terrorizes city!”

  He stopped drinking beer.

  It was the lead story. “Police believe a religious group headed by the Reverend Errol Jacomine, a former candidate for mayor of New Orleans, is responsible for kidnapping a student at a Gentilly school and attempting a second kidnapping that resulted in a man’s death. Jane Storey has that report.”

  The Monk felt panic rise in his throat. His heart began to pound like a piston.

  His first thought was that he liked Jane Storey’s looks. She was a youngish blonde, softer than most reporters, looking more as if she came from Kansas than Central Casting. He wondered how she got away with showing her real face instead of a makeup mask.

  She was standing in front of a blowup of a city map. “Police have confirmed that a shoot-out at a juice bar on Maple Street today was actually a botched kidnapping. Detectives are withholding the identity of a man killed in that attempt, but we have confirmed that the getaway car in a kidnapping two hours later at McDonogh Forty-three in Gentilly—” here she pointed on her map “—was registered to the same man, who was a follower of the Reverend Errol Jacomine during his ministry in New Orleans. The victim is an eight-year-old girl, Shavonne Bourgeois. The identity of the intended victim in the juice bar shoot-out is being withheld, but sources close to the investigation say that she is a twenty-year-old woman with close ties to Jacomine.”

  What followed was a detailed report of the school kidnapping, followed by one of the “juice bar kidnapping,” followed in turn by a lengthy history of Errol Jacomine’s checkered history and suspected crimes.

  The Monk was shaking when it was over. The things that shocked him were these: A second man had been shot in the school kidnap, though he was in “stable” condition, whatever that was. His father, for reasons he couldn’t begin to fathom, had kidnapped a child—not Lovelace, but a child. And his brother had been the instrument of it.

  The station even had a police artist’s drawing of the gunman at the school. It didn’t look exactly like Daniel, but there was no doubt in The Monk’s mind.

  He went back to his vacant lot, but couldn’t even begin to sleep. He tried meditating, though his blood was full of alcohol, and that was no better. In his half-drunk state, it should have put him to sleep, but his mind was like a cricket.

  Hey! he thought suddenly. Hey. The name. He had listened to his father’s name seven or eight times and hadn’t felt a thing. That was the way his other mind was—his crazy one. You didn’t have the least idea what it was going to do when. One thing he’d noticed, though—focus made a difference. If he absolutely had to do something—or, as in this case, simply get through something—his real mind, his sane mind, seemed to get the upper hand.

  If he ever needed it, he needed it now. He had to think. He laced his hands behind his head and stared up at the sky until it began to lighten, and then he called the police from a pay phone. He had to wait until Langdon called him back.

  * * *

  There were witnesses at the school, witnesses at the scene, and an army of anonymous tipsters. There were also some hate calls from people who thought the police should leave a man of God alone.

  Yet there was nothing—not one shred of information—that could shed light on where the hell Jacomine actually was.

  Skip thought she would like to kill Jane Storey—and possibly everyone else in the media.

  The FBI called in a psychologist, and Skip asked for Cindy Lou as well. But it was a waste of taxpayers’ dollars. Both said they thought Jacomine had fixated on Skip and believed he could get to her through Shavonne. By “get to her,” they seemed to mean mess with her mind. But what he might do next they couldn’t say, and Skip had nightmarish visions of cut-off ears and fingers.

  Shellmire wanted to know if Jacomine was “decompensating, as you fellas say.” The FBI guy said he didn’t know. Cindy Lou said, “Law, man, I would have said he was decompensating last time he pulled something like this. But he got away with it and he did it again. What if he is decompensating? It doesn’t seem to make him any easier to catch.”

  Skip wasn’t about to argue with Cindy Lou when she decided to go all practical and non-shrinky—which she often did in police work. But Shellmire said, “Look, there was the getaway car. That was really careless if he doesn’t want us to figure out who’s behind this.”

  “But maybe he does want us to figure it out. One thing we know about this man—he’s mean as the devil himself. If he didn’t want that, you can bet those two guys who pulled the job are getting the worst punishment of their lives right now. He used to do that kind of thing with the Blood of the Lamb folks—and for tiny little things. Real big, nasty stuff, for hardly anything. Public humiliation, beatings, you name it.”

  Skip said, “Maybe that’ll take his attention off Shavonne for a while.”

  And she saw a terrible compassion come into her friend’s face—not for Shavonne, but for her. She knew Cindy Lou. She probably had to bite her tongue not to blurt out, “I wouldn’t count on it.”

  Next to the parent who got the plate number, the secretary from the school had probably been the most helpful. She’d sat with the police artist until they were all reasonably pleased with the sketch they released to the media.

  Lovelace had been taken to a hotel, where she’d immediately fallen into a deep sleep. When she woke up, they showed her the sketch, but she couldn’t say whether or not it was her dad.

  Asked if she’d be willing to help with her own sketch of Daniel, her shoulders started to shake and she looked down to hide her eyes. Which left Skip, who had really only seen him in a cap and shades.

  She tried valiantly, but when her sketch was compared with the one the secretary had worked on, it was impossible to tell if they were the same man.

  So they couldn’t be sure Daniel was the gunman in the school kidnap. But what, Skip thought, did it matter? They had Darnell Roberts’s plate number, and that was almost as good for linking Jacomine to both crimes. The car, however, was probably hidden by now—no officer had seen it, and everyone in the state was looking.

  Two FBI agents were ensconced with Dorise, and her phone, with her permission, was tapped. Two others had been dispatched to St. Philip Street, to Skip’s house, at Shellmire’s insistence. “Look,” he said, “These people are into kidnapping, and they’re trying to get at you. We can’t take a chance on them trying for Sheila or Kenny.”

  She didn’t protest. There was nothing to do but go home.

  It was midnight, but Steve was up, drinking a beer and reading. He stood and came to her. She thought how kind his eyes were. “Tough day.”

  “The worst. I need wine.”

  He went to the kitchen to get it while she took a shower. She put on a cotton caftan and joined him in the cantaloupe-colored living room, grateful to have someone to come home to.

  He said, “I feel so helpless. I just wish there was something I could do.”

  “You feel helpless. This is the worst damn thing I’ve ever worked on.”

  “Oh, I don’t know….”

  “It is. I swear to God. It’s so personal. Like some kind of crazy duel between Jacomine and me. And I can’t just not participate. Did you know you have two bodyguards?”

  “I feel like a rock star.” He was keeping it light. “How’s Lovelace?”

  “Poor kid. Nobody knows what to do with her. Her mother’s off somewhere in Mexico, and she can’t be sent back to school with these crazies on the loose. She’s more or less in jail, although it’s a hotel. At taxpayers’ expense.” But she found she didn’t want to talk about the case anymore. Couldn’t. Couldn’t even finish her wine. After she’d sat silent for ten minutes, holding her glass and staring at the wall, Steve plucked it
from her hands. “You want to talk about it?”

  She knew he meant the man she killed. “Television, huh?”

  “Uh-huh.” He gave her a good hard look. “You’re doing okay. I didn’t know if I was going to get a whole woman tonight or a bag of Skip McNuggets. So far I’m impressed. You’re fine, kiddo. You’re okay.”

  “I’m in denial.” She smiled, but he didn’t let her get away with it. He gave her another hard stare.

  “Are you?”

  “Well, I might be. I’m so exhausted I can’t honestly say one way or another. I think you’re right, though—I might be all right. And that kind of scares me.”

  “You mean it gets easier after the first one?”

  She clenched up her shoulders and closed her eyes. “God, I hope it’s not that. I just think I’ve made my peace with it.”

  “Let’s go to bed.”

  They held each other as if it were their last night together.

  When her beeper went off, she was dreaming she was walking on a roof, trying to rescue a cat. The sound registered as a burglar alarm. In the dream she panicked, started to slide down the pitched roof. The cat yowled, and Steve shook her awake. “Skip. You were dreaming.”

  “My beeper.” Half-asleep, she dialed her office.

  “Langdon, you want to talk to someone named The White Monk?”

  “Jesus.” She came fully awake. “What’s the number?”

  A man answered; a simple “hello.”

  “This is Skip Langdon. Did you call me?”

  “You’re in Homicide, aren’t you? I think I might have killed somebody.”

  “Who is this?”

  “You know me. I’m The White Monk.”

  “Do you have another name?”

  “Isaac Jacomine. How’s Lovelace? I need to see her.”

  “Where are you, Isaac?”

  “I’ll come to you.”

  “Is somebody hurt? Why do you think you killed somebody?”

  “If I didn’t already, I might. You need to lock me up. I need to be locked up.”

  “Tell me where you are and I’ll be there right away.”

  “I’ll come to you. Tell me where you are.”