Blessed Assurance

by Lyn Cote

  Only a few other couples had driven out on the soggy Saturday. Meg watched a young couple sitting at a table behind Gabriel’s left shoulder. Their hesitating movements and forced chatter broadcast their uncertainty about themselves and each other. She’d been a better actress. Colin had thought her older and experienced in flirtation. At present, the boldly handsome, but secretive man across from her wanted to know her secrets, but would he divulge his?

  Soon he helped her on with her black coat. Lingering with her back to Gabriel, she didn’t want him to remove his strong hands from her shoulders, but Del stood between them. And Gabriel’s secrets.

  Outside in the sodden cold, she walked close beside him again. He glanced down at her. “Are you still interested in buying your own vehicle?”

  She couldn’t believe her ears. “Do you mean it?”

  “Yes.”

  She nodded. Soon they were driving back into town. Gabriel parked near a classy car dealership. Inside the windowed showroom, she walked beside him down a line of three shiny black new automobiles.

  “What can we do for you today, sir?” a well-dressed salesman with his hair slicked back with Brilliantine asked Gabriel.

  “Miss Wagstaff would like to buy a runabout for town use.” Gabriel nodded to her.

  “Well…well, how about that?” The salesman firmed his square jaw, evidently ready to sell his first car to a lady. “How about a Cadillac? It’s reliable and easy to drive.”

  Meg said, “I’d like to take it for a drive first.”

  This also seemed to throw the salesman off-stride. “Of course,” he recovered. “The gentleman would be accompanyin’ you, wouldn’t he?”

  Meg grinned. “Gabriel, do you trust me to drive you around the block?”

  Gabriel grinned back at her. “That depends, Miss Meg. How long have you been driving?”

  Meg recognized the subtle teasing in his tone. “My father began teaching me when I was fourteen and I drove a YMCA truck all over France.”

  “Then, I’ll be happy to accompany you.”

  The salesman goggled at them.

  Meg bought the Cadillac. Outside, as she and Gabriel walked back to his car, she said, “I’ll have to ask the hotel manager where I can park my new car.”

  “I think you should hire a driver, then he could park it near his residence and pick you up in the mornings.”

  “I can drive myself.”

  He smiled. “You drive excellently. But just think how hard it is to find a parking place in New Orleans.”

  “I hadn’t thought of that.” She studied him, trying to judge his motives. She was sure it was about more than finding a parking spot.

  The evening of the Demon Rum Ball had come. In her newest black evening gown purchased at Maison Blanche, New Orleans’s foremost department store, Meg dragged herself through the country club entrance. She was nearly two hours late; she’d not been the same after LaRae’s funeral that afternoon. And to make her feel even worse, when she had asked for her key, the hotel clerk had presented her with her first poison pen note—anonymous, of course. The note had warned her about staying where she wasn’t welcome. Who’d sent it?

  The ballroom had been strung with black crepe paper streamers and red-gold silk draped along the walls and overhead like a canopy. Walking inside felt like stepping inside a blazing sunset with the cool, risky fingers of night just closing around her throat. The unusual decorations tightened Meg’s already raw nerves.

  As she gave the hat-check girl her wrap, Meg noticed Dulcine in a demure cornflower blue dress approaching. Miss Dulcine’s scheming sweet-butter-wouldn’t-melt-in-my-mouth mask was beginning to wear thin. Meg was starting to think Gabriel didn’t deserve such a conniving woman as his wife.

  “Miss Wagstaff,” Dulcine greeted her with a prim smile.

  Meg’s frustration bubbled up and loosened her reckless tongue. “Call me Meg—please. After viewing your unmentionables, I don’t think we need stand on ceremony.”

  Dulcine’s eyes narrowed, but her evening-gala smile stayed tacked in place.

  Meg started away, her silken gown rippling around her as she moved. A Frenchman had advised her—in order to catch a man’s eye—always to judge a dress in motion. Would Gabriel prefer chaste cornflower blue or sinuous black silk?

  Dulcine followed along beside Meg.

  “Is there something you wanted to ask me?” Meg paused. LaRae’s funeral had left Meg edgy, moody.

  Dulcine’s pretty eyes widened. “Oh, my mother is giving a tea party in two weeks. If you’d still be in New Orleans, she wants to send you an invitation.”

  “Well done.” Meg gave Dulcine a measured look. “You veiled your curiosity about my departure perfectly.” Meg began walking again. “Thank your mother. I may still be in town, but everything depends on my friend Del’s case—”

  Dulcine pulled her face down into a moue. “I don’t know if you realize—”

  The insinuating tone Dulcine used made Meg halt. “What don’t I realize, Dulcine?”

  “Your involvement with that jazz musician, a Negro charged with murder, is affecting how people view the Fourchette and St. Clair families.”

  “You’re making that up.”

  “I know what I’m talking about.”

  Meg longed to wipe the sanctimonious, pseudo-sympathetic expression off Dulcine’s face. “You know.” Meg leaned close to the blonde. “I was going to say, ‘Take him. I don’t want him.’ But this is too much. You don’t deserve Gabriel St. Clair.”

  Dulcine’s pouty, pretty face burned fiery red.

  Meg sauntered away, churning with unspoken insults. The fanfare of a trumpet stopped Meg, along with everyone else in the ballroom, and she turned to view the entrance.

  With an empty liquor bottle in his hand Corby entered, dressed all in black except for a crimson sash across his chest that read “Demon Rum.” Was Prohibition something to laugh about?

  The band began to play, “When the Saints Go Marchin’ In.” Corby swaggered around waving his bottle. Other young men dressed as policemen with nightsticks, bartenders, obvious drunks, and one man in an old-fashioned dress and bonnet with a hatchet impersonating Carry Nation, pushed in behind him. All converged on Corby either to protect or attack him. People laughed and shouted encouragement to the broad slapstick.

  The scene from LaRae’s funeral came back to Meg full force. After the funeral service, she stepped out on the top step of Mount Zion church. Gabriel had appeared at her side. He had walked beside her the whole way to the peculiar above-ground cemetery. As the funeral procession made its way to the cemetery, a New Orleans band had played jazz, ragtime, and spirituals she learned as a child.

  “Miss Wagstaff.”

  Interrupted, she looked up into Gabriel’s unwavering eyes. “I was just thinking of you,” she murmured. Why had he come to LaRae’s interment? Had he come as her friend or as the parish attorney?

  Gabe could tell from the haunted look in Meg’s eyes that she was recalling the funeral. After LaRae’s funeral, he had found a telegram from Paul waiting for him at his office. He needed someone to talk to. In his mind, Gabe practiced an opening, “Meg, I have a problem. I need some advice…” But no matter how he told the story, it made him sound like a shirker. I wouldn’t have left if I’d known. Will Meg believe that? “I don’t think we’re in the right mood tonight for this.”

  Meg pressed a hand to her forehead. “Doesn’t anyone here understand that this is real life?”

  Could he speak to her of Lenore and Marie tonight? The telegram sat in his pocket, a stick of dynamite to his life. “I don’t think anyone here believes that there will really be no more liquor after tonight.”

  Squeals of laughter exploded behind them. “Don’t they realize that this means alcohol will…become more expensive, dangerous?”

  Gabriel had gone to France looking for danger. He understood its lure for Corby and the other young men here. “Let’s go out onto the terrace. Fresh air might help—
” Let me tell you about Lenore.

  Gabriel eased her through the clusters of people laughing over Corby’s antics. Outside, she stood beside Gabriel. “I shouldn’t have come tonight, but I couldn’t just sit at the hotel.”

  “I’m glad you came.” Knowing Meg would be here had made him come. If anyone in New Orleans could understand about Lenore and Marie, she could.

  “I’m glad, so grateful you came this afternoon to the funeral.” Meg touched his sleeve. “But why did you come?”

  He put a hand over hers, keeping her near. To protect you. “I was curious to see who would show up for the funeral.”

  Meg frowned at him. The glow of electric light from inside illuminated his tense face. Pete Brown and LaVerne Mason had come. LaVerne had watched her from afar with the same fascination one would concentrate on a cobra being piped from its basket by a charmer. Both had steered clear of her until…

  “I have someone in mind to take on the job of driver for you. Have you given my advice any thought?”

  She stared at him. When she had come to New Orleans her mission had been simple, she would get things cleared up and take Del home. How had matters gotten so complicated? She no longer felt equal to the task. “Yes.”

  “Yes, you want a driver?” he asked tartly. “Or, yes, you thought about it?”

  “Both.” Was she doing more harm than good in New Orleans? Had she triggered someone to kill LaRae or was it just a coincidence? She must to talk to Sands about what she’d been told at the funeral, and something she’d noticed.

  “Good. I’ll have Jack Bishop report to your hotel tomorrow morning.”

  Meg saw again LaRae’s coffin being slid headfirst into a stone mausoleum in the above-ground crypt. The mourners around her had sung, “Crossing over Jordan, what did I see, comin’ for me for to carry me home? A band of angels comin’ for me—coming for to carry me home. Swing low, sweet chariot…” A cheer rang out from inside the ballroom. Meg’s eyes flew open. Demon Rum, Corby, had been shoved into the coffin. The policeman lowered the lid.

  “No,” Meg gasped. I don’t want anyone else to die. “I’m so frightened.”

  “I know,” Gabe whispered. I must tell her, she’ll help. His impossible desire to hold Lenore gripped him.

  He pulled Meg to him. Holding the back of her silken head in his hand, he bound her to him with an arm tight around her tiny waist. He gently brushed her soft lips. Tears he hadn’t shed for Lenore in France trickled down his cheeks.

  She pressed closer to him.

  His arms felt how frail, how delicate she was. This took the edge from his need. His hold on her gentled to a sheltering embrace. “Lenore,” he whispered.

  “Gabriel?” Belle’s voice came from behind him, shocking him back to the present and to what he’d just let slip from his lips.

  Meg looked up at him with startled eyes. Still, with her gloved hands, she wiped away the evidence of his tears.

  He let her go and turned to see his sister blushing in the doorway. “What is it, Belle?” His voice sounded funny in his ears.

  “Dulcine says mother wants you.”

  Gabe excused himself and, without meeting anyone’s eyes, went back in through the French doors.

  “I’m so sorry,” Belle stuttered. “I would never have come out if I had known Gabe was kissing you.”

  Meg stalked past Belle. “He wasn’t really kissing me.”

  Chapter 12

  Ready to spit fire, Meg followed Gabe inside the ballroom. When he reached his mother—surprise, surprise—Dulcine just happened to appear beside Gabe. The band struck up a lively two-step. Did Dulcine deem her such a weak sister? Meg strolled up boldly. “Gabriel, this is the dance I promised you.”

  Dulcine tried to hide her chagrin and failed.

  Looking puzzled, Mrs. St. Clair smiled. “Of course, son.”

  As stiff as a tin man, Gabriel bowed and led Meg to the couples pairing up and beginning to dance.

  “Don’t I get a thank-you for getting you away from the persistent Dulcine?” Meg demanded as she bounced in time to the rhythm.

  He grimaced. “Didn’t your stepmother teach you any society manners?”

  “Yes, and in addition to learning which fork to use for which course, she taught me to be honest. It’s time you were honest with me and with yourself.”

  “Who gave you the right to lecture me?”

  “You did.”

  His neck turned red. “You mean when I kissed you on the terrace?”

  “Did you kiss me on the terrace?” Meg raised one eyebrow.

  “What do you mean? Of course, I kissed you on the terrace. Who else?”

  “Her name was—”

  He tightened his hold on her. “Don’t pry.”

  “Don’t lie.”

  They finished the dance in silence. In the early morning hours, the Demon Rum Ball began to limp toward its end. Meg sat alone against the red-orange silk wall and slipped into the pervading ennui she’d felt since her first year in France. She hadn’t talked privately with Sands yet. All evening, people had monopolized him. A swirl of white silk sat down beside her.

  “Meg, may I have a word with you?” Belle said. Meg nodded. Belle wouldn’t meet Meg’s eyes. “Corby told me he thinks he’s falling for me.”

  Meg didn’t feel capable of dealing with this right now, but what choice did she have? “What about you? Are you falling for him?”

  “He’s such a sheik, what if someone else decides to steal him away? What if he won’t wait for me?” Belle’s words came out in a rush.

  Had Belle’s burst of independence already failed with so little cause? Meg stood up. Mrs. St. Clair had left her husband’s side and headed toward the hat check.

  Belle jumped up, too. “What if Corby doesn’t want to marry a woman with a career?”

  “I must speak to your father now, then go home.” She smiled at Belle. “Being an adult means making difficult choices on your own.” I better take my own advice. Sands needs to know what I heard at LaRae’s funeral. Meg made her way to Sands. “I’m worried.”

  “About Del?”

  Mrs. St. Clair came with her dark sable evening wrap around her shoulders. “Oh! Miss Wagstaff, we were just leaving.”

  “Celestia, Miss Wagstaff will come home with us. I want a few moments alone with her in my office.”

  His wife hiding her surprise, the three of them started away. Soon, Meg sat beside the chauffeur. “What about Belle?”

  Mrs. St. Clair replied, “Gabriel offered to bring her home soon.”

  At the St. Clair home, Meg perched in the wing-back dark leather chair in front of Sands’s desk. One green-shaded desk lamp lit the room, casting deep shadows. “Today has been dreadful.”

  “I take it that you are referring to the funeral?”

  Meg let out a dejected sigh and lowered her chin. “I went to pay my respects and Del’s, but I also wanted to see who else came to the funeral.”

  “Tell me, who came to LaRae’s funeral you know?”

  “Two other musicians who played with Del—Pete Brown and LaVerne Mason.”

  “Did they speak you?”

  A shiver shook Meg. “Pete passed by me and said, ‘This is all your fault.’”

  Sands stared at her over his folded hands. “Go on.”

  “LaVerne told me, ‘Leave town before you get us all killed.’”

  “Interesting.”

  Meg’s temper cracked wide open. “Interesting? Now LaRae’s death is on my conscience.”

  “Why? You didn’t put a bullet in the back of her head. Did you think this was going to be a Sunday-school picnic?”

  This question shocked her. “I expected to get Del out of this and back home without more people dying.”

  “Murder begets murder. Someone murdered Mitch Kennedy. Why? Someone killed LaRae. Why? I think the killer is the same or connected to both. But how?”

  Sands’s harsh voice unnerved her, but his words had proven true. “What shou
ld I do?”

  “I don’t want you going to Storyville by yourself again.” Sands’s calm voice enumerated the dangers she faced. “If someone contacts you, I want you to come to me first—no matter what. I’m going to see about hiring a car and driver for you—”

  She dug her nails into her palms. “Gabriel…your son, helped me buy a Cadillac and he’s hired a driver.”

  Sands’s eyebrows lifted. “Who?”

  “Jack Bishop. Have you heard of him?”

  “Of course. He’s one of the men I hire as a bodyguard for my clients.”

  Meg recoiled as though she’d been slapped. “Why do you need bodyguards for your clients?”

  “Because I sometimes represent unpopular people or ones other people wish to silence.”

  “Like Del?” Like me? She swallowed and found her mouth dry.

  He nodded. “I’m not afraid of standing out in the crowd. I have the feeling you aren’t either.”

  Numbly, Meg nodded. “You think that I may be a target, then?” She had rejected this before, but now she forced herself to believe it.

  “I think it is safer if we assume that.”

  Safer? She’d felt safer on the Western Front.

  Mrs. St. Clair tapped on the door, then opened it. “Sands, it’s really time you were resting. I’m sure Miss Wagstaff—”

  “You’re right, Celestia, but I’m inviting Miss Wagstaff to spend tonight in our guest room. I don’t want her out in a car this late.”

  Celestia nodded. “Of course, she’s most welcome. Sands, I will send your man in. Miss Wagstaff, if you will follow me, I will take you to a guest room.”

  The lady’s easy agreement helped Meg accept. She wanted to refuse, but the thought that both Gabriel and his father believed she needed a bodyguard had sobered her.

  As Meg followed Mrs. St. Clair upstairs, she turned this fact over in her mind—even though Gabriel was the prosecution, he had decided she needed a bodyguard. Did he know something that she didn’t?

  Outside home, Gabe noted the light on in his father’s office. Was Meg in there now? “Here you are, sis. See you in the morning.” Belle pouted. He reached across and pushed open her door.