Bayou Moon Read online

  Eleanor was dressed as she always was, elegant and sophisticated, with her hair neatly coiffed. She asked the witch-woman her questions, and the elderly woman used a wooden bowl with bits of mercury in it to divine the answers. When the witch-woman could say no more, Eleanor passed her two hundred-dollar bills and left.

  After she drove off, Nehemiah Trent stepped from the tiny back room and put five hundred dollars on the table next to the two hundred already there. He smiled down at the witch-woman and said, “That’s exactly what she needed to hear.”

  The witch-woman nodded, thinking of new dentures that fit snugly into her mouth and eating hot, buttered corn on the cob once more. Her mouth watered at the thought. “It is so. She already knows what she wishes to hear. A cleansing of the house of the spirits, just as your friend has said. I don’t t’ink she will be back soon. A pity. She is a good client, no?”

  Nehemiah’s smile broadened. He reached into his jacket and pulled out another five hundred dollars. He placed the money on top of the other bills. “This should make up for any inconvenience.”

  “I have other clients.” The witch-woman grinned and gave a careless shrug. “And once I knew Garlande Thibeaux. She would like to rest, dat one.”

  “What do you mean?” he asked curiously.

  The witch-woman began to count the money on the little aluminum table before her. She didn’t look at Nehemiah again. “I t‘ink you know. Best you look out for de young miss. I hear stories about signs of evil a-coming. De blood on de moon last night, de crickets no want to sing at night, de Martinezes’ cows giving of sour milk. Signs of badness to come. I t’ink maybe I go to Bossier City and spend a little time on de river boat.”

  Nehemiah gaped.

  “I like de slots, no?”

  PERHAPS TWO MILES away, John Henry came out of the sheriff’s department rubbing his tired eyes. He had been going through files upon files, hoping to find material to use on Ruelle Fanchon. He had also spent a considerable amount of time looking through cold cases of unidentified bodies discovered within a hundred miles of La Valle. He’d expanded the limits of his search to the eighties and even the nineties, trying to account for bodies which might not have been discovered for years.

  Many of the cold cases were just that, as cold as the ice in the Arctic. Sitting unsolved for years, sometimes decades, with no detective following up on them, no clues to pursue, and no leads that hadn’t already been followed a dozen times, they had left John Henry with a big, fat zero. Surprisingly, unidentified bodies were not particularly common. At least, bodies that remained unidentified were not particularly common. They averaged one or two a year, and he’d eat his badge if some of those hadn’t been solved throughout the years and the files simply were not updated.

  Some of the cases could be discounted because of the victims’ race. Corpses of black men or women could be dismissed outright. A few were far too young. There were two cases that he would have to look into, but both seemed unlikely. One was a woman who was the right age, but she had short blonde hair and the file specified that the color was natural. The other was a man approximately in his forties who had been found deep in the Kisatchie National Forest five years before, but he appeared to have been dead for only a few years. It hardly fit Mignon’s theory that her mother and Luc had been murdered the day they supposedly left La Valle.

  But John Henry’s eyes were starting to cross from reading chicken scratches on old papers, and he needed a break. He suspected that if Luc and Garlande were truly murdered, then Ruelle Fanchon would know something about it. And his desire to make a deal to save his hide might be the only chance that John Henry and Mignon had to ever uncover the truth.

  He drove to the café in LaValle and parked his Bronco in front. It was too early for the lunchtime crowd so it was only himself, Eloise the waitress, and two old men playing chess in a corner booth.

  John Henry sat at the counter and ordered the strongest, blackest coffee they had on hand. Eloise hovered over him after she poured the coffee, and he pointedly ignored her. Finally she drifted to the opposite end of the counter and began cleaning up after a customer who had left.

  He was halfway through his coffee when Jourdain and Geraud came in. John Henry stared at them in the mirror. The two men nodded at him and went to a booth. John Henry wondered why a man just appointed to the highest court in the state suddenly wanted to hang around in what might arguably be one of the smallest towns in rural Louisiana.

  Because, John Henry answered himself silently, curling his hand around the coffee cup, he’s protecting Eleanor. He’s always had a thing for Eleanor. Any fool can see that. Even his own wife sees it and barely tolerates it. Which is why he usually spends more of his time in Baton Rouge. He looked to one side and saw Eloise whispering with the two men playing chess. Their gazes were locked onto Jourdain and Geraud as if Satan and his minion sat within their presence. One of the men made a motion across his chest, crossing himself for protection.

  John Henry watched as Geraud realized what the three people on the other side of the café were doing. His face grew crimson with rage and John Henry wondered what would happen if he started having some of the bayous in the area dragged. And he thought that maybe he would start with the one nearest to the old Poteet place, near the farmhouse Mignon had purchased, an act that had caused much ruckus.

  Geraud leapt to his feet and stalked out of the restaurant with a bitter curse directed at the two old men and the waitress. Jourdain sat quietly and waited for Eloise to serve him. Once she had done that, John Henry rose to his feet, taking his coffee with him, and went to stand beside the lawyer. “Shouldn’t you be in Baton Rouge making an acceptance speech, Your Honor?” he said.

  Jourdain looked up at John Henry and smiled coldly. He took a sip of coffee. “The beginning of January, John Henry. You should know that. The governor likes to wrap up his packages nice and tidy.”

  John Henry put his coffee down on the table and took a deep breath. “I suppose that gives the press time to ferret out all the skeletons in the closet. Maybe it gives the governor time to have an … alternate selection.” He stared into Jourdain’s guarded eyes. “Time to dig up bodies … or maybe even drag a bayou. I guess a fella has to know where to look.”

  Jourdain’s lips curled up into a facsimile of a smile, but there wasn’t a bit of warmth there. He said, “Perhaps you should be careful about what you’re saying, John Henry. It might be construed as a threat.”

  John Henry laughed. “Oh, no, sir. No threat there. Not a bit.” He turned on his heel, tossed money on the counter, and left without saying another word. All the while Jourdain stared straight ahead into nothingness until his coffee grew quite icy.

  MIGNON FOUND HERSELF humming again as she painted on the porch. Everything was almost exactly the same as it had been the day before. She was working progressively on her painting. The sun’s early afternoon golden light shone down on her, illuminating dust motes in the air as they floated majestically about her body. And someone was driving down the dirt road again.

  She had spent the previous evening with John Henry, suspicious sheriff tendencies and all. They hadn’t talked much, but had eaten and made love. His seafood gumbo was, in fact, the best she’d ever tasted, and she had eaten too much. He kept wine at his modest home, and she had enjoyed looking around at his house. Everything was simple and there was a lot of wood. The house was neat and tidy inside and out, and looked like it belonged to a single man. While he wasn’t looking, she had casually rifled through his closet and hadn’t found a single piece of clothing that belonged to another woman. She hadn’t found any files connected to the St. Michels or to herself lying around, either. But then she hadn’t expected to, because John Henry was compulsively organized.

  Mignon had tried to broach the subject of her mother and Luc, but he had deftly sidetracked her and led her down the path he wanted to travel. When she had woken up that morning, she had slept better than she had in months. No nightmares. No
dreams about her mother. No insomnia half the night. It seemed that sleeping with John Henry was good for her, but she knew better. It couldn’t last. He wouldn’t forgive her for her lies, and she couldn’t be one hundred percent sure that he was on the right side.

  They had drunk coffee this morning sitting on his patio and made plans for meeting later in the week. Mignon had stopped at a little art shop in Natchitoches and retrieved a recently finished piece of her work from the trunk of her rental car. She had paid extra to have it framed immediately. They had it finished by lunch and she picked it up before coming out to the old house. It was a sunset done in oils, perfect for John Henry. It would brighten the earth tones and browns that dominated his home. She also picked up extra ammunition for her gun and another mini-mag to replace the one that had disappeared into the river.

  Studying the work on her easel now, she frowned. When she tried to focus on it, it became an odd, amalgamated pattern of nothingness. Conversely, when she stepped back it seemed to be a dark figure in the depths of the forest. A blackened, menacing figure that threatened the viewer. Mignon frowned harder. It hadn’t been her intent to paint such a grim scene.

  The workmen hadn’t been back to the house, but she had known that they wouldn’t be. The road had been leveled again, however. She suspected Miner Poteet had dragged his tractor with the grader blade down the road for her, leveling out the potholes that the heavy storm had caused. Consequently, she had been able to drive right up to the door instead of parking on the road. Miner probably still felt guilty that he hadn’t done more when she was a child. Mignon didn’t know how to tell him that she never blamed him, that she never felt he was at fault for what had been done to her and her father. Miner had been railroaded by the St. Michels just like a hundred other people. This only gave her another reason to stop by his place later and see if there was anything she could do for him or his granddaughter.

  Then the car came around the corner and Mignon saw that it didn’t belong to John Henry or Miner Poteet.

  It was Geraud St. Michel and Mignon immediately reached for her purse, then cursed under her breath. She had left it in the rental car. There was no way she could rush down to get it without running right into Geraud. He looked at her through the windshield and then got out. He was dressed casually in buff-colored Dockers, a white polo shirt, and brown loafers. Mignon hoped he had come with another invitation from Eleanor and that was all, but he glanced around him carefully, as if sizing up the situation.

  Mignon set about cleaning her brushes, but not before she laid the piece of canvas cloth across her painting. She didn’t want Geraud looking at her work.

  He waited on the edge of the porch, just as John Henry had, but with a different appearance altogether. His silvery-blonde hair seemed all the lighter in the bright afternoon light, and his eyes appeared a deeper blue than when Mignon had seen him in the evening. He seemed to be in the prime of his life, a strong, tall man with not a spare ounce of flesh on him. She knew that he spent a lot of time on the golf course or the tennis courts, working off superfluous energy. She also knew that he was a womanizer like his father had been before him, and that he might try his charms on her. The vision of a photograph of a battered sixteen-year-old girl appeared in her mind. Mignon’s detective had gotten her a copy of the photograph from a hospital record in New Orleans.

  “Mignon.” He greeted her only after thoroughly scanning the area. “You seem to be all alone.”

  “It’s a good time to work right now, with the light so good.”

  “Ah, yes, your painting,” he responded, not moving. “My mother tells me a few of your pieces have sold in the six figures range.”

  “A few have gone that high.” Mignon had been fortunate that some of the most select galleries in New York City had chosen to feature her works early in her art career. But she knew that Geraud didn’t give a damn about her art. He was here for a specific reason. Her only question was, How far is he willing to go?

  His conversation with Jourdain came back to her: I think something should be done. But what? The St. Michels weren’t habitual murderers, even on the level of thugs. They tended to bully people out of their parish with roundabout threats, such as the one from the old sheriff about “finding” illegal drugs on Miner Poteet’s son. People left the area rather than buck the system that was the St. Michels.

  But someone had murdered Luc and Garlande. Her unconscious mind reminded her of it on a nightly basis.

  Geraud glanced around him again. “No workmen here today?”

  “They’re around,” she lied.

  “Huh. I wonder if you’d be interested in the advertising business, Mignon,” he said. There was an expression on his face that she couldn’t quite identify. She would have said that he was irritated about something, but as far as she knew nothing new had happened and she hadn’t been needling him about his father.

  Mignon thought about what he said. Nehemiah had suggested that the St. Michels might attempt that route. Bribery was first on the line. She couldn’t afford to be sidetracked by this maneuver. “I don’t do advertising.” Her words were flat.

  “My company would be willing to pay a substantial amount for your work to advertise our products. Your pieces would be influential in selling specific lines. In addition, it would make you a household name.” Geraud wasn’t going to give up easily. The unspoken portion of the offer would be that she would have to leave town and stay out of Louisiana.

  “I’m flattered,” she responded, trying to keep her tone neutral even though she was offended by his attempt to buy her off. “But I’m quite busy. I have a series to complete.” She motioned at the covered painting in front of her. “I have plenty on my plate, and very soon I’m returning to New York City for a gallery showing.”

  “But you’re coming back,” he added, taking a step up onto the porch. Mignon tried not to flinch at the subtle change in his tone of voice. She realized that he was angry. He was hiding it fairly well, but underneath his calm facade he was seething with rage. “To this place, I mean. Why else would you be renovating this … dump?” Geraud looked around him slowly. “It hasn’t changed a bit from when my father used to come here to fuck your mother.”

  Mignon’s lips tightened. She would have swallowed, but it felt like something was choking her. There was a palette knife on the shelf of the easel. It was a thin, flexible thing, not really a knife at all, but it seemed to be all she had. She didn’t look at it, but she rested her hand on the shelf just over it.

  “So you’ve come back to drag all of that history into the present.” Geraud took another step toward her. He was about five feet away from her. “And you said you weren’t interested in all of that. I wonder if you know that the lock on my office was forced the other night, the night the tributary was flooded. Deliberately flooded. A person might think you were attempting to dig something up.”

  A cold chill ran down Mignon’s back. She was more alone than ever. Doubt flooded her. What was I thinking? That someone would wait until I ran and got my gun before coming to confess to the murder of my mother and threatening to kill me? Fool. Fool. Fool. There was no one to rescue her. No one would know that Geraud St. Michel had come to do her in.

  But there was something else to consider. If it were true, then Geraud must have killed his father and her mother when he was only fifteen years old. It was more than possible, but it seemed so unlikely. He had known about his father’s mistress. He had known, and he hadn’t cared. What reason did he have for murdering the two of them? “What is there to dig up, Geraud?” she asked carelessly.

  A sly expression crossed his fine, angular features. “It’s not that easy, Mignon. Mignon. What a pretty French name. Just like Garlande. A man wouldn’t know you come from redneck white trash around the poorest part of Louisiana. You don’t care that my business is suffering because of these malicious stories, and that your presence is causing my sister to have the worst kind of nightmares.”

  Mignon kept her
mouth shut. There was nothing to say to him when he was like this.

  Geraud took another step forward. He was now only about four feet away from her. His hands hung at his sides and they contracted into fists every ten seconds like clockwork. “For a long time I hated your mother. Oh God, I hated her. She disrupted our family. She almost destroyed my life. My life.”

  Her hand closed around the palette knife, and she stepped back, bumping into the porch railing. To get away from him, she would have to turn her back to him and leap over it. In the time that would take, he would be on her. He was taller than she was and outweighed her by eighty pounds, but she ran regularly. If she could get on the ground, she would fly.

  She didn’t respond. Anything she said would be twisted against her anyway. He took another step forward and looked her up and down. Little worms of blue crawling up and down her body, leaving slimy trails. “I wonder what you’d be like. Would you be like her? My father loved to fuck her. He loved coming here. She had that same fiery hair and that same fiery spirit. Maybe that’s what I need.”

  Mignon spun around and leapt. Her feet were in the air when there was a sudden yank on her hair as Geraud dug his strong fingers into her scalp. She stopped in midair and came back the way she’d come, falling heavily on Geraud as he pulled her back over the railing.

  “Where do you think you’re going?” he whispered into her ear, holding her tightly against him with one arm wrapped around her waist like a piece of steel. The other viciously jerked at her hair once more and dropped to her breast. He cupped it slightly, rubbing at the nipple with his thumb. “Someone might think you don’t like me.”