Tony Dunbar - Tubby Dubonnet 02 - City of Beads (7 page)

“Yeah. Melinda. She’s a nurse at Hotel Dieu.”

“She must be very tolerant,” Debbie pried.

“It’s hard to say.” Tubby tried to be noncommittal about Raisin, the reason being he’d known the guy for over twenty years and still couldn’t predict what he’d do next. No doubt this was the feature that attracted more than a few women to Raisin—even those in the pre-geriatric set they were starting to run with.

“But you had a terrible homecoming.” She sat back and pushed aside her plate, on which she had abandoned a tiny crisp of her supper. “What an awful way to die.” Debbie had inherited bluntness from her mother.

“They think he was dead before he was dropped in the oil, but anyhow you’re right. It sure isn’t like dying at home in your sleep. Potter was a good guy. We had some real nice times together.”

“Do you remember the time Mr. Aucoin brought me home from the French Quarter?” she asked.

“I sure do. I respected him for that.”

“I guess I do, too, now,” she laughed. “He really said some things that made me think a lot about drugs.”

“Whatever happened to your date from that night?” Tubby asked.

“Arn? He got married. He’s studying art at UNO and living with her parents. He turned out to be a jerk.”

Tubby nodded, his judgment about boyfriends again confirmed.

“Mrs. Aucoin, she must be in shock.”

“Actually she’s coping pretty well,” Tubby said, patting his lips with a napkin. “She was down at the morgue when I got there. Dr. Jazz came by to pay his respects. She was calm and went home with her brother and sister. She was great at the funeral, making all the people feel better. I called her today about the estate and everything. I don’t think it’s completely hit her yet.”

“What do the police say?” she asked.

Tubby waved the waiter over and ordered coffee. What kind of dessert did you have at a crêpe restaurant? Maybe they could go someplace else.

“They’re still looking for some kind of motive. There’s not a whole lot to steal in a shipping office, especially not the kind of popgun operation Potter ran. And the cops haven’t the slightest clue as to what his business was about, so they can’t really investigate that too much. But really, who steals peanut oil? Their first thought was maybe he fell in the hold of that barge all by himself, but that was a dumb idea. Potter wouldn’t even step on his barges ’cause he didn’t like to get dirty. Anyway, the coroner nipped that since there was a head wound nobody could miss. I don’t think they have any leads at all. Except for the fact that Potter knew a couple of important people, like from card games, they wouldn’t even be going through the motions.”

“Can you do something?”

“Hey, I’m not a sleuth. I’m a lawyer.”

“Yo” was all Debbie had to say to that. She sipped her coffee. “I wish you would help me with a legal problem, Daddy.”

Tubby was immediately alarmed. “What’s the trouble, honey? Of course I’ll help.”

“Oh, not me,” she said quickly. “It’s this group at school, Save Our River. They’ve been trying to find a volunteer lawyer to file a case against some polluters.”

“Well, let’s see. I don’t know anything about environmental law,” Tubby hedged. “Don’t they have a law clinic at Tulane for that sort of thing?”

“Yes they do, Daddy, but they’ve run out of money or something. They’re not taking on any new cases right now.”

“I didn’t know you were involved in environmental work. Is it some kind of club or something?”

“It’s a real organization,” she said defensively. “It’s mostly people from school, but they have members from all over.”

“Tell me more about it. When did you get involved?”

“I’ve been going to meetings for a couple of weeks. Marcos took me to one. His roommate’s the chairman.”

Oh, that explained things. Marcos was a boyfriend. He was a permanent student, on sabbatical from his family estates in Mexico, with an interest in biology. He was good-looking, well off, always polite, spoke English beautifully, and Tubby was running out of reasons not to approve of him.

“The main objectives,” Debbie continued, “are to get the river cleaned up and to catch the major polluters.”

“That’s kind of hard,” Tubby said, “since we are at the tail end of a two-thousand-mile open drainage ditch that starts in garden spots like Pittsburgh and the copper mines of Butte, Montana. And along whose shores any ship or barge that wants to can just flush its hold and send a highly toxic surge toward New Orleans. How are you going to police that?”

“You have to try, don’t you? A lot of that chemical waste comes from right here, so we’re responsible. For goodness sakes, we drink that stuff.”

Shocking, but true. Over the levee at Oak Street, there they were. Big pipes sucking in the brown muck of the river, happy with fish and swirling with an occasional rainbow, all pumped into the treatment plant. There it was given a rest, laced with chlorine, treated to sunshine, and sent out to fertilize the populace. Those who could afford it drank bottled water from some less urban aquifer up north, or drank wine.

“It’s a big problem, to be sure,” Tubby hemmed.

“Couldn’t you help, Daddy? I know you’re busy, but I bet you could make a big difference.”

Actually he was not very busy. If he didn’t get motivated he was going to find himself without any clients.

“What do I have to do?” he asked.

“Just be a lawyer. I’ll tell Twink Beckman. He’s the president. I don’t know the details of the case since I just joined the group. I’ve only been to one meeting actually, and I heard them say they needed lawyers. I’m sure he’ll call you soon.”

“I’m sure he will, too,” Tubby said. “Are you finished?”

“Yes. It’s time I was getting back to my apartment. I have to study.”

“No dessert?” he asked mournfully.

“Oh no, I couldn’t. But I’ll sit here if you’d like to have some.”

“No, I guess not.” Tubby patted his stomach virtuously.

He paid up and drove Debbie back to her new apartment on Hampson Street, the one she shared with two other girls.

“Thanks a lot for dinner, Daddy,” she said when she got out. “And thanks for offering to help save the river. And, oh, I’m so sorry about Mr. Aucoin.” She shuddered and was gone. He watched her get inside the door, then drove away cautiously, the street made narrower by all the students’ Jeeps and Japanese cars parked along both grassy curbs.

The mystery of Potter Aucoin’s death took an interesting twist the next morning. Kathy Jeansonne, the newspaper reporter, called.

“You’re a real butt,” she said, by way of hello.

“What are you talking about?”

“Real cute, ditching me at the morgue.”

“You writers always talk that way?”

“I watched two more stiffs get wheeled in before I figured out the Aucoins weren’t coming back.”

“You’ll probably get some good stories out of it.”

“Sure, watch for my byline.”

She asked Tubby if he knew anything about the Aucoin drug connection. He wanted to know what she was talking about.

“Did you know the police found a package containing more than a quarter-pound of cocaine in his office?”

“No.” Tubby couldn’t believe it.

“That’s right. They’re keeping it, a secret, but not from me. So how do you think this figures into the murder?”

“I don’t know. It’s news to me. If Potter was shipping drugs I’d be shocked.”

“And wild-eyed, no doubt,” she said, unable to resist a dig.

“Yeah, well, thanks for calling me.”

After she hung up, he conceded that it might be true, considering what he knew about Potter’s past. Maybe you never could really give up cocaine once you started. Maybe the lure of big money had just been too strong for Potter.

But he hadn’t seen any indicators that Potter desperately needed cash. They had sent the books over to a CPA, Jerry Molideau, to review, and the preliminary report was that the company had good funds in the bank. Tubby had collected the legal documents from Edith, who got them out of her safe-deposit box, and they showed that Export Products had leased its spot on the wharf from the New Orleans Levee Board, that the company had options to renew running fifteen more years, and that the rent was current.

Edith had put Broussard back to work processing the last of the oil shipments Potter had secured. With the boss gone, no new contracts were being bid. Broussard was shutting things down. It stood to reason that if the police had found drugs in a dead man’s office they would be checking the barges that were still passing through. And if they had found anything big, there would no longer be a secret about drugs. Edith would at least have been questioned. The whole thing didn’t make sense, but it raised disappointing questions about Potter.

Tania had the gun in her purse when she stalked Charlie Van Dyne on Tuesday and again on Wednesday night. She lacked confidence in her aim, since the only weapons training she had had was watching cop shows on television. There was no way that, seated in her car, she could hit the man when he came out of his front door, and she could not even picture herself hiding in a hedge and running across a lawn with a pistol in her hands. So she would get him at a restaurant.

On Tuesday night, however, he set off in a new direction and ended up at Clancy’s, which had valet parking. On Wednesday he went to the Upperline, which paid an off-duty policeman to hang around on the street.

But on Thursday she followed the Cadillac back to Derbigny Street and eventually back to the Bouligny Steak House. This historic establishment served one of the largest porterhouses in town, but the place was so old that almost all of its customers had died. It hadn’t yet been discovered by a young crowd so it was the perfect choice for an intimate meal. Like nobody else might be there. And if you really wanted isolation you could eat in a curtained booth. On this night neither valet nor lawman was visible in the parking lot.

Only one other car, maybe the cook’s, was there when the Cadillac pulled in. Both men got out at the same time. Tania watched from across the street, as she had once before. After half an hour of smelling beef grilling in the distance she started up, made a U-turn, and got closer. She slowly entered the lot and took the exact spot next to the Cadillac, on the passenger side. She switched off her lights. Except for the two other cars, the place was deserted. She got the .38 revolver out of her purse and warmed it up in her lap. It was fully loaded and the safety was off. She had checked those things a dozen times. It really took no genius to operate a hand gun. If you didn’t believe that, it was time for you to wake up and smell the coffee. That’s the way Dear Abby put it, and Tania read Dear Abby every morning at her breakfast table at her house.

She thought about other remarkable advice Abby had given to other troubled people, pregnant girls and women whose husbands snored, over all those years. Thus her mind stayed occupied while she waited for Charlie Van Dyne to finish his steak.

Abby was like Tania, caring but capable. Practical. Problems were to be confronted and handled. You did your best. A panicky doubt passed over her just then, that killing the man was the wrong thing to do. The feeling had come before, and she erased it in a second. What she was about to do was necessary for her well-being, it was that simple. It was fair, and it would make the world a better place. Thank you, Dear Abby.

Voices came suddenly from the front of the restaurant, and she saw Charlie Van Dyne and his manservant round the corner. They paused, as she had seen them do before, while Charlie fished out his cigarette and his bodyguard found a match.

They said something to each other and Charlie shrugged. The driver started to come around the car to the passenger side, but Charlie mumbled, “That’s all right,” and the man changed course toward his own door. Charlie walked past the headlights of his own car and waited, just a few inches from Tania, while his driver got in and popped up the door lock. Charlie opened his door and stooped to get in.

He had taken no notice of Tania, but now she quickly rolled down her window.

“Mister,” she said softly.

Charlie was in the car now, in his seat with his hand on the door to pull it closed. He was startled by her voice and looked at her with questions in his eyes.

“Do you have a light?” she asked sweetly.

Charlie turned away to get the lighter from his driver, and when he turned back Tania had the pistol pointed out the window right in his face.

“Whoa,” Charlie said.

Tania hissed like a cat, and with both hands tight around the butt she pulled the trigger with all her strength.

Charlie’s forehead split apart, and he slammed back against his driver. The inside of the car was littered with gore.

“Jesus Christ, lady!” the driver cried, moving his terrified eyes back and forth from Tania’s and her gun. His face was speckled with organic matter, and he had involuntarily hugged Charlie’s body against his own as a shield. What remained of Charlie’s head rested wetly against his shoulder.

Tania didn’t want to kill the bodyguard. He was not a part of the justice equation.

“You stay where you are, all right?”

“All right, lady. Jesus,” the man said, pulling Charlie closer to him. Tania put her gun back in her lap and started the car. She backed up fast. As she left the lot she saw the front door of the restaurant open a crack and a head poke out, a cautious investigator. Then she was gone.

Her mind raced ahead of her all the way home, replaying the event again and again, while some attentive mass of cells remembered to tell her to stop at red lights, to find Laurel Street, and to park by her house.

She got inside and locked the door behind her. She went to the cupboard where there was a dusty bottle of Canadian Club left over from Kip’s last party, and she poured herself a drink. Once she sat down and tasted the alcohol she began shaking uncontrollably. It lasted about a minute, during which she whispered a rambling prayer to God. And the peace came to her.

She sighed and finished her drink. She picked up the pistol where she had dropped it by the front door in her haste and carried it into the kitchen. Pulling a nearly full garbage bag out of its plastic can, she thrust the pistol, cartridges and all, wrist deep into the trash. Then she tied the bag and dragged it outside to the street. Tomorrow was garbage day. In the morning it would be gone.