CHAPTER NINETEEN

I dropped Rutherford off at his place, then got a light lunch of Gulf shrimp at a little seafood place only a block from my hotel. Henry DeMour’s home turned out to be a huge, two story, high French Victorian with a mansard roof of gray slate. It sat on a half block of deeply shaded yard of ancient magnolias and moss-hung oaks. A pair of oleander bushes at least ten feet high flanked the front steps. I climbed up to the deep, shady porch and rang the old-style doorbell. A few seconds later I heard a faint stirring inside. After about a minute a severe-looking Negro maid opened the door. “I’m Virgil Tucker,” I said.

But before I could explain my business, she stepped aside and commanded in an imperious tone, “Come in, suh. She’s expecting you.”

I had no more than stepped across the threshold when my hostess appeared before me. There was something annoyingly schoolmarmish about Lucinda DeMour, something of the well-heeled and aristocratic old maid who takes a job teaching in the public schools out of a sense of obligation, then spends her lifetime making young people miserable by drumming the more esoteric points of English syntax into their reluctant skulls. She was tall and slim, with graying brown hair worn in a style that could only be called severe. Her gray dress was severe, too, both in cut and fit, its austerity relieved only by a small cameo broach at her throat. She reminded me of my own tenth-grade grammar teacher, and I was well on my way to disliking her when she smiled. It was the sort of tired smile you’d expect from a woman not a week past her husband’s funeral, but still there was a world of sunlight in it. It was a smile that made you think of bees and jonquils and tender green grass and the fragrance of wisteria floating in the early spring air. So instead of disliking her, I decided that Henry DeMour had been a very fortunate man.

“Mrs. DeMour—” I began.

“I’ve been expecting you, Mr. Tucker,” she said, extending her hand. “Simms called me on your behalf this morning. And yes, you may see my husband’s diaries if you wish. But there are a few things I need to tell you first.”

“Sure,” I answered, my voice gentle. “And I appreciate this very much.”

“Let’s go back to the kitchen and have a cup of coffee, shall we? I was just making a pot when you knocked.” She waved the maid off. “I can manage coffee without help, Lucy,” she said. The woman gave us a nod and disappeared somewhere back into the recesses of the old house.

“I have two servants who’ve been with me forever,” she said over her shoulder. “They’ve been treating me like an invalid ever since Henry was killed. It’s gotten to the point that I feel like strangling them both, but they are so devoted.…” She shrugged.

The kitchen would have served a medium-sized restaurant. On a gas range even bigger than the one at home a large ironstone percolator bubbled away. To one side of the room sat a large maple table surrounded by a half dozen captain’s chairs.

“I’m afraid Emily Post wouldn’t approve of my entertaining guests in the kitchen,” she said as she began to pour the coffee. “But I feel more comfortable here than anywhere else. Please sit down.”

“It’s fine with me, Mrs. DeMour. Sometimes I feel like I grew up in the kitchen back home.”

“And where is your home, Mr. Tucker?”

“Matador County, right down on the border. My family are all ranching people.”

“A reassuring activity,” she said. “I’m from Savannah. By the way, do you like old-fashioned pound cake, by any chance?”

“It’s my favorite.”

She placed a large pound cake in the center of the table along with two small plates and two large, steaming cups of dark, chickory-laced coffee. We sipped our coffee and ate pound cake for a while, making small talk, then at last she asked, “What have you heard about my husband, Mr. Tucker?”

“That he was a good man. Very civic minded, a person who cared a great deal about the community where he lived.”

“That’s all true. And he’d been disturbed about the public corruption in this county for years.”

“You knew that he was thinking about running for the senate, then?”

“Of course. We had discussed it at length. We talked about everything.”

“I see,” I said. “Then he must have mentioned the name Marty Salisbury to you.”

“Yes. He’s a hoodlum who runs a nightclub here.”

“Not anymore. An old Ranger named Charlie Grist beat him to a pulp and ran him out of the state two days ago. At first I was convinced that Salisbury was responsible for your husband’s death, but I’m not so sure anymore. He was involved, but I’m beginning to think there’s more to it.”

“Really? Why?”

“I’ll get to that in a minute,” I said. “But first, do you know who the Maceo brothers are?”

She nodded. “Certainly. My husband was acquainted with them both. He said they were reasonably decent men, when you consider that they operate outside the law.”

“They are. Now, what you need to understand is that Salisbury is the nephew of a very powerful New Orleans gangster named Angelo Scorpino. Apparently he was sent up here by Scorpino to take over the Maceo brothers’ operation. It was equally apparent that your husband was about to get in their way. Grist and I both assumed that was the reason he was killed. Then after Grist ejected Salisbury, we met with one of Scorpino’s top men just over the Louisiana line and he assured us that Scorpino had come to realize that the whole thing had been a mistake from the first, and that as far as he was concerned the hatchet was buried.”

“Did you believe him?”

I grinned at her. “Yes, because I think the beating Grist gave Salisbury actually scared Scorpino enough that he was afraid the old man would come down to New Orleans and do something to him.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. You see, most cops handle these Mob people pretty gently even when they arrest them and make cases on them. But Charlie Grist is a law unto himself. At any rate, that meeting should have put an end to it, but last night five shots were fired at Rosario Maceo outside his office. Obviously somebody still has their eye on the Galveston gambling rackets.”

“Who could it be?” she asked.

“I’ve got a notion, but it’s pretty far-fetched. I’d really rather not say anything until after I’ve looked at your husband’s journals.”

She nodded and sighed a long sigh. “Then I’d better tell you what I have to tell. Mr. Tucker, my husband had a serious character flaw, and that flaw was younger women. Over the years he had numerous affairs.”

“Mrs. DeMour, there’s no need—”

“Yes, there is, and for more than one reason. In the first place, I’m convinced that Henry’s philandering contributed to his death.”

“Really?” I asked.

“Yes. But I also want to tell you because my house was burgled two nights ago, and I feel sure the intruder was after those diaries.”

“What makes you think so?”

“Henry’s library was rifled, but not a single thing was taken. They came in through the porch window and went straight to the library and searched it thoroughly. I didn’t even discover the burglary until the next morning, and nothing else was disturbed in any way. That’s why I’m convinced they were looking for his journals.”

“Did you call the police?”

She looked at me sharply. “Are you joking? With the kind of law enforcement we have in this county? What good would that have done? And I don’t mind telling you that I haven’t slept securely since then, but what can I do? My bedroom door is sturdy, and I keep a pistol beside my bed. Beyond that, I just trust in God.”

“I see your point,” I admitted with a nod. “Who else knew about the diaries?”

“All his friends, I’m sure. He talked about them a great deal. They contained his observations on national affairs and whatnot, and he was really quite proud of them.” She smiled sadly and put down her cup. “But back to his womanizing. The first time it happened we’d been married fifteen years. I was terribly hurt, and almost left him. He begged me to stay, and I did. Oh, it’s not what you’re thinking. He didn’t promise to do better and then backslide later on. Quite the contrary. He told me that it was almost certain to happen again. You see, tender young female bodies were like an intoxicant to him. And he was handsome and very charming and able to get almost any woman he wanted.”

“I’m sorry,” I told her.

“It was not your doing, Mr. Tucker. Henry told me that I was the one real love of his life and that his attraction to other women never went beyond the physical. He also said that he regretted it, but that he knew himself well enough not to make any rash promises he couldn’t keep. He pointed out that he’d never lied to me, which was true, and he told me that he didn’t want to start.”

“Mrs. DeMour, there’s no need—”

“Yes, there is, because I want you to know. You are dealing with some very dangerous people, and you are entitled to the whole story.”

I shrugged and nodded and she went on with her story.

“So I had a choice between divorcing a man who was an ideal husband in every other respect, as well as being a devoted father to our two children, or putting up with his childish philandering. And that’s what it was. Childish. So I chose to stay. Actually, such an arrangement really isn’t all that uncommon among the people we socialized with.”

She stopped speaking for a moment and looked at me with eyes that were a little sad. “I suppose you think I was a fool,” she said.

“No, I don’t,” I said gently. “Besides, it’s not my place to pass judgment on you.”

“At any rate, I did stay, and we raised our children and were active in community affairs, and he was discreet in his romantic activities, never causing me any embarrassment or shame.”

“I appreciate you being so frank with me, but I don’t see what this has to do with his murder,” I said.

“At the time of his death Henry was involved with a young woman, and he had gone to meet her that evening.”

“Are you sure about that?” I asked.

“Of course I am. I’d been married to the man for thirty-five years. Besides, as I said, he never lied to me. When he left the house that night I asked him if it was a business call or a social call he was making, and he said a social call, so I knew what he meant. It was a sort of code we had. That means that at the very least, being out with this young woman when he could have been safe at home put him in the place where he was killed. And deep down I can’t help but feel that somehow she lured him to that nightclub.”

“Do you have any idea who she was?”

She shook her head. “None whatsoever. But I wanted to tell you this because you may find some mention of it when you read his diary, and I didn’t want you to feel you had to protect me from the truth. Most of all, I didn’t want you to feel sorry for me.”

I nodded. “I would never presume to do that, Mrs. DeMour. And I really don’t want to pry into your private business. It’s just that—”

“Why are you doing this anyway, Mr. Tucker?” she asked. “Looking into Henry’s death, I mean.”

“Like I told Mr. Simms last night, I’m not really sure myself. Part of it is that your husband seems to have been too decent a man to be written off the way he’s been written off by the officials in this county. Then there was this girl who saw the murder. I was supposed to be protecting her, but—”

“The one who was found out on the Galveston highway a couple of days ago?”

I nodded.

She gazed at me thoughtfully for a few moments, then rose abruptly. “Follow me,” she said. “I imagine you are anxious to see those journals.”

Henry DeMour’s library was what one would expect from a wealthy man who loved books—dark wood paneling and deep leather armchairs, built-in bookshelves floor to ceiling, books everywhere. She opened a door in the paneling to reveal a large safe. After fooling around with the combination dial for a few seconds she swung the door open to reveal a neat stack of leather-bound books. “Take your time, Mr. Tucker,” she told me.

I thanked her and she left the room, closing the heavy door behind her. The top book was the most recent one. I sat down in one of the big leather chairs and began to read. It took me only a few minutes to find what I was looking for, and, when I did, its implications almost curled my hair. I sat for a while, thinking furiously, truly frightened for the first time since the night the goons had come to La Rosa.

Finally I came to a decision. I went out into the hallway and found it deserted. Wandering back through the old house, I discovered Lucinda DeMour once more installed at her kitchen table, coffee cup in hand. “Did you—”

“Mrs. DeMour, you told me you were from Savannah. Do you have any relatives there?”

“Several, including my brother and his family. Why do you ask?”

“You need to go there now.”

She appeared more exasperated than shocked. “Mr. Tucker, I don’t see how—”

I can be extremely persuasive when I put my mind to it. But in this case I didn’t have to be. Instead, I simply put her husband’s open journal on the table in front of her and said, “Read this, please.”

Her eyes quickly skimmed over the book, then she turned the page. When she’d finished she looked up at me with a stricken expression on her face.

“You see?” I asked. “There’s no doubt in my mind that your life is in danger. The next time they won’t bother with burglary. They’ll just force their way in and demand to know where the journals are. Then they’ll kill you afterward.”

“You think?” she asked, alarm in her eyes.

“I’m certain of it. Please pack a few things and let me take you to the depot.”

“All right. I’ll trust you, though God knows why. I guess with Henry dead I don’t have anybody else to trust.”

“Do you need to call your brother?”

She shook her head. “No, I’m welcome there any time, and he and his wife asked me to come last week when they were here for the funeral.”

“Fine. Just get whatever you need as quickly as you can and let’s go.”

She nodded and went to the door.

“And Mrs. DeMour?”

“Yes?” she asked, turning back to me.

I held up her husband’s journal. “I’m going to need to keep this,” I said.

“By all means. I’ll feel much better with it out of my house.”

*   *   *

She took no more than a half hour to get packed. After she’d sent the servants home, I put her bags in the trunk and headed for the Southern Pacific Depot.

“You should be able to get a connection in New Orleans without any trouble,” I said as I pulled up out front.

“Don’t worry about me, Mr. Tucker. I’ve made this trip many times before. When do you think I’ll be able to come home?”

I shrugged. “I have no idea. Why don’t you plan on staying a couple of weeks, at least.”

“What are you going to do?”

“I’m going to get back in contact with Charlie Grist. He was working this case, but he got called back to Austin. I think this will renew his interest. And then I think I’ll talk to a friend of mine who works for the attorney general’s office.”

Good,” she said. She opened her purse and took out a pen and a small notebook. “I’m going to give you my brother’s address and phone number. Please let me know what happens.”

“I promise.”

She had her ticket in a matter of minutes and we had only a half hour wait until the eastbound Sunset Limited pulled into the station. Once the porter had taken her bags, she turned to me and held out her hand, and for just a moment there was a plaintive expression on her face. “It may seem rude to you for me to ask such a question on so short an acquaintance,” she said, “but I would like an outsider’s opinion. Do you think I was a fool for staying with Henry all those years?”

I took her hand and bent down and kissed it, and I felt like Clark Gable. “Mrs. DeMour,” I said, “I don’t believe you could ever play the fool. You make me wish I was thirty years older.”

Her eyes misted and she leaned over to kiss me gently on the cheek. “You are a true gentleman, Mr. Tucker. A lesser man would have said he wished I was thirty years younger.”

The porter helped her into the coach and a few seconds later the train rolled away into the misty gloom of the winter afternoon.