Chapter Nineteen

Linc’s story

Linc came home from school and found the Ghost working out with the weights, the sleeves of his white shirt rolled up and his tie undone like he’d come directly from the office.

“So how could you blow it with Suzanne in just two days, man! When I picked you up at the lake and dropped you off at the Hill, I thought I’d fixed everything up just fine, and here you are working it out with the weights.”

“A lot can happen in two days,” he told Linc.

“Such as…”

“Such as Cherry Fontaine showing up and disappearing. Such as finding out Birdie and Jeff Sonnier stole the silver.”

“What you say!”

The Ghost was still filling in Brother Linc when the phone rang, and Doris came out to get her husband. His mama had called with the news about Jefferson Sonnier. Suicide, she said. He told the Ghost the call was nothing and let him finish what he had to say. All the while Linc wondered how he would tell George that Doc Sonny killed himself. Knowing how his friend felt about the man, thinking Doc should have been his father, not old philandering, hard-drinking Jacques, Ghost would take it hard. Meanwhile, George kept talking about this good man who had kept a promise to a dead woman and tried to spare her son. All mixed up in this were Cherry Fontaine and Suzanne Hudson, the past and the future. Still working on his words, Linc noticed when Sheriff Duval drove up in his squad car.

Funny how a sight like that in these liberated times can still cause a black family to retreat, the children to seek their mama, the wife to move toward her husband. Having the law in your driveway never meant any good in the old neighborhood. The men in uniform rarely came to protect or to serve, only to question and to take people away, but the Man wasn’t looking for Linc this time. Sheriff Duval wanted George.

“Miss Breaux told me you was out here. Guess you heard about Jeff Sonnier taking his own life this afternoon.”

George dropped the bar he pressed into the rack. The sweat on his cheeks looked a little like tears as it ran down to his chin.

“Doc left several long letters and a will all signed and witnessed. You get whatever we find in that cistern tomorrow, but that’s not what I come about, George.”

Linc shook George’s arm to make sure he listened. Not paying attention to the Law when it talks can lead to trouble.

“We checked out your old girlfriend, Mrs. Angers, with her ex-husband down in New Orleans and asked around town if anyone saw her since yesterday. They all said no, but Evelyn Patout over at the museum claimed a stranger came in yesterday morning who didn’t want her tour or any historical information at all—a stocky blond fellow driving a light blue rent car. First, I thought Mr. Angers had hired someone to tail his ex. Maybe he wanted to be sure she didn’t sell off any of those antiques she took with her before their settlement. But, it turns out this blond guy only wanted directions to Magnolia Hill. Said he had a friend living up there named Suzanne Hudson, and did Miss Evelyn know her. Sure, Miss Evelyn says, and he’d better hurry up and get there because George St. Julien and that girl have been out on the town together, and Suzanne thinks she’s too good for any other man in Port Jefferson. Leave it to a Patout, even one by marriage, to stir things up. Anyhow, this guy gets sort of red in the face and stomps out.”

“Hippo down at Joe’s Lounge says he ain’t seen any strange red-headed women, just one fair-haired guy who come in late afternoon and wanted to know where he could rent a boat. Hippo told him Alcide Porrier would rent most anything he owned for the right price and gave the fellow directions. The man drove a light blue sedan. Some of the regulars at Joe’s seen it parked along Front Street when they left around one a.m. Hippo says it wasn’t there at three when he went home. George, I think your lady friend’s been kidnapped.”

“It should have been Suzanne,” George said, looking like a weight had dropped on his foot.

“Would have helped Jeff Sonnier some if he’d took the Yankee gal last night,” the sheriff agreed.

“No, I mean Cherie was sleeping in Suzanne’s bed. Suzanne has been getting weird letters from some man back in Philadelphia. All they ever said was that he’d come to get her and then a lot of…well, descriptions of bondage. No threats against her life, but sick just the same. I pulled one out of the trash the other day when she seemed upset. After that, if I saw another in the mail, I threw it out. The guy sounded like some kind of psycho.”

“If he is a psycho, he might make another try for Suzanne if we give him the chance. Probably, he didn’t figure on two young women staying at your house. Since he wants to do things to her, he won’t kill her right away. He could lead us right to Mrs. Angers. What say you don’t get home tonight, George, in case he’s watching the house?”

“Suzanne could be dead before you stopped him.”

“And if we don’t catch him, she could still end up dead.”

Linc admired the sheriff’s reasoning until he realized George was demanding to go along on the stakeout at the Hill. He started to say, “Look, George, we ain’t playing Devil’s Horseman here. Let the law handle it,” when George volunteered his buddy to go along, too. The sheriff deputized them faster than Linc could back out. It looked like he and the Ghost were going to be spending more time together hunched in the magnolia thickets at the Hill waiting for another man to carry off Suzanne Hudson.