House of Blues (8 page)

"
How can I help you?"

"You know what happened last night?"

"
I know Arthur was killed and everyone else is
gone, if that's what you mean. I'm nearly out of my mind." Skip
thought her eyes grew wet as she spoke.

"
You're close to the family?"

"
To Dennis. And of course Sally's adorable, but
I hardly know Reed. I mean, she's always been very nice, I guess I've
known her since Icebreakers"—seventh grade subscription
dances—"but we never had much in common."

"And Dennis? How do you know Dennis?"

She turned slightly pink. "I'm not supposed to
say."

Skip said, "AA. I know about that."

"
He was the one who got me into it. He really
helped me a lot.

I mean—a lot." She shrugged. "We were
both into plants, so we finally went into business together. Oh, God,
what's going to happen to me now?"

Skip wondered what their financial arrangement was.
"Did Dennis put up the money?"

"
No. I did. But he's indispensable—I can't run
this thing without him. I've been on the phone all day—do you have
any idea what happened over there? At Arthur and Sugar's?"

This was Skip's least favorite kind of a question.
"Sorry, it's under investigation. I really can't discuss it.
Tell me—how has it worked out? Your business, I mean?"

"Well, it's only been a few months. But so far,
fantastic. Just being around Dennis is like—I don't know—being
born again."

"That's pretty strong."

Sullivan had been examining one of her plants. She
turned to stare at Skip. "I must sound crazy. Let me start over.
I come from a family of macho men—everybody's got to prove how big
and mean he is. There's a sweetness about Dennis; a sort of quiet
gentleness that's the most soothing thing I've ever been around."

She's in love with him.

Skip said, "You'd never guess it from his
picture."

Sullivan laughed. "I know. You should see
him—piercing, scary eyes; and that brooding look. There was an
Irishman in the woodpile somewhere. I know because half the Sullivans
have it. Only they don't just look violent—they are."

"Have you heard from him, Silky?"

Sullivan stared at her quizzically. "I'd have
told you if I had."

"
Where do you think he is?"

"
You think I know? I'd go get him if I knew."

"
Tell me about your business arrangement."

"I put up the money because I had it. We pay
ourselves salaries, but any profit above that goes to me until I'm
paid off. After that we split."

"
How about insurance?"

She shrugged. "We've got some."

"
Any life insurance?"

"
Life insurance? Why on earth would we need
that?" Skip didn't speak for a moment, and Sullivan apparently
realized the irony of what she'd said. "Oh, God." She
brought one hand to her mouth and bit it.

When she'd gotten control, she said, "We don't
have life insurance. "

"
Dennis probably knew some pretty questionable
characters when he was using. Maybe you know them too."

"Are you kidding? I grew up on First Street. I
did my drinking where it was socially acceptable."

"Did he tell you about his other life? As an
addict?"

"Not much." Something in her face closed
down.

"
Look, I'm trying to find him."

"
Detective, I can't help you. If I could, I
would, but I really can't. Sober people usually don't talk that much
about that part of their lives—the thing they've left behind."

"
I thought that was what AA meetings were all
about."

"
I could tell you what Dennis went through
emotionally—if that's what you mean. But I wouldn't. We have a
saying: 'What we hear in the rooms stays in the rooms.' "

"I'm more interested in the people he knew then.
Who he hung out with and where."

"
I'm sorry. I really don't have the least idea."

Skip handed her a card. "Let me know if you
think of anything?
 
 

5

Dennis's parents lived in an old neighborhood near
Mercy Hospital, perfectly respectable but not prestigious—"yatty,"
a friend of Skip's called it; full of the working-class whites known
as "yats" to white-collar New Orleanians.

The family homestead was a neat house that could have
used paint but wasn't yet an eyesore. It looked as if its owners
cared but had put off painting for a year too many. In the yard were
bushes pruned into roundish shapes, suggesting attention; so the
peeling paint was probably a function of economics. The house was a
bungalow style with trellislike ironwork pillars that held up the
porch. Four steps led to a little waist-high gate of the same
fanciwork—perhaps there had been a dog once, but there was no
barking now, so it seemed an oddly superfluous luxury. At the rear of
the porch there was an old-fashioned screen door. It was a peaceful
structure that reminded Skip of small houses in sleepy country towns.
When she identified herself, Mrs. Foucher drew in her breath.

"
He's dead. Dennis is dead, isn't he?"

"Oh, I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to frighten
you. We have no word of him yet. I'm just here to ask you some
questions. I'm trying to find him."

Mrs. Foucher had a tissue in her hand that she had
squeezed the life out of. She was overweight and her face looked as
if it was probably sad even when no one was missing or dead. "Truly?
I thought he was dead. Milton, I thought he was dead."

Her husband said, "It's all right, Josie. It's
all right now." He put an arm around her shoulder and turned to
Skip, holding open the screen door. "Come in, dear lady. Permit
me."

The formal, old-fashioned mode of speech sounded
strange to Skip's ears.

They're such ordinary white people, she thought. But
the town was full of families like this—some members "white,"
some "black." Mrs. Foucher was the lighter, with
gray-streaked brown hair, and her husband had darkish hair, also
graying, which he wore with a moustache.

Skip was surprised that both the Fouchers were home,
though it was a Tuesday. Perhaps they were out of work, or one of
them was. Or perhaps Dennis's father had stayed home to await news of
his son. "Could we give you some coffee? You are a blue person,"
Milton said. "I know you understand how Josie feels. We are
happy to have you in our house."

He used no contractions and he enunciated each word,
speaking in discrete phrases and projecting so strongly that if he'd
been a preacher he could have reached every ear in the congregation
without benefit of microphone. She wondered if he was a lay preacher
who just liked to practice; also whether he was a raving lunatic.

 "
A blue person," she ventured. "Is
that what you call a policeman?"

"Oh, hardly. I would hardly call a young lady a
‘man' of any sort. Accuracy is my passion, and I do not make
mistakes so easily avoided."

He and his wife had now led her into a cramped and
dreary kitchen, still smelling of breakfast. Skip refused coffee, but
joined them at a table under a hanging light fixture that threatened
to decapitate anyone who moved too fast.

Josie was silent. "A blue person," Milton
said, "is a person of compassion, someone who feels for other
people, who is kind and who wants to please. Josie is one as well. I
myself am a green person—a scholar, something of a recluse, an
intellectual, someone who loves studying above all else."

In spite of herself, Skip was fascinated. "Is
this your own system or someone else's?"

"
Well, we green people are indeed the creative
ones—the inventors, the scientists. But this is not my handiwork.
It is something I learned in a seminar. I attend every seminar I am
able. I also read constantly. But never fiction, of course. No, sir,
I am interested only in facts." Here his voice rose as if he
were either angry or in the pulpit, making his most vital point.
"Only facts!" he raged, and his face turned red.

He lowered his voice. "If there are no facts, I
do not have interest. I do not watch television for any reason."

"
Are there other colors?"

"
Of course. The world could not survive without
gold people. These are the doers; the movers and the shakers."

"I see. Which one is Dennis?"

An odd expression came over Milton's face. Skip could
have sworn it was confusion, but Milton didn't seem the sort who went
in for that. He recovered quickly.

"He is not intelligent enough to be a green
person. He does not do enough to be gold person. I would say that he
is a blue person except that he does not listen. No system is
perfect."

Skip turned to Josie and smiled. "I wonder if
you've heard from him since yesterday?"

"Of course we have not," said Milton. "If
we had, we would have mentioned it. Dennis was always a hellion. He
skipped school more often than he went, he associated with unsavory
individuals, and he smoked marijuana. I was obliged to whip him at
least three times a week. Quite often, he even failed to come home—he
stayed out all night with fringe-element friends."

Milton had curly hair and looked like a laborer of
some sort. Skip had never in her life heard anyone—especially
anyone who looked like him—talk this way.

"
Worried us to death," said his mother.
"And such a smart boy. He finished two years at UNO, did you
know that? But then he disappeared and didn't come back for a while."

"Somehow or other, he managed to meet Miss Reed
Hebert. Neither Josie nor I will ever have the slightest notion how
he did it. She civilized him as no one else had been able to do. We
watched her turn him into a different person altogether. At this
moment, a good friend of his is dying of AIDS—a neighborhood boy,
two blocks away. This neighborhood. AIDS.

"
This young man is as red-blooded as I am. He
contracted this disease by using needles. That is correct. In this
neighborhood. I stress that this boy is not a homosexual—this thing
could have happened to Dennis. It did not because of Reed Hebert."

He set his lips in a grim line, and Skip wasn't sure
she didn't hear regret in his voice. She thought he had probably
predicted it and hated to be proved wrong.

"
As it happens, I was talking to Mrs. Sugar
Hebert when the kidnap occurred. I had called Dennis to tell him
about his " friend Justin—the boy who is ill—and Mrs. Hebert
answered the phone."

"What kidnap, Mr. Poucher? What did you mean by
that?"

"That is what happened, of course. Surely the
police have figured this out."

Josie said, "Did he mention green people like to
control things?" Skip thought she was trying to be playful, but
it wasn't working.

As always, Milton ignored her. "We will soon be
receiving a ransom note—that is, Mrs. Hebert will. These people
could not get a cent from the Fouchers." His voice was smug.

"
This friend—Justin. Could you give me his
address?"

"You wish to visit Justin? What on earth for?"

"
I want to see Justin and any of Dennis's other
friends."

Both the Fouchers looked furious—Skip couldn't
think why, but she thought it had to do with the control Josie had
mentioned. Blue person or not, she shared her husband's world, and
very likely his reality. Perhaps they wanted to be the only sources,
the world's greatest living experts on Dennis Foucher, dope fiend.

"
We will be glad to comply," said Milton,
"with anything the police desire. However, we know of no other
friends of Dennis's."

His anger was so strong, so naked, she found it
uncomfortable remaining in the room even long enough to get Justin
Arceneaux's address.

If I lived with these two, she thought, drugs might
seem very attractive indeed. In fact, they do right now.

She also found herself thinking new thoughts about
Reed—most of them respectful. Boys from families like this one
simply did not marry into Uptown families.

How on earth had Reed met Dennis? And, more
important, how had she found the courage to bring him home? There
must be a little outlaw in her, Skip thought, and she liked that. But
she thought it must be deeply buried; it certainly didn't jibe with
anything else she'd heard about Reed.

As she was leaving she said, "Can I ask you one
thing? Do you know Nina Phillips?"

Milton Foucher turned red. "I don't believe I
do."

"
She works at the restaurant. Says she's your
cousin."

"
Dennis probably told her that. I am afraid the
boy does not know the meaning of veracity. If he were here right now,
I swear I would whip him again."

Skip sneaked a look at
Josie. Her face looked as used-up as the crumpled tissue she
clutched.

* * *

Justin Arceneaux's family and friends were gathered
in the living room, as if he'd already died. A buffet table in the
dining room was piled high. The sadness in the air was like a heavy
fog on the river. As Skip entered the house, she wanted to run, or
claim to be an Avon lady, to do anything but state her business.