House of Blues (44 page)

"First I called Maurice Gresham, who, I think,
works with the three of you. He's a very special friend of mine, or
he was, until he refused to take my call.

"
After that, I called my friends on the casino
board and my friends in the governors office; every single one of
them couldn't wait to get me off the phone. I called ten in all, and
l'll be glad to give you all their names and a list of the crimes I
personally know they've committed because I've been a witness to
them.

"One of them, apparently, sent me that horse's
ass, Delmonico, who advised me not to say a word, although so far as
I could tell, this had little to do with helping my case and
everything to do with protecting my 'friends.'

"I am fed up, ladies and gentlemen. I am the
sister of Gus Lozano, who as you know was the mob boss of New Orleans
until a few days ago. Our longtime employers have now tried to kill
my brother and caused him to seek exile in another country. I locked
up four people and kept them prisoner trying to protect our employers
and their ‘friends,' and then I thought I had no choice except to
kill them to protect myself. I am informed by my brother that our
friends in the dear brotherhood are gunning for me as well as him,
though I doubt that, because they usually only kill if you've cheated
them or they think you have.

"But in any case, I would like to see them all
die horrible deaths. Therefore I'm prepared to sing like the
proverbial canary not only about my own case, but about everything I
know about the Mafia in New Orleans. And all our dear 'friends,' of
course."

She stopped, hands in lap, smiling like one of the
nice church ladies Skip had recently met. "I do this more in
hopes of revenge than leniency."

"Okay, Anna," said Roth. "Let's stop
there." She turned to the others. "She'll be happy to tell
her story tonight. When we start dealing, we'll talk about the other
stuff. The canary songs."

Shellmire looked like he'd died and gone to heaven.
Skip thought: The D.A.'s going to be pinching himself as well. I hope
I'm maintaining my usual poker face.

Shellmire said, "Mind if we tape this?"

Roth shook her head. "Not at all."

Once again he reminded Anna of her rights. "Okay,
Ms. Garibaldi, why don't you tell us what happened?"

Anna looked pretty good for someone who'd been
through what she had. Some criminals probably did want to be
caught—especially those fleeing their country and a burning house
for an unknown life in an unknown land. To Anna, a prison might be
preferable.

That and revenge.

She said, "Where shall I start?" She seemed
a different person from the frightened, shaky wraith who had rifled
Skip's purse. Sobered up probably. And not only in a physical sense.

"
Wherever you like."

"I guess in a way I've always been involved
because of the fish business, although I didn't know it. Gus set my
husband up in the business when we were very young, and of course
they didn't tell me any of the details because I was a woman. Women
have no role in the mob except to produce children. Then when Phil
died, he left the business to me, and I found out it was a money
laundry. Well, I knew what my brother did for a living, and our
father before him; that didn't surprise me. But I'd never heard
anyone talk about it before. I wasn't really one of them, do you
understand that? Because I'm a woman.

"
I think Gus probably had to fight pretty hard
to get them to let me keep running the business, but he wanted that,
because he didn't have time to do it himself. He could trust me, you
see—he knew I was the one person who wouldn't cheat him. Not only
that, I'd been running it since Phil got sick, and I had an aptitude.

"I was happy doing it.

"We've always been close, Gustavo and I. His
wife left him a few years ago. I don't blame her—who wants a
husband who's never home and never talks about anything important? I
had one like that. But it's different with brother and sister—Gustavo
and I could talk; he respects me as much as he can respect a woman.

"So when he got the idea of buying the house—the
one where Detective Langdon was my guest—he asked me if I'd like to
be his hostess. The idea was a meeting place, a place where we could
impress people we needed, do you know what I mean?"

Tarantino said, "Not exactly."

"I mean politicians. People on the casino board.
People who control things that affected us.

"People like Arthur Hebert—he's been to
parties there. He's worked with us for years. A restaurant owner's
ideal for passing messages—he goes around, shakes hands with the
customers, he talks to everybody. Nobody sees anything, you
understand? Of course he got the casino restaurant concession—why
wouldn't he?"

Skip realized that Sugar's mysterious "Ann"
had probably been the Dragon herself. She said, "Was Reed in on
it?"

'"God, no. But she had to go before the casino
board as a formality. Poor thing; I hear she worked her little butt
off trying to get what was already in the bag."

Shellmire said, "Could we get back to the house,
please? What did you use it for?"

Anna settled back, looking as if she were used to an
audience. "We'd invite these people to parties there, and let
them throw their own parties." She shrugged. "We'd even get
them bimbos if they wanted them. Of course I didn't have to do that.
Gustavo always tried to protect me .... " She blinked and paused
for a moment. "It worked two ways. If they were already in, it
was just a clubhouse for them. We've got a pool and a gym, billiard
room—all that kind of stuff'. Your Sergeant Gresham, for
instance—he liked to bring his women there.

"
If they weren't in, they'd come and meet people
who seemed respectable, and they wouldn't know what they were into
till it was too late, and then we could blackmail them.

"
Anyway, what I did—I ran the house. I guess
you could say I was literally a housekeeper. I hired the staff, gave
the parties, took care of the caterers, all that kind of stuff; I did
all the scheduling, took care of the laundry—everything except
procuring the bimbos. Also, I kept running the fish company. If you
looked in Maurice Gresham's records, you'd see that he did a whole
lot of 'private security work' for us."

"Which he didn't really do."

"
Are you kidding? Why would a fish company need
security? He just did us the kind of favors a guy with the run of the
cop shop can do."

Cappello caught Skip's eye. Skip raised an eyebrow,
acknowledging their previous conversation.

"So that was the setup," she said. "What
happened last Monday?"

"
Monday?"

"
Were you having a meeting at the clubhouse?"

"
Oh, the night Mo's bimbo showed up pursued by
the mother of the baby she'd kidnapped. What a piece of work, huh?
Can you believe anybody could be so stupid? And can you believe she's
Arthur Hebert's daughter? God, I have some bad luck.

"Reed comes running up to the gate, trying to
get in, and yelling everyone's name. We had three casino board
members there—did the neighbors need to know that? They'd just left
the meeting, but it was still in progress and I had to do something
with this crazy woman. I didn't have any choice about it."

She was momentarily fiery, no doubt the Anna that
Reed had seen when she named her the Dragon, the one who was probably
good in business and who ran the mob clubhouse like a four-star
hotel.

There are women like that. They're great in
business, do their jobs well, they make a terrific impression, but
they're completely submissive to men. Twofers.

"
Why not just tell her to go home?"

"
She saw those casino board peop1e—don't you
understand? Do you know what that means? Then it turns out she's Reed
Hebert. Not only does she know them, but they know her. She's seen
them at the mob clubhouse. That tries and convicts them in their own
minds—and who knows where it might have led? I certainly didn't,
and I didn't know what to do. Except contain the damage. That much I
knew.

"So I had Eddie and Mike bring her in, along
with the bimbo, who was out of her mind drunk—or something—and
couldn't be reasoned with. And the little girl. Sally." In the
midst of it all, Anna smiled. As soon as she said the name, her face
was transformed. She looked at Skip, possibly because she'd known her
the longest by a couple of hours. "Is Sally all right?" Her
voice was different too, high and too light; worried.

"She's fine."

"
I took good care of her. I'd never have hurt
her. You know that, don't you? The gun was empty."

That was true: there were no bullets in the gun she
had held to Sally's head.

Shellmire said, "So you took the three of them
prisoner."

"I had no idea what to do. Nothing like this had
ever happened before—first of all, decisions to make; second,
Gustavo out of action. He had gone to New York for a day or two. I
faxed him immediately, thinking to hear back in an hour or two, like
always. Thinking he'd be back in the morning. He'd left no one in
charge, you see. No one.
 
"
So
that meant me. I knew that if I didn't hear from him, I was supposed
to pretend I had, I wasn't to let anyone know he couldn't be
reached."

"You had that agreement with him?"

Anna looked at him coldly. "When you've spent
your whole life in the mob, you're expected to have a minimum of
street smarts. You don't need agreements."

"I see."

"
I kept thinking I'd hear from him any second,
but I also knew that if I didn't, something was badly wrong. I was
crazy with worry, and I couldn't help it, I started drinking and
couldn't stop. I don't usually do that." She sounded surprised.

"
I mean, I've never done that in my life."
She looked at each of them in turn. "But I've never—I've never
had a problem like this. Could I have some coffee, please?"

"Of course. Let's take a ten-minute break."

Shellmire was probably happy to get her some coffee.
He wanted her to stay alert, stay focused. Keep talking.

When they had reconvened, Anna seemed to have gotten
a second wind. "I don't think any of you can understand how
panicked I was and how the panic increased minute by minute, hour by
hour, day by day. I'm not trying to excuse what I did—I am deeply
sorry and I know I'll be punished. I just want you to know that you
can't know how crazy I was."

She stopped and didn't speak for a few minutes,
apparently making up her mind about something. She stared at a spot
on the wall, perhaps projecting on it her own private movie.

She said, "I lied when I said I've never done
that. When my son died, the same thing happened." Tears flowed
freely down her aristocratic cheeks. "I started drinking and I
couldn't stop. It was like that for two weeks. And then—I did.

"I'm not an alcoholic. I don't do this
periodically. I guess—"

She stopped and stared again for a while, working it
out. "I guess I must do it when I just can't face something. I
thought Gustavo was dead. I thought I was alone in the world. I mean,
I see now that was what I was trying not to think. And you see, it
happened at the same time Sally came. I had all those same
feelings—of loss, of the most excruciating despair—that I had
when I lost my son, and yet, here was something filling me up again.
Here was this wonderful little girl I kept falling in love with a
little bit more every day.

"
I would never have hurt her. You have to
believe me. I thought it was the only way I could get to spend time
with her—to pretend like that. I just wanted to be with her."

Skip thought of the way she had held Sally too tight,
the terrified look on the child's face, the way Sally had screamed
for her mother.

We do such odd things in the name of love.

Shellmire said, "Your son was Frankie
Garibaldi."

Anna looked surprised. "Francis, yes. They
killed him."

"But it didn't happen here—it happened in New
York."

"
They set him up."

"Why?"

"
They sent him there. They could have sent
Johnny. Or Carlos or Martin. Any of them were more experienced. They
didn't have to send Francis."

Shellmire spread his hands. "It sounds more like
they gave him a chance and he blew it."

"The bastards set him up."
 

28

Skip had drunk coffee along with Anna, enough to get
her through a long night. She still had to talk to Reed, but that
could wait. Cappello had told her Abasolo was waiting for her call.
She got some peanut butter cookies from a machine in the basement and
ate them mechanically, not tasting, not wanting to, just needing
fuel.

She got Abasolo's machine. "Oh, well, out at a
bar, I expect."

It wasn't likely—Abasolo was a staunch member of
AA—so staunch that was his sometime nickname.

He picked up. "Officer Langdon, I presume."