Kent Conwell - Tony Boudreaux 02 - Skeletons of the Atchafalaya (17 page)

Patric chuckled. “I think so.”

Back in the kitchen, we sat around the table sipping hot
coffee. I’d saved my files and shut the laptop down. It was
only seven-thirty, but I was exhausted. I smiled weakly at
Janice.

She forced a smile, but from the looks of her drawn face
and the rings under her eyes, she was about two good
breaths away from collapsing.

Leroi and Sally were in no better shape. For the first
time, I noticed that Giselle was not around. Probably in the
parlor or living room, I guessed. Doing what she could to
help the others.

The storm shutter outside the kitchen window started
banging.

Leroi shook his head. “Not another one. You think
maybe Nanna’s voodoo can stop the banging?”

Sally leaned into him with her shoulder. “Stop that voodoo stuff. It’s spooky.”

He laughed. “Maybe so, but the cottonmouth is still
missing.”

I remained silent, staring at them, struggling with my
own thoughts. He was right. The snake was still missing.
Why would the killer go to all the trouble to clean up the
room? Why take the snake at all? What was he trying to
prove? Or could it possibly be-I shook my head, refusing
even to consider the unnatural theory.

Giselle came in and opened the refrigerator door. “Anyone for a sandwich?”

“Not me,” I said. “I got no appetite.”

Leroi grunted. “The voodoo’s got him.”

She laughed. “Don’t laugh at it. There are some who
swear by it.” She slid the platter of ham onto the countertop. “Come on. Eat something. It’ll perk you up. Sally, you
and Janice come over here and fix those guys something to
eat. Just count us lucky that we’ve had electricity the whole
time.”

For a moment, no one moved, then Janice threw me a big grin. “Why not? It’s better than just sitting around.
Come on, Sally. Let’s make them a ham-and-cheese deluxe.
Forget about the snake and all that voodoo talk.”

“Just don’t spill mayonnaise on your shirt this time,”
Giselle said to Janice. “I don’t have any more tank tops
upstairs.”

Janice glanced at me, cut her eyes to Giselle, then
quickly returned to preparing our supper.

I glanced at the pantry. I couldn’t help wondering about
the condition of the corpses in the freezer. Without a word,
I rose and entered the pantry. The blankets hung motionless
down the sides of the freezer. I toyed with the idea of
looking at the bodies, but quickly decided against it.

As I touched the blankets, they moved. Squatting, I
placed my hand at the bottom of the blankets and felt cool
air escaping.

I looked around the pantry for some means to secure the
blankets against the freezer, some string or tape. Keep more
of the cold in, which would be essential if the electricity
should go off.

There was everything on the pantry shelves except tape
or twine. I spotted the broom closet. Brooms and mops
hung on all three walls. On one peg was a spool of kite
twine. A curtain covered the back wall.

I reached for the twine, but it slipped from my hand and
rolled under the curtain. I leaned forward, reaching for the
twine with one hand and extending the other against the
back wall for support.

Except, there was no support. There was no wall behind
the curtain.

With a grunt, I caught myself before falling. Slowly, I
moved the curtain aside.

My heart pounded in my chest and my eyes grew wide
as the light from the pantry revealed an opening six feet
high. Beyond, the dim glow of the light fell on a flight of
narrow stairs leading up to the second floor. I breathed in quickly, then retrieved the twine and backed out of the
closet. I closed the door silently.

Doing my best to keep the excitement from my voice, I
called out to Leroi. “Hey, give me a hand in here, will
you?”

He called from the kitchen. “What’s up?”

Casually, I replied, “I want to make sure the blankets are
tight around the freezer so no cold air can escape.”

“Oka”Y•

We wrapped the twine around the freezer several times
before tying it. I stepped back. “There. That ought to do
it.” I deliberately laid the twine on a pantry shelf. I wasn’t
about to go back in that broom closet until I was all by
myself, and I wasn’t about to mention it to anyone, not
even Janice.

I still had no idea who the killer was, but I had found
the way he managed to move about the house without being
spotted. And I was firmly convinced that only the two of
us knew about the secret staircase.

The five of us sat around the table sipping rich chicory
coffee, subdued, lost in our own thoughts. I studied my
cousins. Could it possibly have been one of them? I
couldn’t bring myself to believe such could be true.

Leroi had the motive if Bailey were right. Even Sally
could have carried out the murders to save her own family,
to save what she and Leroi had worked so hard to build.

Then there was Giselle. She had no motive, or none that
I could see. The only motive might be Patric’s assertion
that A.D. was her father, and yet even Patric claimed she
knew nothing of it. Of course, Janice had found a soiled
tank top that she claimed had blood on it, one we had not
found when we searched.

“We best hurry up and get out of here,” Sally announced
as Aunt Marie led her brood into the kitchen. “The others
are coming in to eat.”

Out in the parlor, we sat on the couch facing the French
doors on the east side, the ones from which Uncle Bailey
had fallen. I made a conscious effort not to glance in the
direction of the kitchen and pantry. Outside, the storm battered at the house.

“I don’t see how you can be so accustomed to storms
like this,” Janice said, gesturing to the families sitting quietly, the kids playing games.

“We aren’t,” Giselle replied. “I still jump every time the
wind howls or a shutter bangs against the wall.”

Leroi changed the subject. “You having any luck, Tony?
I mean talking to everyone.”

I hesitated. “If you mean do I have an idea who did it,
no. All I’ve really done is gather a lot of information for
the police. I don’t want to be the one who pins this down.
Not family.”

“But, you did talk to everyone?” I sensed a note of nervousness in his voice.

“Yeah. I think so.”

“You didn’t talk to me,” Giselle said, laughing. “Maybe
you should.”

“No need.” I shook my head. “According to folks in the
parlor, they agreed there were six people who went upstairs
between two and four yesterday.”

Sally slid her arm through Leroi’s. “Six?”

“Yeah. Your husband here, Pa, Bailey, Ezeline, A.D.,
and Marie Venable.” I looked at Giselle. “Grandma Ola
saw you go in the kitchen, but not upstairs.” I kept quiet
about the secret stairway.

She shook her head and laughed. “Grandma Ola doesn’t
miss a thing. Yeah, the hams hadn’t been sliced so I had
to take care of that. I figured people were going to start
coming in, and I didn’t want them to butcher up the hams.”

I glanced at the kitchen. There was something about the
ham, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on it.

Sally leaned forward, her shiny black hair falling over
her shoulders. “But, Tony, surely you have some idea who
is behind all this?”

I held my hands up in frustration. “I can honestly say I
haven’t the slightest idea.” I looked directly at Leroi.
“There are those with good reason to see A.D. dead, and
there’s enough circumstantial evidence around that would
probably focus the state police’s attention on one or two of
the suspects.”

Leroi glanced at Sally, then looked back to me. “You’re
talking about me, huh? The screwdriver?”

All eyes turned to me. I drew a deep breath and released
it slowly. “I know you didn’t do it, but look at the evidence.
First, yeah, the screwdriver; second, A.D. swindled your
father out of oil property-”

“But, that was almost forty years ago,” Leroi protested.

“I know, but I’ll guarantee you, Cuz, they’ll jump on
that like snake on a frog.”

He grimaced. “You’re right. So, what else? Or is that
it?”

“Well, you were upstairs. You went to the bathroom, but
they could suggest that was only an excuse. Instead, you
slipped into A.D.‘s room, saw Pa passed out, and stabbed
A.D.”

Sally blurted out, “You can’t believe that. Not about
Leroi. Why you and him-”

I held up my hand to stem her flood of protest. “Of
course I don’t. I’m just telling you what the state police are
going to see.”

Leroi leaned back on the couch. “It doesn’t look good,
huh?”

I remembered Bailey’s assertions. “That isn’t all, Leroi.”

He leaned forward, frowning. “More? What now?”

“Is it true that A.D. was planning on taking over a piece
of your business? Partner or something like that because of
a loan?”

Leroi’s face looked like someone had hit him in the forehead with a sledgehammer. He stared at me in disbelief.

Sally’s eyes popped wide open. She stared at Leroi in
stunned bewilderment. “Leroi! You said-”

He jerked his head around and glared at her. His face
twisted in irritation. “I know what I said, but I didn’t have
a choice. I couldn’t get the money from the bank. A.D. was
my only chance. I had to take it.”

Her eyes narrowed. She set her jaw. “Then you lied to
me,” she said, her tone accusing.

“I just didn’t want you to worry. That’s all. I knew I
could make the payments. And I could have if we hadn’t
had the fire in number four last month.”

“But you didn’t make the payment on time, did you?
You knew A.D. was waiting for that mistake.”

Leroi chewed on his lip, searching for the right words to
calm her. He glared at me, his eyes blazing with anger.
“You had to go and stick your nose where it doesn’t belong,
didn’t you?”

“It isn’t Tony’s fault,” Sally shot back, her voice rising.
“He isn’t the one who lied to me. You are.” Her voice grew
louder, attracting the attention of some of the nearby family
members. Tears gathered in her eyes. She jumped to her
feet and stared down at him, her tiny fists clutched at her
sides. “For twenty years, I’ve worked at your side. What
else have you kept from me? What other lies have you told
me?”

Leroi quickly rose and grabbed her by the shoulders.
“Calm down, Sally. You’re making a scene.”

She shook his hands off her shoulders. “I don’t care. You
took a chance on losing everything we worked for, that I
helped you get, and you lied to me about it.” Tears
streamed down her cheeks.

I sat quietly, biting my tongue and cursing myself for
opening my big mouth.

He reached for her again. “Now listen, I-”

Her hand blurred and the crack against his cheek cut
through the undercurrent of murmuring around the room.
“Don’t talk to me.” She sobbed, spun on her heel, and raced
up the stairs.

Leroi hesitated. He looked at us, shrugged, then hurried
after her.

The three of us remained motionless for several moments, stunned by the sudden confrontation.

Giselle broke the silence. “Is that really what happened,
Tony?”

I glanced at her. “Huh? Oh, yeah. According to Bailey, Tony borrowed from A.D. to open his last two shops. A.D.
put a clause in the contract that if Leroi were late or missed
a payment, the balance could be called in.”

“And it happened, huh?”

“Looks that way,” I replied, looking up the stairs. “A.D.
didn’t need the money. He was just greedy. A partnership
was just another acquisition, another piece of property.”

“Sure wish I had known,” she muttered. “I have a little
in savings. Not much, but it might have helped.”

Janice blew through her lips. “Makes it look bad for
Leroi.”

Both women looked at me. I couldn’t resist a soft
chuckle. “Maybe not all that bad. I got a feeling what he’s
catching from Sally is a heck of a lot worse than he’d get
from the cops.”

“I suspect you’re right.” Janice wrinkled her button nose
and glanced upstairs.