Orfeo (26 page)

He was only disturbed by Ardyce who appeared at the doorway, making him jump. Her own face was pale but her eyes displayed greater concern for him than fear for herself.

“What happened?” she asked. “I heard shouting.”

Orfeo shook his head, still in shock at what he had just witnessed. “I don’t know,” he said, moving at last to the window. Staring out he could see Snake’s body, broken and lifeless below.

Ardyce drew in a sharp breath as she stood beside him, then she grabbed hold of his arm. “Look!” she hissed.

Turning his gaze away from the corpse below, Orfeo scanned the horizon in the direction she pointed, his senses confused for a moment. Then he saw what Ardyce was gesturing toward and his chest tightened.

On the road that they had followed to the house a black SUV was driving toward them, still some distance away but bouncing along the track recklessly, skidding through deep pools without any regard for safety.

“Earl,” he muttered.

Ardyce nodded. “Come on,” she said, still holding his arm but now dragging him away from the window. “We can get out of the house the back way, but we have to leave now.”

“But where will we go?”

“Toward Blind Lagoon. He’ll have trouble following us, even in that vehicle.” Orfeo remained frozen in place, his mind reeling from everything that he had witnessed as Ardyce began to move away. She,
realizing his confusion, grasped hold of both his arms, shaking him roughly for a second.

“Orfeo! We have to leave. Now!”

Her words snapped him out of his daze and he nodded, following her immediately as she ran down the stairs and through the rooms on the ground floor. Sand and mud covered everything and great black marks were smeared up the walls as they ran through the kitchens and through a back door. To his left, he could just make out the old orangery, all the panes of glass smashed and the exotic plants and flowers inside ruined by the hurricane.

They ran at full speed through the grounds surrounding Xanadu and Orfeo’s chest began to burn as he sped onwards. He had not eaten enough, not rested enough, in recent days and the exertion was beginning to tire him too quickly, his ribs aching in agony. Ardyce, he was sure, must be feeling worse, but when he paused to check her she shook her head and grimaced, pain filling her features. “Run!” she gasped.

The open land beyond Xanadu was marshy and waterlogged, no longer the verdant land he had seen the last time he was here. They splashed through shallow pools and once Orfeo stumbled, one foot sinking deep into the mud that sucked around him like a deceptive lover. Ardyce grabbed him.

“Wait!” she said, bending over as he pulled a stinking foot out of the depths and found safer ground on which to rest. She was doubled over, her breath coming in deep, gasping pants and her face twisted in agony. He reached out with an arm, letting her rest on him.

“No point... no point rushing... here,” she blurted out. Her face was flushed a deep red with the effort of running, and he could see that exhaustion was clawing at her body. Yet her green eyes shone as brightly as he had ever seen and her copper-auburn hair, twisted and scooped in a mass of knots from her head, seemed more vibrant than ever. “We have to... we have to follow the path,” she gasped. “We’ll be trapped, else. Too... dangerous.”

He nodded, attempting to regulate his own breathing. She led the way, moving at a relatively quick walk rather than running now, turning and twisting to avoid treacherous patches where the mud would suck them down.

There was an almighty crash behind them and for a moment they stopped. In horror, the pair of them saw that one of the gates that led into Xanadu had smashed open and now the SUV was careering across the marshy ground less than a mile away.

“Run!” Ardyce screamed.

Despite her panic, she had not completely lost all sense and she dodged from side to side as she made her way across the open ground, avoiding deeper pools. Orfeo followed closely behind, stumbling sometimes as he did not have her sixth sense to guide him through this godforsaken wasteland. Once his foot sunk deeply into mud and he had to wait for a few seconds, struggling frantically to pull it free. Ardyce stared at him in open terror but then her gaze shifted, staring over his shoulder.

Turning, he saw that the SUV had come to a halt, its front end half-submerged in a pool. Wheels were spinning rapidly and, as the distance between them and their pursuers had halved, they could now hear the screaming roar of the engine. Again he froze, only for a few seconds, caught between fear and hope. Then he saw two figures emerge from the vehicle. Turning, he staggered the few feet toward Ardyce and the pair of them began to flee once again.

They had only taken a few more paces when a shot rang out behind them, clear and violent in the silence of the afternoon. Far away, a flock of birds rose up against the sky, black specks wheeling away.

Desperation made them run faster, Ardyce suddenly twisting and turning so that Orfeo almost crashed into her. In that instant, another shot rang out and she let out a cry of pain. In horror, Orfeo grabbed hold of her, pulling her close to him. He could see blood seeping from her arm, the cloth of her boiler suit ragged and torn.

She shook her head as he looked down at the wound in terror. “Just a scratch,” she said, forcing a smile despite her pain. Removing her hand from where she had grabbed herself instinctively, he saw that the bullet had, indeed, grazed her, breaking the skin of her arm but not leaving a hole in the flesh. Far behind them, the two figures appeared to be struggling and, judging that they had a few precious moments to flee he helped Ardyce move along the difficult and dangerous path.

“We have to get out of here, before they kill us,” he said grimly.

She nodded. “If we head north we can make it to the road, hopefully before they get that SUV rolling again. From there we can head to the bridge, get out of the city.”

He stared at her as she spoke. Wounded, exhausted, threatened by the madman who followed them, she was not terrified. Her eyes were clear and she was evidently calculating what they would need to do to reach safety.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

She shook her head, an irritable flick sideways. “There’s no time for that.” Yet almost immediately she softened. Giving him a nervous smile, she placed one hand on his chest and looked up at him, her features gentle and compassionate. “Don’t worry, I don’t regret a thing. I love you more than anything. But,” she continued, glancing back to where their foes had once again taken up pursuit, “we have to get out of here. If we live through this, we’ll have all the time in the whole world to make it up to each other.”

He nodded, his face set and determined. Placing one arm around her to provide her with extra support, his ribs burning with fiery pain, he followed her directions as she guided him through the maze that led beside the dark and flooded lagoon.

Within minutes of receiving Snake’s call they had been in an SUV that they had commandeered, racing along the highway, bouncing from side to side as Earl flung the vehicle from side to side to avoid other abandoned cars and trucks.

Beside him Papa held on tightly to the handle on the door and watched the broken detritus left behind by the hurricane flash by. At this rate, he thought morbidly, they would get themselves killed before they managed to reach Xanadu.

Earl paid no heed to anything else, hunched up as he was over the wheel, his white face distorted by a rictus of savage glee. “We’re going to get her, we’re going to get her,” he repeated over and over again. “She’s mine!”

Papa used his free hand to pull the brim of his hat further across his eyes, shielding his gaze from the madman next to him. The insanity that had been building up for weeks had now burst free, as devastating in its own way as the floods and winds that had ravaged New Orleans.

This was complete madness. They should have left the city, evacuated when they had the chance. Some luck was with them, however, that was sure: they were the only survivors to have made it out of Hades and all of Earl’s other men were either dead or missing, presumably fled from the city. Horse would wait at the Superdome until he was sent for, of that Papa was sure, though strangely he had not been in touch recently. The call from Snake had been a surprise: Earl had fulminated against her, cursing her to hell and calling her every foul name he could think of, but when she had told him to come to Xanadu he had praised her to the skies.

For three days previously Earl and Papa had been combing the wreckage of New Orleans, Earl calling in every favor he could muster. Papa had offered to organize a search elsewhere, in fact planning to see what opportunities could be salvaged from the mess, but Earl had insisted that his oldest
loa
remain with him: keep your friends close, but your enemies closer, Papa thought bitterly to himself.

And so he had been forced to remain with the madman as he hunted high and low for Ardyce. Papa was genuinely shocked by everything he’d seen: New Orleans could not have been more damaged had someone dropped the fucking bomb on it, and the few people left behind had sunk into a pit of misery.

Where were the feds? he kept asking himself. Where was the army? The few rescue attempts he saw appeared to be organized by private individuals, and all the time the city was suffering. The few people left behind, thought Papa bitterly, were too poor—and to black—to be concerned with.

It was ever thus. When he had run the city’s crime, there had been a kind of order but his dark skin had prevented him ever achieving the ambitions that Earl had brought with him. That, in the end, was the reason why Papa had joined up with the other man. He could have fought against such a union: that would have probably got him killed, and at the same time he could see that Earl was capable of achieving great things that he, Papa, could not do. All Papa’s much vaunted strength came to nothing in the end, and even half the stories about him were not true, like that business with Raoul. If he really had sent a young girl’s head to the father, not even he would have been able to keep the cops off his back. He had
killed Raoul with his bare hands, however: leaving his daughter exposed like that, a hostage to the father’s cowardice, deserved nothing less.

Earl had encouraged such stories—it was all part of the mythology he had built up around himself. And they had been useful, Papa had to admit. It certainly made his job easier, just like being one of Earl’s
loa
made things easier. But now, as they turned at ridiculous speed from the highway and descended to the side road that led to Xanadu, crashing through great pools of water that lay across the damaged tarmac, Papa saw that the driver next to him was completely and utterly insane.

“You’re no Bondye,” he muttered.

“What was that?” Earl asked, his face looking demonic as his eyes flickered for a second toward his companion.

“Shouldn’t we slow down a little?” Papa asked, his fingers gripping the handle again.

“She’s close, she’s fucking close!” Earl started to laugh crazily. “She’s fucking mine! I can taste her—she’s this close!” He lifted one hand from the wheel to gesture with his fingers, less than an inch apart. The SUV veered to one side and he threw his hand down to steer again, wrestling with the vehicle to keep it on the road.

Earl thought that they wouldn’t stop as they made their way up to the bleak hulk of Xanadu, but instead would crash through the front wall to cut off vital seconds between Earl and his prize. At the last moment, however, Earl spun the SUV around and leaped from the door before the engine had even died.

Papa followed him more cautiously as his boss ran up the steps toward the front door. Looking sideways, he saw something that made him frown. “Earl, wait!” he called out.

Impatience etched into his features, Earl looked down at him angrily. Papa gestured toward the body on the ground, limbs twisted and the back of her head caved in from impact. There was no point checking whether she was alive: Snake’s eyes were emptier than any trick Papa had ever managed.

“She lost them!” Earl howled. “The stupid fucking bitch let them go!” Flecks of white spittle shot from his lips and his eyes rolled around his head as he glared up at the house. “Find them! Fucking find them now!” Without waiting to see whether his order would be obeyed Earl ran into the house at maniac speed. With a sigh, Papa knelt beside Snake and, moving his hand across her face, closed those empty eyes.

After a few minutes the other man emerged from the house again, running at full speed toward the SUV. “They’re over the marshes, at the back of the house. We can get them!”

Without waiting to see whether he had been heard, Earl leaped into the vehicle, gunning the engine. Papa barely had time to pull himself in through the open passenger door before they were off again, swerving round the side of the house and racing away in the direction of what Papa vaguely remembered was a lagoon out beyond Xanadu.

He clenched his teeth as they crashed through a black iron gate that marked the end of the formal grounds, metal shrieking as it grated along the side of the SUV. Earl was driving even more crazily now, and Papa thought all his teeth and bones would be shaken out of him before they had any chance of reaching the girl. But, he noted grimly, the fugitives were in plain sight now, running across the open shallows and marsh before them.

Without warning both of them were flung forward as the vehicle ran into a deeper pool, sinking into mud. Papa had, at least, braced himself a little, but Earl smashed against the wheel, blood trickling from his mouth as his head made contact. Gunning the engine, again, he attempted to reverse but they were caught fast—and, indeed, sinking into the slime a little further with each spin of the wheels.