The Axeman's Jazz (Skip Langdon Mystery Series #2) (The Skip Langdon Series) (7 page)

She was looking now at a man in his late fifties, maybe early sixties. Like Linda Lee, he’d been dead awhile. He had strangulation marks on his neck and a jagged cut on his arm. A knife lay on the living room floor, a brown stain on the blade. The second difference was the A on the wall—it wasn’t scarlet at all, but matched the stain on the knife.

Even that wasn’t the weirdest part of the scene. Beside the body, as if the victim had dropped it when he was attacked, was a child’s teddy bear.

That alarmed her. “Is there a kid here?” she blurted. Hodges said, “I had the same thought. Nobody home but Tom.”

“Tom?”

He inclined his head toward the floor. “That’s Tom Mabus, a waiter at the Orleans House. Had the same job for fifteen years, never missed a day.”

“You know him?”

“No, but I got you a witness. I had a bet with Cappello—she said you were going to want this one. So, okay, it’s yours. Since I owe you one. You must have some understanding boyfriend.”

“Thanks, Jim.”

He gave her an avuncular look:
You’l1 outgrow this eager-beaver stuff.

“Where’s my witness?”

“In one of the patrol cars, not feeling too good. He’s Tom’s boss.” He looked at his notes. “A Mr. Derek Brown. Tom didn’t show up for work; he investigated—found the body.” He laughed. “Don’t think he’s ever seen one before.”

“Okay. Let me look around and then I’ll get to him. Are you out of here?”

He looked almost regretful. “If you really want this turkey.”

The furniture was old and dusty, smelled mildewy. Everything was shabby, poorly kept. The sheets on the unmade bed were gray. It looked like the house of a man who didn’t know how to take care of it, perhaps a man whose wife had recently died. Alternatively, maybe it was the home of a depressed person, someone with barely enough energy to go to work, come home, turn on the TV. Or maybe an alcoholic. No one very happy.

Derek Brown, sweating and mopping his face every few seconds, was ten or twenty years Tom’s junior, with thinning blond hair and a narrow strip of mustache. His breath was coming in gulps and he was pale.

“You need air,” said Skip. “Want to come out and talk to me?”

He shook his head. “I need to sit down.”

“I’ll get you a chair.” She went inside and brought out two straight-backed dining room chairs. “You can’t stay in there. It’s like a sauna.”

It wasn’t unlike a sauna in the evening air. Brown’s light blue suit was damp and limp. “I should have got somebody to come with me,” he said. “I knew when Tom didn’t answer the phone it was bad. Real bad. I’m not saying I didn’t half-expect to find him dead, but not like this.” He shook his head, willing away the grisly spectacle.

“Had he been ill?”

“It’s not that. It’s that he never misses work.”

“What can you tell me about him?”

“Tom? There’s not much to tell, I guess.” Again, he shook his head. “He was a sports fan.”

“That’s what he talked about? Sports?”

“Yeah. Loved to keep up.”

“What about his personal life?”

“He lived alone, we all knew that. Last year when he got the flu, we were all worried about him, I remember that.” He brightened. “But he had a daughter. She came and took care of him.”

“Do you know her name?”

“Yeah. Just can’t call it to mind, that’s all. Give me a minute.”

“Okay. Do you know who his friends were? Did he belong to any social groups? Church?”

He shook his head. “Edna! That’s his daughter. Edna. I know it because it’s the only name he ever mentioned. He talked about her a little, but nobody else.”

“Grandchildren?”

Brown looked puzzled. “I don’t know. Seems like he would have said if he had any. Shown pictures and all.”

“He didn’t?”

“Did you notice the teddy bear in there?”

“Yeah. What do you think that’s about?”

“That’s what I was going to ask you.”

“Do you know if he knew a woman named Linda Lee Strickland? Young woman, pretty. Blond. Did you ever see him with anyone like that?”

“Are you kidding? Tom Mabus?”

Later, she found the neighbors were pretty much of the same mind—Tom Mabus was the last person in the world anyone would want to know, much less murder. He offended no one and apparently interested no one. He was a nice man, a quiet man, never had friends over, didn’t go out much, watched television a lot. No one had seen anyone with him the day before—or ever—except for his daughter.

There was an Edna Purcell in his address book who lived on the West Bank, in Marrero.

It was a modest neighborhood, a modest house, but still better than the one she’d grown up in if she’d been raised in Tom Mabus’s.

She was overweight, plain, tired-looking. She had on no makeup and wore a pink quilted robe, though the suffocating mugginess still hung in the air.

Inside, a massive man with heavy eyebrows sat in front of a TV, a Dixie beer in his hand. True to stereotype, he wore a T-shirt stretched over his belly, thick chest hair escaping at the top. His forehead protruded.

The house was like a refrigerator; Skip marveled to think of the Purcells’ electric bills.

“Darryl, Daddy’s dead.” Her face was a mask; she hadn’t taken it in yet.

Her husband looked at her with such sudden and unexpected tenderness it tore at Skip’s heart. “Oh, honey.”

The look on her husband’s face was enough; Edna got it, and fell into his outstretched arms, belated sobs escaping her. Skip stood awkwardly in the background.

Finally, Darryl Purcell said, “Edna, I think this lady wants to talk to you,” and the Southerner in Edna, the perfect-hostess-in-any-circumstances, dried her eyes and turned to her guest.

“I’m sorry. Won’t you sit down?” She introduced her husband. “Can I get you anything?”

Skip shook her head, sitting on the edge of the beige velour sofa. She had told Edna only that her father had been murdered, and now she gave the details.

Darryl’s face turned dark. “What kind of animal would do a thing like that? Tom Mabus never hurt one soul in his entire life, never did a thing except go to work and come home.”

“I wonder if it could have been someone he knew.”

Darryl said, “He didn’t know anybody.”

“Did he belong to any social clubs, or maybe a church? A bowling league? Anything?”

Edna shook her head. “We tried and tried to get him interested in something. He’s been a loner ever since Mama died ten years ago. Seemed like he never got over it. Never cleaned the house, always kept the shades down, even in the daytime….”

“That house never would have got cleaned at all if Edna didn’t do it for him every now and then.”

“We asked him to live with us, but he wouldn’t. He lost weight and looked sadder and sadder, I swear, as the years went by. I guess he was one of those people who aren’t happy unless they have someone to take care of.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Well, Mama was a handful.”

Darryl snorted. “Alcoholic.”

Edna nodded. “Yes, she was. He had to work real hard, raising me, taking care of the house, doing everything Mama was supposed to be doing. And then when I was gone, seemed like she got even worse. But after she died, he never had no interest in anything—not even much in me, to tell you the truth. I guess he really loved her.”

“Don’t see how anyone could.”

“Darryl!”

“I’m sorry, Sugarplum. But you know how she was.”

“Are you his only child?”

Edna nodded.

“Do you have children?”

Darryl withdrew, stony. Edna said, “Our daughter’s autistic. She doesn’t live with us.”

”I’m sorry. I asked because your father had a teddy bear.”

“A teddy bear?” Darryl sounded furious. Edna was silent.

“A teddy bear was found near the body, as if he’d been holding it when he was attacked. I’m wondering—do you know of any children he was close to?”

“No, I don’t. He was always so sad about Rochelle.”

“Your daughter?”

Edna nodded. “I wanted him to go into therapy.”

“Sheeit!” said Darryl.

Edna cast him a furious look. “He was miserable, Darryl. You never saw an unhappier man.” “Should have gone to church.”

Edna looked at Skip beseechingly. “He wouldn’t even do that. Wouldn’t do a thing to help himself.”

“Did he ever mention a Linda Lee Strickland?” Edna and Darryl simply stared.

THE MORNING DAWNED hot as the night before, and Skip awoke in clammy sheets. After Edna’s meat freezer of a home, she had slept with only the breeze from the ceiling fan, naked and lonely. She hit the snooze alarm and lay in bed awhile, thinking of Steve and missing him, enjoying one of the principal pleasures of the long-distance romance.

Thirty minutes later, in a crisp white blouse and slate-blue skirt, carrying her suit jacket, she arrived at work, lewd and lonesome thoughts forgotten.

She was puzzling about the case, looking forward to talking it over with Cappello and Joe, getting some ideas—she was out of her own.

But her stomach lurched as she arrived on the third floor. The halls were full of reporters and television cameras—why, she didn’t know, but it couldn’t be good. She pushed through, into Homicide. Cappello was in Joe’s office.

“Langdon! In here!” Joe sounded furious.

“What is it? Did somebody leak the scarlet A’s?”

“Worse. I swear to God it’s worse.”

With a pair of tweezers, he handed Skip a letter, typed on plain white paper. “Look at this.”

It said:

Dear Broadcaster:

You probably remember me. The first time, I wrote to the print media, but there was no television then. I also used an axe. That, of course, would be messy in this day and age and I have two perfectly good hands to strangle with. So forget the axe, but I’m still who I am. My signature is awritten in blood. I kill whom I need to kill, both women and men.

As I mentioned before, they never caught me and they never will. I am not a human being, but an extraterrestrial. (Or perhaps that is the best way you can understand it.) I am what you Orleanians used to call the Axeman—make no mistake, I’m back.

It’s me.

I’m baaaaaack.

Hi, Mom.

Honeee, I’m hooome.

I have killed twice this time, in the Quarter and near Gentilly. Ask the police. I left my signature.

Maybe you know my song. It has two names: “The Mysterious Axeman’s Jazz” is my preference, but it’s also called “Don’t Scare Me, Papa.” I am no one’s papa! I am the Axeman! I am the walrus! (Just kidding.)

Here’s the deal: It’s the same as before. Jazz is the lifeblood of this great city of ours—it was then and it is now. It’s the only constant, the only universal. My spaceship lands Tuesday, and I’ll be out for blood. (Did you know we extraterrestrials are vampires?) But I have an endless supply of infinite mercy and I will show it to anyone in whose home a jazz band is playing between the hours of 7
P.M.
and daylight. Take heed—you will be spared!

But no matter if you aren’t, my infinite mercy extends to my victims. I am quick and I am painless. Ask Linda Lee and Tom.

THE AXEMAN

Skip said, “I don’t believe what I just read.”

“Believe it, Langdon. Every station in town got one.”

“How modern.” She caught her breath. “Could I ask a question?”

“What’s it all about? No problem, ask away. Everybody else in town has. Do you have any idea how many bozos were here when I got to work, waving that damn thing? Fortunately, we were able to have a constructive exchange of information, because some of them were on to the original.”

“Original what, Lieutenant? You’ve lost me.”

“Read this and blow your mind.”

The document he handed her was a photocopy of a page in a book. The relevant part, a letter, had been highlighted:

Hell, March 13, 1919

Editor of the Times-Picayune New Orleans, La.

Esteemed Mortal:

They have never caught me and they never will. They have never seen me, for I am invisible, even as the ether that surrounds your earth. I am not a human being, but a spirit and a fell demon from the hottest hell. I am what you Orleanians and your foolish police call the Axeman.

When I see fit, I shall come again and claim other victims. I alone know whom they shall be. I shall leave no clue except my bloody axe, besmeared with the blood and brains of he whom I have sent below to keep me company.

If you wish you may tell the police to be careful not to rile me. Of course, I am a reasonable spirit. I take no offense at the way they have conducted their investigations in the past. In fact, they have been so utterly stupid as to amuse not only me, but his Satanic Majesty, Francis Josef, etc. But tell them to beware. Let them not try to discover what I am, for it were better that they were never born than to incur the wrath of the Axeman. I don’t think there is any need of such a warning, for I feel sure the police will always dodge me, as they have in the past. They are wise and know how to keep away from all harm.

Undoubtedly you Orleanians think of me as a most horrible murderer, which I am, but I could be much worse if I wanted to. If I wished, I could pay a visit to your city every night. At will I could slay thousands of your best citizens, for I am in close relationship with the Angel of Death.

Now, to be exact, at 12:15 (earthly time) on next Tuesday night, I am going to pass over New Orleans. In my infinite mercy, I am going to make a little proposition to you people. Here it is: