Jass (Valentin St. Cyr Mysteries) Read online

  Prince John dropped the object he had been holding so tightly to snatch it up, and Valentin saw that it was a tiny doll, fashioned of bits of cloth, string, and sticks.

  The dirty hands went scrabbling and produced a rough clay pipe. He tore into the silver paper, broke off a piece of the pill, tamped it into the bowl, and struck a light. As the flame bulged, Valentin was startled to see a raw gash that ran from the center of the Prince's throat up to his left ear, where a chunk of the lobe was missing. The black man gave him a shrewd look.

  "You see how I am?" he said.

  Valentin kept staring at the ghastly wound as the Prince puffed noisily on the pipe. "I should have got away from there, but I was stupid. One night my door got kicked in. There was two of them. They held me down ... and they did this..." He made a rough gesture to the scar. "They thought I was dead. I would have been, too. 'Cept there was a conjure woman in a house back behind me. I got to her and she fixed me until I could get to a doctor. Ain't never been right, though." He stuck the pipe back in his mouth and fixed his eyes on his visitor's face. "But it still ain't over, is it? She's bound to get her revenge for what we did to her. You know she is..."

  The pupils began to dilate and he nodded sleepily. Valentin sensed that he was losing him. "Prince?" The green eyes wandered away. "Prince John!"

  "I hear you."

  "You said the Louisiana Retreat."

  "I did ... Louisiana Retreat..."

  "That's a white hospital."

  Prince John studied the glowing embers in the pipe and a weird smile crept across his face.

  Valentin said, "Emma Lee was white?"

  "White as you," the Prince snickered, with another devilish flash of yellow teeth. Then his smile dropped away and the fearful look returned. "She's gonna be comin' for me?"

  "She'd never find you."

  "I got myself hid good, that's for sure," Prince John said, and sucked harder on the pipe, the scar rising again in the glow of the tiny fire.

  Valentin got up and went to the door, where he stopped and said, "What about that other woman?"

  The Prince didn't look up. "What other woman?"

  "The first one. The doctor's wife. From the Irish Channel."

  "Oh. What about her?"

  "Is the story true or not?"

  "True enough." He allowed a long sigh and a short silence. "Guess I should have learned my damn lesson, eh?" He struck another lucifer and held it over the bowl of the pipe. He didn't notice when Valentin backed out of the shack and disappeared into what remained of the night.

  The detective got to Milneburg Station a half hour before the first train of the day. The platform was dark and silent. Only the faintest lingering mist of rain remained. He stood around the side of the building out of sight, thinking about Prince John and his shack and wondering if he had carried any of that awful stench away. He felt like something other than lake mud and sweat was clinging to him.

  A wet, gray dawn crept in behind the starless night. When Valentin walked out of Union Station, he found the avenues eerily quiet. Nothing was moving. Then, as he made his way down Canal Street and onto Magazine, dark shapes wavered like phantoms out of the silver shadows to cross the intersections. The day's first workmen trundled along, on their way to the docks, their lunch pails banging against the predawn silence. It was oddly calming to him, a sound and rhythm he recalled from when he was a young boy. His father had carried just such a lunch pail when he went off to work, and it was that crude music that announced his return home at the end of the long day.

  Valentin trudged to his door, dirty, wet, and tired to the bone. He undressed in the middle of the bedroom floor, tossing his muddy clothes into the corner. Then he stretched out on the couch, wrapped himself in the blanket, and thought about the place he had visited, the foul-smelling shack hidden away near the lake and Prince John, once a proud rounder with a string of strumpets at his beck and call, now a skeleton, huddling in the shadows, half mad and taunted by demons.

  And what of the young white girl named Emma Lee? According to the Prince, she had crossed Canal Street and arrived alone at a back-of-town Negro dance hall where jass was played and had ended up spending thirty-six hours being ravaged by five colored men, four of whom were now dead. Soon after, she was placed in a hospital for the insane. Or so said Prince John. She might still be there and she might be long gone. She might be in her grave. Wherever she was, she was casting a long shadow and, alive or dead, he would have to find her.

  SIXTEEN

  Valentin dozed and woke up through the morning and into the afternoon. He took a long bath and scrubbed his skin. He dropped down beneath the warm water and tilted his chin up until nothing but his nose and mouth protruded. The quiet soothed him. There were whole minutes in which he did not think about Dominique.

  "When he got out, he rummaged through the icebox and made himself a meal from the food that she had brought home. He ate steadily, lingering over eggs and ham and slices of her island bread, and washed it down with cups of coffee. Then he went to the bedroom to dress.

  He selected his gray cassimere suit and a white collarless shirt and stood looking at his reflection in the mirror. Then he stepped away to collect his wet and muddy clothes from the night before and gather them into a ball.

  He walked to the corner and turned west on Poydras Street. Halfway down the block was a Chinese laundry, where he dropped his dirty clothes and asked to have them back by evening. At the next corner, he caught the St. Charles Line car and rode away from downtown, past the Garden District, the Audubon Zoo, and the universities. He stepped down at Henry Clay Avenue.

  Seven blocks south he came upon a three-story brick building with a mansard roof, surrounded by a six-foot-tall stone wall. There was a brick kiosk for the guards at the front gate, and mounted on it was a small bronze plaque modestly announcing the Louisiana Retreat. Valentin knew that the name on all official documents was the Louisiana Retreat for the Insane.

  It was a private sanitarium devoted to mental illnesses and nervous conditions and served a clientele of Americans of means and well-to-do French citizens, including members of some of New Orleans' best families who contended with disorders of the mind, addictions to drink and drugs, and other sorts of errant behaviors.

  Valentin stepped through the gate and stated his business to the uniformed guard. He was directed along the sidewalk to the door of the main building. He walked up the flagstone path with purpose, all the while surveying the landscape with quick glances.

  The building was in the shape of an E, with the center prong larger than the outer two. In the open spaces between the prongs were courtyards where staff and patients could take the air. The only obvious difference from any other hospital building was the upper-floor windows, which were heavily barred.

  The guard who greeted him when he reached the lobby sent him on to an adjoining administrative office where a gentleman who said his name in such a clipped way that Valentin didn't catch it informed him that he could not be allowed to view any institution records without official permission, which would require a statement of reason or reasons for the...

  Valentin stopped listening. He had expected this. He was using the visit as an excuse to case the site, and it was worth the off chance that he might happen upon an official who was not so official. He let the gentleman finish his recital, thanked him, and departed with a sheet of paper detailing in small print all the requirements for obtaining records. When asked for his name, he said, "John Doe," just to see if it would get any kind of rise. The man didn't even blink; "Deaux" was not such an uncommon name in that city.

  In the lobby he stopped and pretended to be reading over the paper while he got a good look around the layout, making a mental note of the directory that was affixed to one of the heavy columns.

  He pushed through the heavy doors and walked back down the pathway to the gate, where he nodded a thank-you to the guard. He strolled the seven blocks north to St. Charles and caught a car back to
town.

  The sun was going down when he arrived at Magazine Street. He got the brandy bottle out and took his drink back to the bedroom, where he untied the string around his laundered clothes and changed. Pulling open the top drawer of his dresser, he left his pistol and stiletto, but took out a leather case no bigger than his hand.

  After his father's death, he had gone to Chicago, where he was enrolled in a school run by the nuns. It was his first experience passing for white. Despite the sisters' best efforts and his own hunger for books, he got a better education from his Italian and Polish classmates, who were, like him, the sons of immigrants. He learned the ropes from these young hoodlums and was on his way to becoming a true criminal when the beating death of one of his gang changed his outlook and sent him packing.

  He did learn many interesting things along the way, one of which was how to pick a lock. It was simple if you had the right equipment and knew a few tricks. He had brought his little set of tools in their leather case from the Windy City, and he had kept it back in the drawer ever since. Until this night, he'd never had occasion to use it. Now he tucked it into an inside pocket and, after another brandy, headed out the door.

  The downtown streets were falling quiet by nine o'clock. He wanted to avoid even the slightest chance of someone recognizing him on a streetcar and so he walked. He didn't care if Anderson, Picot, or both had someone watching him. Whoever it was, he'd lose them.

  It was a little over five miles and he took his ease, strolling along at an even pace and stopping to rest when he reached Napoleon Avenue, about halfway. He used the time to think about what he was going to do. It had been years since he had used his skills to do something so far over the legal line, but he saw no other way to get the information he needed.

  He arrived at the Louisiana Retreat a few minutes after eleven o'clock. He found a space in the shadows of a church down the block and spent a half hour observing the site. There was no movement in or out. He could see the immobile profile of the guard in his kiosk, which told him the man was probably dozing, always a good sign.

  And why not? The Retreat cared for patients with less serious problems who were placed there voluntarily. The criminally insane were penned elsewhere. The bars on the upper-floor windows were there to protect those on the inside.

  Valentin knew from arresting a fair number of sneak thieves that they were most often caught because they lingered too long and were spotted coming or going. Of course, most criminals weren't known for their feats of wit. The smarter strategy was to get to the target and either go inside or go away.

  The detective made a slow circuit and then found a shadowed point on the north corner of the building. He took a quick look around, scaled the fence, and went over. When his feet hit the ground, he froze, listening. There were no shouts, no patter of running feet, so he didn't hesitate, crossing the lawn to the closest of the doors.

  A cat burglar would bring a small crowbar to jimmy open any door that wouldn't give way. Valentin had decided against using anything that crude. He didn't want anyone knowing he had been there, in case he had to come back. He got out his kit and fumbled about getting used to the tiny tools again. It took him five minutes to pick the lock on the first door, only to find it barred from the inside. He hadn't thought of that. If they were all secured that way, he was finished before he even began.

  Slipping around the building, he managed to crack the lock on the second door in less than a minute and was relieved when the knob turned and it fell open. He pushed it just enough to get his head through for a peek inside. If anyone was standing close by, he would have no choice but to run back to the fence and climb over.

  He found himself peering along an empty corridor that was illuminated by a single electric lamp on the ceiling. He slipped in, closed the door behind him, and hugged the wall, his eyes and ears perked. He could make out recesses for doors down both sides of the corridor, all entrances into offices and examination rooms. He started down the hall, stepping lightly. That part of the building was completely silent.

  Halfway along on one side he found a wider recess and double doors that led to a stairwell. From his glance at the lobby directory that afternoon, he knew that the Records room was in the basement. He took the stairs downward into the darkness. From above he heard some voices calling and doors squeaking and slamming.

  When he reached the basement, he found another set of double doors that opened onto the middle of a corridor. An electric lamp burned at either end, casting faint yellow light. He stopped to listen for anything untoward. Then he stepped into the corridor and looked up and down. The door with RECORDS painted on the leaded glass was the second one on his left.

  The lock was sturdier than the ones on the outside doors, and it took him five sweating minutes and four sweating attempts to finally get the tumblers to click. When the first one went, it echoed like a pistol shot. He wiped his face and palms with his handkerchief, wondering if there was some kind of electrical alarm hooked to the door. It could even be the silent type that sounded only in the guard's kiosk. It was too late to worry about that now.

  He stepped into the dark room and closed the door behind him. There were file cabinets lining the right and left walls of the room, then a back-to-back row of cabinets in the middle of the floor. Three desks were pushed against the back wall, each one with a lamp overhead, for the convenience of the staff.

  He waited and listened for another minute, just to be sure no one had detected him. He didn't know where to begin, so he spent the next forty-five minutes going from one file cabinet to the next and reading the labels affixed to each, burning up so many lucifers that the air fairly reeked of sulfur. He finally found the one he was looking for: Admissions Records from 1906. If Prince John's recollection was correct, this was when "Emma Lee" would have been admitted.

  Now came the dicey part. There was no way he could examine the records by the light of lucifers. If he took the file and left, it could be discovered missing. Which could alert someone and then he might never find the woman. He would have to risk one of the electric lamps and hope that no one would happen by and notice. The desks were partially blocked from view by the file cabinets, but anyone passing by could still see the light.

  He took half the files in the drawer, a twelve-inch stack, and went to the desk farthest from the door. He turned on the lamp and sat down. It took him about ten minutes to go through the stack. There was no one he recognized as Emma Lee. Most of those admitted were men, and of the half-dozen females with files, none was the right age. He went back for the other half and carried them to the desk, and after a quick shuffle, put the men's files aside. When he opened the fourth of the women's files, he found her.

  The top sheet was a standard form, carefully noting the essential data for the subject, "Emma Lee Smith." She was twenty-three years old, five feet two inches tall, weight 110 pounds. She was described as in good health, though her appearance was "unkempt." Her date of birth, place of birth, and current domicile all were marked "Unk."

  According to the notes scribbled in the file, Emma Lee Smith was brought to the hospital in a "state of extreme agitation" by two police officers, one detective and one patrolman, both unnamed. They reported that she had been acting wildly, and they believed she had a problem of a sexual nature, which took the form of "an addiction to promiscuous behaviors." It was also noted that she seemed to be "suffering from delusions."

  Valentin was so engrossed that he did not hear the footsteps padding along the corridor. He almost jumped out of his chair when the door squeaked open.

  A man's voice called, "Dr. Rose? Is that you?"

  Without thinking about it, Valentin muttered, "Uh-huh," keeping his head down and his voice gruff.

  There was a pause that seemed to last an hour, and then the man said, "All right, sir. Good night," and closed the door.

  Valentin allowed a half minute to let his heart stop pounding, then went back to the file. He found a page in a doctor's scribble det
ailing her treatment. From what Valentin could tell, it consisted mostly of an administration of various drugs to control her mania. He noted morphine sulfate among them. The entries covered a period of fifteen days.

  He flipped through some more pages that had little information other than short notations of examination results and medicine doses. As he closed the file, he found a Release Form attached to the back. According to the notation, the patient had been released into the custody of the New Orleans Police Department. No reason was provided. He skipped to the bottom of the page and the box for the signature of the party who had accepted custody of the patient. He let out a grunt of surprise. He stared at the box to assure himself that the name he was reading was that of Lieutenant J. Picot.

  He replaced the files and used his picks to lock the doors again. He went out the way he had come in, carefully retracing and covering his exit at each step. He crept up the stairs without making a sound and hurried back down the first-floor corridor, heading for the door.

  "You there!"

  He stopped and turned around slowly, ready to fight or bolt. A woman in a nightgown stood ten paces behind him. She looked to be in her fifties, gray haired, thin as a rail, with wild eyes that glared into his face. Her hands were on her hips and she looked him up and down like he was a misbehaving schoolboy.

  "You're not William!" her incensed voice brayed down the hall.

  Valentin said, "No, ma'am."

  "Where's William?" she demanded.

  "He's ...upstairs," Valentin whispered, lifting his thumb.

  She tilted her head back and took one hand from her hip to wag a finger in the air. "Ah, of course, he is!" With a nod of dismissal, she turned around and marched off toward the lobby.

  Valentin stopped when he reached the door. He heard voices far-off, one raised in surprise, the other the woman's, demanding to know "William's" whereabouts. He pushed the door open and lingered until he sensed a dead space in the night. Then he slipped out, trotted to the fence, and clambered back over. His bones creaked as he walked south on Henry Clay. He thought for a moment that he was getting too old for this kind of business.