“Just passing through.”
“Passin’ through what … life?”
“Sometimes.”
“No times. It’s too short pass through.”
“I have to go.”
“Go where? Maybe I can hep you get there. Been here all my life, me. I used to see with my eyes. I know the Big ol’ Easy. Where you tryin’ to get to?”
“The address is forty-one Dumaine.”
The old man inhaled deeply, lung tissue making a wet sucking sound. “You are close to it. Don’t know if’n it’d be best to get much closer than where you is right here.”
“What do you mean?”
“I means to tell you that ain’t no place for a girl to go.”
“Why?”
“On account that folks who go there are dem peoples who don’t believe in Heaven.”
“What is this place?”
“Used to be what they called a hot pillow joint.”
“You mean a brothel?”
“Yes ma’am. I’d heard the upstairs might still be. The downstairs is a place where they sells Voodoo stuff. I ain’t never seen no need for it, me. No way. No how.” He shook his head and cleared his throat. “They’s lots better spots in Naw’lens to see.”
“Where’s this place? I’ve found forty, forty-two, and other addresses, but no forty-one.”
“It’s ain’t properly marked. Don’t need to be. Evil don’t need directions, just an invite. It’s a block down Dumaine, right past Moe’s Place, a bar. There’s an old arched brick entranceway, ivy growing all over it, kinda like somethin’ you walk through entering a graveyard. They got a wrought iron door on it. Probably ain’t locked no how. Once you go in there … just follow a brick pathway down the alley ‘till you come to the front door.”
“Thank you. I really like your singing.”
“This one’s for you, darlin’ girl.” He cupped his hands around the worn harmonica, brought it to his mouth, and started blowing. Robert Johnson’s song, Cross Road Blues, poured out of the harmonica. Then he picked up his guitar and started singing, eyes closing, his voice carrying the keys of emotion and compassion. Courtney walked away, towards a brick doorway that the old blues man said looked like the entrance to a cemetery. Before his words faded in the breeze, the last thing she heard him sing sounded like a prayer, “I went to the crossroad, fell down on my knees … asked the Lord above, have mercy on me if you please …”
54
When I arrived at the marina, I parked my Jeep away from the main lot and even farther away from the Tiki Bar lot. I walked quickly down the central dock that was adjacent to the seawall, the dock straddling most of the marina waterfront. The captain of the Sea Witch, a forty-four-foot, half-day fishing boat loaded with tourists, slowly accelerated the big Cummins diesels and headed out towards Ponce Inlet and the Atlantic. A half-dozen seagulls followed in the boat’s wake, the birds squawking over the drum roll of the engines.
Approaching the Tiki Bar, I turned left between the marina office and a yacht broker’s small building and walked to get a clear view of the parking lot. No news satellite trucks. No microwave trucks. No hordes of reporters grazing the perimeter. Maybe a few sat at the bar. At this point, I didn’t care. A woman had said she knew Courtney. And I wanted this person to speak to me before she spoke to the news media. My immediate plan was to walk into the bar, ignore any reporters who may be stalking the area, and then I’d find Kim Davis. I hoped she was there.
I entered the Tiki Bar through the rear delivery entrance. The cook, Big John, an Army veteran I knew, mid-thirties, pushing 280 pounds, sweatband over his thick eyebrows, poured fresh shrimp into a deep-fryer. He nodded and used his index finger to flick a piece of shrimp tail from the back of his hand to the floor. Then he grinned and said, “Dude, don’t blame you for comin’ in the back door. You doin’ all right?”
“Yeah, is Kim working today?”
“Her shift ended about ten minutes ago. She might still be out there. Angie’s here along with two servers.” He wiped his hands on a frayed white towel and folded his arms across his big chest. “I’ve worked here three years and never seen biz like it’s been recently. It’s slacked off today, but all this political crap on TV brought out the news crews and the gawkers. Man, I hope all this shit comes out clean for you.” He used a spatula to flip a burger on the grill.
“Thank you, John.” I walked around him in the small kitchen and entered the Tiki Bar. Two charter deck hands and a charter boat captain tended sweating cans of beer at the bar. A half-dozen tourists sat at wooden tables eating and drinking.
Kim was headed for the door, her back to me, purse hanging from her shoulder. I caught up with her and said, “I heard you got a strange phone call.”
She turned around. “Sean, how do you walk so quietly?”
“Boat shoes.”
She glanced down at my shoes and smiled, her brown eyes lifting up to meet mine. She looked around and adjusted her purse strap. “Let’s get out of here. Can we talk on your boat?”
“We can. Come on.” We stepped out the side door leading to the docks, unlocked the gate, and walked down L-dock. A forty-foot Beneteau sailboat was motoring into its slip, the captain using bow-thrusters to maneuver the boat, two women in bikinis sitting in the cockpit with him.
Kim said, “I can see Nick’s doing better. Looks like he’s grilling something in that smoker on his cockpit.”
Max sat in a canvas chair near the grill, Nick turning over sizzling fish, using a brush to apply olive oil and his special sauces. I said, “Max are you helping or just observing?” She jumped from her chair and ran around the cockpit, between Nick’s bare feet, barking, tail flapping, watching Kim and I approach.
Nick turned to us and grinned, his bruises no longer purple, the swelling was going down. “Hot Dog knows how she likes her fish. She watches me to make sure I get it right. Ya’ll hungry? Dave’s comin’ over to eat. I can toss another couple of pieces on the fire. Red snapper. Grilled with olive oil, lemon, salt, pepper, some paprika and a touch of garlic. Greek style, baby!”
Kim smiled and said, “No thanks, Nicky. Big John made me a lunch.”
Nick looked her, one eye squinting in the sunlight. “Big John is good, but he ain’t Greek.”
I said, “I’ll take a rain check, Nick. I can’t stay long.”
He shook his head. “That’s ‘cause shit happens, and you got some big shit happening. Did you find the girl?”
“No, not yet.”
“The news said three more bodies were found, but no sign of the girl, huh?”
“Some signs. Not many.”
Dave walked across the dock, a bottle of water in one hand. He said, “Kimberly, so good to see you on this side of the docks, so to speak. I’m assuming you’re providing Sean with the details of the woman’s call.”
“I’m about to. We just didn’t want to talk in the bar.”
“Can’t say I’d fault you two there. Media will be back when they get wind of your whereabouts, Sean. I was just following this on-going political saga on some of our esteemed cable news channels. If the pundits and pollsters are to be believed, it seems Senator Logan’s popularity has slipped in the polls by fifteen points in the last couple of days. Right now Courtney Burke has the fate of the Republican Party’s national agenda literally riding on her DNA. Law enforcement is speculating she may have left Florida. FBI has mounted a larger scale manhunt. So how long can a nineteen-year-old kid evade that kind of dragnet?”
I said nothing. Nick raised his shoulders in a shrug and tossed Max a small piece of bread. He said, “You think Bandini’s backing off since all this publicity is goin’ down with the girl?”