"These things you ask about," the Cajun said at last, "they get me dead."
"You're dead already, Ham. My way, at least you get a running start."
"Hey, where you learn that kung-fu shit?"
"My father taught me," Remo said. "And if he heard you calling it 'kung fu' even I wouldn't be able to save you. Quit stalling, now. You want to talk or dance?"
"That loup-garou you ask about, I think you don't believe me if I told you."
"Try me out," said Remo. "You may be surprised."
Chapter 10
It was a fluke that Fortier's gorillas ever caught a glimpse of Remo, but a fluke was all it took sometimes. He was emerging from Ham's Hock Shop when he met another caller coming in. The man was five foot two or three, built like a fireplug, with the bullet head to match. He wore a suit so shiny it was almost iridescent, but without a tie. His oily black hair was combed back from his sallow face in a lopsided pompadour. His sideburns would have set the King to spinning in his grave from envy.
Remo brushed on past the sawed-off thug, confirming with a feather touch that he was packing heat. Intent on getting out of there and merging with the crowd, he didn't spare the shop a backward glance until he heard the cow bell clank again and a gruff voice shouted, "Grab that guy!"
He had his adversaries pegged and counted in two seconds flat. Besides the fireplug, now emerging from the shop with murder in his eyes, three others were hanging back, clustered beneath a balcony where a young woman turned her shapely backside to the crowd and proved she was a natural redhead. The three goons heard their comrade shouting, followed his accusing index finger to the spot where Remo stood, and moved as one to cut him off.
The vast, amorphous organism of the crowd engulfed him, sucked him in, reminding Remo of The Blob, with Steve McQueen. This was a different kind of monster, though: more complex, yet more simple-minded, oozing through the Quarter without seeming purpose, fueled by alcohol, randomly shedding cells on every side, absorbing new ones to replace those lost. A man could get lost in a crowd like that and evade his enemies.
Remo didn't want to get lost.
Of course, he'd prefer not getting any revelers shot. Especially all those friendly college coeds. Remo had no idea where he was going, other than away from Ham's Hock Shop and Jackson Avenue. He wouldn't lead the shooters back to his hotel. Remo slipped and slid through the crowd heading westward, leading his pursuers through the crowd, giving them the occasional glimpse to keep up their enthusiasm. His adversaries pushed and bullied their way through the crush of gaudy costumed bodies.
Fireplug had glimpsed the shop in ruins, maybe spotted Etienne DuBois behind the counter sleeping off the nerve pinch Remo gave him when he had run out of useful information.
Remo assumed the goons were Cajun Mafia, soldiers of Armand Fortier and his lieutenant, Bettencourt. They wouldn't relish going home without an explanation for the ruckus at Ham's Hock Shop, and the best thing they could hope for was to bag the culprit, take him with them when they went back to report.
On tiptoes he could make out a surge of motion through the crush, heads bobbing, bodies rippling as the spearhead of pursuit drove past them. It reminded Remo of snake-hunting in tall grass, the way you had to watch for subtle movement in the grass, because your prey remained invisible.
A mounted cop came out of nowhere, surging through the crush, proceeding in the general direction of the goons who hunted Remo. Had he seen them from his higher vantage point and known that something was amiss? Would he chastise them for their rude behavior, shoving through the crowd?
Then the cop veered off course, proceeding toward the distant outskirts of the mob. On that side of the street, a woman who resembled Shelley Winters in a Dolly Parton wig was dancing naked on a balcony, the sight of so much cellulite in motion making Remo vaguely ill. The mounted cop seemed bent on stopping her, an effort that evoked mixed cheers and booing from the audience.
"That's gotta be a felony," Remo muttered, and began moving through the press of bodies again, searching for a place where he could confront the goons without endangering the revelers.
From Ham DuBois he had gleaned a first name, bits and pieces of a story that could still be crap, despite the fact that his informant seemingly believed it. Remo needed more, and he was hoping that the four punks on his tail could add a few more bytes of information.
Remo began negotiating his way through the crush, moving inexorably toward the north side of the street. The human current had already passed Desire House, drawing Remo and his tail toward the terminus of Tchoupitoulas Street at Jefferson Avenue, with Audubon Park just beyond. South of Tchoupitoulas, the Mississippi River snaked its way along the outskirts of the Crescent City, dividing New Orleans proper from the suburbs of Westwego, Harvey, Gretna and Marrero. Narrow side streets had their own block parties going on, no respite from the crowd, and even alleyways were populated with partiers whose costumes mingled 1950s horror movies and sci-fi with all the trappings of a modernday Gay Pride parade.
Ten minutes after leaving Ham's Hock Shop, he found what he was looking for. It wasn't perfect, but he would find nothing better at this end of Tchoupitoulas Street.
A cemetery. How appropriate.
He wormed his way in that direction, left the surging crowd behind him as he broke into a trot.
JEAN CUVIER HAD NEVER made it with a Gypsy, and the more he thought about Aurelia Boldiszar, the more that lapse in judgment struck him as a critical mistake. She had the kind of look he had always liked in women: slim but not emaciated; elegant, even though her clothes were far from stylish; intelligent but quiet, keeping to herself a bit instead of showing off how smart she was.
The women in the past, let's face it, had been mostly bimbos. They were good at what they did, but without the bedroom and the shopping mall they had no purpose in life. With a Gypsy, now-this Gypsy, anyway-he had the feeling that he would be traveling uncharted territory. It excited him to think about it...but, predictably, there was a problem.
When Aurelia looked at him, which wasn't often, it was as if her eyes glazed over and kept on moving, anxious to find something else to focus on. Okay, the Cajun knew he wouldn't pass for Mel Gibson or that younger guy, Matt What's-his-name, but he had never been described as hideous. Some women went for him, some didn't. But none of them had ever told him that they couldn't stand to look at him.
The more he thought about it now, the more it troubled him. A part of his brain told him that his manly honor was at stake, he had to make the Gypsy really see him, but another part was getting worried. Cuvier was wondering if what he saw there, when her eyes glazed over, was in fact revulsion toward him as a man, or maybe something else.
He thought about the stories he had heard about the Gypsies when he was growing up. He had believed them as a child, and still believed enough of them to recommend that Remo seek out the Gypsies for information on the loup-garou. Some of the stuff he'd heard was crazy, while some other parts made sense. Jean Cuvier had never really stopped to dwell on whether Gypsies could predict the future. Tell someone when they were going to die, for instance. Maybe tell them how.
But what if this Aurelia babe could see his fate? Suppose that what she saw, just glancing at him from across the room, was so damn horrible it turned her stomach and she had to look away or lose her dinner right there on the coffee table.