Blessed Assurance (50 page)

She threw her arms around his neck and kissed him.

He reveled in the abandon of her kiss and swayed with her in his embrace. Her kiss shouted her trust in him, the possibility of a future. He deepened and prolonged the kiss. Finally, breathing hard, he drew back a fraction from her lips. “I will resign. We won't be afraid of the future. And I will give you and father a chance to prove Del's innocence.”

Meg stopped breathing. “What are you saying?”

His decision made at last, he pulled a slip of folded paper from his pocket. “I visited Storyville not long ago to try to find a new informant. This man may be able to help you or he might be worthless. I haven't spoken to him about Del's case, so I don't feel that it is dishonorable for me to give you his name. I pray he will help you.”

She accepted the paper, gratitude swelling inside her. “Thank you. I want to ask you many questions, but I won't ask you to do anything against your conscience.”

“I'm frightened for you. Be sure to go in daylight and take Jack with you.” He cupped her now unwavering chin in his hands. How could he have thought her less than beautiful when first they met?
He wouldn't let this woman go down into disaster or slip from his life. “Right now I can't say all I'm feeling, but know that you are dear to me.”

 

The next morning, parked at the curb on a misleadingly quiet street in Storyville, Meg glanced at Jack beside her in the plush leather front seat of her Cadillac. “I'll be fine. I told you I got this man's name from a trustworthy source. You're armed. My derringer's in my purse. I've entrusted you with the cash, so he won't be able to get it unless he gives us some good information.”

“I don't like you hobnobbin' with lowlife kind of people who live in this neighborhood,” Jack grumbled. “Can't this wait? Court doesn't resume until tomorrow afternoon.”

Meg opened her own door and got out. The warmer breeze spread a brackish odor from the nearby Mississippi River. “Wait for me!” Looking affronted, Jack scrambled out and hurried to Meg's side. “We should-a told Mr. Sands we were comin' here.”

“I didn't want to bother him unless we actually get lucky. The person who gave me Asa Dent's name wasn't sure this man would have anything worth paying for.” Meg tugged her black velvet hat more firmly in place.

“Storyville is no place for a lady.” Jack grimaced. “But I can see I'm not going to change your mind. Give me that address—please.”

Meg chuckled. “Here it is. It's broad daylight and you're with me. What harm could befall me?”

Jack grumbled wordlessly to himself, but studied the address and the doors along the dead-looking street where Penny Candy was. “Looks like he across the street at the far end.” Jack led her to the corner.

As they waited to cross, Meg recognized an open car as it turned farther down on the street and pulled into a parking place in the next block. Shocked, she said, “Look there, Jack, that's Mr. Gabriel's Franklin, isn't it?”

Jack followed her gaze. “Yes.” Then he whistled low.

“What is it?” Meg asked, staring as three men got out of the car
along with Gabriel. All the men in suits gathered on the banquette beside the car and began talking.

“Mr. Gabriel keeps high company. That's the chief of police and the mayor with him.”

“Really?” Meg's brow furrowed. “Why would he be with them here and now and who's the fourth man?”

Jack shook his head. “I don't have a clue why they'd be here. The fourth is probably a plainclothes cop. I think I seen him with Rooney. Here, let's cross now.” He took her in hand and escorted her to the other side of the shabby street.

Meg hesitated looking down the street. Penny Candy, Kennedy's club, lay between Meg and Gabriel.
What had brought Gabriel to Storyville this morning and in such company?
Meg could think of no logical answer.

“Have you seen reason and changed your mind?” Jack asked in a hopeful tone.

“No, let's see if Mr. Dent is at home and awake.” Meg started walking again. She felt as though she were being watched. She glanced around, but couldn't discern anyone interested in them—just a few drunks lying in doorways and closed cars driving through Storyville.

Jack followed her to the address, where Meg tapped the peeling green front door. An old black woman in a faded red house dress, the landlady, greeted them warily and sent them up her stairs to Dent's room. Meg sensed her suspicious black eyes following their every move.

The smell of stale smoke and coffee hung in the sour air. Being in such a rough boardinghouse made Meg uneasy, but she pushed her concerns to the back of her mind. She had to find more evidence to clear Del. Even after Rooney's biased testimony, Del's life still hung in the balance.

Jack knocked on Asa Dent's door hard enough to wake the dead. A careless, tobacco-rough voice called out, “Don't break it down. The old girl will take it out of my hide. Who's there?”

“Jack Bishop.”

“I don't know any Jack Bishop.”

“Well, you might know my friends, George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, even Andrew Jackson—”

The door swung open. “You got some friends I like.”

The landlady called up querulously, “Remember rent's due today!”

“You'll get it, old lady!” Asa Dent in wrinkled trousers and a stained T-shirt looked to be in his thirties, thin, with yellowed brown eyes. “Come on in.” Then he spotted Meg standing behind Jack and his eyes widened.

Jack stepped aside and let Meg enter first. She glanced around. The sparsely furnished room was tidy but dusty. A cigarette burned in an ash tray by the still-rumpled bed.

“What brought you to me?” Dent's eyes assessed them.

Pulling out his wallet, Jack slipped out a five-dollar bill. “We're looking for information.”

“What kind?” Dent's gaze roved over them and back again, puzzled.

Meg turned her eyes on him. “Anything to do with Mitch Kennedy or Corelli.”

“Mitch is dead. Corelli's the new owner. That's all I know.” He folded arms over his thin chest.

Meg couldn't have told anyone how she knew he was lying. But Dent was. Why would Gabriel send her to someone who wouldn't cooperate?

Dent looked nervous, too. “I don't know nothin' about no whitey club owners.”

Jack took out another crisp five-dollar bill and added it to the first.

“Can't tell you what I don't know,” Dent said sullenly.

Jack flashed a twenty-dollar bill.

Dent snorted and glanced away.

“Mr. Dent, we need information for my friend, Del DuBois.” A bad feeling grew inside her. Dent had knowledge, but he wasn't going to sell any to them.

“I can't tell what I don't know.” He turned and picked up his cigarette.

“That's true,” Jack replied in a quiet tone. “But I hate to put these presidents back in my wallet.”

Dent's yellow eyes turned greedy. He took a step closer. “Maybe you're interested in bettin'. I can line up some action for you, hot wagering. Better odds than the on-track bookies.”

Jack shook his head and folded the bills back in his wallet. “Sorry we can't do business.”

“Maybe you know someone who could help us,” Meg ventured, her hope shrinking fast, but grabbing at any chance that remained. “I'd pay you a finder's fee.”

Dent shook his head. “No can do.”

Jack took Meg's arm. “We'll be leaving you, then. Sorry we wasted your valuable time.” He led her out.

Dent clicked the door closed behind them and turned the lock.

Meg's tender optimism of this morning hit the floorboards. Her insides started folding up, shutting down.

Jack and Meg walked down the steps, bid the landlady farewell, and stepped out into the balmy day. Numbly, Meg paused and looked up the street again where Penny Candy lay between them and Gabriel's car. Another hope dashed. Why couldn't anything turn out right for a change? Had Del been just a convenient party to pin a murder on? Or when he'd insisted on being paid, had he unknowingly stepped on someone's toes?

Back on the street again, a black newsboy neared them, shouting, “Extry! Extry! Read all about it! Deputy found dead in Storyville!” Across the way, Gabriel and his companions emerged from another doorway and vanished inside Penny Candy. Had Gabriel seen her? “What's going on here?”

“Paper, lady? Paper, gent? Deputy found dead in Storyville.” The boy waved the single sheet special at her. Absently, she took it and handed the boy a nickel. Meg's eye caught the name, Rooney, in the headline. She cried out, “Jack, look here! That's why Gabriel's here!”

A soft curse. Jack fell to the banquette in a heap. Meg gasped. Searing pain. Her head! She was falling…

Stepping outside of the Penny Candy with his companions, Gabe glanced at his wrist watch. Half past eleven. Mardi Gras festivities would soon fill the nearby French Quarter.

“Mr. Gabriel!” Jack Bishop waved to him and charged across the street.

“Jack! Where's Meg?” Gabe froze, an awful premonition rising within.

“They took her! The paper boy distracted me!”

“Who took her?” Gabe gripped the large man's shoulders. “When?”

“Here! I can't have been out long.” Jack struck the air with clenched fists. “How could I be so stupid? I told her we shouldn't have come here!”

Gabe knew why Meg had come. By giving her Dent's name, he'd set her in danger's path.
I'm a fool. How could I have exposed her like that?

“Who's disappeared?” the chief of police demanded.

“Miss Meg Wagstaff.” Gabe looked up and down the somnolent street, anger igniting in his belly.

“You mean that young woman whose name has been linked to that black boy who's on trial?” the mayor asked.

“That rumor, sir,” Gabe spat out the words, “is scurrilous. His grandmother was her old nurse.”

“I see.” The mayor nodded, still eyeing him.

“Is Rooney really dead?” Jack asked.

“Yes, that's why we're down here,” Gabe replied. “We wanted to question Corelli about it.”

“What was
she
doing down here?” the chief demanded. “Storyville is no place for a lady…
if
she is a lady.”

Burning, Gabe held himself in check, but it cost him. “Miss Wagstaff is every inch a lady. This must be connected with Rooney's death.”

“How is Rooney's death connected to Miss Wagstaff's disappearance?” the mayor asked.

“They must be connected,” Gabe insisted, his stomach rioting. “Why else would Rooney be found dead in Storyville and Miss Wagstaff kidnapped on the
same street
the next morning? Both of them are involved with Del's trial.”

“Well, we can't argue with that,” the mayor said.

The chief of police looked as though he'd like to, but he turned to the fourth man who'd remained silent. “O'Toole, you better call into the station and give them the particulars about this Yankee woman who's gone and gotten herself kidnapped.”

Gabe bridled at the chief's belligerent tone. He couldn't reveal his feelings for Meg, so he used the only tack he thought they'd understand. He declared in a heated voice, “Miss Wagstaff is a guest in my family's home. The St. Clair honor is at stake. I'm going to advertise a reward for her quick return—five thousand dollars.”

O'Toole, the plainclothes police officer, gave him a startled look. “Okay. I'll get right on it.”

“Instead of calling, you may take the chief and Mayor Behrmann back to headquarters in my car. Just leave it in my assigned spot.” Gabe handed the man his key. “I'll go with Jack in Miss Wagstaff's auto.”

The police chief glared at him. “You should leave this investigation to the department, St. Clair.”

Gabe fought the impulse to break the chief's jaw, but his voice came out stiffly polite, “I'm sorry, sir. The lady is a guest in my
home. Southern chivalry demands that I do all I can to find her and bring her home safely.”

This left the three men nothing to say, which was exactly what Gabe had intended. He watched them retreat, then he turned to Jack. “Now, I want you to tell me exactly what happened—from the time you picked Meg up this morning until she was kidnapped.”

Within minutes, Jack helped Gabe retrace Meg's movements, straight to the informant they'd come to question. Upstairs in Dent's boardinghouse, Gabe grabbed the front of Dent's shirt. “You'll tell me the truth, tell me what you know about the lady's disappearance or you will regret it.”

“I told you I don't know nothin'. Getting rough won't change that.” Dent clutched Gabe's hands to keep his balance.

From where he stood by Dent's window overlooking the street, Jack cleared his throat. “Corelli just walked into Penny Candy.”

“Don't leave your room. I may be back.” Gabe released him.

Dent stumbled backward.

Within minutes, Gabe stormed into the empty and hollow-feeling Penny Candy and confronted Corelli beside the bar. “All right. What do you know about the kidnapping of Miss Wagstaff?”

Corelli leaned against the bar smoking a cigarette. “I don't know what you're talkin' about. You called and told me to get here. I came over as soon as I was dressed.”

Gabe's right hand clenching into a fist at his side, he pictured himself smashing the man's smug face. “Don't play dumb. Everyone in New Orleans knows who Meg Wagstaff and Del Dubois are.”

“So?” Corelli flicked the ash off his cigarette.

“I'm putting up a five thousand dollar reward for her safe return.”

Corelli gave a low wolf whistle. “That's a lot of money. Sorry I can't help you.”

Gabe would have paid five thousand dollars for a legal excuse to drag Corelli down to police headquarters. Instead, he slammed his fist onto the bar. He turned on his heel and marched out. Jack followed him.

Outside, Gabe looked up and down the afternoon street. Most of Storyville still slept. “Where do we go from here?”

Jack rocked back and forth on his heels. “Well, I would go to Mr. Sands.”

Why didn't I think of that?
Maybe Del or Meg had told him something that would give them a lead. “You're right.” They got into Meg's car and Gabe pulled out and took off with a squeal of tires.

 

Through the buzzing in her ears, Meg heard voices, men's voices, arguing. She tried to straighten up, but couldn't without making her head spin. She gave up and let her head loll weakly forward. She became aware that she was sitting on a chair, but held so tightly…
I'm bound.
She tried to speak but a cloth gag stopped her. Through the haze in her head, the voices intruded again.

“You're a fool!” An unseen man's sharp voice hurt her ears. “Did I tell you to kidnap anybody? Did I?”

A low voice that she thought she'd heard before tried to explain, “She was nosing around the club, then more showed up—the chief of police, the mayor—”

“So what?” the sharp voice demanded, sounding as though it were below her feet.

“I saw her go to Dent's, then go behind the club. He may have told her something,” the familiar voice tried to sound reasonable.

“I got Dent in my hip pocket. He don't tell nobody anything I don't want him to. You've made a mess of things. Rooney made a mess and look what happened to him.”

A silence. “You mean that was you—”

“Sure it was. Rooney messed this up from the beginnin'. But yesterday in court was the last straw—”

“You went to court?” the familiar voice asked.

“I got someone who did. Rooney picked the wrong fall guy. That jazz player is more than just a cheap Joe. He's got an education. He's got a family behind him worth millions. The guy who raised him runs a high-class magazine that blows the whistle on people who do things he don't like—one of those do-gooder muckrakers.”

“Who knew?”

“Rooney
should have known! He bungled this whole deal from the beginning. Now, don't you bungle this.” The sharp voice sounded stern. “Even if she is a Yankee, the death of a white woman, a lady will cause big trouble. And her father's got enough money to make waves. I don't want to kill her unless I have to.”

“Don't worry.”

“I'm not worried.
You're
the one who should be worried. I want this taken care of today. One way or the other! Don't forget what happened to Rooney.”

“Sure, boss…”

The voices faded from her hearing and receding footsteps told Meg that they were leaving. She opened her eyes and scanned the room she was being held in. One small window let in the only light from high above. She could see no door, but it might be behind her. How long had she been unconscious? Lifting her aching head made her feel woozy. She lowered it fraction by fraction.

What happened to Jack? Did they kill him, too? Tears flowed down her cheeks. Kennedy, LaRae, Rooney had been murdered. Maybe Jack. Am I next?

Her heart beat so fast it hurt. She cried out against the gag.
Oh, God, I'm so frightened
.
What can separate us from the love of God? Can bombs, mustard gas, barbed wire?

Colin's face came before her eyes. Pain cut her in two. Her wrists and ankles pounded with sluggish blood. Only her bindings held her up. Her grief dragged at her like poisoned nails.
Dear God, save Del. Save Gabe. Save me. Without you, we are lost.

 

“Del?” Gabe stared in shock at his father who sat behind the desk in his office at home. “I need to question Del to find Meg? What could he know about this, he's been in jail under guard—”

“Yes, Del,” Sands interrupted. “If you want the truth, son, you must go to him.”

Gabe felt hot and cold. His fears for Meg's safety had shaken him to his core. He now knew the extent of his feelings for Meg.
I
can't lose her. I can't face the future without her.
“You'll tell me nothing, then?”

“I can't tell you what I don't know. I think Del knows more than he's told me.” Father picked up the newspaper, folded it, then handed it to his son. “Take him this. I think the headline will loosen his tongue.”

Gabe took the paper and walked out.

Belle, with Dulcine at her side, accosted him at the front door. “Gabe, I need to know if you will take me to the Rex parade this evening—”

“Parade?” He stared at her.

“It's Mardi Gras today,” Dulcine trilled. “Did you forget, Gabriel?”

Meg's kidnapping had driven everything else from his mind. “Meg has been kidnapped.”

“What!” Belle exclaimed.

Dulcine looked startled.

“I'm on my way to try to get information from Del at the parish jail.”

Belle clutched his sleeve. “Kidnapped? Why!”

“Isn't that a job for the police?” Dulcine asked in a brittle tone.

“No, Dulcine, it's my responsibility because I'm the one who put her in harm's way. Besides,” he went on rashly, “I intend to ask Meg Wagstaff to be my wife.”

Dulcine's face went white except for two spots of red, one flaming on each cheek.

“I'll be praying for her,” Belle murmured.

Gabe touched his sister's shoulder, then left.

 

Gabe faced Del alone in the jail infirmary. The wall clock read quarter past three. Nearly four hours since Meg had been kidnapped. The clogged streets and a fruitless talk with the chief of police had gobbled up precious time. He'd had Del brought here so they couldn't be overheard. Del's bodyguard and Jack stood guard outside the locked door.

“Why did you want to see me alone here?” Del stared at him suspiciously.

“Meg was kidnapped this morning.”

Del reared up out of his seat, cursing Gabe. “Mr. Sands said you hired a good bodyguard for her! What happened?”

“Jack Bishop is a good bodyguard, but they took him by surprise. You can't blame me more than I blame myself. I need you to tell me everything you know, so I can find her.”

“She might already be dead.” Del clenched and unclenched his hands as if he fought the urge to throttle Gabe.

“I hope, I pray not.” Gabe pushed the paper into Del's hand. “My father told me to show you this. Read the headline.”

Del took it reluctantly, but one glance at the headline and shock spread over his face. “Rooney's dead?”

Gabe nodded. “I saw Rooney's body at the morgue before breakfast.”

Del slumped back into his chair.

Sitting down on a stool, Gabe bent over. Folding his hands together, he propped his elbows on his thighs. “Tell me anything you know that might help me to find her. Please.”

Del glanced up. “Your father tells me that you and Meg are an item, is that true?”

“I have fallen in love with her.”
Would Del be able to help?

Del looked at the paper again. “You say you love Meg. Rooney's dead. Why does that mean I can trust you?”

“Because my father sent me. Because Meg trusts me. Because only the truth can free you and save Meg. Tell me. Please.”
Dear Lord, make him confide in me.

Del stared hard at Gabe. “All right. I can talk now with Rooney gone. It took me a while to sort everything out, but…” Del paused, staring at the ceiling, then he looked down. He talked slowly as though exhausted: “As I've figured it out, Rooney framed me. Late one night, I saw him with Corelli and the man who wears a flashy diamond ring on his little finger. At the time, I didn't even know who the three of them were.”

Del shrugged. “I didn't put it together until after my arrest when I found out who Rooney was, then I asked other prisoners about the man with the ring. They told me his name is Mario Vincent.”

Gabe tried to take in what he was hearing.
Kennedy, Rooney, Corelli, and Vincent?
“Vincent runs most of Storyville.”

“That's what I've found out—
since
being jailed.”

“When did you see them together?” The enormity of what Del was revealing shook Gabe.

“Two days before Mitch was killed, about an hour after closing. I think they thought everyone else in the club had gone home but Mitch. But I was in the back in what we called the dressing room. I heard raised voices—”

“They were arguing?”

Del nodded. “I didn't think anything about that. I came out, ready to leave. I just nodded at them and left. They were talking to Mitch. The thing is I don't think I would ever have put it altogether if they'd just let me go north.”