Cities of the Dead (15 page)

“Like I said,” he murmured after she banged the door shut, “everybody oughta have a good time in New Orleans.”

A shiny white van blocked the concrete walkway to the police station. Halfway up the path, a dark-haired woman adjusted her lapel mike and barked orders at two men carrying TV minicams emblazoned with the Channel 4 logo.

At Spraggue's hurried warning, Flowers sped by and turned the corner. They pulled up at the back entrance to the station.

“Better not wait,” Spraggue said. “I'll call.”

None of the cops at the station stepped forward and slapped the cuffs on him, but he could tell from their watchful eyes that he was no longer the fair-haired boy. He wished Rawlins were there.

A silent patrolman led him to a stuffy cubicle on the third floor. Aunt Mary, wearing a red knit dress, provided the only spot of color in the room. She was perched on a dreary beige sofa that was fractionally brighter than the stubble of carpet and the battered gray file cabinets. She used his entrance as an excuse to rise.

The man in the room towered over her. He was three shades darker than the coffee-colored Flowers, half again as tall, and had none of Flowers' easy diffidence.

“Sergeant Hayes,” Mary said tartly, “I'd like you to meet my nephew, the notorious Michael Spraggue. Michael, Sergeant Hayes.”

Hayes looked about thirty, except around his eyes, which stared out of a fiftyish snare of wrinkles. Spraggue split the difference and put him at forty. His handshake was firm and strong, with nothing to prove.

“Is there a problem, Sergeant?” Spraggue asked.

Hayes gave him the kind of glance you give a coin you've just flipped to see if it comes up heads or tails.

“A problem,” Hayes repeated. “Yeah.” He spoke in a slow deep bass, rich as cream.

The quarter had landed on its edge. Spraggue watched the sergeant's eyes, waiting for the coin to topple.

“We've got a citizen downstairs wants to swear out a complaint on you,” Hayes rumbled. “Not for jaywalkin' either. The reason you're up here and not over in Interrogation with the cop who caught the squeal is 'cause somebody down there matched this up with the Fontenot homicide and swung it my way. Rawlins filled me in before he left for Angola. He told me about you, and he's a man whose judgment I generally trust. I've been stalling this guy. I thought maybe, if I got the two of you together, we might skip a lot of paperwork and publicity.”

Publicity. Spraggue nodded slowly, remembering the TV cameras out front. The tall man's eyes never left his face.

“You want a lawyer?”

“Not if we can keep it informal,” Spraggue said.

The coin fell, heads or tails. Hayes made a decision. In whose favor, Spraggue wasn't sure.

“I'll bring the complainant in,” Hayes said. “He may insist on a lawyer. Or an armed guard.” The sergeant's teeth flashed in what could have been either a grin or a grimace, and he walked out, leaving the door ajar.

Spraggue folded himself onto the couch to wait. He was sure Aimee had a more comfortable sofa.…

Aunt Mary brought him back to reality with a whisper geared to foil any eavesdroppers at the open door. “I phoned Henri Fiorici in New York. As far as I'm concerned, he's out of it. No backbone. No motive.”

“Didn't sound like he was desperately in love with Dora?”

“Once upon a time, maybe. But there's quite a leap between loving someone years ago and killing to protect that someone's honor two days ago.”

“Agreed.”

“More importantly”—Mary lowered her voice until she was almost inaudible—“Fontenot's financial position.”

“You've got something good?”

“You have no idea how many banking regulations have been tossed in my face.”

“Not as many as you know how to circumvent,” Spraggue said.

Mary smiled. “Well, Pierce and I phoned every local bank, inquiring, on behalf of the Foundation, into the financial status of Joseph Fontenot. It's a horribly common name in Louisiana, but fortunately, he had the middle initial
O
. For what, I can't imagine. I got a copy of one of his past paychecks from Paul Armand and worked from that. It turned up a very simple savings and checking account arrangement at the First National Bank of Commerce. None of Fontenot's dealings through First National in any way accounts for a sixty-thousand-dollar deposit on that restaurant. The man didn't have the money.”

“Dead end,” Spraggue said.

“You underestimate me, my dear. Once I had exhausted Joseph Fontenot, I began on Jacques Forte and James French. An accommodating head teller at the Hibernia Bank ferreted out Forte's account.”

“He wouldn't have used James French again. French had a police record.”

“If I'd thought of that it might have saved some time,” Mary said. “But listen to this.” She pulled a scrap of paper out of her gray leather handbag. “Jacques Forte opened one of those money market plus accounts on July tenth of last year with an initial deposit of twenty thousand dollars. Certified check. And he deposited ten thousand every month until he died.”

Sergeant Hayes's voice boomed through the open door, requesting that Mr. Hampton follow him, please.

Spraggue stood up.

Hampton entered the room with the same practiced elegance that had carried him in and out of the Café Creole. He looked sleek and well-fed and pleased with himself. His thinning hair was lacquered in place. He patted the yellow handkerchief that stuck out of the pocket of his sky blue suit, and peered around the room. He seemed disappointed with its contents.

“Sit down.” Hayes indicated the lumpy sofa with a commanding nod of his head.

Hampton obeyed with a hint of condescension, a monarch sitting in the presence of commoners.

Mary said, “I'll stand, if you don't mind.”

Spraggue leaned against a cardboard-thin wall.

“Mr. Hampton,” Hayes said. “You know these people?”

“I have spoken to Mrs. Spraggue-Hillman.” His voice was silky soft. Spraggue had heard it on the radio. “She sat with Dora Levoyer at the banquet, at my table. I've seen Mr. Spraggue only on the stage, and in, I think, one movie. And, of course, last night.”

If Harris Hampton had seen him in one movie, he'd seen him in half the movies he'd made in his life, Spraggue thought. The man qualified as a fan. “You forgot to mention the Café Creole,” Spraggue said. “Yesterday afternoon, when Paul Armand gave you the boot.”

The fat man turned to Sergeant Hayes. “Yes,” he said cooly, “I'm almost sure, practically a hundred-percent sure, that this is the man. Same dark hair, same profile. By the way, has anyone asked for me? I was expecting someone to call. It's rather important.”

“They'll take a message at the desk,” Hayes said shortly. “This is kind of important now. You're making a positive ID?”

“You mean, right now?” Hampton made a nervous noise, somewhere between a giggle and a snort. “Right here? I thought there'd be one-way glass. A lineup. Witness protection.”

“What's the point of a lineup?” Hayes said calmly. “Like you said, you already know Spraggue's face from the movies. It would have been a cinch to pull him out of a lineup.”

“And we met briefly yesterday afternoon,” Spraggue reminded them, just for the pleasure of seeing Hampton squirm at the memory.

“So he's identified my nephew as my nephew,” Mary said. “What next?”

“You can save your sarcasm, madam.” Hampton's quiet dignity would have gone over big on a talk show. “I know what I saw.”

“I don't,” Spraggue said.

“Go ahead and tell him,” Sergeant Hayes suggested.

“I thought I could just swear out a complaint and leave.” Hampton looked quickly from one face to the next. Realizing that he was the only one seated in the tiny room, he tried to reassert his dignity by standing.

“You could,” the sergeant agreed. Every nuance of his deep voice, every line in his face, denied his words.

Hampton shot back his shirt cuff and stared at his wristwatch. “This is absolutely the last time I go through this today.” He glared his defiance at Hayes, but met only a stony frown. “I was standing in front of my hotel last night, the Monteleone, when a car careened off the street and swerved right at me. If I hadn't jumped out of the way—”

“What kind of car?” Hayes asked.

“I told the other officer.”

“Tell me.”

“A dark-colored sedan. I don't drive. I don't know anything about cars.”

“What time was it?”

“Oh, a little past three in the morning.”

“Witnesses?”

“The doorman had gone inside the hotel. I was under the impression that the police would look for witnesses.”

“What on earth were you doing ‘standing outside' your hotel at three in the morning?” Aunt Mary asked.

“I may have to answer
your
questions,” Hampton snapped at Hayes, “but I don't have to answer
hers.
” He stared at his wristwatch again. “Could you check to see if someone's trying to get in touch with me?”

“I wonder what time this trash has to be taped by, to make the six o'clock news,” Spraggue said.

Hampton's head jerked around.

Spraggue ignored him, spoke instead to Sergeant Hayes. “There's a TV camera crew camped out on your front lawn.”

“A TV crew out front?” Hayes echoed in disgust. “If that's what this Mickey Mouse song and dance is all about—”

“Well, I don't know anything about it,” Hampton said quickly. “Why should I? I mean, maybe someone spotted me coming in. I am a celebrity, you know. Millions of people read my books, watch me on TV.”

“Call the station,” Spraggue said to Hayes. “Ten to one, they got an anonymous tip.”

“If you've been wasting my time—” Hayes began.

“Wasting your time! I like that. I came in here to help you. You have a killer loose in the streets, waiting to kill again.”

Hayes swallowed. “Some of our good citizens get pretty drunk in the Quarter around Mardi gras time; they drive a little careless. Maybe that's what happened last night.” The sergeant made his suggestion through clenched teeth.

“It was a deliberate attack. And I think it was this man. Unless he's got an alibi—”

“For three in the morning?” Spraggue shrugged his shoulders. He should have left that bar and gone home with Aimee Fontenot. He knew it.

“Did you call those TV people?” Hayes' arm started involuntarily for Hampton's collar. The food critic shrank back against the sofa.

“I have information!” Hampton said quickly. He offered his words to Hayes the way a beaten dog might offer a bone to his tormentor. “Important information, and every time I try to give it to one of your damned officers, they tell me to keep my mouth shut.”

“About this so-called hit-and-run attempt?” Hayes asked.

“No.” Hampton's pale eyes searched the room but failed to discover a sympathetic listener. “I admit, well, I may have made a mistake on that, like you said. It was dark.”

“The story would get better coverage with my name in it,” Spraggue said. “Right?”

“I have information concerning Joseph Fontenot's death.” Hampton wasn't letting go of the spotlight now. “He was my friend, and I know who killed him. The police refuse to—”

“You want to make a statement or just read your speech to the TV cameras?” Hayes muttered.

“Nobody wants to hear the truth.” Hampton ignored Hayes' interruption. “Just because Denise Michel is some kind of grande dame around here, some traditional, sacred cow, you're all pretending she had nothing to do with it. Denise Michel is a dangerous woman. She ought to be locked up. I told that other policeman and he's done absolutely nothing. Nothing!” Hampton carefully wiped his palms on his pantlegs, and sank back on the sofa. It creaked as it got the full benefit of his weight.

“I read the statement you gave Sergeant Rawlins,” Hayes said. “As I recall, you didn't back up your suspicion with any facts.”

“Hah! Denise Michel had a reason to kill Fontenot that a saint couldn't ignore. He was horning in on her cookbook deals. Cutting her out. I mean, why do you think she invited Dora down here in the first place? Undying friendship?” He tapped his massive chest, then lowered his voice to a confidential murmur. “No one knows the food and wine scene in New Orleans the way I do!”

Spraggue exchanged a long glance with Hayes, said, “Maybe the police haven't really taken advantage of your insider knowledge.”

“Right.” Hayes swallowed. “Maybe those other officers didn't realize who they were talking to.”

Mary gave the sergeant an appreciative wink.

Hampton's round face settled into a satisfied smirk. “The police haven't got a clue,” he said. “I mean, it's obvious, isn't it? Bigamy's still a crime, isn't it? Denise uses Dora to threaten Fontenot, says stay away from my publishing deals or you'll wind up with a lawsuit that'll cost you more than any royalties you'll ever earn. Not to mention your reputation and your marriage. Now, I'm not saying she set out to kill him. Maybe he tried to kill her and she fought back. She's one tough woman, Denise Michel. Butchers her own meat.”

“And what would you say if I told you that she was in plain sight while the murder was committed? We have five, maybe seven witnesses who'll swear to it,” Hayes said.

“Then she must have had a partner,” Hampton insisted.

Little Paulette with the flowered dress, Spraggue thought. “How well did you know Joe Fontenot?” he asked.

“Oh, we moved in the same circles, you know.”

“You called him a friend before. An old friend?”

“Depends on what you mean by that. I was one of the first people in New Orleans to pick up on the truly extraordinary things he was doing with Cajun food. I
made
his career, not that I ever expected any thanks for it. The power of the press, you know. And TV. There were a lot of chefs I could have talked about on the air, but Joseph was the most deserving. And the way people responded! Fontenot's cooking was absolutely the new wave. Anyone could see that! Even a fool like Denise Michel. I wouldn't be surprised if her next cookbook is a direct steal from Fontenot.”