Delancey leaned toward me, fascinated by this. “There must have been a lot of addicts in New Orleans in those days.”
“A very large number, between the drinks and the food,” I agreed.
“And the Belvederes became addicts, too?”
“Sadly, yes. They managed to conceal it—especially after the banning of absinthe—by spreading the story that mental illness ran in the family, and when Alzheimer’s, Creutzfeldt-Jakob and similar diseases were researched, this made a convenient cover. In fact, I made a few phone calls and it was obvious that early confusion was common. One of those calls was to St. Cynthia’s, the mental hospital. Some of the symptoms are similar.”
“So if the book had fallen into the wrong hands, it could have proved a blackmail weapon against the family?”
“Well, I can think of a journalist or two who would like to make a big story out of it,” I agreed. “The point that bothered me, though, was the thought of one of the Witches killing Mortensen to get the book. It seemed out of character and, from a practical aspect, not reasonable.”
“You’re too soft on women,” said Delancey. “Do you know what percentage of them commit … well, never mind. Of course, it didn’t have to be one of them,” he added.
“No, but they themselves thought it was and I was inclined to think they were more into this whole business than anyone else, so they were more likely right. A quite different motive seemed to be called for, though.”
“Before we get to that, I’m a little puzzled about that book. It was a forgery, you said. How did that happen?”
“Mrs. Pargeter,” I said. “A woman of uncommon integrity. She realized that exposure of the book would be a terrible blow to the Belvedere family. She probably tried to pull it out of the auction but it had already been publicized. Its disappearance would have been noticed. She wanted to see the charity benefit but not at the expense of the Belvedere family. So she had a copy made.”
“That’s a point that sticks in my craw,” said Delancey. “How did she happen to know a forger? Not many people do.”
“On the wall of her apartment is a certificate of achievement awarded to her husband by the National Publishers Association. It refers to his work as setting up the first investigational section of the NPA. I called them and asked about that. It seems that at one time the association found itself encountering a lot of forged books and William Pargeter was chosen to do something about it. It must have been during that time that he uncovered the activities of several forgers. Herman Harburg was one of those interrogated, but no charges were ever brought. There are a few ways this might have gone, the most likely being that Harburg cooperated to a considerable degree with William Pargeter in his investigations—”
“Ratted on some of the other book forgers, you mean? In return for having any charges against him dropped?”
“You might want to put it that way in your report,” I said, being urbane but getting in a retaliatory dig at the same time. After all, no one likes to be bugged when they don’t know about it … “But this is a point you’ll have to clear up. Mrs. Pargeter must have learned that her husband included Harburg in his investigations. She could have also known Harburg as a book lover and a bookbinder. He may have always been a supporter of charity auctions and so on—they would be a good cover for him.”
“Mrs. Pargeter was taking a risk, wasn’t she?” asked Delancey. “She might have been putting a good blackmail lever in his hands—”
“She wouldn’t have to take that risk. I would bet that she simply photocopied selected pages and gave them to him to use as a guide to the handwriting. It wouldn’t matter if the book looked different overall because no one had seen the original. It would look authentic—well, an authentic copy, anyway—and the recipes and notes and so on would be convincing. All the stuff concerning absinthe would be left out of the material that Mrs. Pargeter gave to Harburg to copy.”
“Harburg gave her the book in the first place,” Delancey pointed out.
“Yes, but he told me that he never looked at them, especially when there was a large number. Even if he had, it might not have meant anything to him. As the book had come to Mrs. Pargeter from him, his name was uppermost in her mind. The idea of forging a copy might have originated that way.”
“That bookseller, Gambrinus,” Delancey said. “I don’t have a clear fix on him yet. What’s your reading?”
“I’m not fully clear on him, either. He’s very well-informed on books, including cooking books. He must have suspected that the Belvedere book was valuable but I haven’t figured out yet why he thought so. He has lived in New Orleans all his life—he would know about the Belvedere family. He might have known that they used absinthe themselves and put it into their products.
“At any rate, Gambrinus sent Mortensen to buy the book for him. Mortensen was a sharp cookie and could smell an opportunity. He planned to have the book ‘stolen’ from him and was taken by surprise when someone stole it from him and then killed him.
“Mortensen’s buddy, Earl Whelan, tried to take over the book and peddle it. He knew about it from his wife, Leah Rollingson.”
“An arrest was made this afternoon, as the ladies left the lunch at the General’s Tavern,” Delancey said matter-of-factly. “Other arrests were made an hour earlier.”
“The other arrests being at the distillery.”
“Right. I got hold of a guy called Kilmer—he’s with the Louisiana Bureau of Alcohol and Tobacco. We’ll probably have to get the FBI in if we find out that the distillery has been selling across state lines, but it’s best to nail them here in this state first. Kilmer’s known for some time that absinthe is being sold, but he’s not been able to put his finger on the source. He’s been able to tie in absinthe with several deaths so this case is a high priority with the A and T bureau.” He gave me his questioning look. “How’d you get on to this place?”
“Landers was the character following me—the one I told you about. I turned the tables on him and when I saw him in a bar and followed him to other bars, I learned more about him. I waited till he was absent from the distillery then went there and took a tour.”
Delancey raised an eyebrow. “They give tours?”
“They were a bit reluctant but I spun a story—”
Delancey rolled his eyes and put up a hand. “Don’t tell me.”
“Okay. So I saw this room, heavily padlocked with a steel door. Next to it was an old, beat-up wooden door. I got taken in by that trick once before. I got as close to these doors as I could, first one then the other. I have an extremely keen sense of smell and taste, Lieutenant, it comes with the job. Suspicion would, of course, be aroused by the heavy steel door but at the old wooden one, I detected just a faint aroma of aniseed—characteristic of absinthe.”
Delancey rubbed his chin reflectively. “Don’t know how to work in that kind of evidence—it’s what might be described as ‘intangible.’”
“A good description,” I agreed. “One other thing I saw clinched it for me—Landers had a photo of his wife on his desk. The different names fooled me, but when I saw that photograph of Marguerite, I was able to put it together.”
“I’m not real clear on the incrimination of the two,” Delancey admitted. “But they’ll point a finger at each other once we get them talking, whether deliberately or otherwise. She may have committed both murders, he may have, or each could have committed one of them.”
“I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s the dominant one of the pair,” I said. I thought back to when I had first seen her, Marguerite Saville, owner of the Bistro Bonaparte. She had been the black-haired, long-lashed number with the nearly perfect features. “She’s a very strong-willed woman and the two of them have a lot to lose.”
I recalled also that it had been Marguerite who had insisted on hiring me when Della and the others had assumed that I wouldn’t be able to act for them, as I was already hired. Marguerite wanted to be sure she knew my movements. It had surprised me when she told me that she had been offered the book, too, but she was close to Leah and, through her, Leah’s husband Earl would have known of Marguerite’s prominence among the Witches. Marguerite would have been eager to get the book and suppress any possibility of her husband’s distillery being exposed.
“The way Kilmer tells me,” Delancey said, “there could be murder charges flying in all directions, as well as other charges. A lot of people in these parts might feel that their relatives had their minds destroyed.” He waved a hand. “Kilmer would like a few words with you—okay?”
“Certainly.”
“He’s got a few questions, like where this wormwood comes from.”
“I’m sure he does. Wormwood doesn’t grow in this part of the world, normally, but it belongs to the sunflower family and is found wild in the Mediterranean so it could be cultivated here. It was probably imported from the Med in earlier times—”
“And since it was banned?” Delancey asked.
I thought back to my visit to the Belvedere mansion and the stroll that Ambrose and I had taken out back, toward the stand of giant oaks. I recalled the large area of blackened soil and remnants of burned vegetation.
“I suppose it would have been possible to cultivate the wormwood plant somewhere around here,” I conceded.
“We’ll let Kilmer worry about that side of it,” Delancey said. “Meanwhile, how about signing these statements?”
J
ACK KILMER WAS A
similar type to Delancey, cautious, thoughtful and an intriguing blend of tough and considerate. I could see the two of them getting along together very well in a field where conflict could arise easily. He looked a lot like Delancey, too, but was taller and skinnier and had a pronounced Louisiana accent. I answered all his questions and tried to skirt away from any theorizing on where the wormwood could have been coming from but it was inevitable that he would press the point.
“Think it was local?” he asked.
“The climate in many of the Southern states is amenable to growing it,” I said carefully. “With modern agricultural techniques, soil can be chemically modified if it’s not fully suitable. They even grow wine-making grapes in places like Canada today.”
He nodded.
“You’ll probably make more progress backtracking through the bars that have been selling it clandestinely, though,” I said.
“We’ll be doing that, too,” he agreed. “Of course, if this gets to be a big deal—class-action, maybe, a mini-tobacco case, that kind of thing, we might have to run through some satellite pictures. Infrared, or some variation of it, might show up wormwood crops. Our guys are getting good at that kind of stuff.”
I’m sure they are,
I thought,
but they won’t be able to make anything out of pictures of burnt-out fields.
I didn’t say anything, though. I was satisfied to let that alone.
We had been talking in Delancey’s home station, and after Kilmer left me, Delancey reappeared. He looked more rumpled than usual but he assured me that he was making excellent progress on wrapping up the case.
“I’ll tell Hal Gaines you were a big help. Might be useful, next time you’re in the Big Bagel getting into trouble.”
“That’s never my intention,” I told him. “From now on, I’m keeping a lower profile. I’ve bought a few of your Louisiana hot sauces to take back with me but otherwise, it’s going to be milder stuff—tarragon and thyme, basil and bay leaves.”
“Think that’ll do it?” He didn’t sound convinced.
“It’s sure to,” I said confidently.
“Yeah,” he said in that languid way of his that meant he didn’t believe it for a second. “Oh, one other thing—”
“Yes, Lieutenant?”
“The book, the original book. You never did tell me what happened to it after it had caused all this mayhem.”
I had had time to prepare for this question—and just as well, too, otherwise I would have been running out of hems and haws.
“Neither Mrs. Pargeter nor Ambrose Belvedere want to talk about it, but you can safely work on the premise that Mrs. Pargeter considered destroying it then decided that it was Ambrose Belvedere’s responsibility to do that.”
“And …” Delancey gave me one of his little waves that invited me to be more forthcoming.
“And I would say that Ambrose destroyed it.”
He eyed me. “You would, eh? You’re saying I can work on it—that premise?”
“Safely, Lieutenant.” I couldn’t prevent the intrusion of a mental picture of the urn that Ambrose had shown me with ashes in it, paper ashes.
“Tough to put premises in a report,” he commented wryly.
I shrugged; a safe ploy under the circumstances, I thought.
“And I wouldn’t want to have that book reappear and cause trouble all over again.”
“I can understand that,” I told him.
“Because if it did, I’d have Scotland Yard put you in a crate and ship you over here within twenty-four hours.”
“I prefer business class—but hold on,” I added quickly. “I give you every assurance I can that the book has been destroyed. It’s hard to prove that something no longer exists.”
He digested that for a moment.
“Okay, well, have a good trip back—you are leaving today, aren’t you?” His tone was anxious.
“Yes, I am.”
“Good. Just one word of advice—”
“Yes, Lieutenant?”
“Try a credit card from the National Bank of New York.”
For a moment, I was baffled.
“You mentioned a library card for, er, certain uses,” he continued. “I told you it needed to be a credit card. The one that the National Bank of New York issues is the best. We’ve tried to get them off the streets but can’t. Better get one while you still can. Just don’t get arrested for using it.”
“Thanks for the recommendation, Lieutenant,” I said. “I hope I won’t need it. How are the law studies proceeding?”
“Okay. Gonna have to make a decision soon on what direction to head in.”
“Criminal, civil, real estate—that kind of decision?”
“Something like that.”
“Any preferences at this stage?”
“Years on the force incline me toward criminal law but at the same time, I’m thinking of going for something more constructive.”
“I’m sure you’ll make the right decision. Will you consider going back to New York?”