The Rift (65 page)

“Yes. And that’s what I wanted to talk to you about.”

“Ah. Here’s our tea.”

Lorette arrived with tea on a tray and poured. Omar asked for sugar, no cream, and got a sugar cube dropped into his cup with silver tongs. He stirred the dissolving lump into his tea— he knew from Wilona that his silver teaspoon was to a pattern made exclusively by a firm in Vicksburg since the 1840s— and he glanced at his cup as he raised it to his lips. Even if this was the second-best china, it was still impressive enough: thin and delicate as the petals of a flower, gold-rimmed, with a design of a shepherd frolicking with a shepherdess. Omar could crush it to powder by closing one hand, and for a moment— only a moment— he was tempted to do so.

Mrs. Ashenden had seen him study the cup. “It’s Sèvres,” she said, “but it’s soft-paste, not
porcelaine royale,
and our set is incomplete.”

“It’s very fine, ma’am,” Omar said. Mrs. Ashenden was lucky she had inherited the porcelain, the silver, and Clarendon, too, because if she hadn’t, she might well be wandering the parish bereft as any refugee. Her husband, the late Herbert Temple Ashenden of Fort Worth, had gone through their combined fortunes like a hailstorm through ripe wheat. He had lost most of their money in the oil business, and then dropped the rest in a scheme to turn the Shelburne cotton fields into an exclusive hunting resort here in Spottswood Parish, a place carefully groomed to support quail, deer, duck, trout, and who-knew-what. He’d built a lodge and preened the country, and imported or otherwise attracted the game, and then found that no one came.

Rich people, it seemed, had better places to spend their time than Spottswood Parish. The scheme leaked money like a sieve. Ashenden, along with his blond girlfriend, a former Miss Concordia Parish, died in a car crash in Mississippi. Most of the old Shelburne plantation had been sold to pay his debts, and now belonged to Swiss Jews who had demolished the lodge, chased off the wildlife, and put the land back into cotton.

Omar had heard that Mrs. Ashenden had a hard time coming up with the taxes on the property she had remaining, but had made an agreement with a cousin, one of the Davises, to leave Clarendon to her in return for having her taxes paid. Rogers Wilcox, who worked at the courthouse, claimed to have seen the legal documents when they were filed.

It was hearing this that had determined Omar to run for office. Mrs. Ashenden couldn’t back her political favorites with money, only with words and sheer force of habit.

It was time, Omar thought, that the old habits died.

Omar put his cup into his saucer. “What I wanted to talk to you about, Miz LaGrande,” he said, “is the homeless people here in the parish, and the casualties.”

Concern entered Mrs. Ashenden’s voice. “Are there very many injured?”

“There are some who really need to go to a hospital,” Omar said, “but we don’t even have the clinic anymore. Dr. Patel’s offices collapsed last night. I know this is an imposition, but we need a place to put the injured, and this is the safest building in the parish.”

“Of course you may bring them here,” Mrs. Ashenden said. “We have always done our bit in an emergency. We sheltered a great many people during the Flood of 1927.” She gave a little smile. “It will be like the War Between the States, I fancy, when so many of our homes were turned into hospitals.” A troubled look crossed her face. “But I don’t have the staff here to care for people. Just Lorette, and Joseph, and the gardener.”

“Dr. Patel and his nurse will be here,” Omar said. “And we hope that the families will pitch in.”

“Ye-es,” Mrs. Ashenden said, a little vaguely, as if she were picturing to herself a horde of people swarming into her house to look after their relations.

“Besides the injured,” Omar continued, “the parish seems to have acquired a lot of, ah, misplaced people. Evacuees who were on the road last night when the quake hit. I don’t know how many, but there are hundreds. The Bayou Bridge is down, and the Parish Floodway’s broken, so right now there’s no way in or out.”

“Mercy.”

“We’ve got to put these people somewhere until we can get them shipped out, or until we can get the bridges rebuilt. Last time we used churches and the schools, but none of those buildings are safe anymore.”

“Yes?” There was calculation behind those ice-blue eyes.

“I thought your lawns and gardens,” Omar said, then added quickly. “You’ve got what— six-eight acres? Nice, flat, with grass. We can put people under tents or some other kind of shelter, and we can use your house as an infirmary and your kitchens as a cookhouse.”

“Gracious.” Mrs. Ashenden seemed surprised. “Don’t you have anyplace else?”

“I’ve got Dr. Morris to open up the A.M.E. campground, but that’s going to fill up pretty quick. And everyplace else in the parish is either wilderness, under water, or planted in cotton. You know what it’s like around here. I can’t put people in a cotton field, and I can’t scatter them around, because I need to bring food and other supplies to a central point.”

Mrs. Ashenden absorbed this. “But I don’t have the
staff.
Not any longer. I don’t have the means to take care of all these people.”

“Well, Miz LaGrande,” Omar said, “I suppose they didn’t have the staff in the War Between the States, either, but they managed somehow.”

He saw the glint of duty in her eyes, and knew he’d won. There was nothing more sacred to a Shelburne than the traditions of Southern Womanhood. In times of crisis, the lady of the manor opened her home to those in need, and that was that.

Omar helped himself to one of Mrs. Ashenden’s macaroons on the way out. When he got into his cruiser, he turned to look at the massive front portico, the four giant pillars—
distyle-in-antis
— and he thought of Clarendon surrounded by a shantytown, refugees living under tents or blankets, screaming children breaking down the neat hedges and rolling in the flowerbeds, the boiling laundry and slit-trench latrines contributing their odor to the flower-scented Clarendon air . . .
wonderful,
he thought.

Just like the War Between the States.

When Omar got back to his office, he dispatched two officers to Miz LaGrande’s to direct traffic, and another two to the A.M.E. campground. Then he got on the radio and told his officers to start moving the refugees to the camps.

“Sheriff?” came a reply, “how do we know which camp to send folks to?” Omar recognized Merle’s voice.

“Well,” Omar said, “if they look like an African Methodist Episcopal to you, send them there. And if they don’t, send them to Clarendon.”

There was a pause. “Ten-four, chief,” came the answer. Omar could just picture Merle’s grin.

Omar had actually considered sending all the blacks to Clarendon, just burying Mrs. Ashenden in niggers. But Clarendon was only half a mile from Shelburne City’s town square, and he knew the merchants and landowners would complain if he packed the town with refugee blacks from the inner city. Best to keep them well out of town, in their own place.

Wilona put her head into the office. She looked exhausted, deep circles under her eyes, lines of worry at the corners of her mouth. Omar signed off the radio, then went to Wilona and put his arms around her.

“You okay?”

“Just tired. I’m worried about our house, with all these strangers around.”

“The neighbors will keep a lookout.” He kissed her. “I’ve been to Miz LaGrande’s.”

She brightened immediately. “Yes?” she said. “Did you talk with her?”

“I had tea,” he said, “off the second-best china.”

“Well,” Wilona frowned, “the Wedgwood was probably in storage, to keep it safe.”

Omar grinned. “That’s what Miz LaGrande said.”

She brightened again. “So what did you talk about?”

“We’re going to set up a hospital at Clarendon, and put a refugee camp on the grounds.”

Wilona’s eyes widened. “It’ll be just like the War!” she said.

“I think the crisis has passed,” Omar said. “Why don’t you go down to the squad room, lie down, and get some rest?”

“I should go to Clarendon,” Wilona said. “I should offer to help Miz LaGrande with her work.”

Omar looked at her sourly. It was as if Wilona was planning on nursing the wounded of the Confederacy. “You’ve got plenty enough to do.” he said. “We’ve got a busted house, and if that isn’t enough there’s plenty to do here.”

“But I could help at
Clarendon
!”
Wilona said.

“It’s not going to be a tea party,” Omar said. “It’s going to be a refugee camp with screaming babies and sick people and bugs. Probably there will be a fair number of criminals, too. No place for white gloves and pearls.”

Wilona seemed unconvinced. “I think it could be lovely.”

“Wilona,” Omar said. “What is it you came in here to tell me?”

“Oh. Sorry. Tree Simpson needs you in the council chamber.”

The room where the parish council met was a court room when the council wasn’t meeting there. Tree— short for Trelawny— sat on the council. He ran one of the parish’s two pharmacies, was a middle-sized man with a little grizzled mustache, and looked as if he hadn’t slept in a week.

“We’re not getting the Bayou Bridge replaced anytime soon,” he said. “Every portable or collapsible bridge in the U.S. of A. has already been deployed into the disaster area.”

“How about an evacuation?” Omar said.

Tree only shrugged. “I couldn’t get ahold of anybody who had the authority to do anything. I got someone who said he’d put me on a list for someone in logistics, so that at least we could get sent some food.”

“Joy in the mornin’,” said Omar.

“The rest of the council are getting food supplies together. Paying with personal checks. At least we’ll be able to feed our guests later today. Oh.” He looked up as he remembered something. “The governor’s declared martial law in several parishes, including ours. If that makes your job any easier.”

“Could be,” Omar said.

There was a tap on the door, and one of Omar’s special deputies stuck his head in the door. “Sorry, Sheriff,” he said. “But I thought I’d better tell you there’s been a shooting.”

*

It was clear enough what happened. The drifter had been digging through the fallen remains of Ozie Welks’ storeroom. He’d run when Ozie had challenged him, trailed bottles of Miller Genuine Draft behind him as he fled, and then as he paused to hop over Ozie’s straggling barbed-wire fence, Ozie blew the back of his head off with the shotgun he kept on the rack in his pickup truck.

The most natural thing in the world, shoot a stranger who was trying to steal your stuff. That’s what you carried shotguns
for
.

The stranger was a little man, white, with a wrinkled cotton shirt and a porkpie hat. He was maybe fifty, with a homemade tattoo on the back of one hand. Even in death, he still clutched a bottle of Jim Beam to his breast.

“That’s a looter, all right,” said David, one of the first on the scene. Wearing one of his father’s spare uniforms, he looked more official than most of the special deputies, whose uniform consisted of a star and a gun worn over civilian clothes. David poked at the bottle of Beam with the toe of his boot. “Got the evidence right in his hand.” David looked at Ozie with an admiring grin. “That’s a good shot, Ozie.”

“Some ol’ drunk,” said Ozie. “Couldn’t live without the hooch for another minute.” He had come back from helping a friend rescue some furniture from his collapsed mobile home, and he’d found the drifter looting his bar in broad daylight.

“Any ID on the body?” Omar said.

David shook his head. “We checked.”

Omar looked at the looter. Sweat trickled down the sides of his nose. He let his gaze travel over the road, the cars pulled off the highway during the quake and then abandoned by people heading into town. “One of those cars is probably his,” he said, “but there’s no way to know which one.”

“Shall we take the body to the coroner?” asked one of the deputies. Who, come to think of it, was Tree Simpson. Tree had been appointed when the last coroner, a tire salesman, had been electrocuted in his bathtub.

“Bag it up,” Omar said. “Show it to Tree. Then we’ll shove it in the potter’s field.”

“Dang,” David said. “That was a great shot.”

Ozie looked grim. “I’m going to have to put up with a lot of shit on account of this, ain’t I?”

Omar shook his head. “Not with a looter. Not at a time like this. It’s martial law now.”

“Good.” Ozie wiped sweat off his stubbly chin with the back of one arm. “Maybe nobody’ll miss this boy at all.”

Omar glanced up as a pair of cars drove by, each packed with families heading for Clarendon. The cars slowed, and Omar felt himself being scanned by the eyes of strangers. The Klan Kop, Komplete with Korpse.

He could feel their little tiny refugee brains drawing conclusions.

Strangers, Omar thought, refugees. Wandering around without supervision. Bound to get into trouble, and one of them had just got shot by a local. And unless Omar got things under better control, this body wouldn’t be the last.

He walked to the car, unhooked the mike from the radio, and spoke to the guards he’d sent to his two refugee camps.

“Once people get into the camps,” he said, “I don’t want anyone to leave unless they can tell you the name of the local resident they’ll be visiting. Unless they know somebody here, there’s no place for them to go.”

He held the microphone to his lips for a moment, saw the corpse lying by the vine-covered barbed wire. The Louisiana heat beat on his head.

“Tell them it’s for their own protection,” he added.

*

Bill Clemmons knew it was going to be bad when he saw the flies. He was carrying government food home from Cameron Brown Park in a wheelbarrow, and when he passed the BMW that his neighbor Charlie Johns had been living in, he saw clouds of black flies floating in and out of the open door. Thousands of them.

Bill hesitated while sweat tracked down his nose. He knew well enough what the clouds of flies meant. He was tempted to let it be someone else’s problem.

But it
was
his problem. He couldn’t have that next to his own house, his own family.