The Saint Louisans (37 page)

Pierce nodded. “It sucks. Don't blame yourself.”

But I did. A part of me always will, the angel that let one fall. In the drawing room, the clock chimed midnight. I drained my glass and rose.

“Let's go rob a grave.”

The major lesson of Watergate: don't rely on cheap help.

I pondered this maxim as shovels dug under a moonless and chilly night, bringing up rump roast-sized chunks of earth. The men's heavy breaths made small puffs; not a freezing night, else they'd have steamed out. We were thankful for a mild winter and damp soil. Antje, spade in hand, watched where she'd earlier traced a square where Sonia's machine located a body.

“Go faster,” she urged, “we shouldn't reach the skeleton until a few more meters.”

“Feet,” grunted Sky.

She shrugged. My foot tapped the plastic body bag we'd use for the bones. After thirty-odd years, no one was expecting a cadaver. One foot deep, and going on two.

Antje stared at the upturned soil like an early bird waiting for worm carryout.

“The body,” she said, “will shift in the years. But not that deep. If Lucas was frightened, he probably dug a shallow grave.”

Pierce forced a smile between digs. “She can go on all night about this.”

“Yeah,” grunted Sky as he shoveled. “Digging up a stiff. Where's Vincent Price when we need him?”

The men were three feet down, and there was no need to crouch. We
were far enough from Grand Boulevard. The security guard was bribed. He liked Margot, was paid peanuts, and settled for two thou to look the other way. Antje threw off her coat to reveal a black T-shirt with a green-glowing outline of a man with a hat, proudly marching. This was
Ampelmannchen
, the Little Traffic Light Man. He was used at traffic lights in East Germany, and had become a cult after the wall came down. East Berliners treasured him, one of the few things they liked about the old system. When traffic lights were being westernized, there were riots.
Ampelmannchen
stays!

He didn't, but the cult is strong. You see another wear the T-shirt, and a nod is given. Antje adores him. He's her Veiled Prophet. His glowing some sort of weird postmodern green light to our enterprise.

She tapped the earth with the flat of her spade, then stepped into the deepening trench. Pierce grabbed her arm.

“Hey,” he said, “take it easy.”

“I must check the dirt.”

“Let me. You're carrying our baby.”

Antje glared. “You're being patriarchal.”

Sky leaned on his shovel. “What's ‘patriarchal'?”

Pierce sighed. “It's the new
ism
over there. Greenhouse effect's out of fashion.”

“Right,” croaked Sky. “Male chauvinist pig. Been there, done that.”

“Antje,” Pierce impatiently whispered.

“Mutti Bridger,” she said to me, “stop him.”

“Pierce, stop being patriarchal. We've got a stiff to dig up.”

Pierce sighed and stepped back. Antje bent down, positioned herself, and probed with a trowel, carefully, like a surgeon searching for a bullet.

Antje kept probing. I looked at the men. Sky wiped his brow. He looked down at Antje. “You can see that T-shirt from ten feet away.”

“He's
Ampelmannchen
,” thumbed Pierce, “and he stays.”

“
Ja
,” Antje said as she probed. Her trowel tapped something.

Pierce took out a mini-mag flashlight. Before I looked into its shaft of light, a dull white shape emerged from Antje's hands after she scraped away dirt. Her blue latex gloved hands held a skull.

“Alas, poor Yorick,” whispered Pierce. He looked at me. “Well, someone had to say it.”

He and Sky carefully shoveled around the skeleton's ribs. I went to check on Margot.

Margot breathed heavily from the sedation. I smelled her, that jaundiced odor of the body beginning to break down. Soon, she would lose control of her functions. Rainer stood by her bedside, watching me take her vitals and check the dosage.

“Has she said anything?”

Rainer sighed but remained stiff and straight, like a nun's ruler. “Mutterings here and there. Asking for you. I told her you would be up soon. She rested then.”

I stared at him and didn't look away. He reached down to smooth Margot's bed covers. “It is rude to stare, Mrs. Bridger. Is this the way of nurses?”

“You know what happened. Who's buried there. You probably saw it and said nothing. Why?”

Rainer's hand made a soft crease of the blanket, eliminating a last wrinkle. “Would it make any difference? Lucas destroyed everyone around him, and yes, I know about the body. I heard Lucas's cries and his frantic attempts to bury … it.”

“It? Not ‘him?'”

“The Desouches, Mrs. Bridger, tried to pass their morality onto their children … their overindulged, egotistical children.” He shrugged like a postscript. “I am no moralist, just the butler. I see things and say nothing.”

I thought over Rainer's part confession, part defense as I stroked Margot's head. She cozied deeper into her pillow. Even in her drug induced sleep, she responded kindly to my touch.

“What do I need to know about that skeleton that I don't already know?”

Rainer absently rearranged things in the room that were already perfectly arranged. “Antje is the better detective. She will give you answers.”

He brushed past me with a tray of dirty cups and saucers. I followed him, ready to do battle when my cell phone purred. I stopped my advance. Pierce was at the door.

“Mom, come down to the basement. We assembled it there.”

“God, it's like
Arsenic and Old Lace
. What did we find?”

“The plot thickens.”

I followed him downstairs.

The skeleton was laid out on an old wooden table, clumps of wet dirt still clinging to the rib cage and femurs. The light bulb dangled above from a thick brown thread. Sky raised his eyes to me.

Antje peered at the skull.
Ampelmannchen
still glowed and marched. She wasted no time and positioned herself on a stool. Her still latexed fingers traced above the skeleton's heart-shaped pelvis. “This is a woman's pelvis. As is the skull.”

My mouth was dry.

“Antje?”

She did another Yorick and picked up the skull. “I noticed the inchal ridge. Its profile is round.” She took calipers from her coat, carrying them around like a nerd would a slide rule. “I measured the cranial …” she looked to Pierce.

“Index,” said Pierce. Antje nodded and continued, her finger on the skull. “See the shape of the eye. It is round. It slopes.”

I dumbly nodded, my old anatomy class coming back. Antje continued. “Did you suspect the subject was a Negro?”

“We were shooting in that direction.”

Antje frowned. “The Negroid inchal ridge is pinched. Little. A Negroid eye …” She looked to Pierce.

“Socket.”

“Thank you. Is a square rectangle. These skull measurements fit those of a mongoloid.”

Sky wiped his forehead. “Whoa.”

Antje's withering stare made him step back. “Also, it is the racial measurements of Native Indians. They and mongoloids match.” She set down the skull. “This could be a Native American woman.”

I sank back against the door. “We just dug up Corn Mother?”

Sky whistled. “Shit. Can I get a drink?”

Even
Ampelmannchen
seemed to march faster.

Antje took a deep breath and stepped forward. “It cannot be this Corn Mother. The skeleton is … I don't believe it is that old.”

I shrugged. “That's what I think, but we can hardly pop in to the coroner's for a friendly checkup on carbon dating. Which leaves the butler.”

“I talked to him,” Antje said. “He keeps secrets. Like in Germany.” She frowned. “Older people always have the secrets.”

The stairs creaked. Our heads quickly turned as Rainer descended. He looked around. “She is not an Indian goddess.” He was sour. “Lucas brought her here.”

I glared at Rainer. “No more secrets. Come on.”

Rainer stared back. “I don't know who she was. A Chinese woman, I think.”

“Bullshit.”

Rainer glared and seemed to grow an inch as he stiffened. “You are right. Lucas brought her in. A man was with him. Black. A Mark Anthony Hollis. Yes, Mrs. Bridger, it was a drug deal that went bad. Lucas confessed to me after the woman was buried.”

Pierce spoke. “You decided to keep her buried?”

“I would hardly do this without consulting Madame and Mr. Desouche.” He turned to me. “Your patient needs you.”

Sky stretched his arms. “I got a boat to take south tomorrow. Let's all
get some sleep, and play detective in the morning.” He turned to me. “I'm crashing on the sofa. I'm used to sofas.” He grinned at me. “Right, Dear?”

In the morning, I drove Sky to the riverfront, Pierce and Antje in the car with us. We'd had a quiet, moody breakfast as Sky and I exchanged glances, as well as that wink I'd gotten to hate, but I had to admit Sky had been a big help. As a grave robber, he was top drawer.

We parked at the riverfront, the Mississippi speeding by on cruise control as usual. Sky grabbed his bag.

“It'll be good to hit the river again. I was getting tired of being a boy scout, but we had some laughs.”

We parked, then walked to the levee under the arm of the Eads Bridge, one of America's first engineering marvels. Circus elephants were sent over the bridge to test its strength. The overarching girders and vaults are like the ribs of Moby Dick.

It was time to get things rolling, and I nodded to Sky. He tweaked a smile. “So, Antje, what do you think of our river?”

For being up all night and making an earth shattering discovery, my daughter-in-law was remarkably chipper. “It's majestic. I understand, as a captain, you know it well.”

“That I do,” Sky said with no small amount of pride. “I start the second leg of the trip. Goes from here to Cairo.” Kay-ro. “Then from Cairo to New Orleans. We'll manage about twelve miles an hour.”

We stood where Lewis and Clark had docked from the West in 1806. Back then, St. Louisans were more shocked than joyful seeing the expedition's boats return upriver from the Missouri. They'd long been given up for dead. Once they realized the explorers were very much alive, the city exploded in celebration. St. Louisans even then were known for hedging their bets.

Sky pointed across the river. “There's my boat.” He read the letters on its bow. “
The Cahokia
. Usually name them for some fat cat or dead moneybags, but not this time.” Sky's boat was the usual barge tender, a three-storied craft looking like a floating pyramid, the wheel house its temple. Crewmen paced back and forth along the barges, checking for leaks. Bright orange vests were
strapped on their torsos, with flashlights attached. The crew always looks raffish, but as Sky told me, a felony conviction is almost a prerequisite for getting hired. Since no booze or drugs are allowed, it's a paid rehab.

“It's beautiful,” murmured Antje.

Sky laughed. “It's ugly as a ten dollar lay, but it moves cargo. No romance there, just freight. Like the Indians and Cahokia. They piled into canoes going up and down the river with trade goods from the big mound, then one day, just said the hell with it. Walked away from their city. Like everyone walks away from St. Louis.”

Pierce yawned and put his arm around Antje. “The riverfront here wasn't so empty. Used to have lots of boats here.”

“When Sky and I were married,” I said, “there was a floating restaurant. A big excursion boat called
The Admiral
. And a replica of the
Santa Maria
. Brought here by Mayor Cervantes. He was on a Spanish heritage kick.”

Sky nodded. “It sank. Then there was the
Inaugural
. An old minesweeper. Filled the riverfront with all kinds of floating crap. Boats going nowhere. Like a lot of marriages.” He shot me a cold glance, then continued. “Then came the flood of '93.” Sky pointed. “The river rose to the steps of the Arch. Remember that?”

I nodded. Bridges were flooded over. Roads cut off. The confluence of the Missouri and Mississippi became an inland sea. We really were a city under siege. “The river broke all those boats loose. They floated away. Hit the bridges. Sank.”

“Yeah,” Sky's tone darkened. “Especially that fucking minesweeper. If it had crashed into those fuel tanks downriver, that would have been something. They just let it sink by the shore. When my boat goes south, I always see what's left of it rusting by the side. Piece of shit. That's how it is with St. Louis, Antje. Pearl Harbor has the Arizona. St. Louis has the piece of shit.”

Antje had listened to all this, her eyes studying the barge as if she was ready to hop on board. “Tell me, Sky, do you agree with Mutti Bridger? That this river is a goddess, or do you think it is a brown god?”

“Hate to admit it” Sky said, “but Lee's right. This river is a goddess, and she's high maintenance. I just think she had enough of that shit on the shore and did her own celestial housekeeping.” He looked at the river as I remembered him look at the cityscape outside the hospital when, years
ago, we thought we'd connected. When the night and city was a parable we thought joined our lives. But our life together was abandoned, much like the Cahokians abandoned their city and made North America's first cosmic divorce.

“Yeah,” he said, “the Corps of Engineers is always shaping, molding trying to straighten out her curves, but the Mississippi goes right back to being her old cantankerous self.”

A motorized raft zoomed up the river, its top raised like a snout. It came to us, the crewman's wild curls sticking out from a beaten-up baseball cap, his hog-like jowls sprouting a new beard. He nodded to Sky.