That Old Black Magic Page 18

  “Well, change it back, Aunt Ellinore. What you’re doing isn’t fair. The Duchamps money should stay in the family.”

  Feeling embarrassed to be eavesdropping on a very personal conversation, Piper turned and left the shop. She could come back later.

  Chapter 80

  The first order of business was to unobtrusively lock the front door. That way they would not be interrupted.

  Ellinore was busying herself with straightening the beautiful objects on an old hutch near the rear of the shop. Her body was turned away. Now was the time. Now!

  Quickly, silently, sneaking closer, carrying the bag full of living, breathing hoodoo clues.

  A heavy candlestick was grabbed along the way. The elegant weapon came down hard against the back of Ellinore’s skull with a sickening thud.

  The woman gasped with surprise and pain as she collapsed, reaching out while falling forward and pulling over a carved mahogany side table with her. The crystal bowls and pitchers that had been displayed on top slid and crashed to the floor, splintering into countless glittering fragments.

  As she lay amid the broken glass, Ellinore’s eyes were closed, but a low, hoarse groan issued from deep in her throat. She wasn’t dead yet.

  It was dangerous to leave her on the shop floor. Though the door was locked and they were in the back, somebody just might be able to catch a glimpse of something from the front window. Better to finish the job where nobody could see.

  Dragging Ellinore’s limp figure through the crystal shards was no easy task. Her body was thick and heavy. Blood oozed from her head, and the bits of broken crystal pierced her skin in places, causing a red, sticky mess.

  The door to the cellar was reached, and with one long, forceful heave, Ellinore was propelled down the hard, steep stairs. Her head smashed against the steps again and again as her body flipped over and over. Finally she lay motionless on the cold cement floor.

  A quick check confirmed that she wasn’t breathing. It was done now.

  All that was left was to release the butterflies.

  Chapter 81

  Piper played with the arrangement for the cake topper. She wasn’t satisfied as she looked at the miniature paddleboat she’d purchased at the gift shop. The painted metal of the little vessel was cheerful and colorful, but it didn’t look right sitting in between the fondant bride and groom. She decided to dip the paddleboat in chocolate.

  As she melted the white pellets in a gleaming copper pot, Piper reminded herself to be sure to let Sabrina and Leo know that the steamboat was not to be eaten. It wouldn’t be good to start out married life with a cracked tooth.

  While she stirred the molten white chocolate, Piper glanced at her watch. It was a quarter to five. She wanted to get back over to the antique shop before it closed.

  The paddleboat could wait. She turned off the stove and hurried out of the bakery.

  A small crowd gathered in front of Duchamps Antiques and Illuminations. They were staring through the front window, seemingly mesmerized by what they were watching inside. As Piper got closer, she could see why.

  Dozens of sparkling chandeliers, all fully lit, hung from the showroom ceiling. Among them flitted scores of butterflies, their colorful wings flapping gracefully. The overall effect was breathtaking.

  Was it some sort of marketing ploy, designed to lure people into the shop? If so, it didn’t seem to be working. The onlookers seemed content just to stand on the sidewalk out front and watch the magical display inside.

  Taking a deep breath, Piper decided to venture in. She excused herself as she made her way through the group. Opening the front door, she entered quickly, trying hard not to let any of the butterflies escape.

  “Hello?” she called. She batted the swarm of butterflies that enveloped her as she walked into the shop.

  No one responded to her call.

  A butterfly alighted on her sleeve as Piper went deeper into the shop.

  She called out again. “Hello? Anybody here?”

  Piper winced as the flying insects tangled themselves in her hair. Butterflies flapped, around and around. But she could detect no other movement. Her pulse began to race.

  She remembered what she had heard Cecil, the musician, say on Aaron Kane’s radio show. The butterfly was the symbol of the voodoo loa associated with St. Joseph. Oh, no! Had she gotten here too late?

  Her instinct was to turn, run, and get help. But still Piper kept on going. Maybe she was wrong and alerting the police would just be foolish. Or maybe Ellinore Duchamps was still alive and needed help. Either way Piper had to see what the situation was before doing anything else.

  The overturned table and shards of sparkling crystal confirmed some sort of accident. The smeared dark trail of blood confirmed something much worse. Piper followed the path that led to the closed cellar door.

  She hesitated before opening it. Now she knew she should get the police. But what if Ellinore was down there, alive and needing help? What if Piper’s immediate attention could save a life?

  Yet what if a killer was also down there . . . waiting?

  She called 911, quickly giving her name, where she was, and a brief summary of the situation. The dispatcher instructed her to leave the antique shop immediately and wait outside for the police to arrive. Reluctantly, Piper complied.

  As she waited on the sidewalk, she thought of Falkner and the snatch of angry conversation she’d overheard in the shop earlier that afternoon. Had the verbal fight turned into a physical confrontation?

  A patrolman arrived on foot. Piper saw him rest his hand on his holstered gun as he entered the shop. Immediately after, a squad car pulled to the curb. Two more officers got out, one going inside, the other instructing the burgeoning crowd out front to move back.

  The minutes ticked by. More cars arrived, followed by an ambulance. The crowd was at its largest and a TV news crew appeared when the stretcher bearing the body bag filled with Ellinore’s remains was wheeled out of the building.

  The police were canvassing the crowd, looking for witnesses who might have seen anything that could help with the investigation of the third murder on Royal Street in less than a week. Piper approached a familiar detective, the one she’d spoken with at the police station just that morning.

  “Ah, Miss Donovan,” he said when he saw her. “I hear you’re the one that called this in. You sure do get around, don’t you?”

  Piper squirmed uncomfortably.

  “What were you doing here?” asked the detective. “You don’t look to me like the type who goes in for antiques.”

  “I came over to warn the owner,” said Piper.

  “Warn her about what?” asked the detective suspiciously.

  “That she could be in danger.”

  “How’s that?”

  Piper explained that she’d been working in the bakery, looking at some designs of nursery-rhyme cookies, when she came upon the three-men-in-a-tub cookie and realized that the first murders on Royal Street had been those of a butcher and a baker.

  “So I thought that the next murder victim could be a candlestick maker. I thought I should warn the owner.”

  Even as she said it, Piper knew how outlandish it sounded.

  She caught the detective rolling his eyes slightly. “All right,” he said. “Let’s continue. Did you see anyone when you arrived inside the shop?”

  “No,” said Piper uncertainly. “Not really.”

  “What does that mean? Did you or didn’t you?”

  Piper hesitated. Falkner had been kind to her the night Bertrand was killed. She didn’t want to implicate him in a murder. Yet he had been in the shop, arguing with Ellinore Duchamps just a few hours ago. Piper had to tell the police. To withhold the information would be unconscionable.

  She described what she’d overheard. The detective scribbled some notes, shaking his head
while he did so.

  “I forgot to ask you this morning, Miss Donovan. When did you get to town?”

  “Last Thursday.”

  The detective nodded. “So you’ve been here for all three of the Royal Street murders.”

  Piper’s eyes widened. Had he thought she was casting suspicion on Falkner as a way to cover her own guilt?

  “Are you looking at me as a suspect?” she asked incredulously.

  “We’re looking at everybody,” said the detective. He closed his notebook. “All right, you can go for now. But I have to ask you not to leave New Orleans.”

  Piper was stunned as she turned to cross the street. She’d been on the scene of two murders in the last two days. The cops could easily consider the possibility that she was reporting the crimes as a way to shift suspicion away from herself. But then it occurred to her that she had her own question to ask. She had to know the answer. She went back and found the detective.

  “Would it have made any difference,” she asked earnestly, “if I went right downstairs without calling the police? Could I have helped her?”

  The detective frowned. “I’m afraid not, Miss Donovan. The body was already cold. It looks like she’d been dead for a while.”

  Chapter 82

  Good news traveled fast.

  Jack listened, brow furrowed, as his FBI colleague in New Orleans described the latest murder in the French Quarter. Jack slammed his fist on the desk when he heard that Piper was the one who had made the 911 call to the police.

  Barely anyone looked up from the other desks in the New York squad room. They were used to Jack’s temper. Though he preferred to call it passion.

  At first Jack was furious at the thought of the NOPD putting a tail on Piper. She was no more a murderer than the man in the moon. But the more he thought about it, Jack decided against calling and putting in a good word for her with the cops down there.

  Let them keep her under police surveillance. At least she’d be safe.

  “All right, thanks, Louie,” said Jack resignedly. “Keep me posted, willya, buddy?”

  When he hung up the phone, Jack wanted to call Piper and make sure she was all right. Yet he didn’t. Maybe she had to really be left on her own for now. Maybe then she would finally learn her lesson. She was an actress and a cake designer, not a law-enforcement officer.

  He thought, Sometimes the best love is tough love.

  Chapter 83

  In spite of the latest murder, or maybe because of it, business was brisk that night at the Gris-Gris Bar. The customers were buzzing with conversations about the murder next door and the butterflies let loose in the antique shop. Even those who’d been skeptical about the Hoodoo Killer before were now convinced.

  Falkner’s face was ashen as he entered the bar. He slowly climbed up onto a stool at the counter and ordered a stiff drink.

  “I’m sorry about your aunt, Falkner,” said the bartender. “You look like you’ve lost your best friend.”

  “Hardly,” said Falkner, sighing deeply. “She totally screwed me, Wuzzy. She changed her will before she died. I’m out.”

  “Ouch! That hurts, bro.”

  “And you want to know the best part?” asked Falkner. He took a long swallow of bourbon before answering his own question. “The cops knocked on my door to question me. Seems somebody came into the antique shop this afternoon and heard me and Ellinore arguing.”

  Wuzzy waited for more.

  “I asked them to think about it, Wuz. Why would I want to kill Ellinore? I had nothing to gain. I was already written out of her will.”

  “What did they say to that?” asked Wuzzy.

  “The detective said I could have killed her in a fit of rage. Then he started asking me questions about my connections to Muffuletta Mike and Bertrand Olivier.”

  Wuzzy’s jaw dropped. “Falkner, I think you better get a lawyer, bro.”

  Falkner laid his head down on the bar and closed his eyes. A minute later he raised it again and looked at the bartender.

  “It’s ghoulish, Wuzzy. But at least something good will come from my aunt’s death. Now you can get her shop and expand the bar.”

  Chapter 84

  Piper braced herself for the call to her parents. She didn’t want them to hear the news on television. She hoped to reassure them that although she was shaken, she was all right. Both her mother and father got on the extensions to listen to her story.

  “Enough is enough, Piper,” said Vin when she finished. “You’ve got to come home. Now.”

  “I can’t, Dad. Even if I wanted to, I can’t leave now.”

  “That’s nonsense,” said her mother. “Why not?”

  Piper hesitated.

  “Why not?” Vin pressed.

  “Because the police told me I shouldn’t leave New Orleans.”

  “Dear God, Piper!” cried Terri. “They don’t think you’re a suspect, do they?”

  “I don’t know what they think,” said Piper. “But I don’t think it would be a smart move to take off now. It would make me look guilty, like I have something to hide.”

  “Piper’s right, Terri,” said Vin. “She’s got to stick around down there for now. But damn it, Piper, you’ve got to promise me to just do what you went down there to do. Stay at the bakery, make your cakes, and don’t get into any more trouble.”

  “I promise, Dad,” said Piper. “Believe me, I totally promise.”

  Determined to keep her vow, Piper washed up, took a Tylenol PM, and got into bed. But she couldn’t keep herself from tuning in to The Aaron Kane Show. She turned on the radio and listened in the dark.

  Caller after caller chimed in with observations about the latest murder on Royal Street. The butterflies flitting around the crime scene had captured everyone’s attention. Some of the regular listeners applauded the host for calling it from the first.

  “Your guest on last night’s show nailed it, Aaron. It was as if that street musician could see the future when he talked about Loko, the voodoo loa, being associated with St. Joseph’s Day and telling us that Loko shows himself as a butterfly.”

  “Keep up the good work, Aaron. You were way ahead of the curve. You got onto this hoodoo thing last week when it was only Muffuletta Mike who’d been killed. Now there are two more victims. Kudos to you, sir.”

  “I agree with the previous caller, Aaron. You are either clairvoyant or the luckiest man alive to have declared a hoodoo murderer so soon. But it looks like you sure were right. It makes my skin crawl just thinking about it.”

  Aaron chuckled. “Well, I know I’m not clairvoyant—although I may just be the luckiest man alive. But I think the questions we have to ask ourselves tonight are these: What are the New Orleans police doing to protect us? Are they just waiting around for a fourth victim? What’s being done to make sure the Hoodoo Killer doesn’t strike again?”

  Thursday

  March 20

  Chapter 85

  It was Sabrina’s fourth trip in twenty-four hours to Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport, greeting and shuttling newly arrived wedding guests to the Windsor Court Hotel just outside the French Quarter.

  The baggage claim area was already busy as the bride waited anxiously for her mother to arrive. The early-morning flight from Washington, D.C., had landed on time. Sabrina craned her neck to catch a glimpse of her mother coming into view.

  Mother and daughter embraced in a long, firm hug. When they pulled back from each other, Sabrina’s mother immediately noticed her daughter’s red-rimmed eyes.

  “What’s wrong, sweetheart?” she asked. “You’ve been crying.”

  “Oh, Mama, I’m so glad you’re here. But let’s not go into it all now. We’ll get your bag, and we can talk later. I thought we could go to Court of Two Sisters for the Jazz Brunch Buffet.”

  “Sounds perfect.” />
  Forty-five minutes later, mother and daughter sat in the wisteria-covered brick courtyard of the historic French Quarter restaurant as a jazz trio serenaded them and the other customers. After ordering mimosas they went to the extensive buffet, where they helped themselves to made-to-order seafood omelets, sausage, grits, and grillades.

  As errant wisteria petals floated gracefully down onto their table, Sabrina barely touched her food, but she quickly ordered another mimosa.

  “Okay, Sabrina. Now. Tell me what’s wrong.”

  “Well,” Sabrina began. “I guess you’ve seen the stories on the news about the recent murders here, right?”

  “As a matter of fact, I haven’t, honey. Taking care of Grandma is a full-time job. I hardly know what’s going on in the world anymore.”

  Sabrina reached over and patted her mother’s hand. “I’m sorry, Mama. I know you have your hands full up there. I wish I lived closer and could help you.”

  “Don’t worry about that now, Sabrina. Your life is here with Leo, and that’s the way it should be. I should have been down here helping you with everything, but I just couldn’t leave Grandma alone. As it was, I don’t feel all that comfortable with the caretaker I found to look after her for these next few days.”

  “That’s all right, Mama. Leo and I have had fun planning it ourselves. Until this last week, and then all sorts of horrible things began to happen. Now I wonder if we should have postponed the whole thing.”

  Sabrina described the gruesome events of the past week.

  Her mother’s eyes widened. “The murders were all right here on Royal Street?” she asked. “And they are all tied to voodoo? Dear Lord!”

  After taking another sip of her mimosa, Sabrina continued. “The worst part, for me at least, Mama, is that the third victim was my boss. She was killed yesterday.”

  “Ellinore? The woman who’s been so nice to you? The one who gave you that chandelier you love as a wedding gift?”