This is the very first John LeGrand, Cajun PI, story, and if you don't
know what Sauce Piquante is, check out the previous blog. A word of warning:
some of the language in here might offend some people. It's not graphic by any
means, but…
I woke up, clutching the telephone
against my chest like a teddy bear.
"Hello? Mr. LeGrand?
Hello?"
I gaped at it. I didn't remember
picking it up, and I was surprised to find it in my hand. I placed it against
my ear.
"Hello? Mr. LeGrand?"
I mumbled something. My head was
still in the dream of my ex-wife—a nightmare really.
"Are you Mr. LeGrand, the
detective?"
I'm a small town detective. Mostly,
I track down animals for local farmers, or I'll do stints in department stores
with shoplifting problems. Occasionally, I will spy on a wife or a husband for
divorce reasons. I also teach a law enforcement class part time at Ellisonville
Junior College, the local college. I was broke. I hadn't had a case in weeks,
and part time teaching salary barely paid the groceries.
I glanced at the digital clock on
my nightstand: 6:15. I thought, six
fifteen in the morning?
"Uh, yes ma'am, I am." I
paused. I wanted to tell her that calling someone at six fifteen in the morning
was outrageous, as well as discourteous and just wrong, but I didn't want to
lose a potential money-making case.
"My name is Aline Fontenot.
Would it be possible to have a word with you?"
"Right now? It is a bit early,
Ms. Fontenot."
"I have plans for the rest of
the day, Mr. LeGrand. I have about an hour to spare."
I cursed my luck.
"Can you give me at least
fifteen minutes to dress and brush my teeth?"
"Yes, but I must warn you, I
will have only forty-five minutes to spare."
Who
is this woman?
"I'll make it fast."
I hung up, slipped out of bed, and
took care of my morning routine: I urinated, brushed my teeth, showered, and
dressed. Then I padded to the kitchen and started the coffee pot.
***
I operated out of my house on
Chinaberry Street, which was on the wrong side of the tracks in Ellisonville,
but close enough to make it semi-respectable. In fact, it was so close to the
tracks that everything shook whenever a train passed through at 6:00 a.m.,
11:47 a.m., 2:32 p.m., 7:11 p.m. and 12:01 a.m. My house is a small white
clapboard with a good size front porch. I moved in it ten years before with my
new bride. Five years later, my new bride moved out. She did leave a note
listing all the problems she had living with me. The trains were number one on
the list. I had been working for Sheriff Pat Broussard as a deputy for about
three years at that point, but I gave that career up for a bottle and some
self-pity time. When I had fallen far enough into the pit of despair, I still
had my house and enough common sense to know that I would die if I didn't climb
my way out. Pat, who had become a good friend, helped pull me out.
At exactly six thirty, Aline
Fontenot rang my doorbell. I slipped on some slippers and answered it. She
wasn't what I would call a beautiful woman. She had, what my mother would call,
a good childbearing frame—not fat, but wide and strong looking. She was dressed
in black slacks, a white blouse with a thin tie, and a black jacket. She wore
no make-up, but her face was pleasant enough that she didn't need it. She had
rich eyes, deep green with specks of gold in them. Sometimes I can read a
customer through her eyes—nervousness, guilt, cowardice, modesty, all sorts of
revelations. I searched her green eyes, but she held my gaze and let nothing
through.
"What can I do for you?"
I asked after I had seated her in the rickety wooden chair across from my desk.
I had found the chair and the desk at a yard sale.
She didn't waste time getting to
the point.
"I think my husband is
cheating on me. I want to know for sure."
"What makes you think he's
cheating on you?"
She pulled out a pack of menthol
cigarettes from a small leather pocketbook.
"Mind if I smoke?"
I minded, but I needed the business
more. I found the old tuna fish can that I had cleaned out and used as an
ashtray for the occasional celebratory cigar or the occasional smoker who
visited. She shook out a cigarette and lit it with a small gold lighter she
fished out of her pocketbook. She blew a cloud of smoke over my head.
"It's the little things he's
doing. He's coming in late at night."
"Could he be working late?
What does he do for a living?"
She looked at me as if I were
crazy.
"Oh, come on. Everybody knows
Emory Fontenot."
Up to that point, she had not
mentioned her husband's name, so I had to assume she meant that her name was
equally recognizable. I knew Emory Fontenot, the Sauce Piquante King, from his commercials on local television
and radio stations—an overweight Cajun with a crown on his head advertising the
"good Cajun food" at Ellisonville Courthouse Café. Emory was a cook
there, and then Sam Martin, the owner, discovered Emory's talent for acting.
After that, Emory's popularity shot up. He was now a local celebrity, well
known in Ellison Parish and the television coverage area.
"Maybe he's preoccupied with
making more commercials," I suggested.
If that's the case," she said
through cigarette smoke, "then you tell me, collect your money, and
everybody is happy." She tapped her cigarette into the tuna fish can and
held my gaze.
"It'll take me at least a
couple of days to verify his movements." She nodded. "I charge two
hundred dollars a day."
She reached into the pocket book
and pulled out two bills.
"Here's two hundred
dollars," she said, sliding the bills across the desk. I'll give you the
other two, once you're done.
"Plus fifty dollars up front
for expenses, Mrs. Fontenot."
She pulled out another bill.
"Two hundred and fifty
dollars," she said. "That should buy you at least five sauce piquante meals at the Courthouse Café." She
smiled at her own sarcasm.
I took the money and slipped it in
the cigar box I kept on the desk for such occasions. It was never a good idea
to leave the money in front of the customers tempting them to change their
minds. I pulled out a standard contract that I kept in my desk drawer and had her
sign it. It said that she agreed to pay me two hundred a day and at least fifty
dollars for expenses—more if I had to go out of town. Any expense over fifty
dollars, I would run by her. She glanced at it, signed it, and slid it back to
me.
"Okay," I said.
"I'll take the job. What can you tell me about him? His habits?"
She studied me for a moment, leaned
forward, and snuffed out her cigarette.
"Emory goes to work at nine
every morning. He comes home at six, or he used to. Now, he comes home at
eleven, twelve, sometimes later smelling of whiskey and cigarette smoke."
"What are his excuses?"
She shrugged.
"The usual. Had to work late.
He went to dinner with the boss or some television employer that will land him
a statewide or national TV job. At first, I believed him. Emory is a very
convincing man, Mr. LeGrand. I have occasionally caught him in outright lies,
and he somehow convinced me of the truth of his words. Well, this time I
noticed little things that made me suspicious, and rather than allow him to
work his magic on me, I came to you."
"Little things? Like
what?"
"I don't know. The sound of
his voice. The way he refuses to look me in the eyes at certain times. This
kind of nervousness is not like him, and I suspect his discretions are serious
enough to unnerve even the Sauce Piquante King. "
I nodded and looked down at the pad
on which I'd been taking notes.
"Have you ever had problems
like this with your husband before, Mrs. Fontenot?"
"No, Mr. LeGrand. I met Emory
shortly after high school. He had been two classes ahead of me. I was taking a
course or two at EJC then and working part time as a clerk for Cajun Quick
Construction when he came in looking for a job. I knew immediately that I was
going to marry him." She paused and smiled at something she remembered.
"He didn't get the job, but he got me. I married him two years later. I
had gotten my degree from EJC and was working as a receptionist for the
college. Emory was still unemployed despite a few starts at jobs here and
there, mostly menial."
"When did he get the job as
The Sauce Piquante King?"
She fished out another cigarette
and lit it. She exhaled a steady stream of smoke in my direction. I coughed a
small protest.
"That didn't come until we'd
been married quite some time. After about a year and a half of my support, he
found a job as an assistant cook at the Courthouse Café. Emory was a good cook,
Mr. LeGrand. Still is. One day, Sam asked Emory if he would do a commercial,
and the rest is history. Emory is making a good deal of money now, but that is
of little consequence to me. I'm an independent woman. I have a good paying job
at EJC. I don't need his money. I devoted ten years of my life to this man and
despite the fact that I would rather not see all those years wasted, I will not
play a secondary role to anyone. Do you understand that, Mr. LeGrand?" She
stared me right in the eyes. Her cigarette smoke danced bluely between us.
I met her stare and nodded.
"Okay," I said.
"I'll get to work on this today, and I'll give you a report as soon as I
have something concrete.
She stood before I did, snuffed out
her cigarette, and found her way to the door. I followed her. She stopped with
the screen door open.
"Let me make it very clear to
you, Mr. LeGrand," she said. "If Emory is really working, or if he's
just going through some faze, I'll be very happy, but if he is cheating on me,
I'll destroy him. I won't play second fiddle to anyone." Her mouth twisted
hard for a second, and I thought I saw hurt and pain in her eyes. Then she
smiled, revealing smoke-stained teeth. "I just wanted you to know."
"Thanks," I said, but it
was lost in the slam of the screen door.
***
Pat was really the one who
convinced me to give up the booze. He came into my house one day, found me
passed out on my bed in the middle of the day and forced about a gallon of
black coffee into my gut. After I retched most of my insides out, he sat me
down in a chair and told me that if I didn't stop drinking, he was going to
expedite my demise—he can be overbearing sometimes. I would never admit this to
Pat, but having somebody care whether I lived or died made all the difference.
Vera had abandoned me. In a way, Pat took her place. As I said, I would never
reveal that to him. I gave up drinking heavily, cleaned myself up, and with his
help, obtained a PI license. At first, I spent most of my time outfitting part
of my living room into an office. Then a farmer came by, asking me to find out
who was stealing his cattle. I spent three weeks living in a mosquito-infested
pasture babysitting a herd of beef cows until one moonlit night, I caught a
teenage boy leading one of the cows out through a hole in the fence. He had
been slaughtering them and selling the meat in Baton Rouge. The farmer was very
pleased with my work and spread the word about me.
I didn't suddenly receive an influx
of customers, but now and then someone would wander in and after a few moments
of "I heard from my sister's husband's father's best friend that you do
detective work," we would settle down to establishing a case and a price.
A teacher at EJC contacted Pat Broussard asking for someone to teach an
Introduction to Criminal Justice class, and he gave him my name. In that way, I
slowly built up a reputation and earned enough to survive. I had been in
business for four years when Aline Fontenot woke me up out of a dream at six
fifteen in the morning.
***
The Courthouse Café was nothing but
a hole in the wall squeezed between the Ellisonville Feed & Seed Store and
the Main Street Drug Store. Up until Sam Martin saw the potential in
advertising, it had been the hangout for a few regulars, sheriff deputies and
office workers from the courthouse across the street, mostly. Now, the
Courthouse Café stayed packed with customers, and it was difficult to find a
free table or space at the counter during mealtimes, especially during lunch
and supper. Nothing had changed in the interior. It still contained the same
tacky diner décor, the same greasy food. The only difference was that Sam was
making money now. I had heard that he had just bought a new house on Chêne
Avenue where the wealthy lived—a good distance on the other side of the tracks
from mine.
I parked my "87 Dodge Ram
Van—payment for finding a lost pit bull—in the thirty-minute free parking zone
across the street. Although it was a good three hours to supper, a few people
lined the counter, drinking coffee, and several others occupied the tables
scattered around the dining area, as well. I asked the blond woman behind the
counter where Sam was. She looked at me as if I was crazy or stupid, or both
maybe.
"How the hell would I know? He
doesn't tell me anything." She paused a second, and when I didn't react,
she added, "Do you want something or you gonna just ask questions?"
It didn't look like the service had changed either.
"Uh, a cup of coffee will
do," I said vowing to leave her a big tip when I left. She had to be
overworked. When she returned, I asked her another stupid question, judging
from her expression.
"Any idea where Emory Fontenot
is?"
She glared at me.
"Man, do I look like his
keeper? I got no idea where the King is. He came by this morning, made his
fifteen or so gallons of sauce, and left just like he does every day of the
week."
"Where does he go?"
"How would I know?"
I pulled out my wallet and opened
it. I slipped a twenty out—a huge chunk out of my expense account—and placed it
on the counter. Her eyes widened when she saw the bill. She reached over and
pulled it to her.
"Try the Stagger Inn
Bar," she said. "He likes to go there in the afternoons. I hear tell
he has a honey there."
"Thanks," I said.
"Keep the change." But she had already gone to the cash register to
pocket the nineteen dollars left over from my dollar coffee.
***
The Stagger Inn Motel was across
town next to the Greyhound Bus station. The Stagger Inn Bar was located in
between the two. Actually, the bar had been a seldom-used storage shed for the
bus station, but when Sissy Ching bought the Stagger Inn Motel, she convinced
the depot to sell her the shed and the piece of property it stood on. She stuck
a jukebox, a bar, what passed for food service, and a few tables in it and
created an instant hit. Travelers liked to visit the Stagger Inn Bar while
waiting for buses. Sissy was smart enough to keep an updated bus schedule
hanging in plain view. Motel customers visited the establishment for nightcaps
before tackling the cheap motel beds for the evening. There was usually a
steady stream of customers in the place.
I walked into the dark building and
stood by the door for a moment while my eyes adjusted to the lack of light. The
jukebox cranked out an old Hank Williams tune, "I'm so Lonesome I could
Cry." Two men in suits sat at the bar and hunched over their beers, crying
for all I knew. A barmaid made as if she were listening to them. She glanced in
my direction, didn't like what she saw, apparently, and returned to her
crybabies. A red head and a man were having a tête à tête over a couple
of drinks, but the man was not the Sauce Piquante
King. I scanned the rest of the place, but there was no one else there. I
walked up to the bar.
"What'll you have," the
barmaid asked in a bored voice.
"A Dixie."
She leaned into the cooler in front
of her and pulled out a bottle. She popped off the top off and placed it in
front of me.
"How much?"
"One fifty."
I gave her a five, and held it a
second too long before releasing it, a signal that I wanted information. I
learned that from reading hard-boiled detective novels. It always worked.
"Seen Emory Fontenot
today?"
"Yeah," she said, still
bored. "Came in around noon. Had his usual two bourbons and left."
"Know where he went?"
"To the motel, I suppose. It's
what he does most every day, lately."
"He goes to the motel every
day?"
"Uh, huh. And if you got more
questions, you'll have to break out a few more bills."
I couldn't do that. My expense
account was disappearing fast, and it was nearly impossible to justify a beer
as an expense.
"One more," I said.
"What does he do there?"
She laughed exposing stained and
partially rotten teeth.
"How the hell do I know? Takes
a nap, maybe? Or catches a nooner with that whore of his?"
"Are you serious?"
"You said one more." She
took the five and rang up the beer on the ancient cash register sitting
opposite the bar. She dropped the change in a Mason jar in front of the two
men, glanced at me, and smiled an "I bested you smile." I finished my
beer and slipped out into the bright sunlight.
***
The Stagger Inn Motel office was a
ten-foot wide by fourteen-foot long room with a black and white television
sitting on a counter, a fish tank filled with three overweight gold fish near
the entrance, and a Naugahyde chair next to the fish tank. Sissy Ching sat on a
stool behind the counter. She reached over and turned down the sound on the
television when she saw me. Sissy was a good-looking oriental woman with a nice
smile and white teeth.
"Hello," she said,
flashing her white teeth at me. She looked about mid-forties, but I was sure
she was older. "You looking for room?"
"No," I said. "I
just wondered if Emory Fontenot was here. I need to talk to him."
"He left about twenty minutes
ago."
"Any idea where he went?"
She shrugged and turned up the
volume on the television. A soap opera came on.
"Thank you," I said and
thought of a question. "What kind of car does he drive?"
"Big black Cadillac," she
said, not looking at me.
***
When I returned to the Courthouse
Café, it was significantly more crowded. I muscled myself a spot at the counter
and asked the new blonde woman, if she knew where Sam Martin was. She nodded
her head toward an office door at the end of the counter. I walked to it and
knocked.
"Come in," a voice said
through the door. I opened it and walked in. Sam Martin was a short, pudgy
Cajun with dark curly hair, balding on top. He looked up from the papers he
worked on and fixed two dark eyes on me.
"What can I do for you?"
"I'd like to ask you a couple
of questions about Emory Fontenot."
"You a cop or something?"
"No."
"A newspaper man?"
I shrugged, and he must have
thought it was a nod.
"What do you want to
know?"
"Well," I said.
"Does he still work as a cook now that he does commercials for you?"
"Yeah, sure. He comes in every
day and makes his famous sauce piquante."
"What does he do with the rest
of his time?"
"I don't know. We shoot
commercials occasionally. I got no idea what he does with the rest of his
time."
"Does he get paid extra for
the commercials?"
Sam looked at me suspiciously.
"Listen, I paid him good money
before he became the Sauce Piquante
King. He still gets that, and he gets major bonuses every time he does one of
those commercials. Not only that, he gets another bonus every time the damn
things air. That guy can talk blood out of a turnip if you ask me. I'll have to
raise my prices just to keep him from draining me."
"Looks like you're doing
alright to me."
"What'd you say your name
was?"
"I didn't. It's John
LeGrand."
"What newspaper did you say
you work for? The Gazette?"
"Nope. I'm not a reporter,
Sam. Let's just say I'm a fan of the Sauce Piquante King."
Sam shook his head from side to
side.
"You're probably from Lafayette
or Baton Rouge, I bet. You're going to steal him away from me, aren't you? I'll
never find another guy like him with such a smooth tongue."
"Any idea where he is?"
"Who knows? Probably getting drunk somewhere. The SOB
drinks like a sponge. You might consider that if you're planning to hire
him."
"Thanks," I said.
"You've been real helpful."
"Yeah, right," he said
and returned to his paper work.
***
I found Emory at the Four Corners. Someone
I had talked to mentioned whores or a whore, so on the off chance I might find
Emory there, I checked the Four Corners
parking lot. His was the only Cadillac in the lot. If he was cheating on his
wife, he wasn't working too hard at hiding it. The Four
Corners was what passed for a whorehouse complex a few years before.
Now, it was nothing more than a collection of broken down clapboard buildings.
Three of them were boarded up. The opened one contained aging, unattractive
women in pants suits passing as prostitutes. The AIDS epidemic and fear of STDs
had put a real crimp in the Four Corners. A few losers still visited, judging
from the smattering of cars and pickups in the parking lot.
I parked next to Emory's Cadillac
and entered the building. The beer I bought off the gorilla behind the bar cost
me three dollars; the information I wanted cost me the change from my
ten-dollar bill. Emory was out back with a prostitute. He would be back in
fifteen minutes. I nursed my beer and waited. One overweight woman with scummy
teeth and wearing a polyester pants suit hit on me, but I told her to get lost.
She must have been used to such treatment because she left without a word. A
lone man sat at the end of the bar nursing a drink. I figured he was probably
waiting for someone, a particular prostitute maybe, or a friend that he came in
with who couldn't pass up the selection. Three prostitutes sat smoking and
chatting at a table in a dark corner of the room. From my vantage point, the
selection looked unappetizing.
Emory Fontenot looked exactly like
he did on television except without the crown. He wore dark slacks, a light
blue button down shirt and a dark jacket. His stomach was huge, probably from
eating too much of his own cooking. It spilled over his belt. He waddled to the
bar and ordered bourbon on the rocks. I grabbed my beer and sidled up to him.
"Emory?"
He looked at me, a bit startled. He
had small brown eyes sunk deep into his pudgy face.
"Yeah. Who are you?"
"John LeGrand."
"What do you want?" He
said this gruffly, as if he didn't want to be bothered.
"I'm a fan, Emory."
He smiled, revealing white teeth—they
gleamed too white to be natural. The Sauce Piquante King enjoyed admiration, it seemed.
"Yeah? You seen me on TV?"
"Uh, huh. I love the one where
you sit at the table with that crown on your head that accordion music in the
background, and you just dig into the sauce piquante with that oversized fork."
He cocked his head to the side,
smiled, and pretended he held a fork to his mouth.
"Then I say, 'This sauce is
soooo good, it's fit for a king.'"
"Yeah. That's it. Makes my
mouth water just thinking about it."
"It's my favorite too. Did you
notice that bottle of Dixie next to the plate?"
"Uh, huh," I said.
"Nice touch."
"That was my idea. Sam didn't
want me to put it there, but I told him it was either the beer bottle or me,
and he let it be." He held my gaze. His eyes hardened for a second—dared
me to disagree. "I told him that it was artistic integrity. The guy who
directs those things thought it was a brilliant idea. That's what he called it,
brilliant."
"Well, anyone can see that it
makes the commercial special. It adds the Cajun element to it. It really was
brilliant." Emory grinned at me, and I let a few moments of silence pass.
Someone stood, one of the prostitutes, and dropped a coin in the jukebox. Soon
we were listening to Tammy Wynette's, "D-I-V-O-R-C-E." Even the songs
in this place were old.
"Let me buy you a drink,
Emory," I said, noticing that his glass was almost empty.
"Sure."
He held his drink out to the huge,
dumb-looking bartender with eyes the color of moss. I pulled out a ten and gave
it to him when he returned with the drink and a bottle of beer for me. He
waited a moment or two, for a tip perhaps, but I had already spent my expenses
for the day. He wasn't going to get any extra from me.
Emory raised his glass and clinked
it against my bottle.
"To success," he said.
"Amen," I championed and
drank from my beer.
He had unbuttoned his jacket, and I
could see he carried a piece. He saw me looking at it, and he looked down at
the holstered pistol.
"I got a license for it,"
he said. "I told Sheriff Broussard that I needed a concealed weapon
because I was a celebrity and all. You never know when some crazy is going to
jump in front of you and blow your brains out. It happened to Huey Long, you
know."
I made a few sympathetic sounds
deep in my throat and let a few moments of silence pass as I pretended to enjoy
the taste of my beer. Actually, this was my third, and I was already starting
to feel the effects. I was not a big drinker anymore.
"I saw you come from the
stalls," I said, breaking the silence with an observation most men would
not make in an establishment like this. The way things worked in this place was
the customers would make a deal with the prostitutes, disappear into the men's
room, go through a door mark JANITOR, and meet the prostitutes in a hallway on
the other side. "Which one did you go with?"
He eyed me for a while, his cold
brown eyes sweeping over me, stopping and holding my gaze. Maybe it was the
beers making me paranoid, but I felt as if he was reaching into my head,
reading my thoughts. His eyes were intelligent, not those of the big galoot who
peddled sauce piquante on the television. I had hoped that the alcohol would
loosen him up a bit.
"Oh, that"s Clarisse,"
he said, leaning closer to me. "I didn't do anything with her, 'cept talk.
I knew her in high school." He paused, seeming to consider whether to say
something else. He didn't.
"A regular high school
reunion, huh?" He didn't like that. I could tell that by the way he
frowned into his drink. "Was she a particular good friend of yours, Emory?"
He glanced at me, but he didn't say
anything. I had hurt his feelings, or maybe he had figured out my ulterior
motives. Funny, but I felt as if I was playing a poker hand with him, and I had
to figure out whether he was holding that flush or not.
"One of my high school
sweethearts became a prostitute," I said trying to get back in his good
graces. "Called herself Misty, blonde, blue eyes, and freckles all over
her body."
That got him. He smiled.
"Yeah? She work here? I could
go for blonde and freckles."
"Naw, Misty was high class.
She went to work in New Orleans. Dances on bars." I tried to bring the
topic back to Clarisse. "Were you and your friend tight?"
"Clarisse? Naw. We knew each
other a little, you know. After high school, she just disappears from
Ellisonville. Two weeks ago, she shows up at the Courthouse Café and says
hello. I'm really happy to see her, but I'm busy, you know. I have to make my
sauce before the lunch crowd shows up. So I tell her to go to the Stagger Inn
Bar and wait for me there. When I show up, she tells me that she had just
accepted a job here." Emory drained his drink and ordered us each another.
At least, it wasn't coming out of my empty expense account.
"You mean here, at the Four
Corners?"
"Uh, huh. I was a little
surprised, but, hey, she had been kinda wild in high school. Anyway, I met her
here today. She said the only way we could talk is if I take her out back, so I
did. You know, catching up with an old friend kinda thing." I followed his
gaze and even across the dark room, I could see that Clarisse was a thin woman
to the point of sickness; she looked anorexic.
"Does your wife know about
her?" I nodded toward the woman.
"Oh, no. I could never tell
Aline about her. She would never put up with it. I hate going behind her back,
but…," he said, finishing the sentence with a shrug.
"What they don't know, huh?"
He shrugged again; I knew that was
about as much as I could get out of him on that subject.
I spent over an hour with the King
of Sauce Piquante, and I
had no idea whether he was cheating on his wife or not. I knew one thing for
sure; he was definitely capable of it.
He and I had another round of
drinks before he left. I had to break one of the hundred dollar bills to pay
for it. After he walked out, I took my beer and walked over to where Clarisse
sat nursing what looked like a whiskey sour.
"Hi," I said, feeling a
little light-headed from the short trek. I pulled a chair and sat across from
her.
She looked up and licked her teeth:
worried, I supposed, that some of the red lipstick she wore had stained them.
She needn't have worried. Her teeth were an ugly brown, the color of weak tea.
"Hi," she said. "Looking
for a little action?"
"Maybe. I was just talking to
Emory, and he said you were the best this place had to offer."
She nodded as if that was a given.
"You smoke?" I shook my
head. "How about buying me a drink then?"
I signaled the bartender, and he
sent a tired-looking server over. I ordered a whiskey sour, gave her a twenty,
and watched another significant portion of my fee disappear.
"Emory told me that you two
knew each other. Have you known him for long?"
"Since high school. The SOB
knocked me up and then refused to take credit for the dirty deed." She
laughed as if she'd said something funny. I could see her gums. They were red
and sick looking.
"He got you pregnant and left
you holding the baby? Is that why you left Ellisonville?"
"I wasn"t good enough for
him. He wanted a woman who could give him more than good sex and loud, smelly
kids." The drink came, and she downed half of it before letting it touch
the table. "Hey, do you want some action or not?"
I shook my head. I'd had all the
action I could handle for one afternoon.
I shouldn"t have been driving,
but I was afraid that if I stayed there any longer, I would drink more and end
up with one of those prostitutes, maybe even Clarisse. That scared me sober
enough to attempt the drive home. I was surprised that the sun was down, and it
was already dark when I exited the whorehouse. The mosquitoes were in full
force, and I swatted them away from my face. It would have to be one brave
mosquito that sucked my blood.
***
I made the drive home without as
much as a fender bender. I tried to make sense of what I'd learned, but my
alcohol-soaked brain wasn't working well. I should have gone straight to bed,
but instead, I called Aline Fontenot. She answered on the third ring.
"Yes?"
"Mrs. Fontenot, this is John
LeGrand. I think I need to talk to you."
"So talk, Mr. LeGrand."
"It's a standing policy of
mine not to give reports over the phone. Could you come here?" My stomach
turned over and reminded me that I was hungry. "Or maybe we could meet at
a restaurant?"
"I haven't eaten, yet. Why don't
we meet at Ally's? Do you know where it is?"
"Uh, huh," I said. "How
about thirty minutes?"
"That will be fine," she
said and hung up.
I showered, shaved, and sobered up
somewhat, before I set out for Ally's. A crippled Black woman, who made some of
the best traditional Cajun and Creole dishes in the state, owned the
restaurant. Her blackened catfish was well known statewide. Word was that the
governor occasionally sent a helicopter out here to grab a carry out of
blackened catfish when he had special visitors. I called to make sure there
would be a table available. Fortunately, there was.
***
I pulled into the lot and walked to
the entrance of the old barn converted into a restaurant. Aline waited for me
at the bar. I joined her, and together, we allowed the waiter to escort us to
our table. She ordered a glass of white wine, and I had an iced tea. We both
ordered the blackened catfish. We made small talk until the waiter took our
dishes and brought us coffee.
"You have a report for me, Mr.
LeGrand."
"I don"t think your
husband is cheating on you."
"Good. Now convince me."
I had wrestled with whether I
should tell her about Clarisse or not, but I didn't see any way around it.
After all, Aline Fontenot was my client, and my allegiance was to her.
"Do you remember him telling
you about a woman named Clarisse?"
"Clarisse Lafleur, that little
whore? Is she back in Ellisonville?"
"You know her?"
"I know her, Mr. LeGrand. I
attended high school with Clarisse Lafleur. She was nothing but a tramp. Slept
with all the boys at Ellisonville High and most of the ones at EJC, too. Emory
had a little fling with her before he met me. I believe she disappeared shortly
afterward. Everybody figured she'd probably run off with some married man or
something. What does she have to do with all this?"
"That's who your husband has
been spending time with. She works at the whorehouse."
"At the Four Corners?"
I nodded.
"It figures. She was never
good for anything else. What I don't understand is why Emory would jeopardize
his home life and career for some sleazy prostitute like her."
"If it's any consolation, I
don't think he's having sex with her. Or that's what he's saying, anyway."
"Let me see if I have this
straight. My husband is spending time with a woman who happens to work in a
whorehouse, but you don't think he's having sex with her. Do all men stick
together that way, Mr. LeGrand?"
"Now, wait a minute. You're
twisting my words here. You haven't heard the full report."
She stood and threw her napkin over
her plate.
"Write it all down, Mr.
LeGrand and mail it to me. I am well aware of what's going on between Clarisse
and Emory, and I will handle it."
"Wait, Mrs. Fontenot.
There"s something you need to know."
"Write it down, Mr. LeGrand.
Our association is over."
I stood, but she had already
started to walk away. I sat back down and finished my coffee. The waiter
brought the check--$39.49. By the time I left the tip, I had blown another
fifty dollars. If I wasn"t careful, I would end up paying to take this
case.
***
I'm
standing buck naked in a doorway, my hands cuffed and tied over my head to the
doorframe. Clarisse, dressed in garters and fishnet stockings, holds a whip in
her hands. Her skin is stretched tight over her bones, which poke through
obscenely. Emory stands next to her. He is dressed in boxer shorts with tiny
little skulls and crossbones all over them. His stomach seems to pour over the
underwear. The crown sits cockeyed on his head. Clarisse raises the whip high
above her head and flings it at me. It wraps around my chest. The pain is so intense
that I hear a ringing in my ears. She raises the whip and again I hear the
ringing. The ringing gets louder and Clarisse and Emory slowly disappear.
***
It was the telephone. I ignored the
piercing pain in my head and answered it.
"Yeah?"
"John?"
"Uh, huh. Don"t shout at
me, Pat."
"You hitting the bottle
again?"
"Just business, Pat. What the
hell do you want at this hour?" It was eleven thirty at night. I sat up a little straighter and
paid for it. "Do you know an Aline Fontenot? She had your card in her
pocket book."
"Yeah, I know her."
"Well, she's dead, John."
"What?"
"Shot through the temple. The
house was trashed. Looks like robbery at first glance."
"Where did you find her?"
"In her bedroom. Looks like she
never heard whoever shot her—no scuffle, no mussed up bed sheets. What can you
tell me about her?"
I told him what I knew—about Emory
and Clarisse, but I didn't mention the Stagger Inn Motel. I don't know why. I
owed Pat Broussard a lot, but Aline Fontenot had been my client, and because I
didn't give her my full report, I made her dead. I had to find out on my own. I
promised Pat that I would go over, make a statement in the morning, and hung
up. Then I dug up my police piece, a .45 caliber that I kept when I left the
force. I checked to make sure it was loaded and stuffed it in my waist.
The radio in my van was on, and
after a sappy swamp pop tune by Clint West, a commercial came on. I listened to
the smooth voice of Emory Fontenot. "Listen Folks," he said, "and
I'll tell it to you straight. You can't get a better meal anywhere in the state
of Louisiana. Come join me, the Sauce Piquante
King, for a meal at the Courthouse Café. Right across from the courthouse
in downtown Ellisonville. Tell Sam Martin that Emory Fontenot, the Sauce Piquante King, sent you. You'll get a
good meal at a good deal. You have my word on it." I slammed my hands
against the steering wheel before reaching over to shut off the radio. What a
fool I was? I was no smarter than the thousands of people who listened to Emory
Fontenot's smooth voice and took it at face value. He had told me what I wanted
to hear, and I had swallowed the hook.
***
Sissy Ching sat behind the counter,
although it was after midnight. She lowered the volume on the black and white television
when she saw me.
"Where is Clarisse's room?"
I asked.
"The whore?"
I nodded.
"Room 13. First floor."
Room 13 was located at about the
middle of that wing. The door was in the shadows of the stairs leading to the
top floor. I placed my ear against the door and listened to the movement
inside. Someone spoke, a man's voice, but I could not make out what he said.
I knocked softly with my piece and
someone cracked open the door. I slammed my shoulder against it and sent
Clarisse flying across the room. I felt the bullet nick my scalp and slam into
the doorframe before I heard the report. I fell to my knees and fired once.
Emory took the bullet in the chest. His body folded in half and slammed into
the wall. I watched him slump to the floor leaving a trail of blood on the
motel wall. He remained sitting, his upper body propped up.
Clarisse screamed something and
made as if to crawl toward him, but I was there before she could reach him. I
picked her up and threw her on the bed, where she remained, and didn't move.
I searched through the partially
packed suitcase looking for some kind of clue that would give me a reason for
everything that had happened. I found it in Clarisse's purse—a marriage
certificate between her and Emery Fontenot. The Sauce Piquante King was a bigamist, a career-ending situation to be
sure.
I threw the purse next to Clarisse,
who sobbed loudly on the bed, and I sat on the threshold, trying to swallow
down the bile, like a bad meal, that kept rising up in my throat. I waited for
the distant sirens to arrive.
***
The story made all the papers. Emory
finally achieved his statewide reputation. The headlines read, "Love
Triangle Takes Life of Sauce Piquante King
and Wife." The article mentioned me but only briefly as the King's killer.
Two days later, jailers found Clarisse
Lafleur dead in her cell at the courthouse. She was already dying. The coroner
said that her body was riddled with cancer. Had Emory waited a few weeks, he
would no longer have been a bigamist. The newspaper story that covered her
death revealed that she had married Emory Fontenot a few months after
graduating high school, and unhappy with the arrangement, she ran off to points
unknown. It was widely speculated that she had been pregnant—probably why Emory
had to marry her—although a child was never discovered.
Pat Broussard called me a couple of
days later and filled in the rest of the blanks. She had been working as a
barmaid in Nevada, but her heroin habit was so bad that she could no longer
support it. I guess she heard about the King, and she returned to Ellisonville
hoping to blackmail him.
"Emory starts acting strange,
so his wife hires you to check him out."
"And when she hears Clarisse
Lafleur's name, she remembers the high school story and suspects he's laying
her again."
"Uh, huh. I doubt if she knew
anything about the blackmail business, the marriage, or the pregnancy. She
confronts him when he comes home and probably threatens divorce. He can't let
her do that for two reasons: a divorce would reveal that he was already
married, and he was being courted by a big TV guy from New Orleans. They wanted
him to go national. People would not listen to a bigamist."
"I'd heard rumors that he
might leave Sam Martin," I said. "So it was true, huh?"
"Yap. The publicity would have
destroyed him, so he panicked and did the only thing he could think to do. He
killed his wife, hoping to make it look like a robbery or something. He didn't
account for you, but it wouldn't have mattered. The bullet matched the gun he
carried."
"What were his plans about
Clarisse then?"
"She told us that he was going
to take her to New Orleans with him. I doubt it seriously that she would have
lasted long. If he didn't kill her, the cancer would have. I don't understand
why he didn't kill her instead of his wife. Nobody would be looking for her, a
common whore."
"I'm pretty sure he had me
figured out, Pat. He had to know I was going to tell his wife that he was
seeing Clarisse."
"Maybe he figured out that if
she thought that all he was doing was getting a little on the side, she'd be okay
with that."
"Then he didn't know
her."
"Or maybe, he figured you
would tell her exactly what he told you, and she would accept that." Pat was
silent a moment. I could hear muffled voices in the background, and I
remembered that he liked to leave the radio in his office on low throughout the
day. "Well, John, it's been a rough case, and you had to kill a man. Can't
be your best moment. Can I do anything to help you?"
"Thanks for the offer, Pat,
but I think I'll have to work this one out on my own."
I hung up and went for a long drive
in my old van. A Courthouse Café commercial came on. Sam Martin had already
replaced the Sauce Piquante King
with another commercial, but this guy's voice was not nearly as smooth as Emory
Fontenot's was. I suspected that Sam might have to give up his new fancy home
and move back to my side of the tracks.
I turned off my radio, and watched
the highway lines disappear under my van. When I took this case, I had no idea
it could ever end up as it did. I had learned a valuable lesson: any time
people interact, bad things can happen, even in a town like Ellisonville.
I pulled into the Stagger Inn Bar
parking lot. It was going to be a long night. I didn't know if I could drink
the taste of death out of my mouth, but I sure as hell was going to give it a
try.
