Blood Memory (17 page)

Suddenly there’s a crash of thunder, and then I wake to violence in the dark, battle erupting above and around me, thick arms flailing, fists cracking bone. I want to run, but I’m rooted to the bed. The combatants struggle over me in silent rage, their sole intent to kill. I’ve seen this battle before, but this time—unlike the other nights—I see the whites of two eyes flickering in the black mask of one face. As the face whips toward the bedroom window, I recognize my father.

And I scream.

My eyes open in the dark. I know the nightmares are over, because the little teeth are gnawing at my veins again.

I need a drink.

My bedside clock reads 5:53
A.M.
I’ve slept over twelve hours. Sean must be long gone. He promised to wake me if he had to leave, but it’s morning, and here I lie alone. It doesn’t surprise me much. Sean has broken promises before. I’ve broken a couple myself. Adultery isn’t a fairy tale.

Sean is probably lying in bed with his wife right now. Soon he’ll wake and drive to the FBI field office to work with Kaiser and the rest of them. Picking apart the tapes of my conversation with Malik, reexamining every scrap of evidence from the murders, waiting for me to decide I’m capable of handling “debriefing” by the FBI.

That’s not going to happen today.

Lying in the dark, I know one thing with absolute certainty. I must return to Malmaison. Today. I may believe that one of the bloody tracks on my bedroom floor was put there by my foot twenty-three years ago, but until that’s a proven fact, I can go no further with the information. I have the tools and the knowledge to prove it, and I won’t feel any peace until I do. Because I keep my forensic equipment packed and ready at all times—even the stuff for tests that fall outside my discipline—I can be on the road in twenty minutes. I don’t plan to take much longer than that. It’s Monday, and I want to beat the traffic.

Walking down the hall to make coffee, I smell cigarette smoke. Then I hear a cough from the den. Sean quit smoking a year ago.

I creep to the end of the hall. The den is dark. As my eyes adjust to the gloom, I see a man sitting on the sofa.

I reach out and flip on the hall light.

Sean is wearing boxer shorts and his oxford shirt, unbuttoned all the way down. His face is as haggard as I’ve ever seen it. He looks like a man who has witnessed a terrible accident. An accident involving his own family.

“Sean? What are you doing?”

He doesn’t look in my direction. “Thinking.”

I pad over to the sofa and look down at him. A bottle of Bushmills stands on the coffee table, a saucer piled with crushed cigarette butts beside it. The bottle was new, but it’s one-third empty now. An opened newspaper lies on the table as well, and the face of Nathan Malik stares up from it. Beside the close-up of the psychiatrist is a shot of Malik waving to the camera as he’s led along Gravier Street by police—the so-called Hollywood Walk that leads from NOPD headquarters to the Central Lockup Unit.

“Are you all right?” I ask.

“No.”

“Have you been here all night? In the house, I mean?”

“No.” He still hasn’t looked up at me.

“You told me you’d wake me if you had to leave.”

“I tried. You wouldn’t budge.”

“Where did you go?”

At last he looks up. His eyes are glazed. “They know, Cat.”

“Know what? Who knows?”

“Everybody.”

“What’s happened, Sean? What are you talking about?”

“Us. Everybody knows about us.”

I take a step backward. “What do you mean?”

“Somebody talked.” He shrugs as if he doesn’t give a damn. “I doubt it was Kaiser. Maybe it was his driver, I don’t know. But word got back to the task force. By suppertime rumors were flying through the department.”

“You wouldn’t be acting like this over rumors in the department.”

He shakes his head. “Somebody called Karen. The wife of this detective I pissed off about a year ago. She called Karen and made it sound about as bad as she could.”

I’ve been expecting something like this for months. Now that it’s finally happened, I feel a strange numbness in my chest. “And?”

“Karen called my cell phone about eight last night. She told me not to come home.”

“What did you do?”

“I tried to talk to her.”

“In person? You went home?”

He nods. “She wouldn’t let me in.”

“You have a key.”

Sean chuckles softly, the sound eerily devoid of humor. “She changed the locks.”

Good for you, Karen,
I say silently.

“She got a locksmith out there after hours and changed every damn lock on the house.”

I look over at the picture window. A faint blue glow lightens the blackness on the left side of the lake. The sun is coming. I need to move.

“Look, I know this is a bad time…but I have to go.”

He blinks in confusion. “Go?”

“Yes.”

“You’re ready to talk to the FBI?”

“No. I’m going back to Natchez.”

He rubs his eyes like a man coming awake after a long sleep. “What are you talking about? You just came from there. Why would you want to go back?”

Trying to explain my reasons to Sean while he’s drunk is more than I want to deal with. “Look, I don’t need to be here right now. I need to go home.”

He waves his arm broadly. “I thought this was home.”

“I have to know what happened in that room. What happened the night my father died.”

“Well, you can’t just
leave
. Malik thinks he has some kind of connection with you. You’re important to solving the case.”

An image of the psychiatrist comes to me, a black-clad figure looking down a corridor like a concerned father. “Where’s Malik now? What’s that newspaper story about?”

“He’s in the Orleans Parish Prison. He refused to obey the court order. The
Picayune
ran a story about his big moral stand against the Feds. Some people think Malik’s a hero for protecting his patients’ privacy, others think he’s the killer, or that he’s protecting the killer. All anybody agrees on is that he’s the only goddamn lead in the case.”

None of this surprises me. “Look, I did what Kaiser wanted. That’s all I can do right now. I’m an expert on bite marks, but they’ve got somebody else doing that job. There’s nothing I can do to alter events. I’m done. I’m going home.”

Sean shakes his head as though trying to sober himself up. “Last night you asked me if I could give up everything for you. I told you I could.”

I nod but say nothing.

“Well…we can be together now. Right now. No waiting.”

I’ve dreamed of hearing him say this for more than a year, but now that he has, I feel only sadness. “You didn’t make that choice freely, Sean. You got caught. That’s a different thing.”

He looks incredulous. “Are you serious?”

“On top of that, you’re drunk. You don’t know how you’re going to feel when you sober up. For all I know, you’ll be begging Karen’s forgiveness and trying to sleep at home by tonight. I don’t want to sound like a bitch, okay? I love you. But I have something important to do, and I can’t put it off because you happened to get caught last night.”

“You do sound like a bitch.”

My laugh is a short, harsh bark that surprises even me. “Thanks for making it easier.”

At Malmaison, I find the wrought-iron gate standing open. Could the house be on tour? It’s the wrong season for that. Carefully negotiating the blind curves of the high-banked lane that leads to the main driveway, I circle around to the rear drive and pull into the gravel lot behind the two slave quarters and the rose garden.

Mother’s Maxima, Pearlie’s blue Cadillac, and my grandfather’s Town Car are in the lot. There’s also an Acura I don’t recognize. The Town Car is running. My grandfather’s driver is sitting behind the wheel. Billy Neal gives no semblance of a greeting, but stares at me with a strange malevolence.

I’m about to walk over and ask him what his problem is when Grandpapa marches through the trellis at the rear of the rose garden. He wears a stylish suit cut by the Hong Kong tailor who travels through Natchez twice a year and takes measurements at a local motel. The dark fabric sets off his silver hair, and he wears a white silk handkerchief prominently in his pocket.

Billy Neal gets out of the Lincoln and opens its rear door, but by then my grandfather has seen me and turned in my direction. Neal leans against the trunk of the Town Car and lights a cigarette, his posture radiating insolence.

“Catherine?” Grandpapa calls. “Two visits in three days? What’s going on?”

I’m not going to lie about my reason for being here, even though it might upset him. “I came back to finish the work in my bedroom.”

He stops a couple of feet from me, his blue eyes twinkling with interest. “You mean the blood you found?”

“Yes. I want to check the rest of the room for blood and other trace evidence. Probably the rest of the slave quarters as well.”

The twinkle goes dead. “What kind of evidence? Evidence of what?”

“Evidence of what, I’m not sure. But I’ll find whatever is preserved after twenty-three years.”

He glances at his watch. “You’re going to do this yourself?”

“I don’t think so. I wanted to. And my forensic equipment is packed in my trunk. But if something I discovered ultimately involved the courts, that could—”

“The courts?” He’s giving me his full attention now. “What could possibly involve the courts?”

Why is he forcing me to say it? “Look, I know you told me that you and I probably tracked that blood into the bedroom from the garden that night, but…”

“But what?”

“It was raining that night, Grandpapa. Hard.”

He nods as if only now remembering. “You’re right.”

“It’s not that I don’t believe you. But I can’t stop thinking about that rain. How could anybody track enough blood over thirty yards of wet grass to make those footprints?”

He smiles. “You’re as obsessive and tenacious as I am.”

I can’t help but smile back. “As far as me doing the work, the problem is objectivity. If any kind of legal proceeding involved me—and if I alone had discovered the evidence—that evidence would be suspect. I know people who work at the state crime lab in Baton Rouge. They do some moonlighting. Reconstructing crime scenes, testifying as experts in criminal trials—”

“Mississippi or Louisiana?”

“Louisiana.”

Grandpapa gives a perfunctory nod, as though suddenly preoccupied with something else.

“They could work up my bedroom in half a day and videotape the whole thing. Any evidence they discovered would be beyond reproach. Honestly, I can’t even pretend to be objective about this.”

“I understand.” He glances over at his driver, then back at me.

“Do you have any problem with me doing this, Grandpapa?”

He seems not to have heard me. The stroke he had a year ago wasn’t supposed to have affected his conscious thought processes, but sometimes I’m not so sure.

“Whose car is that?” I ask, pointing at the Acura.

“Ann’s,” he replies, his eyes distant.

Aunt Ann rarely visits Malmaison. Her stormy personal life long ago alienated her from my grandparents. It’s my mother who makes the effort to exert a positive influence in Ann’s life, but her efforts mostly go in vain. Diagnosed as bipolar in her midtwenties, Ann—the beautiful and favored child of the family—became a cautionary tale in local society, an example of how great wealth doesn’t necessarily confer happiness.

“Is she visiting Mom?” I ask.

“She’s with Gwen now, but she actually drove up to see me.”

“What about?”

Grandpapa sighs wearily. “What’s it always about?”

Money.
Mom told me that Aunt Ann long ago depleted the trust fund my grandfather set up for her. Yet she has no qualms about asking for money whenever she needs it. “Mom said Ann’s new husband is beating her.”

Grandpapa’s face tightens, and I sense the slow-burning anger of a man who judges men by his own strict code. “If she asks me for help with that problem, I’ll intervene.”

I want to ask if he gave Ann the money she requested, but I don’t. He probably wouldn’t tell me.

He’s looking at his watch again. “Catherine, I have a meeting with a member of the Mississippi Gaming Commission. It’s about Maison DeSalle. I can’t be late.”

I suddenly remember the architectural model he showed me in his library, his plans for federal certification of a Natchez Indian Nation. “Oh, right. Good luck—I guess.”

Across the parking lot, Billy Neal holds up his wrist and points at his watch. Grandpapa waves acknowledgment, then gazes deeply into my eyes, as though trying to communicate something important. Through his hypnotic blue eyes, he’s brought the full weight of his considerable charisma to bear on me. His mental capacity hasn’t diminished at all.

“Catherine,” he says, his voice grave, “I’d like you to postpone your plans until I get back from this meeting. It won’t take more than an hour or so.”

“Why?”

He reaches out and takes hold of my hand. “It’s a delicate matter. A personal matter. Personal for you.”

“For me?” A strange buzzing has started in my brain. “Then tell me now. I was about to call the crime lab and get things moving.”

“This isn’t the proper place, dear. We should talk in my study.”

“Let’s go, then.”

“I can’t now. I have the meeting.”

I shake my head in frustration. “I’m tired of being in the dark, Grandpapa. If you want me to hold off doing this, tell me whatever it is right now.”

Anger flashes briefly in his eyes. But instead of chastising me, he walks slowly around the Audi and climbs into the passenger seat. His desire is clear. I get into the driver’s seat beside him, but he’s not looking at me. He’s staring through the windshield with a faraway look in his eyes.

“Listen,” I say, “ever since I found that blood—long before that, really—I’ve had the feeling you guys have been keeping something from me about that night. I’m sure you think you’re protecting me, but I’m not a child anymore, okay? Not even close. So please tell me what this is about.”

His eyes remain on the red sea of rosebushes in the garden. “The rain,” he murmurs. “We were foolish to think we could lie to you and get away with it for long.” His big chest falls with a deep sigh. “You always had finely honed instincts. Even as a child.”

My extremities are tingling. “Please hurry.”

Grandpapa suddenly faces me, his eyes solemn, the eyes of a doctor about to break bad news. “Darling, your father didn’t die where we told you he did.”

A strange numbness seeps outward from my heart. “Where did he die?”

“Luke died in your bedroom.”

My bedroom
…The numbness inside me turns cold, the numbness of frostbite. Internal frostbite. I look away, my eyes drawn to the roses I’ve hated for so long. “How did he die?”

“Look at me, Catherine. Look at me, and I’ll tell you all I know.”

I force myself to turn, to focus on the lined patrician face, and he begins to speak in a soft voice.

“I was downstairs reading. I heard a shot. It was muffled, but I knew what it was. It sounded the way our M1s did when we mopped up the Jap bunkers after the flamethrowers went in. When I heard the shot, I ran outside. I saw a man running away from the eastern slave quarters. Your house. I didn’t chase him. I ran straight over to see whether anyone had been hurt.”

“Was the running man black, like you told me before?”

“Yes. When I got inside, I found your mother asleep in her bed. Then I checked your room. Luke was lying on the floor, bleeding from the chest. His rifle was beside him on the floor.”

“Where was I?”

“I don’t know. I examined Luke’s wound, and it was mortal.”

“Did he say anything?”

Grandpapa shakes his head. “He couldn’t speak.”

“Why not?”

“Catherine—”

“Why not?”

“He was drowning in his own blood.”

“From a wound to the side of his chest?”

“Darling, that rifle was loaded with hunting rounds designed to mushroom on impact. The internal damage was devastating.”

I shut out the pain by focusing on details. “Did you touch the gun?”

“I picked it up and smelled the barrel to see if it had been discharged. It had.”

“Did you call the police?”

“Pearlie did. She called down to check on you, just as I told you. The rest happened much the way I told you the other day. Your mother woke up, and you walked into the bedroom moments later.”

“Where had I been? I mean…it happened in my bedroom.”

He takes a moment to consider this. “Outside, I think.”

“Who moved Daddy’s body into the rose garden?”

“I did.”

“Why?”

“To protect you, of course.”

“What do you mean?”

Grandpapa shifts on the seat, but his eyes remain on me, deadly earnest and filled with certainty. “You were eight years old, Catherine. Your father had been shot by an intruder in your bedroom. If that story had been printed in the
Examiner,
there would have been no end to the morbid speculation. What happened to you before Luke arrived? Were you molested in some way? Raped? In this little town, that would have followed you for the rest of your life. I saw no reason to put you through that, and neither did your mother. Luke was dead. It made no difference where the police found his body.”

“Mom knows?”

“Of course.”

“And Pearlie?”

“It was Pearlie who helped me clean Luke’s blood off the bedroom floor and walls before the police arrived. Not that it mattered. They never even checked the slave quarters.”

“Why not?”

He looks at me as though the answer should be self-evident. “They believed what I told them. Luke was lying dead under the dogwood tree in the rose garden. I told them how it happened, and that was that.”

Such a passive police response would be unimaginable in New Orleans, even back in 1981. But in the Natchez of twenty years ago? What local cop was going to question the word of Dr. William Kirkland, especially when his son-in-law had just been murdered?

“Did they do any forensic investigation at all? Did they search the grounds for blood or other evidence?”

“Yes, but as you pointed out, it was raining hard. They didn’t put too much effort into it. It was a sad night, and everybody wanted it over.”

I gaze across the rose garden to the slave quarters that was my home for sixteen years. Then I pan my eyes right, to the dogwood tree where for most of my life I’ve believed my father died.
Luke was dead…It made no difference where the police found his body.
But of course it does make a difference to me. It makes all the difference in the world.

“But Grandpapa…what if something
did
happen to me? Did you ever think about that?”

Before he can answer, his Town Car pulls alongside my Audi on the passenger side. Billy Neal gives my grandfather a pointed look.

“What’s his fucking problem?” I snap.

Grandpapa frowns at the expletive, but he motions for Billy to pull away. After about ten seconds, the driver obeys.

“Of course I considered the possibility, dear. I examined you myself, after the police had gone.”

“And?”

“I saw no evidence of assault.”

“You checked me for sexual assault?”

He sighs again, obviously put out by the specifics of my question. “I did a thorough examination. Nothing happened to you. Nothing physical, I mean. The psychological shock was clearly devastating, though. You stopped speaking for a year.”

“What do you think I saw?”

“I don’t know. On the milder side, the prowler might have exposed himself to you. I suppose he might have fondled you or forced you to fondle him. But at the other end of the spectrum…you might have seen your father murdered before your eyes.”

I want to hide my quivering hands—my grandfather despises weakness—but there’s nowhere to put them. Then he closes one of his strong, age-spotted hands around both of mine, stilling my tremors with the force of his grip. “Do you have any memory of that night?”

“Not before I saw his body. I have nightmares, though. I’ve seen Daddy fighting with a faceless man…other things. But nothing that makes any sense.”

He squeezes my hands harder. “Those aren’t nightmares, dear. Those are memories. I’ve said some bad things about Luke, I know. And God help me, I’ve lied to you as well. Hopefully for a good reason. But one thing I told you, you can take as holy writ. Your father died fighting to save your life. He probably
did
save your life. No man could have done more.”

I close my eyes, but the tears come anyway. I’ve always felt a certain amount of shame about my father’s war-related problems. To hear now that he died a hero…it’s almost too much. “Who did it, Grandpapa? Who killed him?”

“No one knows.”

“Did the police really look?”

“You’d better believe it. I rode them hard. But they couldn’t come up with anything.”

“I can,” I say quietly. “I can take apart that crime scene with tools that didn’t even
exist
about back then.”

Grandpapa is watching me with grief in his face. “I’m sure you can, Catherine. But to what end? What if you were to find DNA from an unknown person? There were never even any suspects. Are you going to take blood samples from every black man in the city of Natchez? That could be five thousand people. And the killer could easily be dead now. He could have left town years ago.”