Tragic Magic (15 page)

“Sure.” His eyes never left hers. “Actually, I just did. Looks great.”

“Then give me a little room and let me finish the design at the bottom.” Carmela grabbed a rubber stamp of a jalapeño pepper, rubbed it against a red ink pad, then made a series of impressions at the bottom of the page. “There,” she told him. “Done.”

He looked at the flyer, a little mystified. “Terrific, but that’s only one.”

“This is the original,” she told him. “Now I’m going to scan it into my computer and print out a few hundred on white linen paper.”

“That’s how it works, huh?” he asked.

“It’s one way,” she told him.

“Hey,” he said, grinning. “I saw you on TV the other night.”

Carmela waved a hand. “It was nothing.”

“You look good on camera. Very photogenic.”

“I was backing out of a store. Trying not to be interviewed. How good could I look?”

“You impressed me,” said Quigg. He cocked his head and gave her a lazy smile. “Say . . . your divorce final yet?”

Carmela shook her head. “Nope. But counting the days.”

“Mmm,” murmured Quigg. “Not soon enough.” He started to lean in.

Putting a palm flat against his chest, Carmela exerted a fair amount of pressure. “Whoa, there. Kindly back off.”

He did. But not by much.

“We had some good times together, didn’t we?” Quigg asked.

Carmela had to admit they had. Back when Shamus had left her the first time and she’d finally decided to get back into the swing of things, she’d attended a fancy Garden District dinner party with Quigg. It had been pleasant, but he hadn’t seemed eager to give up his bachelor ways. Since then, they’d had dinner together a couple times at Bon Tiempe, his upscale restaurant over in the Bywater part of town. There’d been sparks between them, but none that had seriously ignited. Still, Quigg did appear to be simmering a bit now. Now that she was . . . otherwise occupied?

“If you can wait five minutes,” Carmela told him, “I’ll have these flyers ready for you.”

Quigg fixed his laser-beam brown eyes on her. “What about distribution?”

Carmela smiled back. “That’s up to you.”

Now Quigg screwed his face into a worried look. “See, that’s where I’ve got a problem. I’m supposed to check out this property on Magazine Street that I might be signing a
lease on. Then I have to drive all the way down to Theriot to pick up eighty pounds of alligator steak. To cook for Saturday night.”

“So you’re saying . . . what?” asked Carmela.

“The flyers should really be distributed today,” he told her.

“So run your errands tomorrow,” she told him.

“That alligator meat is thawing even as we speak. Do you have any idea what eighty pounds of alligator can do to a BMW?”

She grinned. It didn’t sound good. “So you’re . . . what? Asking me to distribute your flyers?”

“Only as a practicality,” said Quigg. “And then only to local galleries. The ones up and down your street here. And, um, maybe over on Royal and Bourbon Streets, too.”

She gazed at him, then finally said, “I suppose it’s the least I can do, considering I caused the delay.”

“You’re a peach,” he told her.

While Quigg’s flyers were spitting out of her printer, Carmela quickly ran to help Aysia Burgoyne, a woman who was fast becoming one of their regular scrappers.

Aysia, at forty, had cascades of reddish-blond curls, a peaches-and-cream complexion, and a romantic wardrobe of ruffled blouses and silk pencil skirts, and was married to Thompson Burgoyne, a private financier.

“I just discovered the most wonderful photos of my grand-mother,” cooed Aysia, “and decided to make some kind of commemorative album. But . . . I’m not sure where to start.”

“How many photos?” asked Carmela.

“Six really nice sepia-tone photos,” Aysia told her. “But all fairly small. None more than four by six inches.”

“What if you put them into a booklet?” suggested Carmela, pulling out a small, ready-made chipboard album that consisted of eight pages. She studied it quickly, then handed it to Aysia. “This one will give you three double spreads on the inside.”

“Okay,” said Aysia, turning the album over in her hands. The stiff white paper didn’t seem to impress her.

“What you’d do is cover each spread with fabric,” Carmela hurriedly explained. “Pick something luxurious, like a brocade floral, to serve as your background. Then cover a piece of card stock with a contrasting piece of brocade and mount one of the photos onto it. Maybe add some bits of old lace around the edges, then flourishes like gold tassels, an old-fashioned beaded pin, gauzy ribbon, or pressed silk flowers.”

“I adore that idea,” declared Aysia.

“The real trick,” said Carmela, grabbing a snippet of plum-colored ribbon as well as a bronzed angel charm, “is to build up layers. Maybe keep the colors in the plum- magenta-Persian red family, and try for three or even four overlapping fabrics. And don’t worry if your album looks a little messy; you
want
it to look aged and atmospheric.”

“And you’ve got tassels and beaded pins?” asked Aysia.

“At the front counter,” directed Carmela.

Once Quigg’s flyers were all printed, Carmela tamped them into a nice thick stack, then decided there was probably time left to deliver some of them. She could hit a few antique shops and kill two birds with one stone. That is, deliver the flyers and ask the shop owners if Melody had been in buying antiques lately. Carmela was looking for some sort of thread or connection, though she knew it would probably be quite tenuous.

Devon Dowling, the owner of Dulcimer’s Antiques, was a short, fat, balding man with a scrawny pigtail down his back and a fat pug snuggled in his arms. He happily accepted a handful of Quigg’s flyers, but told Carmela he hadn’t seen Melody in his store.

“You’re sure she came in here?” Dowling asked. “Mimi are I are generally here every day, but I don’t recall seeing Melody.” He kissed the pug Mimi on top of her furry little head, then assumed a pensive expression. “Terrible thing, that poor lady.”

Peacock Alley Antiques was pretty much the same story. They were happy to take some of the flyers to pass along, looking forward to the upcoming Galleries and Gourmets festival, but didn’t recall seeing Melody in their shop.

In the third gallery, Metcalf and Meador Fine Arts and Antiquities, Carmela had better luck. But mentioning Melody’s name brought a wave of sadness to Jack Meador, the proprietor.

“Oh my gosh,” he said, “can you believe what happened?” Meador was a tall, thin man, slightly ethereal with a long, hangdog face. He wore a tweed jacket with bagged-out pockets, as though he perpetually overstuffed them with keys, change, cell phone, whatever. In recalling Melody’s death, he looked even more hangdog.

Carmela wanted to tell him she surely could believe what happened to Melody, because she had been right there, Johnny-on-the-unfortunate-spot. Instead, she commiserated with Meador for a few minutes. But when he pulled out a white hanky, honked loudly into it, then finally said, “You know, Melody was in here not so long ago,” Carmela’s ears perked up.

“Shopping for antiques?” Carmela asked.

Meador’s narrow shoulders gave a slightly affirmative shrug. “I wouldn’t exactly call them antiques. The items Melody bought were mostly just old.”

“So not from your sales floor,” said Carmela. She glanced around and her eyes fell upon Sung dynasty vases, elegant oil paintings, a mahogany secretary with brass fittings, antique lamps, a pair of Chippendale chairs, and hundreds more tasty pieces. Underfoot were fine Oriental carpets, and at least a dozen glittering chandeliers hung from the high ceiling.

“Melody was shopping for that Medusa Manor place of hers,” said Meador. “So she was more interested in character than quality. She pretty much confined her shopping to the back room and the basement.”

“You probably don’t know this,” said Carmela, “but I’m taking over that project for Melody.”

Meador brightened slightly. “You are? Say, she put a few things on hold. Think you might still be interested in them?”

“They’re here?” asked Carmela.

Meador nodded. “Back room.”

“Let’s take a look.”

They wove their way past dining room sets, highboys, and a pair of towering brass vases, then pushed through a Chinese red velvet curtain into the back room. Meador pointed out the items Melody had perused.

“That dining table over there, those two paintings. Not great pieces, but not terrible, either.”

“We could still use those things,” Carmela told him. “It’s a big place to fill.”

“Yeah?” said Meador. “I have some other stuff Melody looked at. An old round-top trunk, a lamp, more paintings. Fact is, I purchased a rather large lot of things at auction up in Baton Rouge. I did okay, cherry-picked the best stuff for the front of my shop. But there was an awful lot of junk, too. Not the antique quality I’ve built my reputation on, and certainly not the kind of items knowledgeable collectors would want in their homes.”

They tromped down narrow wooden stairs into a musty basement that was lit by four bare bulbs.

“See what I mean?” said Meador.

Staring at a high, round-topped trunk, Carmela could visualize a ghoulish body popping out of it. “That trunk would work really well,” she told Meador. “So would that twisty-looking lamp.”

“Tell you what,” said Meador, “I’ll give you a good price on the lot. The stuff we looked at upstairs plus these two pieces.” He pulled a calculator from his baggy jacket pocket, poked in a few numbers, and showed it to Carmela.

She ran the numbers in her head, then nodded. “Okay.”

“I’ll even be happy to deliver everything. Just let me know when I can get in there.”

They trooped back upstairs and exchanged business cards.

Meador picked up one of the flyers Carmela had given him earlier and studied it. “This event Saturday and Sunday is a good thing, you know? It’s been tough sledding these past few years. We need something like this to give a boost to the galleries and restaurants. Sure, there’s been music and jazz festivals, but mostly those just benefit the bars.”

“It’s going to be a good time,” said Carmela.

Jack Meador crinkled his eyes at her. “I think you’re right.”

“H
OLY cats!” exclaimed Ava, as she lifted her smoked sunglasses to stare at the four-story, redbrick monstrosity that loomed in front of them on the hill. “You didn’t tell me we were going to visit Dracula’s castle.”

“It’s an old insane asylum,” said Carmela, turning her car into the overgrown drive. “I told you that.”

Ava didn’t look particularly happy about their destination. “Isn’t that a rather politically incorrect term these days?”

“It wasn’t back then,” said Carmela, “when this old place was still in business.” She slowed her car, gazing at the Gothic letters that spelled out
Mendelssohn Asylum
in the twisted, wrought-iron archway.

“Place doesn’t exactly look welcoming,” said Ava as they bumped up the drive. “Look . . . the windows are either broken or boarded up, and rusted chains are stretched across all the doors.”

“This is the kind of place the Restless Spirit Society lives
for,” said Carmela. “An abandoned building that might be haunted.” And it really was abandoned, Carmela noted. Located some ten miles out of town, right on the edge of a vast bayou. As for the haunted part, well, that remained to be seen.

Ava pulled a tube of bright red lipstick from her bag and applied it to her generous lips. “When you told me it was a tour,
cher
, I was imagining something a little more refined. With refreshments included. Champagne, perhaps, and some nice cheese and crackers.” She flipped the visor mirror down and smiled at herself. “Last art studio tour I went on, that’s what they had.”

“We’ll be lucky to find a chunk of stale bread,” Carmela chuckled. Then she crunched across gravel and pulled in next to the half-dozen cars that were already parked there.

“Oh man,” said Ava, “this place makes Medusa Manor look like a cute little storybook cottage.”

Gigantic columns paraded across the front of the building that had once housed the psychotics, alcoholics, and eccentrics of New Orleans. Two balconies, one on top of another, protruded over the front yard. Carmela could imagine administrators lining up there in past days, scrutinizing visitors as they arrived, wondering which ones would stay, which ones would attempt a daring escape.

“At least we’re not the only ones here,” grumped Ava as they climbed from the car. The evening’s cool air and the bayou’s humidity immediately wrapped around them like a wet blanket as streaks of lightning flashed in the sky. “Hopefully that thunderstorm won’t hit until we’re back home.”

“I wouldn’t want to get caught here without lights,” agreed Carmela.

Ava frowned. “Lights. They do have lights in there, don’t they?”

“Probably not, but I brought my trusty flashlight,” said Carmela, hoisting her Fendi tote bag. “Even remembered to put in fresh batteries. I didn’t want to come unprepared.”

“Carmela, you’re such a little Girl Scout. What’s the motto? Be prepared?”

“I think that’s the Boy Scout motto.”

“Huh,” laughed Ava. “In my experience, boys and men are always prepared.” She reached a hand down the front of her red silk blouse and pulled out a thin chain with a silver medal. “See. I
knew
there was a reason I wore my Michael the Archangel medal! Guaranteed to protect us from negativity and evil spirits!”

“Car-a-mello?” A perky blond cheerleader type suddenly popped up in front of them.

“Carmela,” said Carmela. She tapped an index finger to her chest. “I’m Carmela. And this is my friend, Ava.”

“Mindy Deerfield,” said the woman in a thick Southern drawl as she shook hands eagerly. “Membership secretary for the Restless Spirit Society. Glad you gals could join us tonight.”