Phantom Evil
“I’m all grown up now, Tyler,” she reminded him, but she hugged him in return.
“She has a tendency to rush in—right into people who have guns,” he said.
Jackson grinned. “We’ll watch out for her. I promise.”
Tyler nodded. “Adam wouldn’t have set her up with you if you weren’t good people. And if she wasn’t going to be safe.” He paused, looking around. “So this is the Newton house. It doesn’t look like a dark torture chamber, but…I’m sure it’s creepy as hell at night. You all be careful, huh? I remember when the kid took a header when the cops were after him about a decade ago. Brought it all back. And now Mrs. Holloway…it’s a shame, and it may just be that the place is bad.”
“We’ll all be looking out for each other,” Jake said solemnly.
Hugging his sister and warning her to call him, Tyler left at last.
Jackson looked at the four members of his team and the mass of boxes in the living room. “Well,” he said.
Whitney shrugged. “It’s not bad, really! Somebody else is in film, right?”
“Will Chan, but he’s not here yet,” Jackson said.
“We follow orders well,” Angela assured her.
“And I’m way brawnier than I look,” Jake added, laughing.
“That’s good. Because you can all start while I check the doors, windows and the alarm system again,” Jackson told him. “Here are the rules—no one opens the gate without me knowing it. We’re going to be opening the balcony doors from our bedrooms, so I’ll have the alarm set during the day so that we can do that. Though it will sound if we don’t key ourselves in and out of the front door—everyone understand?”
“Yes, and thank God! I can’t imagine not going out on that beautiful balcony,” Whitney said. She didn’t seem the least disturbed by the house—simply fascinated.
“We’ll dig on in and help Whitney start getting set up,” Angela assured him.
“I won’t be that long.”
He was long, though. Longer than he intended.
None of them had been up to the third floor yet. After taking the grand stairway to the second floor, he briefly checked each of the rooms on the front end of the house, and came around to the middle section, and the stairway there. He went up to the third level. Thankfully, the middle section was one big expanse of space. With remnants from the decades that the house had stood.
No one had gotten up here yet to start on the cleaning. The area was rife with dust; it almost felt as if he took a step back into a different time. Dressmakers’ dummies were along the wall, near one of the three dormer windows. Jackson checked them; the alarm wires were in place. Clothing on the dummies ranged from an antebellum ball gown to a World War II–era swing skirt.
A huge old sewing machine was in another corner, and a wire crate held toys from eons past, wooden soldiers, dolls that might have been collectibles, croquet mallets, balls and wickets. More—he couldn’t discern everything in the container.
He walked through the low hallway at the one end, arriving at the area over the ballroom, and discovered that it had been set up as a row of dormitory–style rooms, and he assumed that the rooms had been slave quarters for the household staff at one time, and servants’ quarters at another.
It was slow going, but he checked each of the dormer windows. He walked back through the main storage room and through the low–ceilinged hallway to the last ell; here, he found just two rooms, both of them large, and both of them empty. But the alarm wires were in place, and the windows were secure. He walked back down to the second floor and went through all the motions, finally reached the first, and checked that all the windows not facing the courtyard were secure.
The place was huge. Despite the fact that the police had searched the premises, and despite the alarm system, Jackson still wondered if there hadn’t been a way for someone to slip in—uninvited, and unknown.
Back in the ballroom he discovered that his crew had been busy. There was a set of television screens arranged at the far end of the room, cables, cords, lights and more equipment aligned against the wall.
“We’re trying to decide which rooms should get the cameras first,” Angela told him. She stared at him peculiarly.
“What?” he asked.
“You look like a ghost yourself,” Whitney said, giggling.
“Like you’ve been playing in a pail of plaster,” Jake added. “You went up to the attic? I’m guessing there hasn’t been a cleanup crew there.”
He groaned and looked at his arm. The sleeves of his cotton shirt were white.
Once again, the doorbell rang and he walked to the door, expecting the remainder of the team.
A tall, slender woman of African descent stood there as straight as a ramrod, and as ancient as one. She frowned, seeing Jackson, and murmured something that seemed to be a prayer against curses.
Angela swiftly came running to the door, catching the woman’s hand. “Hi, I’m Angela. Jackson is just dusty—can we help you?”
“Gran–Mama!” Whitney cried. “You’re early.”
Jackson spun back to look at the old woman. Angela had reached out a hand to invite her in.
“Who are you?” Jackson demanded.
“I am Mama Matisse. Whitney didn’t tell you that she asked me to come?” the woman asked. “Whitney, child! I don’t come where I’m not invited!”
“Gran–Mama,” Whitney began, her face chalky, “I just haven’t had time to talk to them yet.”
“No, she didn’t,” Jackson said. “You’re a priestess? A voodoo priestess?”
“Yes. But I am also Whitney’s great–grandmother,” the woman explained.
Jackson wasn’t sure whether or not to be indignant at her demeanor. But he had the feeling that this woman could help them, and that the wisdom in her eyes ran deep. He bowed his head slightly. “Whitney didn’t mention you, but, please, yes, stay, help us.” He cast Whitney a frowning glare; she lifted her hands helplessly.
“Gran–Mama—Mama Matisse—was friends with both the maids who worked here. And she knew Regina and the senator. I thought you might want to hear what she can tell us,” Whitney said.
Jackson nodded at her. “I’ll run up and take a two–minute shower. Mama Matisse, Whitney will take you into the kitchen and get you some coffee or water or whatever. Please?”
“I am here to help you,” Mama Matisse said with tremendous dignity. “I will do my best. You see, the police have not much cared for what I’ve had to say, but I can tell you this—the very day that Regina Holloway died, her maid, Rene, came running over to tell me that there were ghosts in this house. There were ghosts, and there is tremendous evil, and whether or not they are one and the same, that you must discover.”
CHAPTER FIVE
Mama Matisse drew a long bony finger down her teacup as she sat at the kitchen table. “Whitney asked me to come here today because of the maids—and because I was here, and worked with Regina Holloway,” Mama Matisse explained.
“You worked with her?” Angela looked from Mama Matisse to Whitney.
“Regina Holloway was very fond on my great–grandmother, and believed in her wisdom,” Whitney explained.
Mama Matisse nodded gravely. “The maids will not come back in this house, Trini or Rene,” she assured Angela. “They are afraid. They have taken money from the senator to live on while they look for new positions. They need to keep working in this city, so if you were to try to call them and ask them questions, they would not come to you with a ghost story. They don’t mind if I speak to you in their stead. If you question them, if the police question them again, they will not speak about the ghosts, and that is all that there is to it. But they have talked to me, and I don’t believe they care that I talk to you.”
“Thank you,” Angela said.
“They are afraid that people will think that they are crazy,” Mama Matisse said. “Loco, as Trini says,” she added.
“My great–grandmother is considered to be extremely wise,” Whitney said. “Many, many people come to her. Whether they are voodooists, Jewish, Buddhists, Christian or whatever.”
“I promise you, we’re not going to repeat anything that you say,” Angela assured her.
Mama Matisse looked at her. “If you were to repeat what I say on behalf of the maids, it wouldn’t matter. I have said it, and not them.”
Angela nodded. Mama Matisse did not easily trust people, but Whitney had asked her to come, and so here she was.
“The women, both Rene and Trini, worked here the day that Mrs. Holloway died,” Mama Matisse said.
“Did they tell you that they saw something?” Angela asked.
“Yes, they saw a ghost. Or they thought they saw a ghost. He was in the hallway, Trini told me. They saw a man, and then he disappeared. They didn’t tell Mrs. Holloway. She had said that she didn’t believe in ghosts. And the man disappeared, so he couldn’t have been real. Mrs. Holloway had told them that she was going to lie down. They later heard that she was dead, that she had killed herself, going over the balcony. They were very upset.”
“Of course,” Angela murmured.
“I didn’t believe it,” Mama Matisse said. “I didn’t believe it a minute when they said that she committed suicide. Neither did her maids. She was Catholic. She went to church every Sunday morning, and sometimes, during the week. Her faith was strong. To a Catholic, it’s a grave offense to God for us to take our own lives.”
“But she was very upset about the loss of her little boy, right?”
“She was sad, yes,” Mama Matisse said. “So sad—I was here when the senator told his wife that they always wanted more children, and that they would try again, that they would have several. Mrs. Holloway told him that they couldn’t replace Jacob. The senator said no, they would never try to replace him. But they had always wanted more children and they would try. And she said that yes, she loved children, and she loved him, and that she would fix up the house, and that one day, they would have a family. And they talked about all the needy children in the world, and maybe they would have a child, and adopt a child.”
“That doesn’t sound like someone about to commit suicide,” Jackson said from the doorway to the kitchen.
He had showered away the dust, and appeared clean, striking and confident as he came in to join them. He was casual, pausing to pour himself a cup of coffee before taking a seat across the table from Mama Matisse. “She sounds like the nicest woman imaginable. What about the other people in their lives? Those closest to them? What about their day–to–day lives?”
“I don’t know about their day–to–day lives, Mr. Crow,” she said. Angela didn’t remember that Jackson had ever introduced himself, but Mama Matisse knew who he was. “I haven’t been here before on a day–to–day basis. I can tell you this—Mrs. Holloway had many friends. But she needed time to be alone—because people kept telling her how sorry they were about her son.”
“We really need to speak with the maids,” Jackson reminded.
Mama Matisse merely stared at him.
“I’m sorry. I’m grateful that you’re here.”
“The maids will not speak to you. They will not speak to anyone anymore. They talked to the police, and they have nothing more to say. They are afraid. They have their lives to live.”
“If this case ever goes to court—” Jackson began.
“Do you think that everything is solved in a court, Jackson Crow? I think that you know differently,” Mama Matisse said.
Jackson stared back at her. Angela was certain that he had reacted inwardly, but, as usual, she saw nothing change in his expression.
“You are right. You can’t always force the truth in court,” Jackson agreed. “So, please, tell me, who was closest to them. Tell me what you can. David Holloway is a politician, so his life is full of people, but tell me what you know about his relationships.”
“Let me think about those around him…There is Mr. DuPre, and Senator Holloway’s secretary, Lisa Drummond. Lisa Drummond protects the senator at his office. Martin DuPre tries very hard to be the go–between. He protects the senator’s time. The senator still appears to be reeling from what has happened. He is dependent on those around him. He must have an aide. He is proud of Mr. DuPre, and thinks that one day he will step into politics on his own.”
“Actually, I’m curious. The government is in Baton Rouge. Why was the senator so determined to have a wonderful home in which to entertain in New Orleans, do you know?” Jackson asked.
Mama Matisse smiled. “That is no mystery. New Orleans is their home. There need be no other explanation. They had an apartment in Baton Rouge, of course,” she said.
Jackson said, “Well, of course. I’m sorry. Of course. And Baton Rouge isn’t so far, right?”
“It’s just eighty miles,” Mama Matisse said. “But that’s why Senator Holloway has a chauffeur. He works in the car when he drives there and back.”
“But he must have stayed over in Baton Rouge often enough,” Jackson said.
“Yes, I suppose so.”
“Did Mrs. Holloway stay here alone when he was gone?” Jackson asked.
“Yes, many times. Of course, the senator was home a lot. The first week they moved in, the state legislature wasn’t in session,” the old woman told him. “You must understand, while I knew Mrs. Holloway I was not her spiritual adviser. She had her priest, but she did have me do a banishing spell.”
“A banishing spell?” Jackson asked.
“Yes, as a precaution against all evil,” Mama Matisse said. “But you must remember that Regina Holloway clung strongly to her own faith. Father Adair came and blessed the house. However, this is New Orleans, and she was part of the fabric of the city. A banishing spell is not black magic. Black magic is when you wish someone ill.”
Whitney cleared her throat and told them, “My great–grandmother does banishing spells often. And when you do a spell, it has to be done the right way. You are always careful not to wish anyone ill. If you wish a ghost to leave, you wish that the ghost finds peace, and you hope that leaving is what will bring the ghost peace.”
Mama Matisse nodded solemnly.
“I see,” Jackson said.
Angela wasn’t sure that he really “saw” anything, but she didn’t say so. Instead, she asked, “So, she wasn’t afraid of the house?”
Mama Matisse shook her head slightly. “No, I do not believe that she was afraid of her own house.”
“What about the chauffeur, Grable Haines? Is he still with the senator, and did he drive for Mrs. Holloway as well?” Jackson asked.
“To the best of my knowledge,” Mama Matisse said, “Mrs. Holloway never drove, and she only got into a car when she was going someplace with the senator. Friends picked her up sometimes, but otherwise, she did everything in the French Quarter. She liked a hat shop on Royal Street…She bought groceries just down on Royal, too. She liked to walk to Jackson Square, and go sit in the cathedral. She didn’t like to leave the area…She hated cars.”
“Because her son was killed in a car?” Angela asked.
Mama Matisse lifted her hands with a shrug. “So one might think. She didn’t own a car. She just rode with the senator when he wanted her with him. So, that means, if she had to go somewhere, she went with the senator—and Grable Haines. Oh, I believe she liked Grable. Everyone likes him. He is a handsome man,” Mama Matisse said. She leaned closer across the table toward Jackson. “But, sometimes, a man can be too handsome. Too many things in the world come too easily to him.”
“I understand,” Jackson said.
Mama Matisse smiled. “You understand, but you don’t accept many things,” she said.
Jackson smiled at her; they were challenging one another, Angela thought, and yet, it also seemed that they respected each other innately.
“Do you think that a ghost killed Regina Holloway?” Angela asked.
Jackson flashed Angela a quick look. “I’m asking,” she said quietly. “Just asking. Do you think that a ghost might have killed her?”
“I told you, I wasn’t here the day she died,” Mama Matisse said.
“But what do you think?” Jackson persisted.
“This is what they told me—Rene yelled for Trini. She was in the laundry room.” She pointed. The laundry room was a small area next to the kitchen, but the two rooms didn’t attach. “Trini said that she came quickly, and she thought she saw a man, vanishing into thin air. She made a cross on her chest and they both prayed to the Virgin and came into the kitchen, but there was nothing in here then.”
“You’re still not telling me what you think,” Jackson said, smiling.
“I think that evil can exist, that’s what I think,” Mama Matisse said. “I can only tell you what they said to me. If it’s true or not, I don’t know. But, soon after this happened, it was time for them to leave for the day. Mrs. Holloway came to the door with them, and they left. They were very frightened. That’s why they talked to me.”
“They never told Regina Holloway about the ghost?” Jackson asked.
“She said that she didn’t believe in ghosts—the maids would not have told her that they had seen one,” Mama Matisse said flatly, staring at Jackson.
“What about the alarm?” Jackson asked.
“They heard her set the alarm. She was always careful when she was alone.” Mama Matisse hesitated. “But…she didn’t like the basement. She never went there when she was alone. She locked the door that led down to the basement.”
Jackson looked at Angela. She kept staring at Mama Matisse.
“Did she say why she was scared of the basement?” he asked.
Mama Matisse shook her head. “She just said that basements—and attics—were inherently strange places. They were like depositories for the past, and she just didn’t like them.”
Jackson mulled that information over for a moment.
“She did believe, I’m sure, that she and the senator lived with a certain amount of danger and uncertainty because he was a politician.”
“Yes.”
Jackson then asked her, “Tell me about Senator Holloway’s bodyguard, Blake Conroy.”
Mama Matisse sniffed.
“He should have been guarding Mrs. Holloway, maybe,” Mama Matisse said. “The girls told me that he was always eating. Making a big mess in the kitchen, and thinking that he could make a big mess anywhere that he went. He is a big man,” she added.
“Was he mean, or rude?” Jackson asked.
“It’s rude to make a mess of a clean kitchen.”
Angela smiled; she saw that Jackson did, too.
“Did Mr. Holloway have a bodyguard just because he was a politician?” Jackson asked.
“Well, there are some people—and some groups—who don’t like the senator,” Mama Matisse said.
“Do you know who? Can you tell me about them?” Jackson coaxed. He apologized. “You see, we love New Orleans, but you know so much more than we do.”
“Senator Holloway said all people did was fight when what they needed to do was figure out a solution. To live in our world, we had to learn to compromise. Senator Holloway likes to give speeches. He says that he believes in New Orleans and the state of Louisiana—it’s a place for everyone to live, and to live together, and to remember the past so that we never repeat it,” Mama Matisse said.
“You don’t sound as if you believe all that,” Jackson said.
Angela was surprised; she hadn’t heard anything out of the ordinary in Mama Matisse’s voice.
She shrugged. “He is a politician.”
“So, who disliked him? Who would want to hurt him?” Jackson asked.
“The Aryans, for one,” she said.
“Have they become a political group in this town?” Jackson asked.
“They are bigots, that’s what they are,” Jake Mallory, who had been leaned against the counter, said irritably.
“They’re Louisiana based, but they’re an offshoot of a group that formed up in North Dakota. Most people around here ignore them,” Jake said. “They could make Archie Bunker look like a bleeding–heart liberal.”
“Archie Bunker?” Whitney murmured.
“Hey, don’t you ever watch TV?” Jake asked her. “Archie Bunker, All in the Family, a major television show in its social honesty, reflecting the changing times.”
“Hey, we can do television history at another time,” Jackson mimicked.
“Right. The Aryans do hate Senator Holloway,” Whitney said. She was next to Jake, and she lifted a hand dismissively. “They have a campaign against interracial marriage. Ridiculous.” She made a face. “I’d be a poster child for what not to do! They are convinced that we’ve diluted America, and that all mixed babies should be aborted.”
“They sound charming,” Angela said dryly.
“There’s another group, too,” Mama Matisse said. “The Church of Christ Arisen.”
Jackson waited, and Whitney explained, “They are like the Baptists, the Catholics and the Presbyterians all rolled into one.”
Jake sniffed. “That insults the Baptists, the Catholics and the Presbyterians!”
“They don’t believe in anything but early to rise, early to bed. No dancing, no drinking, no sex before marriage. Adultery means you’re banished from the church,” Whitney explained. “They believed that Haiti got what it received—just like New Orleans—when nature swept in and killed people. That was God taking vengeance on sinners. They campaign against Senator Holloway because he’s a huge believer in social reform. He opened a home for unwed mothers. They were horrified.”
Jackson frowned, confused. “But—they don’t believe in abortion, I take it. Why wouldn’t they want to help unwed mothers?”
“Unwed mothers shouldn’t exist,” Whitney explained.
“I see,” Jackson said.
“That’s why the senator needed a bodyguard,” Mama Matisse said, nodding solemnly. “I believe that the senator spent time investigating the groups, trying to find out what they might be up to next. But it was all very hush–hush, so I can’t really tell you much. He was worried that they might mean to take physical action against him.”
“So, they do believe in assassination?” Jackson asked.
“There was a doctor who came down from New York City and opened a clinic—a family–planning clinic. He was on a lot of the local talk shows. He denied that he had come because they call New Orleans the Big Easy,” Whitney said. “He was a smart man, from what I could see. He said that it was better for a confused young woman to abort a child early than to give birth in a ladies’ room and flush the living child down the toilet.”
“What happened to him?” Angela asked.
Whitney looked at her with a sad grimace. “He died in a hit–and–run accident just outside his clinic. It was over in the CBD—the Central Business District. Unrelated to their son’s accident.”
Angela could see that Jackson seemed to have acquired all that he wanted from Mama Matisse.
“You have been so kind to come and talk to us,” she said. “We thank you so much.”
Mama Matisse rose. She looked at Whitney. “You know where I am. Come to see me, and we can talk more if you wish.” She turned to Jackson, studying him. “You have the ability to find all the answers—if you let yourself do so.”
“Well, thank you for your faith. I’ll see you out,” Jackson offered, rising. “Do you need a ride anywhere? It would be the least we could do.”
Mama Matisse shook her head. “I am nearing ninety. I am nearing ninety because I walk the French Quarter every day. But thank you. You do have courtesy.”
“Well, thank you,” Jackson said. Angela was surprised when Mama Matisse offered him her hand. Jackson took it. There was an interesting exchange of gazes between the two. Mama Matisse smiled. They walked out together.
“This is so, so sad,” Whitney murmured.
“Yes, and it was good of your great–grandmother to come. Especially because she’s right. We can’t make the maids talk to us.”
“Because Rene thought that she saw a ghost. And she won’t tell anyone—but my great–grandmother. Neither was here when Regina died,” Whitney said. “But I knew that they had spoken with Gran–Mama.”
“Ah, but was it a ghost? A trick of the light, or her imagination—or was someone really in the house?” Angela asked reflectively.