Читать книгу The French Quarter - Ken J.D. Mask - Страница 9

It’s amazing how quickly bad news spreads. I looked up, thinking that my next visitor would be a physician or some nursing assistant, but in walked Pepper Louise. Behind her was Iris French. Strange that the two would arrive to visit me at the same time. I closed my eyes as quickly as I had opened them, hoping they would think I was asleep, and perhaps would not want to be disturbed.

Strange. I found myself not wanting visitors, particularly these two—not these two together. Had they talked? Did they know? I didn’t need any confusion, drama at this point in my life. There was too much going on.

“Hi, baby,” Pepper grabbed my hand. In her mid-40s, she looked like she was in her mid-20s, pretty brown, short black curly hair, not too much make-up, bright dark black eyes, dancing with the rooms contents, immaculately dressed in a causal blue pin stripped jump suit. She kissed me on my cheek gently.

“Job’s gone over some things with me. We’re going to help you with this.”

Iris chimed in behind her, “Hey, Jake. How ya doing?” She hesitated before she said “honey,” which she usually called me, looking at Pepper.

Iris, my most recent love interest, a young 20-year-old Midwestern blonde with piercing gray-green eyes, looked around the room, smiling. It was obvious to me that Iris would be cool. They hadn’t talked.

We sat there for a few moments chit-chatting about the events of my encounter until a nursing aide walked in to take vitals. She scurried around the equipment, tubing, and devices and looked at the two ladies as if to say, “I think it’s time for you two to leave.”

It must’ve been no later than 7:30 in the morning, and I thought, “Good, someone is in the room to break the tension.” The two of them, Iris and Pepper looked at each other. “Come on, Mrs. Louise, let’s leave.”

“Are you heading back to New Orleans?”

Pepper looked at her with her head tilted to the side. “Yes, I think I am. But, how do you know my name?”

“I’m Iris French. I work in the Tulane Law Library. I have helped you out on several occasions. I’m a Tulane Law student.”

“Oh, yes. Okay. I thought you looked familiar.”

Again, I heaved a sigh of relief hearing this dialogue. They knew each other on a different level, not associated with me. They exited, each waving.

* * *

I don’t know how long I was out, but when I opened my eyes, two gentlemen were in my room. One of them had a serious expression on his face and the other one seemed indifferent. Dressed in suits, both had legal pads in their hands and began asking questions.

“Where were you going when the police officers stopped you?”

I sat up in my bed and cleared my throat. “I was going home. I had been in the country taking care of some business. I got stopped. Do you know why? Who were the officers?”

“We’re asking the questions.” The man with the mustache sounded hassled as he reached for the chair adjacent to the night table.

“Where did you get that weapon?” The clean-shaven, bald man frowned.

Wait a minute now. Hmmmm, who are you guys and why are you asking me these questions?”

“Don’t get smart. You’re already in deep shit.”

“I need to speak with a lawyer. Is there a lawyer around?”

I stirred around, my sheets rustling. “I would like to speak with a lawyer.”

They looked at each other slyly.

“Okay, fine. You want to do this later, that’s fine with me. We just wanted to get some answers out of you.” They said it almost as if to say, you’ll be sorry if you don’t talk to us now.

But I realized this was something that D.A.s usually did just to get people to talk and say something without having appropriate briefing. I just stayed silent, and they walked out of the room.

A few moments later another nurse—a sister, thick-bodied, light Creole, an aquiline nose, a heart-shaped face framed by fine short curly reddish hair—came into my room. Compared to the raven-haired Latina nurse, this one seemed indifferent, colder, and insensitive. She fumbled around with my IV tubing, checked my sheets and bed, and then spoke to me in an abrasive voice. “You’re in a heap of trouble, son.”

“What’s this ‘son’ thing? This is the second time I’ve heard this from someone younger than me.”

“You’re going to need some help,” she mumbled under her breath, but meaning for me to hear it.

“Has someone called my …?”

“Yeah, I think they called your friend.”

“No, they’d better not call Melvin. He’s busy.”

I pondered my situation. Who could I get to come down and brief me on what’s going on? Who can I turn to? I know-Luke! He’ll help me. He’s stuff, solid as an old oak; he’s been through most of this before.

I looked up and noticed the nurse had left the room. I pushed the call button, and the same Creole nurse reentered, lips curled in a surly twist, almost as if to say, why are you bothering me?

“Could you do me a favor, please? Call Luke Jacobs. I mean, Luke Jacobs is a lawyer in New Orleans, and I need someone to get in contact with him.”

Her badge identified her as Gabrielle Delacroix. Lips pursed, Gabrielle scribbled the name down on a crumpled piece of paper, which looked like something she had wrestled out of her pocket. Nonchalantly, she murmured, “Okay, yeah, I’ll see what I can do. I think he’s been called.”

“No, this is serious. Can you please have Luke Jacobs called?”

“Yeah, I’ll get it done. I just have something to do right now.” She pivoted around, and then sashayed out of the room.

I thought of Luke, whom I had known since law school. Luke was solid; he was stable. Yes, Luke would be able to help me.

I fell asleep again. The next thing I know I hear the phone in my room ringing. Brrrr ... ing. Brrrrr ... ing. Brrrrr ... ing. Brrrr ... ing. It seemed to be the loudest thing in the room, in spite of all the beeping and wheezes of the blood pressure machine squeezing my arm, and the trilling heart monitor. That ring jarred me awake. I looked around to see where the phone was. It was halfway across the room so I attempted to get out of the bed. Just then, the same no-nonsense nurse entered the room, slid the table over to my bedside, picked up the receiver, and thrust it at me.

“Hello.” Given the fact that I was in the hospital, apparently had been shot, and was in a lot of trouble, I tried to be as cheerful as I possibly could, even tried to sound confident.

The caller was Luke Jacobs. “I’ll be right over,” were his only words.

I let out a sigh of relief. “Wait a minute, how far are you out?” It seemed like he was on his cell phone because I could hear the rumbling of an engine and the blowing of the wind, the usual accompaniments to cell phone calls, but he had clicked off.

Ten minutes later, he bounced into the room, smiling, confident but serious. He said to me, “Listen, I’ve done some research. There’s trouble.”

I said nothing and listened to him speak.

He talked for several moments, speaking of a murder, or rather a death.

“A death? I’m alive. What’re you talking about?”

“The police officer you shot is dead.”

“What do you mean?” I squeezed my eyes shut. Opening them again, I asked, “What do you mean a police officer is dead? The one I killed? I was merely acting in self—”

Luke interrupted me, “Where’d you get the gun, Jake?”

“What gun?”

“The gun. The gun you used to shoot him.”

Then, closing my eyes again, I traveled back through several cloudy visions of what had happened to me. Suddenly the whole scene came rushing back at me. I recalled the police officer, the big white one, leaning down, placing a gun in my hand.

“Oh yeah, that was planted on me. I mean the guy put it in my hand.” My words burst forth like a geyser.

For a moment, he looked at me, almost unbelievingly. He finally spoke up. “Yeah, son. You don’t even know what a gun feels like. I believe you.”

His “son” was more of a warm “son,” like a friend, like “everything’s going to be all right, son,” almost like the sun shining, son.

Luke got up, walked over to the telephone and punched in some numbers. Obviously realizing that he couldn’t call out from the hospital phone, he reached into his pocket, went over by the window to get better reception from his cell phone, and pushed some more numbers. I heard him saying to someone, “He told me they put the gun in his hand. Yeah, that’s right. He told me they put the gun in his hand.”

Luke spun around and faced me. “Is that all you remember?”

Closing my eyes, I thought back. It hit me. I’d better say something quick because whoever he’s talking to probably doesn’t have much time.

“There was a boy—I mean a boy was running away from where this thing happened.”

Luke told the person on the line, “He said there was someone who saw this thing.” He looked over at me, nodding his head for me to go on.

“It was a young boy, a young white boy.”

He then gave me an even look, as if he was trying to determine if my memory served me correctly.

“Are you sure? Do you know who this boy was? Well, no. You wouldn’t know who he was. You don’t live out this way. Could you describe him?”

“I can describe him. In fact, he ran away from the scene into some woods like he know where he was going. It was at some crossroads … yeah, I remember. I was on highway 90 about two blocks from where the turn is off of Venice Drive.”

“Yes, that is where the police report said the shooting occurred.”

“Yeah. It was on the same side as where the police officers had pulled me over. He ran into some woods and the police officers came back disgusted they couldn’t find him. He’s got to be up there somewhere close, in those houses. There weren’t too many of them there in that region. He must live somewhere up there.”

Luke spoke again to the person on the phone. “Yeah, I think we may have a witness.” Clicking his cell phone closed, he came over to my bedside again and put his hand on my head. “Everything’s going to be okay. I’m going to go down to the place and see if I can find out whom this boy is. Meanwhile, don’t say anything to the D.A. Do nothing till you hear from me.”

Jacobs soldiered on out of the room as quickly as he had come in.