The Whispering Room

“She claims she suffers from a mild form of agoraphobia. According to her, she’s prone to panic attacks anytime she leaves her house. So I’m sending someone to her place in the morning to hear what she has to say.”

“If you don’t mind my asking, why are you telling me about her?” Evangeline said. “I’m off the case, remember?”

“Oh, I remember all right. But Lena Saunders is refusing to talk to anyone but you, Theroux.”

“Me? Why? I don’t even know her.”

“She says she knew Johnny.”

Evangeline was stunned into momentary silence.

Her heart started to pound as she clutched her cell phone. “How?”

“Evidently, he was one of her NOPD contacts.”

“On which case?”

“She didn’t say.”

Even though the name had sounded familiar to Evangeline earlier, she was almost certain she hadn’t heard about Lena Saunders from Johnny. She would have remembered. And yet if he really had been one of the woman’s contacts, why hadn’t he mentioned her? He surely would have brought it up if he had talked with a writer.

“I still don’t understand why she wants to see me.”

“You can ask her yourself tomorrow,” Lapierre said.

“Does this mean I’m back on the case?”

“Nice try, but this is a one-time-only situation. The woman claims to know something about the Courtland murder case and we need to know what that something is. And since she has some influen-tial friends up the food chain, I’m inclined to accommodate her just this once. The last thing I want is a deputy chief breathing down my neck.”

Lapierre’s voice lowered conspiratorially. “Look, Theroux. I can’t tell you what to expect when you go over there in the morning, but just watch yourself, okay? This woman may not be the kind of tinfoil-hat whacko we’re used to dealing with, but if you ask me, she sounds like a real kook. This could be nothing more than a figment of her imagination, but we’ve got to hear her out anyway. When you leave her place, you come straight back to the station and see me. Don’t talk to anyone else about this, not even Hebert. You got me?”

“Yes, ma’am,” Evangeline said, resisting the urge to gloat. The unintended consequence of Lena Saunders’s request was that now Evangeline had more leverage than she’d had ten minutes ago. Not much more maybe, but if she played her cards right, she might just persuade Lapierre to put her back on the case.

“Where and when do I meet her?” she asked.

“Nine o’clock tomorrow morning at her house.”

She gave Evangeline the Garden District address, then hung up.

A few minutes later, Mitchell called. “Thought you’d like to know, I just heard from Lorraine. She was over at Linda’s house when Nathan called. Sounds like he’s on his way to the cemetery. If you hurry, you can probably still catch him.”

“Hey, thanks for the heads-up.”

“No problem. You want me to meet you over there?”

“I’m only ten minutes away. He’d probably be gone by the time you could get there.”

“Yeah, you’re probably right about that. Traffic’s a bitch today. Anything else going on I should know about?”

Evangeline hated keeping things from Mitchell, but she also knew better than to get on Lapierre’s bad side. “Same old, same old,” she muttered.

They chatted for a few more minutes, and then she called her mother to warn her she’d be late picking up J.D.

It wasn’t until she’d hung up that Evangeline remembered she’d yet to thank her mother for the mobile.

The sun was just setting when Evangeline pulled her car to the curb near the cemetery gates. Killing the engine, she watched as a tour guide shepherded a group of tourists to a waiting bus.

That’s good, she thought. Get them all out of there before dark.

Although popular destinations for tourists, New Orleans cemeteries were extremely dangerous at night. Common sense dictated that the narrow paths between the rows of vaults and tombs could effectively conceal a mugger, and yet every year people fell prey to vicious assaults, especially in the old cemeteries near the Quarter.

Before she climbed out of the car, Evangeline slid her gun into the back pouch of her bag. Then she slipped the strap over her shoulder and across her body for easy access. As she walked across the street, she stayed alert for any untoward movement.

And for Nathan Mallet.

She’d already spotted his red Mustang across the street. The 1967 classic stood out among the SUVs and minivans of the tourists, and Evangeline remembered how much Johnny had always coveted that car.

But to her eyes, the Mustang looked worse for the wear since the last time she’d seen it, and she wondered again what Nathan had been up to since Johnny’s shooting. Why he had felt the need to leave town so quickly.

Several people still milled about inside the brick walls even though the sun was already setting. By New Orleans standards, Mount Olive was relatively new, but it had many of the same characteristics as the older cemeteries. The rusty iron gates opened into an eerie necropolis of sun-bleached tombs and contrasting shadows cast by the crosses and statues.