Alexa raced across town. Nobody had checked out Andy “Doc” Tinsdale’s place, and unless somebody did so tonight, the place might not still be there later. He was dead and it was a loose end that would bother her until she saw for herself what was there. She had no warrant and no way to get a warrant. Most of the judges who were smart enough to issue one had long ago left the city.
With her GPS lady’s assistance, she arrived at 912 Fulton, her wipers barely able to keep the rain cleared. The hurricane was closing in. If the storm had ever seemed an abstraction to her, it was as real to her now as a section of lead pipe.
She ran through the driving rain to the darkened house and stood on the porch. She picked the lock and let herself inside, slipping on gloves as she did so.
The living room and kitchen held only a recliner, a floor lamp beside it, bookshelves, and a television set with rabbit ears, perched on a spindle-legged table. There was no dining table or chairs, only a TV tray leaned against the wall. The bookcase was comprised of cinder blocks and planks. The shelves held only paperback novels, alphabetized by author. There was not room for one more book on the planks.
The bedroom contained a mattress on box springs. Tinsdale’s clothes were neatly folded and in stacks against a wall. A cheap Oriental carpet covered the floor.
The closet held a packed suitcase. Alexa took it to the bed and opened it. Inside, she found clothes, a wig, a passport in the name Douglas Winston, and a plane ticket to Madrid. There was also a brochure in Spanish that showed before-and-after examples of cosmetic surgery. No wonder he didn’t care if he was identified.
Alexa ran her hands over the lining. Using her pocketknife, she cut the lining open and took out a manila envelope. She reached in and removed three sheets of notebook paper, filled front and back with cursive script she now knew well. The pages were the ones that had been removed from Fugate’s spiral notebook.
Trembling with excitement, she sat on the edge of the mattress, and read the pages slowly, absorbing the words written by a woman who was stunningly candid, although completely deluded, and perhaps as insane as the people she had spent her career nursing. Alexa was amazed by the same brand of evil that had allowed the Nazis to commit their atrocities to paper and film.
Unbelievably, the entry was dated the night of the LePointe murders. It began, It was a dark and stormy night…
Before she finished the first page, she understood why Andy Tinsdale had torn these sheets from the diary.
These lone pages were worth many times what the notebook without them was. Anyone with half a brain would never have killed this golden goose.
Not in a million years.
99
At eight o’clock on Sunday evening, Alexa left her hotel for the last time, put her suitcase and valise in the Bucar’s trunk, and made her way slowly up St. Charles Avenue. The street was not nearly as deserted as it should have been, with the storm’s fury mere hours away. The streetcars were still running, packed with evacuees headed for the Superdome.
It was raining hard, and according to the radio, the wind was gusting to thirty-five miles per hour now. Alexa passed a lone television sound truck parked outside Dr. LePointe’s home and pulled up to the gate in front of the mansion. The guard made a call before he opened the gate. Suddenly floodlights blasted her car as a cameraman aimed his camera at her. She ignored the shouted questions from the reporter wearing a raincoat with its storm hood up to protect her hair-a woman who looked like she just wanted to get the hell back to the safety of the TV station.
The Bentley was parked under the portico, aimed out for a fast exit. Alexa parked and strode to LePointe’s front door. A solemn black man opened the door and let her inside. Two men in overalls walked the large Turner painting up the hall, turned in the foyer, and carried it upstairs. Alexa supposed they were figuring if New Orleans flooded, the waters couldn’t reach the second floor.
“The doctor is in his study, miss. But he is leaving in a few minutes for the airport in Baton Rouge.”
“Thank you,” she told the servant before making for the office in the rear of the mansion. “I’ll be brief.”
Dr. LePointe looked up as she entered, closing the door behind her.
“The Bureau will be returning your bonds as soon as they process them,” she told him. “We recovered all but twenty.” She sat down without being invited.
“Twenty thousand?”
“Twenty bonds.”
“What happened to those?”
“I have no idea,” Alexa answered truthfully.
He said, “Not an excessive amount to pay, considering the results.”
Alexa noticed the glass of amber liquid on the desk and realized that LePointe was drunk.
“I suppose you can write it off to the soaring cost of dirty business.”
“You think I care about that money?” He waved his hand dismissively. “Inconsequential.”
“What I think is, it’s amazing you can keep from blowing your brains out.”
LePointe smiled thinly and rocked back in his chair. “I suppose it’s beyond your experience, and I don’t want your understanding or forgiveness. I made misjudgments, but I assure you my intentions were to protect my niece from the ugly truth. Are you here to gloat?”
“I’m going to do everything I can to see that you go to jail.”
“That’s a good one. Take your best shot, Agent Keen.”
“I intend to.” Alexa took the recorder out of her purse, turned it on, and sat back to watch LePointe’s face.
“Stop saying I did it. Tell a lie. Stick a needle in Sibby’s eye. Fucker man, the fucker man. Put the chopper in my hand. Windy rain. Windy rain. The stinky nurse is here again. Lie bitch, lie bitch, I know the trues. I never lose. I still can choose. The baby comes, the liars go. The smiling cop deserves a blow. Tell the people what you know.”
“Do you remember Dr. LePointe?”
“Fucker man, fucker man. Put a chopper in my hand.”
“Sibby, who killed those people in the kitchen?”
“Fucker man.”
“Who brought you to that house where the dead people were?”
“Windy rain.”
“It was stormy that night. Who took you there?”
“Stinky nurse.”
“Nurse Fugate?…Note: Sibby is nodding.” Alexa’s voice was steady. “Sibby, who chopped up the bodies?”
“Raincoat fucker man. Put the cleaver in my hand.”
“He put the cleaver in your hand after he chopped them up?”
“Fucker man push Sibby down. Bloody blood. Who did it? You did it. Who did it? You did it. Who did it? You did it. No. Lie, lie, lie. Fucker man do. Not Sibby.”
Alexa snapped the recorder off.
LePointe’s face had lost its color. He took a drink, then shook his head.
“She’s an extremely sick woman.”
“She knows,” Alexa said.
This surprised Dr. LePointe, but he managed to say, “Pure nonsense. Obviously Dorothy can’t confirm your suspicion.”
“That’s why you and Dorothy kept her a prisoner and tried to destroy her mind. Sibby knew.”
“Sibby heard voices. In fact, if I recall, this fucker man was a voice she listened to. One among many. The voice probably commanded her to kill Curry and Rebecca.”
