Voodoo River

'I don't think so.'

'Maybe I put it in a different year.'

'I don't think I'll need it.'

He nodded thoughtfully, told me to call him if I needed any help with the little crank, then went back to his book cart. When he was gone I took the January spool out of the microfiche and dug around in the box until I found the two July spools. I threaded in the first and skimmed through until I reached the Gazette dated 9 July. The ninth was a Tuesday and had no birth announcements. I searched through the tenth, eleventh, and twelfth, which was the following Friday. Friday's paper had three birth announcements, two boys and twin girls. The boys were born to Charles amp; Louise Fontenot and William amp; Edna Lemoine, the twin girls to Murray amp; Charla Smith. As I was writing their names on a yellow legal pad, Mr. Parks strolled by. 'Are you finding everything you need?'

'Yes,' I said. 'Thank you.'

He nodded and strolled away.

I cranked the little spool back to the beginning of July and copied the birth announcements published at the end of every week, and then I did the same for June and August. When I was working through August, Mr. Parks pushed the book can next to me and made a big deal out of straightening shelves and trying to pretend that he wasn't interested in what I was doing. I glanced up and caught him peeking over my shoulder. 'Yes?'

Mr. Parks said, 'Heh heh,' then pushed the cart away. Embarrassed. They get bored in these small towns.

When I finished with August I had eighteen names. I put the little spools back into their box, turned off the microfiche, and returned the box to Mr. Parks. He said, 'That didn't take very long.'

'Efficiency. Efficiency and focus are the keys to success.'

'I hear that.'

I said, 'Is there a phone book?'

'On the reference table next to the card catalog.'

I went over to the reference table and looked in the phone book for the names I had copied. I was on the fourth name when Mr. Parks said, 'Seems to me you appear to be looking for someone.'

He was standing behind me again, peering over my shoulder.

I put my hand over the names. 'It's rather personal.'

He frowned. 'Personal?'

'Private.'

He peered at my hand as if he were trying to see through it. 'You're not from around here, are you?'

'No,' I said. 'I'm from the government. Central Intelligence.'

He looked offended. 'No reason to be rude.'

I spread my free hand.

He said, 'You were copying birth announcements. Now you're looking for those names in the phone book. I think you're trying to find someone. I think you're a private detective.' Great. The big-time Hollywood op gets made by the small-town librarian. He started away. 'Perhaps we should call the police.'

I caught his arm and made a big deal out of looking around. Making sure that the coast was clear. 'Thirty-six years ago, the person I'm working for was born in this area and given up for adoption. She has now contracted leukemia and requires a bone marrow transplant. Do you know what that means?'

He answered slowly. 'They need a blood relative for those transplants, don't they?'

I nodded. You toss it on the water and sometimes they take it, but sometimes they don't. He was a knowledgeable man. He'd know more than a little about marrow transplants. He could ask to speak with my client or my client's physician, and, if I were legitimate, they'd be more than happy to speak with him. He could ask me if the leukemia was acute or chronic, or he could ask me which type of white blood cells were affected. There were a hundred things he could ask me, and some of them I could scam but most of them could blow me out of the water.

He looked at my hand over the list of names, then he looked back at me and I saw his jaw work. He said, 'I saw some of your names there. I know some of those folks. This lady, the one you're working for, she gonna die?'

'Yes.'

He wet his lips, then pulled over a chair and sat down beside me. 'I think I can save you some time.'

Of the eighteen names on my list, Mr. Albert Parks knew four, and we found another three listed in the phone book. The rest had either died or moved away.

I copied addresses and phone numbers for the seven still in the area, and Mr. Parks gave me directions on how to find those people who lived in the outlying areas. He offered to phone the four that he knew to tell them that I'd be stopping around, and I said that that would be fine, but that he should ask them to respect my client's privacy. He said that he was certain that they would. He said that he hoped that I could find a donor for my client, and asked me to give her his very best wishes for a complete recovery. His wishes were heartfelt.

Mr. Albert Parks worked with me for the better part of an hour, and then I walked out of the cool quiet of his library into the damp midday Louisiana heat feeling about three inches tall. Lying sucks.

CHAPTER 4

O f the seven names on the list, four lived in town and three lived in the outlying area. I decided to speak with the townies first, then work my way out. Mr. Parks had recommended that I start with Mrs. Claire Fontenot who, as the widowed owner of a little five and dime just across the square, was the closest. He said that she was one of God's Finest Women. I took that to mean that she was kind and caring and probably easy to manipulate. Son of like Mr. Albert Parks. As I walked over I thought that maybe I should just cut out this manipulation business and proclaim for all the world who I worked for and what I was after. If I did, I would probably feel much better about myself. Of course, Jodi Taylor probably wouldn't, but there you go. Her privacy would be violated and her confidence breached, but what's that when compared to feeling good about oneself? Elvis Cole, detective for the nineties, comforts his inner child.

Going into Fontenot's Five amp; Dime was like stepping backward in time. Cardboard cutout ads for things like Carter's Little Liver Pills and Brylcreem – a little dab'll do ya! – and Dr. Tichnor's Antiseptic were taped and retaped to the door and the windows, filling the same spaces that they had filled when they were first put up forty years ago. Some of the cutouts were so faded that they were impossible to read.

An overweight girl in her late teens sat on a stool behind the counter reading a copy of Allure. She looked up when I entered.

'Hi. Is Mrs. Fontenot in?'

The girl called out, 'Miss Claire,' and a stately woman in her early sixties appeared in the aisle, holding a box of Hallmark cards. I said, 'Mrs. Fontenot, my name is Elvis Cole. I believe Mr. Parks over at the library might've phoned.'

She looked me up and down as if she viewed me with caution. 'That's right.'

'May I have a few minutes?'

She viewed me some more, and then she put down the box of cards and led me to the rear of the store. She seemed rigid when she moved, as if her body were clenched. 'Mr. Parks told me that you want to know something about a baby that was given up for adoption.' She arched an eyebrow when she said it, clearly suspicious of the practice and disapproving.

'That's right. Somewhere around the time that Max was born.' She had delivered a son, Max Andrew, sixteen days before Jodi Taylor's birth.

'Tm afraid I don't know anything about that. I kept all my children, believe you me.' Daring me to deny it. When she spoke, she kept both hands folded together between her breasts, as if she were praying. Maybe you did that when you were one of God's finest.

'Not one of your children, Mrs. Fontenot. Another woman's child. Maybe you knew her, or maybe you just