Not a single red-haired woman, tall, short or in between, could he pick out in the crowds.
Scully’s didn’t serve food in the daytime so only a few hardy drinkers straggled in. There wasn’t any music until the evening. Danny said the reason was that any daytime tourists in search of a meal headed for Bourbon Street. The regulars were all he got.
He had to go in, Gray decided. And he’d think of something to say by the time he got there.
At the curb, waiting for an open-topped tour bus to pass, he had an interrupted view of the door at Scully’s. Riders’ heads got in the way, then breaks came and he glimpsed his target through grubby windows.
Not so grubby that he didn’t see the sun catch on the polished brass door handle when two women left Scully’s. One tall, dark haired and dressed in beige, the other shorter with long, blond hair.
He readied himself to erupt across the street as soon as the bus was out of his way. To his right sat another taxi, just idling away, its filthy noxious exhaust trembling in the heat.
The women across the street got into a black BMW that surged away, threading through impossibly small spaces and skimming the sidewalk when necessary.
Why such a hurry? he wondered.
Gray dithered an instant, deciding whether to try following.
Most likely an instant too long. He decided to go after the women and waved in the wing mirror of the cab closest to him.
A small woman nabbed it before he could reach the handle. Intent on securing the ride, she didn’t look in his direction, but she wore a black T-shirt and shorts. Even if a stray red curl or two at the back of Marley’s neck, beneath the wide brim of a veiled, black hat hadn’t given her away, the flash of her long trailing leg would have.
Up ahead the BMW made a right turn followed by Marley’s cab.
Gray felt doom bearing down on him. He was going to lose Marley and he didn’t want to think about the potential outcome of that.
A bicycle messenger ran down the steps from a military model shop. “Hey,” Gray said, hopping in front of the lanky, blond kid. “Can I borrow your bike?”
“Do I look stupid?” the kid said.
Gray grabbed the handlebars of the messenger’s rusted-out bike. “I’ve got to get somewhere. I’m desperate.”
“I gotta get back to base or I’m toast.”
Whipping out some bills, Gray flapped them in the blond boy’s face. “Would this buy the bike?” It was three times what the heap of rust was worth.
The kid was moving a wad of gum from one cheek to the other and closing his fingers on the money when Gray leaped on the bicycle. As he rode away, he grabbed the messenger’s black baseball cap.
“What’s that?” the kid hollered. “Now you gotta get extra with the deal.”
“Why not,” Gray shouted without turning back. “Don’t we all expect a little
He pedaled away with the sound of disbelieving laughter in his ears.
The BMW, with Marley’s cab on its tail, made a loop and headed away from the French Quarter. Gray pulled the baseball cap down over his eyes and pedaled like hell, making sure he didn’t get too close, or a traffic light too many behind. He soon saw their route led back through the warehouse and business areas toward the Garden District.
Bikes were good things in tight spots. Somewhere in the back of the garage at the Creole cottage he shared with Gus in the Faubourg Marigny there was a bicycle. He’d check it out and keep it handy.
The Garden District came up fast, partly because of the speed the BMW managed to make by keeping up its weaving path between all vehicular comers.
Greek Revival, Romanesque and Italianate mansions glowed in the sunlight along streets lined with old oaks and sycamores.
Between elaborate columns, closed shutters helped trap cool air inside the high-ceilinged rooms they hid.
Here there were fewer cars. Gray hung back and hoped that Marley wasn’t looking.
His next thought was gratitude that he had slowed down. The cab swerved to the side of the road and stopped as if it had encountered a spike strip.
Under most circumstances, Gray would have ridden past, but that would be pushing his luck. He rode onto the sidewalk, leaned the bike against a hedge and crouched down as if he was having problems with a chain.
The black car had pulled into the driveway of a vast pink mansion with intricate wrought-iron railings along its flower-laden galleries and central double doors at the top of a tall flight of white stone steps. The house stood atop mounded lawns so green they didn’t look quite real and pristine pathways snaked through the grounds. Just visible at the back of the property was a white pavilion surrounded by flower beds. As Gus would say, this house wasn’t bought with green stamps.
Marley got out of the cab and paid it off. Gray could make a few guesses at the next move she intended to make and any of the possibilities could mean trouble.
She stood behind the trunk of a large tree and peered around to look across the street. He understood why she needed to cover her hair, but where had she come up with the huge black straw affair? She might as well be in a raincoat with the collar turned up!
Sidney ran up the front steps of the mansion and paused, looked back to watch Pipes’s slow climb. Gray saw Sidney’s impatient head motion. Then he saw Marley prepare to leave her cover.
One of the front doors of the house called Bord De L’Eau opened and the women went inside.
Gray sprang. He caught Marley in the middle of the street, hauled her from her feet and carried her, kicking, back to the sidewalk.
“What do you think you’re doing?” she hissed when he plunked her down behind the tree she’d recently left. “Where did you come from? You followed me, Gray Fisher.”
“You’re right. And I’m going to keep on following you as long as you seem to have a death wish.”
Chapter 18
“You are so out of line,” Marley told Gray. “Get out of my way.”
His expression went from inscrutable to steely determined and he muscled her against the tree. “When I can trust you not to try something bloody stupid—like showing up at that house over there without an invitation—I’ll let you go wherever you want to.”
“Trust me?” Her voice rose to a squeak. She cleared her throat. “You are out of your mind. It doesn’t matter what you do or don’t trust me to do. I’m none of your business.”
“You’ve become my business,” he said and she could tell he was deadly serious. “When you announced you’d seen two women the cops kind of think I could have knocked off, your life and mine got wound up together. Live with it.”
“How did you get here?” she asked him. At least she knew where to find Sidney so she could come back again once Gray lost interest. She looked at him. He didn’t show any sign of losing interest.
“What do you think you’re going to do?” he said.
“What I’m not doing is giving you chapter and verse on my movements. Before or after I make them.”
A woman pushing a baby buggy approached. Beside her, holding the buggy handle, a toddler boy with a tattered red cape tied around his neck trotted along. The boy chattered while the woman murmured responses.
“If you don’t get out of my way,” Marley said through her teeth, “I’ll make a scene.”
“In front of a couple of kids and their nanny?” Gray said. “Into scaring women and children, are you? Very nice.”
“Ooh,” she said under her breath.
Gray held her hand again, too tightly for her to get free, and said, “Hi,” to the passing trio.
