Grave Mistake

Toussaint, Louisiana Jilly Gable had a man to confront. Maybe this time Guy Gautreaux would keep his big mouth shut and let her finish what she had to say before he piled in and told her what to do and why, and reminded her of his earlier warning that the reappearance of her long-lost mother could be bad news. Guy had trouble with the concept that a woman could have a change of heart after thirty years of not giving a damn about a person. He didn't believe people changed; he thought that as years went by they became more of what they had always been. In this case, once a bad mother, eventually a really bad mother. Jilly pulled her aging VW Beetle into the forecourt at Homer Devol's gas station--the last gas station on the way out of the town of Toussaint, and first on the way in, depending on whether you were going or coming and which side of the sign you looked at. Homer usually went to pick his granddaughter up from school in the afternoon, leaving Guy to tend the gas station and the convenience store beyond, where a string of colored lights outlined the roof. The lights stayed on all day and into the evening, all year. Pots of showy geraniums hung beneath the eaves with ivy trailing to the ground. Jilly looked around. Nothing on two legs moved. With her head out of the window, she called, "Homer! Guy!" then she screwed up her eyes and listened. No response. She looked quickly toward the road. All day she'd had a sick sensation that she was being followed, watched. Last night she had got a warning, even if it wasn't direct, that someone was watching her movements. Who better to advise her than Guy, a New Orleans Police Department homicide detective on extended leave? Way to the left, closer to the bayou, Homer's split-timber house stood on stilts with its gallery facing the bayou across the sloping back lawn. She got out of the lime-green Beetle and went through the useless exercise of trying to take in a breath. Hot didn't cover it. Heat eddies wavered above the burned-out grass and did their shaky dance on tops of the roofs. From where she was she could see cypress trees crouching, totally still, over Bayou Teche. Beards of Spanish moss hung from branches as if they were painted there, and the pea-green surface of the bayou might have been set-up Jell-O. Even the gators would be sleeping now. She reached behind her seat and hauled out several bakery boxes tied together with string. If she didn't get them inside fast, the contents would be gooey puddles. Jilly owned All Tarted Up, Flakiest Pastry In Town, one of Toussaint's favorite gathering places. Her brother, Joe--a lawyer--had been her partner until his marriage the previous year. She'd been able to assume the loans and she loved having the business to herself. Guy's beat-up gray Pontiac hugged a slice of shade beside the store, but she saw no sign of the man, either in the gas station or the store. He didn't live out here and mostly stayed away from the house. A walk toward the bayou ended her search. He stood on the dock, a cell phone clamped to his ear, his arms crossed, and his face pointing away from her. A door slid open behind her and she jumped, swung around and barely kept her balance. Homer's fish-boiling operations were housed in this other building, one you didn't see until you got close to the bayou. Ozaire Dupre walked out and turned to slide the doors shut, but not before the dense smell of boiling fish rushed free. Ozaire, caretaker at the church, man of many schemes, also helped out with Homer's boiling and drove the giant pots of fish, and sometimes vats of his part-time boss's own special gumbo, to backyard barbecues or any event looking for real Louisiana cooking. Ozaire saw Jilly and frowned, shook his big, shaved head dolefully. "Better you keep me company today, girl. That one down there--he's one big, black cloud, him." Ozaire fooled some peCameron, Stella is the author of 'Grave Mistake ', published 2006 under ISBN 9780778323532 and ISBN 0778323536.