Booty Bones: A Sarah Booth Delaney Mystery (9 page)

Terrance Snill tsked. “Ah, so you’re taken with Armand Couteau. He’s quite a popular local figure. French nobility, blackguard, buccaneer, and savior of young slave women. A romantic figure. Not a single woman comes into this store who doesn’t fall in love with him, at least a little bit.”

“I’ve heard of him.” I recalled Angela’s comments. “He’s a very handsome man. A real swashbuckler.”

“And lived life by his own rules. He threw over an inheritance as a relative of Napoleon Bonaparte and threw in with famous French pirate Jean Lafitte. They were the terrors of New Orleans for a number of years. Stories have it that the mayor of New Orleans put a price on Lafitte’s head and had flyers printed and posted all around New Orleans. Lafitte printed handbills of the mayor, doubling the ransom offer. Guess who was worried? Not Lafitte.”

I laughed out loud, and realized how long it had been since I’d done so. Snill was a fine storyteller. “There’s a story about a treasure Couteau buried here. I can’t recall the details,” I prompted.

“Treasure, stolen slave girl who became his wife, and so much more.”

“Do you have time to refresh my memory?” I asked.

“Since I’ve retired, I have nothing but time. This is the slow season here on the island. In fact, I frequently lock the doors on weekdays and only open on Saturday. But have a seat. Perhaps a cup of tea or cocoa?”

“Cocoa would be lovely.”

He went in the back of the shop and returned in a few moments with two steaming cups of cocoa. Tiny marshmallows floated on top of the chocolaty beverage. I would need the warmth for the bicycle ride back to the cottage. October wasn’t cold, but it was brisk, and the afternoon was fading.

“My dog is outside. May I bring her in?”

“Of course. I love dogs,” Snill said. “My best friend, Maybelline, died last year. I’ll go to the shelter and get another dog, but my heart needs time to heal.”

I understood his need to recover, but I also knew I could never be without my four-legged friends, and so many wonderful dogs needed a home. When Sweetie was resting at my feet, I settled back to hear the tale of a Mobile Bay pirate.

“Pirates like Couteau and Lafitte were very bold. They robbed the ships right off the coast, and within a matter of weeks, they’d smuggle the stolen goods ashore and sell them on the streets of New Orleans. Often they’d sell them to the very people who’d already paid to have them brought over from Europe.”

It was indeed an audacious scheme. The ruling class would be furious, yet the pirate’s actions appealed to me. Not exactly a Robin Hood angle, but close.

“Couteau took the loot and spared the lives of the sailors. In fact, a lot of sailors changed allegiance and went to sail with the pirates. Like Lafitte, Couteau had an island garrison off the Louisiana coast. He declared his island a free state and imposed his own rules, which followed the tenets of socialism. The wealth the pirates stole was divided among all of the residents, and women were given an equal share.”

“Fascinating.” I hung on Snill’s every word.

“Couteau was a notorious thief of slaves, both male and female. He snatched them from the streets of New Orleans or Mobile or even off slave ships. Once they were safe on his island, he gave them their freedom. They could leave or stay. The majority stayed. If they’d gone back to the mainland and been captured, chances are they would have been sold back into slavery.”

“Couteau treated them as people, not property.” I took the last swallow of the delicious cocoa.

“The part most of my female audience enjoys is the story of Armand’s masterful theft of a beautiful young slave girl, a princess snatched from the coast of Benin and brought to America in chains.”

“What could be more romantic than a pirate and a slave girl?” I asked. Sweetie agreed with a soft hound-dog yodel.

“LuAnn is an interesting figure,” Snill said. “My research proves she did exist. And she was a princess. She was fluent in French as well as her native language and she was apparently an acclaimed musician. She played a type of woodwind instrument.”

“How did she come to be taken as a slave?”

Snill shook his head. “There are no accounts. She first entered the history I know in New Orleans. She’d been brought from Benin to Louisiana and sold to a wealthy sugarcane planter in Louisiana to work the cane fields, but he heard her playing the flute and brought her into his home as a house servant.”

A lucky break for her. The cane fields were hard labor. “How did she meet Armand?” Snill had swept me up in the story.

“The pirates had a warehouse near the French Quarter in New Orleans. As I said, Couteau was brassy. He strolled the streets of New Orleans, almost daring the authorities to take action against him. Of course they didn’t, because they feared retribution from the pirates. Couteau was selling their stolen wares right under their noses.”

It was a damned clever scheme, and one that required guts as well as brains.

“LuAnn had been sent to the French market for fresh fruit and vegetables. She was shopping when Armand saw her. It’s said he fell in love instantly and followed her back to the Thomason home, where she lived.”

I could picture it. This beautiful woman moving sensually between the tomatoes and peppers, the long strings of garlic. She gathered the provisions she needed in a basket, unaware she’d caught the eye of the handsome pirate.

“Armand shadowed her for several weeks. One day he approached her in the market. She was very shy, but few women could resist the pirate’s dark charm. He brought her presents. The best gift of all, though, was her freedom. That’s what he offered her.”

That would be the ultimate gift. “And so she left with him?”

“Indeed. They were married on his island, and for a while they lived a wonderful life.”

Until it ended. This part wasn’t something I was ready to hear. I stood and handed Snill my empty cocoa cup. “I think the conclusion is going to make me very sad.”

“It doesn’t turn out well. Shipwreck, Couteau dies in prison here on Dauphin Island. LuAnn, who was on board the pirate ship, was rescued and sold back into slavery. They held the slave auction right on the beach, just about where your rental cottage might be. They wanted to make an example of LuAnn to the other pirates. From a life of relative luxury, she was sent to Alabama to work in the cotton fields.”

“A harsh sentence.”

“Runaway slaves were treated like murderers. In some areas, they were killed. LuAnn wasn’t executed because it was widely believed Couteau stole her against her will. And after the shipwreck, she was thought to be a little insane. She kept insisting that she could find a great treasure if only they would free her. She said she knew where to find Couteau’s map revealing the location of the treasure he’d been trying to claim when a storm smashed his ship against a reef.”

“Do you believe there’s such a treasure?” I wondered how the local populace assessed the old legend.

“It’s Couteau’s treasure one of our local residents said he’d found. But he died before he could retrieve it.”

Here was more than just folklore. This was pertinent to my investigation.

“Do you believe John Trotter really found Couteau’s treasure?”

“I do, and I see you’ve heard the tragic story. John was a dedicated hunter. He worked on Couteau’s missing booty for more than a decade, and it cost him his life.”

“You know a lot about Trotter’s business.” I tried to soften the words with a curious tone.

“I was the postmaster. Letters coming in and going out. John wrote hundreds of organizations, other treasure hunters, historians, and even a few kooks who claimed to have information about the pirate. He also wrote the Thomason family—the people who bought LuAnn. John believed LuAnn did know how to locate the treasure, and he was hoping the Thomasons had some record of her claims. I think he found what he was after. Of course, I don’t know what the letters said, but I do know he worked at it hard.”

“And you really think he found it?”

“John stopped by the shop late on the afternoon he was killed. He was on top of the world. He said he’d found the key to bringing up Couteau’s gold. Said he’d have it in his hands within the week. He just had to get back something he’d sold.”

“What was it?” I couldn’t believe my good luck.

“He didn’t say, exactly.” Snill rubbed long, thin fingers on his chin. “But he went to stand in front of Couteau’s portrait. And he laughed and said, “What a clever devil Couteau was. The key has been right in front of us.”

Opinions didn’t carry much weight, but I figured I’d ask while I was there. “Do you believe Larry Wofford killed John Trotter?”

He laughed heartily. “That’s ludicrous. They were friends. Sure, they sometimes drank too hard and got sloshed, but neither of them had a violent temper. Larry is harmless. He adored John. And Angela. He thought that girl walked on water. The way I see it, Larry was easy to convict, and the sheriff’s department needed a resolution to a murder. They’d had a rough year with a number of unsolved crimes, and I have to say, Angela had given them the dickens when she was a reporter. She kept things stirred up about the incompetence of the sheriff and his department. Larry Wofford was an easy target. No money, no family to fight for him.”

“That’s what Angela says.”

“So you’ve met our island princess?”

I nodded. “I’m working for her. Just for this week while I’m vacationing on the island. I’m a private detective.”

Instead of being taken aback, Snill was thrilled. “I hope you can find evidence to overturn Larry’s conviction. He’s a good guy. You’d be righting a terrible wrong.” He hesitated. “Just be careful.”

Goose bumps danced along my skin. “Why do you say that?”

“John was a dreamer, but he wasn’t superstitious. The day he was killed, he told me that he was worried. Something in a letter he received.”

“You were the postmaster, can you remember who John corresponded with?”

Snill snapped his fingers. “There was a flurry of letters from a man named Remy Renault. Another treasure hunter. He has a private dock off an inlet in Heron Bay not too far from here. Word was he dredged and put it in before the EPA stopped such things. Anyway, John hinted that Remy might attempt to jump his claim on the Esmeralda treasure.”

“Did the sheriff pursue this line of investigation before arresting Wofford?”

Snill slowly shook his head. “I don’t think so. To be honest, I can’t recall mentioning this to the sheriff. I never considered Remy a real treasure hunter. He never did the work, but he might try to jump someone else’s claim.” His eyebrows drew together in consternation. “Do you think I’ve been sitting on important information and didn’t have the good sense to know it?”

I could only hope that was true. “I’ll check it out.” I took down the directions to the private dock.

“Be careful. Remy is known to have a hair-trigger temper. And he’s not much for manners. He moored here a while, but several of the regulars complained because he said rude things to them. There were incidents where boats were damaged. Maybe not by accident.”

I didn’t say it, but Remy Renault sounded far more like a candidate to commit murder than Larry Wofford. I had one more name to check. “What do you know about Lydia Clampett?”

He tilted his head. “Can’t say I’ve ever heard of her. How does she fit in?”

“I’m not sure. I heard she was a friend of Wofford’s.”

“She’s not local. And whoever she is, she sure didn’t stick around when Larry was charged. Larry had a reputation as a rounder, which worked against him as far as John was concerned. He was protective of Angela. This Clampett could be some woman from Florida. Larry did a lot of carpentry work for the ladies, if you get my drift.”

“I do.” Wofford made questionable life decisions. As Cece would put it, he wasn’t always thinking with his big head. But if that was a jailing offense, a respectable percentage of the population would be in the slammer.

8

Darkness had fallen over the island like a star-spangled blanket. Sweetie and I paused in front of Snill’s shop, taking in the scent of the ocean and the beauty of a sky unclouded with pollution. I pedaled hard toward the cottage and Sweetie galloped at my side. Like most hounds, she was well put together and aerodynamic. She made running at twenty miles an hour seem like a piece of cake. My legs were about to come off at the hips, but Sweetie bounded along without effort.

When we got to the cottage, it was full-on dark. The night and the cottage. Where was Graf? Pluto was gone, too, so perhaps he and the cat had taken a stroll. I would get a flashlight and track them. Better yet, put Sweetie on the scent, and I would have Graf in my sights in no time. Why mess around with flashlights and sandy tracks? We hurried to the beach and Sweetie turned east, toward the long row of mostly empty cottages.

I loved the wind whipping my hair and clothes and the sound of the surf. The magic of the island was almost overpowering. When Sweetie struck a trail and took off, I shifted into a jog to catch up with her.

Down the beach, a child’s squeal of delight was answered with Sweetie’s happy bark. Movement ahead alerted me that I wasn’t alone. Graf stood at the edge of the water looking south, toward the Caribbean and the waters that Armand Couteau had once used as his hunting grounds. I couldn’t wait to tell him the romantic story of the pirate and the slave girl.

But then another person appeared against the white sand. Two more, in fact. The slender blonde and the child, sharing a flashlight, walked away from Graf, heading down the beach. The child raced into the foaming surf as Sweetie Pie barked and played at her side. The woman’s laughter rippled on the gusting wind.

Something about the scene stopped me dead in my tracks. I wanted to rush to Graf and ask who the woman was and whether he knew her. I couldn’t. Dread held me motionless. Had Graf come down to the beach to meet this woman? Or was it just coincidence?

The woman and child disappeared into the darkness, and I still couldn’t move. In a moment, Graf approached me, and I forced myself to call his name. I didn’t want him to find me standing in the dark as if I was spying on him. When he drew abreast, I waited for him to greet me with a hug, but he didn’t.