City of Masks

7

The business was either something scary happening in someone's head or something scary happening in an old house in the Garden District. Before going to her appointment with Lila Warren the next morning, just to get an idea of what she was up against, Cree drove over to take her first look at Beauforte House.

Following her city map, she headed out Magazine Street, through downtown and then through a wilderness of highway overpasses and interchanges. That gave way to a dilapidated but charming older district, and then as she continued west the style and feel of the neighborhoods began to change dramatically. The buildings grew in size and improved in appearance; greenery intruded and diversified. By the time she crossed Jackson, the houses had become huge and much more like Cree's image of classic Deep South architecture.

From her reading, Cree knew that the Garden District grew from an invasion of Americans who began moving to the city after the United States purchased the Louisiana Territory in 1803. Before the railroad era, the Mississippi was the artery of trade and transport, New Orleans the center of economic activity, for the whole middle of the continent. The river and lush agricultural lands had been good to the original French and Spanish settlers, allowing them to convert a swampy backwater into a thriving financial and cultural center ruled by a wealthy, cosmopolitan Creole aristocracy. In the decades following the purchase, upriver sugar and cotton and timber growers and American shippers, merchants, and entrepreneurs arrived in increasing numbers to get a piece of the action.

But finding little space or welcome in the Creole-dominated Vieux Carre, they settled mainly in their own town to the west. Coming from a different culture and determined to let the natives know it, they built lavish houses that turned the traditional local architecture inside out. Where the typical mansion in the old town was deep and narrow, presenting a flat facade to the street but wrapping around a gardenlike interior courtyard, the new houses were centered in lush lawns and gardens, spreading into their lots with wings and galleries. Many were built in variations of the Greek Revival style, with thick white columns in front, or, later, the Italian-influenced style with slender pillars, more elaborate decoration, and rounded window tops.

Some were the size of small mountains, Cree realized as she cruised Second Street. Matching the houses, massive live oaks spread their branches in gnarled aerial tangles. Date palms rose tall above, and flowering trees and shrubs lined the fences that bounded each lot. Most of the houses were splendidly restored and maintained, and the cars on the streets and in the driveways were Porsches and Mercedeses: The Beaufortes weren't the only people with money around here. So this was what Jack Warren aspired to.

Beauforte House was one of the big ones. Cree approached it with a tingle of anxiety, but in fact it was a pleasant-looking place, yellow with white trim, graciously proportioned, a modified plantation-style house with a central block and asymmetrical wings on either side at the rear. Its lot was bigger than most of the neighboring yards, more overgrown with green, surrounded by a head-high wrought-iron fence. Next to the front gate, a darkened bronze plaque labeled the property a national historic site. When Cree rolled down her window to look it over, she was met with a gush of humid, blossom-smelling air. Nine-thirty A.M., and it was already getting hot.

Yes, a nice-looking place. True, looks could be deceiving, but it was easy to understand why Lila still wanted to live there, despite what she'd experienced. The house had… what? Texture, Cree decided. Presence, weight, depth. It looked securely anchored in its place, belonging like an old tree or something geological. It was real – unlike the plasticized, minor-league opulence of the house that Lila and Jack now called home. It all tied in with Lila's tiny, self-diminishing watercolors and the compressed yearning for more, for an outward-blooming life, that Cree felt in her. Whatever else Lila was coping with, part of her spirit was straining against the containment imposed by her Tupperware-tight world.

Cree left the Garden District and drove to the Warrens' house, where she was surprised and disappointed to find Jack's cream-colored Mercedes in the driveway. She had hoped to get to the tough stuff with Lila today, which was likely to take a lot of coaxing, encouragement, and refocusing. Jack's being there could distract Lila, or, worse, functionally censor her.

She got another surprise when she rang the bell and Jack ushered her into the foyer. Lila was there, holding her purse, dressed as if ready to go out.

"I want to go to the house," Lila said. "This morning. Right now before I chicken out again."

Cree just tipped her head inquiringly.

"We had a big fight last night after you left," Lila explained.

Jack began, "Honey, do we have to – "

"A knock-down, drag-out humdinger," Lila continued. She had the red, puffy eyes of someone who had been crying, but she also had a look of angry determination, as if she'd hit bottom but had found some gritty resolve down there to sustain her.

If Jack had been keeping any cool at all, he lost it now. He was taking huffing breaths as he stood looking at Cree with his elbows out and fists dug in at his waist.

"As long as we're determined to air our dirty laundry with an audience present," he said, "I told my wife I didn't think it was wise to continue with this… this charade. She was a damn shambles after you left, but she still wasn't goin' to tell me just what it's all about, what the hell she is so afraid of over there. I told her this thing is ruinin' our marriage, and I also told her I want Ms. Cree Black to butt her ass on out of our family life!"

"Jackie!"

"I mean, encouraging her, this thing of- "

"And I told Jackie he was right," Lila interrupted. "He's entitled to know, I owe him that. But I can't go over it and over it with every last person, it's… it's too much. So we agreed, Jackie, that today we'd go to the house and I'd tell you both, I'd show you. Get it done with. And that after we've heard Cree's opinion, / will decide what to do for my own peace of mind!"

Jack spun away, frustrated. Lila just looked beseechingly at Cree with those haunted eyes.

Cree scrambled to adapt. Obviously, she'd landed smack in the middle of a marital crossfire as well as a metaphysical and psychological crisis. She'd really have preferred to hear it from Lila without Jack there, but that option had obviously been negotiated out of the picture. Best to roll with it, make it work to everybody's advantage. If these were the terms for getting Lila to Beauforte House, she'd take them. Anyway, there might be therapeutic value in Lila's telling her husband the whole story.

"Mr. Warren?"

Standing with his back to her, arms crossed, he took a moment to answer. "Yeah."

"Does that sound like a plan you can live with?"

"Yeah." Grudgingly.

Lila looked both relieved and terrified.

Cree told them she needed a moment to explain her process and introduce them to some of the technology before they drove over. She went out to the car, popped the trunk, and got out the big, aluminum-clad equipment case. When she came back, they all sat in the living room as Cree talked it through.

She explained that she wanted to hear everything Lila could tell about her experiences, with as much detail as she could recall. She also wanted to see the house, particularly the rooms where Lila had witnessed anything. She'd be glad to hear any history of the house that Lila thought relevant, but her main focus would be Lila's perceptual, mental, and emotional experience.

"Lila, Jack, I know you're both religious people, and I know the idea of there being… unknown entities… touches on belief and faith and can sometimes seem at odds with religious tradition. I'd be happy to go into the metaphysics of this with you later, but today let me just give you a basic idea of the science I'm going to be starting with."

She waited for nods from both of them.

"One of the consistencies we've encountered in our research is that paranormal or 'supernatural' occurrences seem to require a particular state of mind, or sensitivity, on the part of the person perceiving them. This doesn't mean the person is going crazy. Think of, oh, the radio telescopes we use to look at distant galaxies. They are instruments designed to pick up very7 subtle, but real, electromagnetic activity. Or the instruments we use to detect solar activity like gamma rays or X rays we can't perceive these things with our senses, but the right instruments can. You following me so far?"

A less-than-heartfelt nod from Jack: If you say so.

"Today we're going to focus on your mental and physical state, Lila, because so far you're the 'instrument' that's perceiving these subtle phenomena. You're the one 'tuned' to the right frequency. Many ghosts are not readily perceivable by more than a single witness, so if I'm going to see this one and interact with it, I need to come to know you pretty well. In fact – this may sound strange – you may even find me talking or moving a little like you. It's all part of my effort to think like you, to take on your mental and emotional state as a way of 'calibrating' my own perceptions, sensory and otherwise. Does that make sense?"

A halfhearted nod from Jack, some quickening interest from Lila.

"And beyond what you can consciously recall, it's likely that your body and your unconscious mind remember many things. So, Lila, if you agree, I'd like to fit you out with a kit that'll give me readings on your vital signs. I'll explain it now, but once you're rigged I want you to try to forget about it. Just focus on remembering your experience."

Cree lifted the case to the coffee table and opened it to reveal the foam-encased devices Edgar had so painstakingly adapted for the peculiar needs of ghost hunting. She hesitated over the voice-stress analyzer but decided that under the circumstances it wouldn't reveal anything she didn't know. Instead, she pulled out a fat, flesh-tone plastic finger clip that dangled an electronic plug.

"This is just like the clips you get when you go to the hospital. We'll put one on your forefinger, and it'll continuously take your pulse rate and blood pressure. The information will be fed to this" – Cree held up a strap of nylon webbing attached to a small black box not much bigger than a wristwatch – "which you'll wear like a bracelet. The box is a little radio-sending device that'll relay the data." She handed them to Lila, who turned them over in her hands uneasily.

"Relay it to where?" Jack asked.

Cree handed him a bigger, titanium-cased box with a number of output plug receptacles and a series of knobs for adjusting sensitivity levels.

"This is a receiving and recording device – I'll be carrying it in a fanny pack so you don't have to be too burdened, Lila. It'll digitally record the readings from your monitors. Later, we'll print the readings out on a roll of graph paper, just like an EKG, so we can review and precisely measure your responses."

Jack passed the recorder to Lila, who gave it only a distracted glance and set it back on the table.

"We also like to use some other medical monitoring technologies, and my partner uses a wide array of sensing devices that measure and record environmental phenomena. But that'll come later. At this stage, the most complicated gear we'll use is this." Cree took out a harness of elastic fabric and wires. "This coiled wire goes around your chest, and this band around your waist against your skin. The first one will tell us your breathing rate and depth. The other – you see the little metal buttons? Those are electrical contacts that'll tell us about your skin conductivity levels."

"That's a, what do they call it… a galvanometer?" Jack said.

"Basically, yes – "

"Like on a lie detector?"

That froze Lila up, Cree saw. Wide eyes showed she took it as a betrayal by the one person who claimed to believe her.

Cree got to work on damage control: "Yes, it's adapted from polygraph technology. But 'lie detection' is a myth – there's no such thing. All any of it does is measure degrees of metabolic arousal, caused by unconscious agitation – telling lies is only one of many psychological reactions that can cause it. And that's not what we're after here, Lila. As we walk through the house, and you tell me things, this'll let us know what frightens or upsets you. What triggers intense unconscious mental activity. Lila, remember, you're our instrument here, right? This is just a way for us to better understand what the instrument is telling us."

She hoped that sounded reassuring, but Lila didn't look any happier.

They drove down in two cars, Cree alone in her rented Taurus and the Warrens together in the Mercedes. Following them, Cree could see Jack's head bobbing and swiveling as his right hand gestured vehemently. Obviously, the argument wasn't finished yet. But by the time they got to Beauforte House, it had apparently settled into the comparative calm of emotional exhaustion. The Warrens met Cree at the iron gate wearing chastened expressions.

They went up the broad stairs and between tree-thick pillars onto the front porch, which Jack explained was called a "gallery" in New Orleans. The day had turned quite hot, but when Jack opened the front door a wave of cool, stale-smelling air poured from the interior. And suddenly the deep, shadowed porches and dense vegetation made sense to Cree: Down here, shade was all that kept houses from turning into ovens.

They went into a large entry hallway, where Jack took a moment to disarm a blinking security panel. A proud staircase rose along the left wall; double doors opened to rooms on either side. As Cree's eyes adjusted to the poor light, she could see more of the interior: fourteen-foot ceilings, tall windows covered by full-length drapes, antique furniture, darker doorways at the rear.

Open the curtains, let in some light, it would probably be a pleasant place, Cree thought. But the whispers were growing, like a chorus singing in the far, far distance. Very faintly, she felt the subliminal jitter, the sense of some activity just out of view or hearing. The vague, irrational sense that something was about to happen.

Yes, there was something here.

That recognition came with a thin blade of fear but also a tingle of excitement, the thrill of the hunt that she and Edgar shared. Cree's right hand found the controls on the fanny pack, turning on simultaneously the receiver-recorder and a voice-activated audio recorder. While one recorded changes in Lila's vital signs, the other would record anything said in the coming interview. Both were equipped with a chronometric tagging system so that the polygraph readings and voice track could be precisely synchronized, second by second, later.

Jack led them into the right side room. He flipped a switch to turn on a little galaxy of lights in a chandelier hung from the center of the ceiling.

"We keep the drapes closed 'cause with no one here we want to keep pryin' eyes off all these antiques," he explained. "Anyway, too much light'll degrade the old fabrics and finishes."

The electric lights allowed Cree a better sense of the space, but they gave the interior a depressing, underlit, yellow cast. The slotted daylight around the curtain edges was bright, almost harsh, by comparison.

"I'm… not sure where to start," Lila said in a tiny voice. Her earlier grit was gone, and now she looked around like a pursued creature trying to decide which way to run.

"Whatever is easiest," Cree said. "Why don't you just walk me through the house? We can focus on specific areas later. You just tell me whatever comes to mind, I'll take a few notes as we go, and if I have questions I'll ask them. Does that sound okay?"

Lila nodded.

The room they were in was the size of Cree's whole apartment, perhaps thirty by thirty, and was joined at the back by a wide, arched doorway to a second room the same size. Windows lined the outside walls, defined by the daylight that sneaked around the drapes. A massive marble fireplace coping and mantel framed a small, black coal-burning grate, and fine cornice moldings detailed the juncture of walls and ceiling.

Jack gave a running commentary: "Originally, this front room would've been the guest parlor. Usually, it'd be closed by these sliding doors so's to be kept clean for social occasions, with the rear room serving as your main family living room. 'Course, for major social events the doors'd be slid open like they are now, making it one long room big enough for musical recitals, dances, and whatnot. These chandeliers are Baccarat crystal – they used to be set up for burnin' oil, then got converted to gas, and then finally to electricity7. Those portraits, that one's Lila's daddy, there's Momma, there's her uncle Brad… these others are of General Beauforte, his wife and daughters, various relatives – Lila or Ron can tell you more than I can on that score. The carpets and furnishings are authentic period items collected at great expense by Lila's daddy. Ol' Temp Chase, he had a more contemporary style, so a lot of 'em we just locked in the storage room in the back after Momma moved out. There's central air and heating now, and wiring of course, but mostly this looks look just as it did back in 1851."

Shit, Cree was thinking. Bring a Realtor along when you tour a house, you'll get a Realtor's spiel. How to shut Jack up long enough to allow Lila to think?

Still, Lila managed to chip in, "We used to keep it open – Daddy liked a big room. And he and Momma entertained so often anyway… Naturally, with all these antiques, we kids weren't allowed to run crazy in here, but one time Daddy let Ron set up his model train tracks all through both rooms." She was still speaking in a small, shaky voice, but as Cree had hoped, being back here had triggered a mood of recollection.

They headed into the rear parlor, identical to the first, with four windows, coal stove and mantel, chandelier, all period furniture. Also a splendid, ten-foot-tall gilt-framed mirror with an unfortunate crack marring its heavy silvered glass. Jack talked briefly about the antique Turkish Ushak carpet and Chippendale tables, then led them into the hallway that continued from the foyer through the center of the house. The relatively dark hall had several doorways opening to rooms on the other side, and to a brighter room at the back – the kitchen, Cree saw. Through the open doors Cree saw a smaller room that was set up as a formal dining room, and a sitting room with very little furniture in it.

They paused in the hall while Jack flipped on more lights and told Cree that the moldings and fluted pilasters – flat Grecian pillars on either side of the main doorway to the rear of the house – were not really marble but wood painstakingly painted to resemble it. "And the doors themselves, they're all Southern cypress, hand painted to look like white oak. Faux finishin' was quite a popular art, back then – "

"Jackie." Lila's quavering voice interrupted him.

Jack pulled up short. "What, darlin'?"

"Jackie, I want you to stay with me."

He took a step closer to her. "Well, of course, honey, we'll just – "

"No – I mean after what I have to tell you. After you know. No matter what you think about it. Even if it's the craziest thing you ever heard."

Now Jack seemed to remember what they were here for. And gazing at the diminished, shaking creature that was his wife, he began to look a little frightened himself Cree was rocked by a wave of sympathy for them both: two plump, staid-looking little people standing on the trembling verge of chaos.

'Course," Jack mumbled.

"Promise me you won't tell Momma? You won't tell Ron? No matter what? Both of you! I can't live with what they'd say, I already know what they think of me. You have to promise."

Cree promised. Jack nodded and moved as if to put his arm around her, but then, confused, seemed to think better of it.

Once she'd gotten their assurances, Lila seemed determined to plunge on, straight into it. She turned and stumped ahead of them down the remainder of the hall, a woman running on utter desperation and not much else.

The hall ended in a large kitchen that had obviously been remodeled not long ago, with white-marble counters, cheerful yellow walls, tile floors, and brushed chrome appliances. The pleasant breakfast nook was surrounded on three sides by windows framed by bright, flowery curtains. Where Temp Chase had blown his brains out. Yes, Ron had gone to considerable lengths to get rid of that unmarketable "ambience." Cree could feel it, just barely – the dark paroxysm, the convulsive pain and confusion that had been lived here. But she pushed it away, held it down: Not yet.

"This is the kitchen," Lila said. "Isn't it the prettiest kitchen you ever saw."

On her pad, Cree made a note of Lila's flattened affect. The recording unit in her fanny pack vibrated faintly, reminding her that the scroll would tell it definitively later. But watching Lila now she knew what it would probably show: ragged, generally rising indicators on all of Lila's signs since they'd come into the house, but not the telltale spikes and deep valleys that revealed a remembered or unconscious crisis. Not yet.

"Wasn't the original kitchen," Jack said. "Old days, they always kept the kitchen pretty separate – wood-fired stoves, too hot, and there was always the fire risk, so – "

Cree gave Jack a look and tossed her gaze to Lila. To his credit, he got the message.

"Down here is the library," Lila said. "Jack, remember I told you about that noise, I thought it might be termites…"

"You said you never heard it again. I sure never heard it."

"I did hear it. I heard it every day." Walking quickly, Lila led them down a side hall from the kitchen, into one of the wings. They passed a modern bathroom and a couple of closed doors Cree assumed to be storage rooms or closets, and then came to a large, dark room lined with bookshelves.

In the gloom, Cree could make out the glisten of dark, oiled furniture and the straight white teeth of a piano keyboard. She picked up a faint sense of presence here, but not the sense of nightmare Lila apparently felt. This felt keening… a piercing sweetness. Whatever it was, it wras subtle, impossible to probe with the distractions of Jack and Lila present.

"Let's get some damn lights on in here," Jack said. He fumbled for the switch and bulbs came on in a smaller version of the chandeliers in the front rooms.

"Jackie, that table… that table was making the noise." Lila was unwilling to go farther than the doorway.

"What the hell -?"

"It… it came alive. The claws."

Jack looked as if someone had hit him in the gut. He looked quickly to Cree, something like panic in his eyes. For a long moment, he didn't have a reply. Then he crossed the room to the table and bent to look at the wooden talons. The dark mahogany legs, Cree could see, were elaborately carved with scales or feathers, each one ending up in a gryphon's head just below the top.

Jack shoved at the table and turned back to his wife. "We'll get rid of the thing. We'll sell it. Hell, we'll toss it out on the trash today!"

Lila just shook her head. She was biting her lips, fighting to stay functional. "I can't. That was one of Daddy's favorites, Momma would never forgive me. Anyway, it wouldn't help. That… isn't all. There's more. A whole lot more."