Play Dead

Chapter 15

Strata Luna had agreed to meet Elise at four in the afternoon in a small cemetery near a church on St. Helena Island, a place that was steeped in Gullah heritage. It was also where Jackson Sweet was supposed to have been born.

Elise followed a crude map that had shown up at her home in a manila envelope sealed with the Black Tupelo design. The church ended up being a two-story clapboard structure blasted gray by wind and sand.

A long black car with Georgia plates was parked not far from the building, its front bumper a few inches from a fence tangled with heavy vine. Elise swung her car around and backed up, keeping a good fifty feet between the two vehicles. She looked over her left shoulder to see her buddy Enrique behind the wheel. He smiled and pointed in the direction of the church, drew an imaginary circle, then walked his fingers in the air.

She nodded, shut off the car, and stepped out, feeling beneath her jacket for the outline of her SIG Sauer. She checked her pocket to make sure her cell phone was handy.

The sand was loose under her feet as she made her way around the church.

Had she herself been born on just such an island? she wondered. Maybe even this island?

It was tough not knowing where she'd come from, tougher yet when Audrey asked questions about her past that Elise couldn't answer. Unlike Thomas and Vivian, who had a history they could share.

Windows in the church were broken. The front door hung by a hinge. Sweet grass grew from the foundation, and live oaks, with their black curtains of moss, cast long shadows. A strong ocean wind blew without pause.

The place was creepy even during the day.

Elise spotted a single set of footprints and followed them.

On the east side of the gray structure was a small cemetery, the ancient, moss-covered tombstones dwarfed by dense, spreading trees.

Under a canopy of leaves, the wind stopped and the protected area turned to twilight. As Elise walked, the sand gave way to packed earth and a soft layer of small brown leaves. Parallel ruts lined the ground, created years ago when coffins were transported by horse and buggy.

Elise followed the faint road, turning when it turned, slowing when she spotted a shadowy figure in the distance.

She approached cautiously, until she was near enough to make out a woman sitting on a cement bench near a large headstone.

Strata Luna.

The woman wore a long black dress and a wide-brimmed hat. For a moment Elise felt as if she'd stepped back in time.

With gloved hands, Strata Luna gracefully lifted the hat's veil away. "Hello, Elise."

Her face was regal, with high cheekbones and large eyes beneath thick, black eyebrows. Full red lips against ebony skin.

No one knew her age. Elise had done the math, and knew she had to be at least fifty. She looked much younger.

Regardless of the myth surrounding Strata Luna, the compelling aura she carried hadn't been understated. It was said that in her youth, men froze in the streets when she walked by, unable to move until she'd passed. Elise believed it.

"So, you're the daughter of Jackson Sweet."

Strata Luna's voice was as mysterious and hypnotic as the rest of her. Deep, slow, metered, and melodic.

"It's a rumor. Folklore."

"Have you had the opportunity to test yourself? Has anyone passed the mantle to you?"

"I dabbled a little."

Elise stepped closer and sat down on the opposite end of the long bench, leaving several feet between herself and Strata Luna.

"Dabbled? That's not a serious word."

"It was years ago. I was a kid."

"But you gave it up for a life of practicality."

"Something like that."

"Come closer."

Elise remained where she was.

"You don't trust me."

"Trust and foolishness go hand in hand."

The older woman laughed, then reached into a deep pocket of her black cotton dress. She pulled out a small bundle of white fabric tied with a long, looped string. "I have something for you. A wanga."

A charm.

Piece of candy, little girl?

Strata Luna stood and approached. She was a tall woman, large but not overweight. Smiling, she slipped the wanga over Elise's head.

It smelled like herbs.

"It's a good root," the woman said. "It will protect you." She reached out and touched Elise's hair. "Your hair is like his. Dark. Straight. And your eyes. Let me see…" With a graceful motion, she placed her gloved fingers beneath Elise's chin and tilted her face toward her.

Then, as if stung, she dropped her hand away.

"Those eyes…," she said with discomfort. "They're very strange."

Elise was used to such responses, yet had expected more control from Strata Luna. "You undoubtedly know I was left on a grave because of them," Elise said, trying to make light of her past the way she always did.

"Almost every color in there." Still staring, Strata Luna suddenly seemed shaky and old. "And every color makes black." She turned away and sat down, as if unable to look at Elise any longer. Silence grew around them until Elise was afraid the woman wouldn't speak again.

"You knew Jackson Sweet?" Elise finally asked.

Strata Luna pulled in a deep breath and straightened her shoulders. "Honey, we used to drink together," she said, her voice now light and almost flippant, a woman of rapid mood swings. "And we used to fight together. Said I was too pushy for him." She glanced at Elise. "You're his daughter." She nodded. "No doubt 'bout that."

A shock went through her. Elise had never believed the stories. Not really. Not in her heart. Growing up, she'd only wanted to believe them. But now… with Strata Luna seeming so certain…

"Do you have any children?" Strata Luna asked.

"A daughter."

"Daughters…," Strata Luna said distantly, in a remembering kind of voice.

Elise produced the photos she'd shown to Enrique. "Have you ever seen either of these men?"

Strata Luna stared at them a moment. "I think this one used to work for me." She tapped the face of Jordan Kemp. "I don't recall his name. I'm not sure about the other one." She passed the photos back. "I have a lot of people I support. Some of them stay. Some of them go. I don't always remember names."

"Jordan Kemp and Samuel Winslow." Elise pulled out another photo, this one of the body art.

Strata Luna examined it closely and smiled. "This work was done by Genevieve Roy. See how delicate the lines of the implants are? Not many people are so adept."

"Does it have a purpose?" Elise asked.

"It's a mojo," Strata Luna explained. "People who work for me often get it. I don't insist, but most of them want it. It gives them protection they wouldn't otherwise have."

"Apparently it's not providing enough," Elise said dryly.

"That's because the design has been stolen from me. People who have nothing to do with Black Tupelo are getting it."

"Status," Elise said. She could see that kind of evolution.

Strata Luna waved her hand. "Now it means nothin'. You have more questions? I must go soon. Enrique is waiting."

"We've had some unexplainable poisonings in Savannah. Victims killed with tetrodotoxin," Elise said, pressing forward, realizing this could be her last chance to talk with Strata Luna-at least in an unofficial, casual environment. "It's rumored that you drug your… employees to keep them complacent," Elise said bluntly. "And that you use a secret recipe with one of the ingredients being tetrodotoxin."

Strata Luna straightened, her thick brows drawing together in tempestuous irritation. "Are you accusing me of murder?"

"The male prostitute had your insignia on him and tetrodotoxin in his bloodstream. It's only logical that we would question you."

"Escort service. It can be an unpleasant occupation. Sometimes new recruits-and even seasoned workers-have a hard time dealing with the unpleasantness. Sometimes they need a little help to get them through the night. It can be one of many drugs. I help them, but never against their will. And I would never use poison from the puffer fish for that purpose. You're talking zombies and voodoo."

"Maybe someone is eking out his own brand of justice," Elise suggested.

Strata Luna shrugged as if the turn in the conversation was boring her. "You police are always lookin' for a reason, a motive," she said. "Why are you so unwilling to accept the truth?"

"What's the truth?" Elise asked.

"That evil doesn't need a reason to exist."

"I can't think like that. For me, everything has an answer."

The woman shook her head. "You'll change your mind someday."

Elise herself had seen a lot of evil in her job as a homicide detective, but she had the feeling Strata Luna had her beat.

Interview over, she got to her feet and handed the woman a business card. "Thanks for agreeing to meet with me. If you think of anything important, please give me a call."

Strata Luna stood. "I want to show you something. Come. Follow me."

Elise followed her deeper into the cemetery until they came to a small cluster of broken, moss-covered tombstones. The older woman stopped, not in front of the stones, but before a dip in the ground. Scattered around the indentation were a telephone, a mirror, a comb, some change, and a full bottle of whiskey.

"This is why I wanted you to come here today," Strata Luna said. "This is your father's grave. The grave of Jackson Sweet."

The air left Elise's lungs.

She stared at the indentation in the ground. In the distance, hidden in a dark place, hundreds of frogs spilled their secrets, the wall of sound hypnotically rising and falling.

"There can be no marker left on the grave of a conjure man," Strata Luna explained, her voice coming from a million miles away. "Otherwise people dig up his bones for mojoes and spells. They wouldn't leave him in peace. But some of us know where Jackson is buried. And now you know. See the hole?" She pointed. "Root doctors come and dig here."

"Goofer dust," Elise said.

"And now we must both leave something. You cannot visit the grave of a conjurer without leaving a personal item."

Strata Luna pulled off her black gloves and placed them near the indentation.

At first Elise couldn't think of anything to offer. Cell phone? Of course not. She dug through her pockets. Notebooks. ID. Gun.

Her fingers came in contact with a pen. Just a regular, everyday ink pen. Maybe he needed to do a little writing.

She placed it on one of Strata Luna's gloves.

"I have one more thing for you," the woman said.

"I can't accept anything else."

"This ain't really from me." She pulled out a small leather case and handed it to Elise.

"Go on. Open it. It's something that belonged to your father. Something you should have."

The leather was cracked and black and extremely old; the small hinges were rusty.

Elise opened it. Inside was a pair of wire-rimmed glasses with dark blue lenses.

Conjurer's glass. Blue lenses that kept out evil spirits and allowed the wearer to see things others couldn't.

"Put them on. I want to see them on you."

She seemed so sure that Jackson Sweet was her father.

"You're alike," Strata Luna stated.

"How?"

"Your father was a cop."

"Jackson Sweet? No, he wasn't." Elise would have known if Jackson Sweet had been a policeman.

"Not by your rules, but by a root doctor's. He punished bad people and rewarded the good ones. That's better than the idiots with badges we have in Savannah."

A self-proclaimed man of the law? A man who scared the shit out of people, forcing them to mend their ways or face the wrath of a white root doctor? Was that why Elise had become a cop? Was it in her blood? Because she was the daughter of Jackson Sweet?

Intrigued, she removed the glasses from the case. The wire was thin and fragile. She carefully unfolded the antique frames and slipped them on.

Shadows turned bottomless black. The sky turned gray. Sunlight that fell through branches and leaves created a dappling of crescent moons on the ground.

Dizzying.

Disorienting.

Caused by the weird, distorted lenses? Or something else?

At that moment, Elise believed what Strata Luna was telling her. She suddenly had a past, a history.

She'd been abandoned. She'd been thrown away, left to die. But if she came from a world of conjurers and spells, then her life could never have been what other people thought of as normal. Who wanted normal anyway? Instead, she'd met the world in a weird, sensational way.

He would have wanted her. Jackson Sweet had been on his deathbed when Elise was born. Otherwise he would have rescued her, kept her, raised her. She suddenly felt very sure of that.

What about Audrey? Should she tell her? What would she think? How would she react to the news that her grandfather was Jackson Sweet?

Standing in the center of the strange, colorless world was Strata Luna, beaming at her. "Look here, look here, Jackson Sweet," she said. The words were tossed to someone invisible, standing just beyond her shoulder. "You ain't never gonna believe what ol' Strata Luna brought you today."

The two women stood there in the dark, listening to the frogs. Finally Elise told Strata Luna good-bye. She removed the glasses and walked in the direction of the church and the cars.

Strata Luna watched her go, a feeling of loneliness suddenly engulfing her.

Loneliness and fear.

She thought about unwelcome evil and was reminded of another time, a time she tried not to think about-the night her youngest daughter drowned…

Strata Luna had run from the house, a sheer white nightgown billowing around her. Down the flagstone steps, past the hedges and roses and weeping magnolias, her bare feet already whispering that it was too late.

The night sky was a cobalt blue; the trees were black silhouettes standing silent and unmoving. What she saw caused her heart to stop beating for several minutes.

Something floating in the water.

Fabric.

A nightgown.

Ebony hair.

The most beautiful, shiny, ebony hair a child could possibly possess.

No! God, no!

The night sky reflected on the water, a child's hand reaching for the moon and stars. Strata Luna tumbled into the pool, the surface shattering like glass.

She grabbed the body of her daughter. The water tugged, fighting to hold the child, to keep her. Strata Luna finally pulled her free and turned her over.

Dead, dead, dead.

Some people claimed she'd killed the angel herself, with her own hands, holding her under the water until her lungs filled with water. Sometimes Strata Luna thought it was true, since she hadn't been able to foresee her death.

But evil was a part of life.

It was the shadow that followed her. The shadow she feared had returned.