“The house has quite a history, and I – ”

“Could Cass Shelley be alive?” Mr. Porter was asking.

“Not likely. Now Augusta became the mistress of Trebec House under very sinister – ”

“Are there any alligators in that bayou?” asked the intrepid Mr. Porter “You think maybe an alligator could’ve eaten her body?”

Though she wanted to stuff a sock in Porter’s mouth, Betty smiled on him with benevolence. “A gator could eat you whole. When he clamps down on you, he goes into a death roll and drags you under.” She liked that image of Porter. “But if the gator isn’t hungry just then, he’ll stuff your body in some underwater hole or a cranny in the bayou wall ” Either way the gator went with that, Porter would be just as dead. “And then he’ll bide his time till your body rots up real tender.”

Now she had everyone’s attention. Bloodthirsty bastards, bless their little hearts and credit cards. “But an alligator didn’t eat Cass Shelley. Fred and Ray Laurie killed every single gator in these bayous a long time ago. Finger Bayou runs up near Trebec House. Before Cass died, I used to take my tour groups up there. Augusta won’t allow strangers on the place anymore, though. I guess the stoning spooked her. She stopped the herbicide on the bayou, and now it’s choked off with water hyacinth, impassable by boat. You see those plants floating on the water? And most of the land surrounding the house is swamp, infested with poisonous snakes. So I repeat, you don’t want to stray off on your own. Now what was I saying before we got off on gators?”

“The house,” said the man from Maine.

“Right. Now the house and a few acres was all that was left of the original plantation. The town sprung up, lot by lot, as the Trebecs sold off the land.”

“You said the house was ruined,” said the man from Maine. “So Miss Trebec is too poor to maintain it?”

“Poor? Augusta? Oh, no.” Betty laughed. “She’s a master of shady land deals. She owns all those cane fields out by the highway. Bought her first forty acres with seed money inherited from her mother. Then she sued a chemical factory for fouling the water on her land. That gave her cash for more land near another factory. Over the years, she’s filed lawsuits against most of the chemical plants along the River Road. They always settle out of court. Today, Augusta owns most all of St. Jude Parish, except for Dayborn and Owltown.”

“Could you lose a body in that bayou?” asked Mr. Porter, impatient to get back to the subject of murder. “Maybe sink it down with weights?”

“No, I don’t think so,” said Betty. “The sheriff was all through Finger Bayou dragging for that body. He would have turned it up.”

“I can understand her not wanting to spend her own money on a house that isn’t hers,” said the man from Maine, still trying to make sense of the ruined mansion. “But if the woman is rich, there’s nothing to keep her here. So why doesn’t she just leave?”

“Oh, Augusta won’t go till the house falls down. She could set a match to it, but that would offend her sporting nature.”

The man from Maine gaped. “You mean she wants it to – ”

“What about quicksand?”

“No, Mr. Porter,” said Betty. “There might be a bog or two back there in the swamp, but even a bog will yield up a carcass eventually. Of course, only a Cajun could walk that swamp – or Augusta. She’s what you might call a Cajun without portfolio.”

The rest of the group had their binoculars trained on the top window of Trebec House. One scrawny woman from California was shaking her head sadly. “Surely the historical society will restore the house when this crazy woman dies.”

“Can’t,” said Betty. “It would take too much money. They waived their rights in favor of Augusta’s proposal for a bird habitat. Those ornithologists won’t waste a dime on Trebec House. They’ll just watch it rot. That’s the deal they made with Augusta.”

“So what do you think happened to the body?”

“It is a mystery, isn’t it, Mr. Porter?” And if it were ever solved it would cut into her business, now evenly divided between bird-watchers, amateur detectives and the visiting New Church seminar suckers.

“Is it possible to lose a body in that swamp, say if you sunk it in a bog, and – ”

“What goes into this ground will come up again, Mr. Porter. I’ll show you what I mean.”

She led them through the skirt of trees and into the cemetery. “We generally bury bodies aboveground. If we sink ‘em in the earth, they just rise again, and it doesn’t matter how many stones you put in the coffin to weight it down. Now some of these bodies here were buried in a traditional manner, but you see that big slab of concrete? That’s to keep the coffin belowground.”

“Couldn’t there have been one alligator hiding in the bayou?” asked the hopeful Mr. Porter.

“No! Sorry. No, the closest thing we got to a gator around here is Augusta. When she smiles, you can see the resemblance, and if you get on her bad side, her eyes will go dead on you – just like a gator. Oh, and just because a gator’s dead, that doesn’t mean it’s safe to approach one. An alligator can bite you two hours after it’s been killed. I plan to be several hours late to Augusta’s funeral when she goes.”

“But suppose there was just one alligator.”

Betty’s smile was broad, but her teeth were grinding. “Cass Shelley died this same time of year. Even if there was a gator in there, he would have been hibernating. Cass did not end up as gator food. Now, Mr. Porter, if we are done with the alligators?”

She pointed to the monument which towered over all the others. “That’s the back of the angel. She’s the image of Cass Shelley, God rest her soul. And the little girl in her arms? That’s Kathy. She’s come home again and murdered Babe Laurie.”

The first of the tour group stood in front of the angel while Betty brought up the rear. “Now you just gather around. As I was saying, the little girl in the angel’s arms – ”

“What little girl?” The California woman was looking up at the angel.

“The little girl in her arms.” What kind of blind fools did they make up north? They shouldn’t allow idiots to travel; there ought to be a law. “Later, I’ll take you into the alley alongside the sheriff’s office and show you where her jail cell is.” No point in telling them the fugitive was on the loose. That might result in some empty rooms. “She might even come to the window, so take a good look at the little girl.”

“What little girl?” asked the very sensible man from Maine.

Now Betty came around to the front of the statue to point out the little girl you couldn’t fail to notice even if you were just this side of legal blindness.

But the stone child was gone.

The angel was alone on her pedestal, eyes cast down and holding out her empty arms.

“Oh, my God. It’s a miracle.” Betty walked up to the angel and stared into her eyes. “Oh, my God.”

“She’s crying,” said the man from Maine. “The statue is crying.”

Ten cameras shot the angel simultaneously.

Augusta wondered if sleep had been induced by the herbal concoction to stave off infection. Or had the girl passed out from the pain of irrigating the bullet wounds? Well, better that she slept.

All around the room were soggy towels and windings of gauze. Augusta picked up the bloody debris and put it into a plastic garbage bag. When she had washed her hands, she sat down in a chair by the bed and removed the bandages. She pulled the packing from the back wound and replaced the poultice. The girl slumbered on as Augusta taped the poultice in place and then turned the body over to clean the front wound in the shoulder.

With no warning, one white hand snaked out and held Augusta’s arm in a surprisingly strong grip. The cat leapt onto the foot of the bed and made a low growl. Augusta hushed the cat and looked back at her patient and deep into a pair of very angry young eyes.