82 Desire

of people on the streets. Surely she was safe. Surely she could just walk in someplace and ask to use the phone to call the police.
    But panic seized her as tightly as the rage of moments ago. What the fuck am I into? she thought. What’s the deal with Russell Fortier disappearing?
    The thing was, she had committed a few little illegalities in the course of her work for Allred. Maybe someone was upset about something.
    Could she outrun this dude or not? It was worth a try.
    Once again, she felt in her purse for the key, and this time her hand closed on it. She saw that the man was already out of his parking spot. She shoved the key in the ignition, but her fingers were so slick with sweat she didn’t trust them on the steering wheel.
    Still, at this point there was no choice. He could drive up beside her and shoot her through the window.
    Instead, he drove past her. Could it be that this was a different man? Maybe he wasn’t chasing her. He stopped at the stoplight. She was four cars behind him.
    As he went through the intersection, she turned right, wondering how this could be so easy.
    Yet she drove around a few random blocks, and still the van didn’t follow.
    Damn , she thought. Why didn’t I get his license number?
    But it was obvious why. She was too scared.
    Nothing to do but go home. She stopped at Schwegmann’s on Elysian Fields, as she’d promised Miz Clara, and was approaching calm as she got back in the car and went home.
    But there, in the center of her modest block, smack in the middle between Desire and Piety, was a tan van.
    Oh, Jesus Christ , she thought, what now? My mama’s in the house.
    She got out of the car warily, looking around her, wishing she had a gun.
    Someone seized her from behind, clamping a hand over her mouth. She felt the roughness of his beard as the man leaned close to her ear.
    He whispered, “Open the door,” and she realized he meant her own car door.
    She worked it.
    “No. The back door.”
    He pushed her in and slid in beside her. She felt something slip over her head, and then she was wearing the ski mask, backward, so that it formed a blindfold.
    “Scream and your mother’s dead,” the man said.
    Inside the wool mask was unbearably hot. Why a ski mask? she thought. Why not a stocking mask? She realized that wouldn’t have disguised the man’s race. But he’d blown that one. The man was white.
    He spoke to her gently, much more nicely than you’d expect from someone who’d just threatened to kill your mother. “You’re okay. I’m not going to hurt you and I’m not going to hurt your mother. You’re involved in something you don’t understand, that’s all. Wait till tomorrow and call me at the office.” She felt something slide into her hand, something he was pressing into her palm. A business card.
    “Now, wait till I’m gone and then go in the house. Your mother’s okay.” She waited till she heard her car door slam and then ripped off the mask. He had his back to her so she still couldn’t see his face, but she damn sure wasn’t going to sit there like a dummy when she had a chance to get his plate number.
    But it had been splashed with something, probably mud. He drove off while she was still squinting at it. She looked at the card in her hand and let out a little gasp.
    It bore the crescent and star of the New Orleans Police Department. DETECTIVE SKIP LANGDON , it said.
    She dashed inside. “Mama? Mama, you okay?”
    Her mother was watching Oprah. “Girl, why ain’t you out looking for a job?”
    “Did you send me to college to make chicken fricassee? I hope so, ‘cause that’s what I’m gonna do.”
    “Hmmph. For ya no-account boyfrien’ wit’ the horrible hair. Not for ya mama.”
    Talba had stuffed the damn ski mask into the Schwegmann’s bag. She took it out and looked at it. Fuck! she thought. No way a cop would have treated a white person that way—threatenin’ to kill my mama! I think I might call Public Integrity.
    That was the office called Internal Affairs elsewhere, but she hesitated, deciding instead to try Allred’s office one last time. No one answered. All day she kept calling and getting no answer.
    She ran the whole thing by Lamar that night, after they’d eaten the chicken fricassee. Whatever her mama said, Lamar was not no-account, any more than she was. He was a grad student at Xavier, in the art department, and he was a damn good artist, especially, as her mama said, if you listened to him. He had