The water was halfway up the house. Faint, flickering yellow light, probably from candles, shone through an open dormer window in the gabled roof. The screams came from there. Bull took the Zodiac to the wall. Bill and Bull leaped out of the boat as Johnson tied up, and scrambled across the tar-paper roof. At Bull’s signal, the policemen erupted into the little room. An instant later, they called the others.
The attic, even though it had a window, was actually only a low space between the roof and the downstairs ceiling. Unpainted rafters sloped down to meet rough flooring. Yellowing lumps of spun fiber, now useless as insulation, were stuffed into the corners of the space. An ancient African American man, tiny, wrinkled, and covered with sweat, lay on the plank flooring by the window, gasping and groaning, his right hand clutched to his chest. Amaia assumed he’d been shot, especially because an old woman was aiming a rifle down the steep stairwell, cursing furiously at someone invisible in the darkness downstairs. A little boy, maybe four or five years old, had crawled back under the lowest part of the roof and was huddled against the mass of yellowing insulation, sobbing.
Amaia felt a film of sweat break out over her skin as soon as she got inside. The temperature in the attic must have been well over one hundred degrees. The place stank of piss, sweat, and mold. The only light came from the stub of a candle inside an ancient hurricane lamp at the woman’s feet. Her enormous shadow moved across the attic space every time she shifted her position, making it hard for them to see what was going on.
Charbou seized the woman from behind, immobilized her, and disarmed her. His firm movements were assured and unprovocative. She gave up her weapon but doubled her ranting against the unknown intruder downstairs. Alarmed, Charbou pointed his pistol in that direction.
Johnson crouched next to the moaning victim. The old man’s clothes were soaked with sweat. Without hesitating, Johnson ripped off the old man’s shirt to check for a wound. There was no blood, but it was obvious he’d received a tremendous blow to the chest. Several bright-red marks were evident over a massive bruise.
“This may be a heart attack.” Johnson’s voice was uncertain.
The old woman was crouched behind Charbou, gabbling hysterically and pointing down the dark stairwell. Bull tried to ask her what had happened, but it was no use. She kept shouting nonsense and pointing down the stairwell.
Dupree stepped back to the window and looked out on a sky so black it seemed as if dawn would never come. He raised his gun so the laser sight on the barrel sent a glowing beam through the darkness, and he pulled the trigger. The tremendous explosion deafened them all. They all turned toward him.
Dupree said nothing, but he had everyone’s attention. Amaia doubted anyone could have heard him if he’d been speaking just then, for their ears were ringing from the gunshot. He raised a finger to his lips to command silence; he stepped over the man on the floorboards and slowly approached the huddled boy. He hunched low but his head brushed against the underside of the roof. Keeping the dazzling beam of his flashlight away from the boy’s eyes, Dupree spoke quietly. “We’re from the police. We’re here to help you. You’re safe now. Stop crying and listen up. Is there anyone else here?”
The boy wasn’t sobbing anymore. He pointed toward the stairs.
“Okay, that’s fine, I understand. Somebody’s downstairs. But is there anyone hiding up here?”
The boy shook his head and again pointed urgently toward the stairs.
“Did they touch you?” Dupree asked, tapping his own chest.
“Only Grandpa.”
“That’s good. Stay right there.” Dupree moved out from the low space and got to his feet. He holstered his weapon and turned to the old woman. He took her by the shoulders instead of speaking. He guided her away from Charbou and turned her so she could see his face. “How many of them?”
“They took the girls!” she sobbed.
“Who took the girls?” Dupree asked her in a low voice.
The woman replied, plainly terrified but quiet now. “Samedi. Samedi took my girls.”
Charbou was surprised. “Samedi?”
“Baron Samedi, le criminel Samedi!” she insisted, her voice rising. “Samedi took my babies!”
Dupree and Bull exchanged a nod. Amaia looked to Johnson for an explanation. She was fed up. She’d been obliged to put up with this game of complicit little nods and cryptic remarks for the last three days. She wanted to know what the hell was going on. It was obvious this had nothing to do with the Composer, and it was just as clear to her that both Bull and Dupree had been expecting something like this from the moment the team got to New Orleans.
“Are they down there? Did they run off?” Dupree asked the old woman.
“No, they gone and they carried off the girls, but my man,” she said, waving toward the old man stretched out on the floor, “he shot one of them devils. They leave him behind and that one run off to hide down there. I know he down there, I can hear him; he not gonna get far after what my Henry done to him. No way to kill them devils, but my man put him down.” Her face was full of fierce pride. “They almost kill Henry for that.”
“How old are the girls?”
“Eight and twelve, Diana and Bella, my granddaughters, Jacob’s sisters.” She pointed toward the dark corner where the boy crouched. “Samedi, he take only girls. He want virgin blood, want to eat their hearts.”
Bull nodded, exchanged a glance with Dupree, and motioned toward the ladder.
Charbou looked from Dupree to Bull as he listened to the old woman’s incoherent remarks, astonished to see them taking her seriously.
“Hey, can someone explain what the fuck—”
“Keep quiet!” Dupree sternly cut him off and focused again on the woman. Amaia was shocked by Dupree’s reaction. He leaned close to the woman to reassure her. “Tell me, ma’am, how many are down there?”
“One! Henry shot him in the leg, the others leave him behind. He down there now, I hear him.” She waved a trembling hand toward the stairs.
“Now, think carefully. Is there any other way out?”
“No, we nailed plywood ’cross all the doors and windows, and then we came up here; they made this window up here in the old house ’cause they afraid of floods.”
Dupree took out his gun and shined his flashlight down the stairwell. The water was all the way up to the landing where the stairs turned and were lost in darkness. A trail of blood confirmed her story. The quantity on the stairs meant that whoever lost it was in danger of bleeding out completely. Dupree heard water splashing. The movements sent ripples across the surface of the dirty lapping water. Dupree turned to the old woman, pointed toward the far end of the attic, and whispered, “I want you to go over there next to your man and your grandson. Y’all stay right there and keep quiet. You hear?”
She nodded without a word and retreated to settle down next to the old man, who was gasping for breath.
Dupree motioned to Amaia and Johnson. They positioned themselves next to Charbou, who showed his dislike for what was happening by shaking his head and glaring at his partner. Amaia saw he was furious. He planted himself on the stairwell where Johnson sent him, but he didn’t object when Dupree and Bull took the lead on the way downstairs.