Don't Go to Sleep by Bryce Moore

Author:Bryce Moore
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Sourcebooks
Published: 2022-06-07T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Eleven

Axman is Invited to Small, Select Party:

The Axman is invited to a stag party at 552 Lowerline Street tonight at 12:15. He’ll be as welcome as the flowers in May, according to an invitation extended him through the Times-Picayune by Oscar William Morton, William Schulze, Russell Y. Fairbanks and A. M. LaFleur, Jr. They sincerely hope he won’t have his social secretary send regrets.

Enzo and I were to meet at the Butcher’s Hall in the French Market. For once, I beat my friend there by fifteen minutes. I might have felt from my work in the grocery store that the entire city was panicked because of the influenza, but you wouldn’t know it from the line in front of the Café Du Monde, even at six o’clock. The lights were already on the awnings, and the air was full of the scent of fried dough and coffee. Men and women and families, out waiting in line. Most of them masked, though plenty of them with their masks down below their noses or even tucked underneath their chin. Wearing a mask like that was like wearing a skirt hiked up to your waist. Technically you had it on, but it wasn’t really doing anything it was supposed to.

At least the spitting laws were being strictly enforced.

When Enzo came, I was ready to give him a hard time about being late. But his hair was out of place, and he had bags under his eyes. Sometimes you know at a glance when good-natured joking is a bad idea. “Did everything go okay today?” I asked him.

He nodded and smiled. “Just a long day. I’m sure you can relate.”

I wondered what I looked like. With the amount of sleep I’d been getting, maybe just as bad as my friend.

“Are you hungry?” he asked. “We could get a beignet or some coffee.”

The thought of eating made my stomach turn. He might as well have suggested we gnaw on wood, for all the thought did for me. He must have seen my face blanche, because he continued right away. “Me neither. Let’s go.”

We’d mapped out a route for us to follow, starting in the Vieux Carré and weaving out in a spiral to hit most of the stores we’d already been keeping an eye on. By starting this early, we should be able to get to all of them twice, and the French Quarter itself we should be able to get to a third time. Yes, the Axeman had attacked elsewhere. We couldn’t cover Algiers, for example, and the farthest parts of the city were out of reach, but this was something.

Sitting around tonight doing nothing would have been impossible. And, by being out, maybe we’d have a head start on anything that happened. With so many people on the lookout for him, finding someone he could attack would have to be almost impossible. Wouldn’t it? Enzo and I had warned who would listen to us to be on the watch for a man with a scarred right hand, but who knew if anyone would really pay attention.

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