Crescent City Symphony
A short story about environmental justice
—sonata: look the storm in the eye—
Special Councillor Trevor B. Lemurel lets out a sigh of relief as the plane’s landing gear hits the runway. It’s been a rough ride, and things have only just begun.
“Welcome to Louis Armstrong International,” the captain says over the intercom, “I’ve just been told we’re the last flight allowed to land.”
It’s not Lemurel’s intention to travel towards an approaching hurricane, but an unexpected turn of events necessitated his urgent trip to the Big Easy. Normally stationed in Washington DC, Lemurel’s talents are needed for a certain undertaking, an operation so delicate he will get the details on a ‘need-to-know’ basis. Right now he only has his airline ticket and a hotel reservation. Presumably he’ll get some updates after he’s checked in at the Mazarin.
Torrential rains combined with severe gusts of wind pound the French Quarter, in April already, thanks to climate change. Yet the citizens of New Orleans seem oddly defiant as Mardi Gras is still taking place—bars bursting at the seams with people, floats in the overcrowded streets and more beads than brains—many more. Even the Mazarin seems fully booked, which is just as well, according to Lemurel. No better place to get lost in than a crowd.
Lemurel also can’t help but notice that despite the relentless downpour, the streets are not flooded. The new storm drains seem to work fine and judging by their revelry, the burghers of the Big Easy seem to have faith that the rest of their coastal defenses will withstand the worst of Hurricane Ivana, as well. Even as Ivana is strengthening into a category 5 hurricane over the unseasonably warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico, its bullseye aimed as unwaveringly on the Crescent City as its notorious predecessor Katrina.
The political pressure to justify the huge costs of the ‘once-in-a-10,000-years’ coastal storm defenses is so immense that no evacuation was ordered. Come hell, high water and the storm of the decade, New Orleans would sit through this one and show the world where their tax payer’s money was spent. Since one of his ancestors was a survivor of the 1953 North Sea Flood, Lemurel can sympathize. Like the Delta Works, he thought, once but never again.
Other matters require his attention, though, as he enters K-Paul’s Louisiana Kitchen to meet his contact. He spots LeJeune at a lone table in the far corner of the legendary establishment, wearing his era-perfect costume of the Jazz Age—to the intense envy of many a hipster.
“Jean-François,” Lemurel says, “Comment ça va?”
“Pas mal, Trevor,” LeJeune answers in kind, “tout bien considéré.”
Initially, their conversation is all polite and generic, their impeccable French not quite out of place in this particular locale. They order an exquisite meal and take their time to enjoy it with a bottle of fine wine. It is only after they’ve moved to the backyard—that now features a hurricane-proof, retractable roof—to enjoy the cognac and cigars after dessert that they get to the point.
“Your target stays at the Ritz-Carlton Suite,” LeJeune says, “deeply incognito.”
“Who is he?”
“A retired CEO-cum-politician who we shall name ... T—” LeJeune says after exhaling a whiff of Cuban smoke.
“Interesting,” Lemurel says after a sip of excellent XO, “I thought he was touring a few European countries?”
“That was what everybody—including certain agencies—were supposed to believe,” LeJeune says, “and act upon. And we will, if your mission succeeds.”
“Which is?”
“There’s more than one who can play the doppelgänger game,” LeJeune casts a casual look at the cognac swirling in his glass, “your mission is twofold. You need to swap Mr. T-0 with Mr. T-1, then deliver Mr. T-0 at a certain spot.”
“Which spot?” Lemurel says through a series of carefully crafted smoke rings, “and where’s Mr. T-1?”
“Mr. T-1 will be in the Fantastic Suite of the W tomorrow,” Lejeune’s look couldn’t be more disinterested, “and here’s the spot.” He quickly shows Lemurel a card with something written on it, then sets fire to that card with his cigar.
“Is his wife with him?” Lemurel asks as he puts down his empty glass. “Or other family members?”
“He’s alone,” LeJeune says, his index fingers mimicking quotation marks, “a ‘business’ meeting plus a night out with the boys. Excepting his security detail.”
“Obviously.” Lemurel nods slightly. “It will be done.”
As Lemurel walks back to his hotel, he wonders how Lejeune keeps his costume in such perfect shape through this flying storm. But it’s just a temporary distraction while his subconscious works at the mechanics of the upcoming job. Getting Mr. T-0 out of his suite is one thing. Going back to the scene of the crime to replace him with Mr. T-1 is an altogether different kettle of fish. Yet, as his surface thoughts drift off into wondering how bad the storm will be tomorrow, a plan slowly ges.
He need do a little reconnoitering and squeezes himself through the throng of the French Quarter. Has a cocktail at the Alibi, checks what’s playing at the House of Blues, has an Abita Amber at Cajun Mike’s. As the howling winds shake cocktail glasses, rattle window sills and roll hats over the crowd like tumbleweeds on cobbles, the mood is positively rambunctious while fear is swept away like spindrift on a stormy sea: Mardi Gras über alles.
On the one hand, the incoming hurricane complicates matters quite a bit. Mr. T—and his doppelgänger—are tall, heavyset men, so carrying them in and out will be no mean feat. On the other hand, Ivana’s onslaught together with Mardi Gras will provide plenty of cover and distraction. The carnivalesque atmosphere gives Lemurel an inkling of what to do.
He heads back to the Mazarin, trying to get there before he is totally soaked, hoping certain places will be open tomorrow. He has some shopping to do.
—adagio: calm during the storm—
Early next afternoon, through the torrential downpour and intense gusts, Lemurel checks a few Costume & Mask shops that, to his surprise, are still open. At Fifi Mahony’s, he buys one Harlequin costume for himself, and two Court Jester outfits for ‘friends’, making sure to pay for them with cash. Then he visits a Mardi Gras social club—the Krewe of Endymion—and convinces them to run a certain errand for him, paying a prepostorous amount of cash for the privilege.
After that, he checks a number of local machine shops outside town until he finds one that has the equipment he’s looking for, even if it needs a few tweaks to fit his particular application. Thankfully, they can get that done just before dinner.
Unlike last night, he has a light dinner and heads back to his hotel room in the Mazarin to prepare for his midnight heist-and-swap. Then he heads for the W where there is an urgent, top secret delivery. There will be little sleep tonight—if any—but the anticipation fuels the fire in his underbelly. This is what he’s here for.
🌪🌪🌪
After two massive hurricanes—Harvey and Irma, the latter, at 112 terajoules only 4 terajoules weaker than Katrina—struck the Gulf Coast within two weeks of each other, the people of Louisiana realized that it would be only a matter of time before the Crescent City would be the bullseye for the next huge hurricane. As the costs of Harvey exceeded 200 billion dollars, awareness dawned that prevention would be cheaper both in the short and long term.
So the 2022 Coastal Master Plan was implemented and upgraded with input from the Dutch Rijkswaterstaat, Water Boards and renowned and several innovative Dutch waterworks engineering companies to secure New Orleans—and the wider Louisiana coast—against a once-in-a-10,000-year event—the same risk factor as the Dutch Delta Works.
An intricate and robust network of levees, storm drains and retractable storm surge barriers not unlike the Maeslantkering were implemented, together with the installation of the next generation, hurricane-resistant wind turbines. In the city, ‘Green Alleys’ of permeable pavement and landscaped, shallow troughs—bioswales—were installed, acting as environmentally friendly drainage, filtering and absorbing polluted waters. In this way, 80% of rainfall—even during a hurricane event—is diverted from the sewage system, flowing either into Lake Pontchartrain or the Mississippi, thereby preventing the roads from flooding.
The upgraded plan also included amphibious housing, a number of ‘sand motors’ created by a Dutch/Belgian dredging consortium, and urban planning that mandated the expansion of the city through so-called ‘Eco-Boulevards’, where canals with boathouses are aligned with porous asphalt roads—an improved version of Dutch ZOAB—making those Eco-Boulevards flood proof. Even further out of the urban zone, houses are built on elevated berms that rise up from the wetlands—so-called ‘berms with benefits’—with a rapid electrobus connection and bike lanes connecting these spine-shaped suburbs to the city. On top of that, floating shipping containers on foundations of many thousands of discarded plastic bottles were fabricated and put in reserve to provide vital functions such as education, sanitation and power in the aftermath—or even in anticipation of—a hurricane. Typically, such a ‘city app’ contains a classroom, a sanitation unit, a kitchen and a battery pack connected to a mandated solar cell roof.
Many people took the installation of solar panels as an opportunity to further make their homes as hurricane-proof as possible through reinforcements and quick-to-mount stainless steel windows covers. In this way they were both preparing for the effects of climate change and addressing one of its root causes.
—andante: in the eye of the storm—
As the eye of Ivana crosses the French Quarter, Lemurel makes his move. It’s impossible to remain unsighted in a city that never sleeps—let alone at Mardi Gras—so he decides it’s better to hide in plain sight. A minor turbulent event might go unnoticed in the eye of the hurricane, especially if one tries to blend in.
Time to begin—what Lemurel sardonically referred to as—the dance of the four hotels: a commedia dell’arte for a Harlequin and a pair of Court Jesters. Or a Four-Square in Four Acts. First act at the Hyatt. In the Petite Queen Suite, inconspicuously guarded by a few fellow compatriots, Lemurel hypnotizes the person who is referred to as Mr. T-1, then dresses him in a Court Jester’s outfit, which nicely complements his Harlequin costume.
🤡🤡🤡
After cities like San Francisco, Oakland, New York and Miami started to sue—with increasing degrees of success—the big five oil companies for willfully ignoring the effects of climate change that they were aware of at a very early stage, the principle of ‘the polluter pays’ started to include climate change, and—as it transcended national borders—eventually became a criminal offense under the rules of the International Criminal Court in The Hague.
Under that new jurisdiction, the ICC issued a warrant against Mr. T—who was a fervent climate change denier both as CEO of a major petroleum company and as an appointed cabinet member. As the USA—who had originally signed but then withdrawn from the ICC—would not extradite him, it seemed Mr. T— could enjoy the rest of his life in splendor in his mansion in Texas. The world was taken by surprise, however, when it was announced that Mr. T— accepted an invitation for a series of lectures in Europe. Almost as if the wanted Mr. T— dared a confused world to arrest him.
🌪🌪🌪
Under hypnosis, Mr. T-1 follows Lemurel out of a side entrance of the Hyatt onto a crowded street. Then they walk half a block to the Courtyard by Marriott for the second act. As inconspicuous as possible, Lemurel takes Mr. T-1 to the top floor. There, through the fire escape stairs, he takes him up to the roof and quickly into the service closet of the hotel’s elevator, where Lemurel has already stashed two more costumes and a battery-powered electrowinch.
Lemurel puts the doppelgänger to sleep and changes into his second outfit—that of the Hunchback of the Notre Dame. He ties the battery-powered electrowinch to his back, effectively hiding it in the costume’s hunch and stuffs the second costume in a fake paunch.
Surreptitiously, he makes his exit from the service closet, then moves to the edge of the roof to show his disguise to the partying crowd in the streets, needing a launch a few firecrackers to draw their attention. He takes a few bows, performs a number of clownish moves and then climbs up the wall of the Ritz-Carlton, in full sight of the cheering crowd. The eye of Ivana is passing over the French Quarter, and for about twenty minutes it will be eerily quiet.
However, the moment he reaches the top floor of the Ritz-Carlton, he disappears out of sight, in preparation for the third act. He doesn’t have to wait long, as he’s already seen the Krewe of Endymion—all dressed up as Harlequins just like him—make their way into the Ritz-Carlton, throwing out jelly beans to the reveling crowd like their lives depending on it.
While his prepayment was already very generous, Lemurel’s upped the ante by promising a considerable bonus to all Krewe members who make it all the way to the Ritz-Carlton’s top floor (and prove that through a few selfies with room numbers and/or guests). Most of them do, as the hotel’s staff is outnumbered and outclassed by the professional merry-makers, and most of the guests seem to enjoy the Mardi Gras invasion, as well. Especially the moment they find out that the jelly beans have a secret filling—the brown ones filled with bourbon, the yellow ones with margarita, the blue ones with blue curaçao and the green ones with true to life absinthe.
On the top floor, they become the problem of Mr. T—’s security detail. The hefty bonus incentivized all of them, and Mr. T—’s protection personnel have their hands more than full trying to handle them. In that mad crowd, one extra Carnival character does not stand out, if he is found.
Outside of the Ritz-Carlton suite, unseen by the distracted security detail, Lemurel breaks in, the muffled creak of the ancient window lock lost in the wild revelry noises from the crowded corridors. He’s in the deserted dining room and makes his way towards the bedroom. Mr. T— is there, dressed, awake, alone and not at all surprised to find the Hunchback of the Notre Dame has entered his room.
“Twenty years ago,” Mr. T— says, apparently in a good mood, “I’d join you guys and party all night.” He waves his hand towards the exit door. “But now I need my beauty sleep. If you could join the rest of your party and leave this old man alone.”
“No problem,” Lemurel says, “but first I need to show you this.”
He quickly takes out his tablet that’s preset to show the most mesmerizing and fast-hypnotizing pattern known to humanity. The pattern looks very pretty and enticing, yet becomes irresistible with the right combination of words.
“Say it is too late,” Lemurel says, barely distinguishable from the noise in the corridors, “Prepare to see the way it falls apart. Give up, let it come down, and see the decisions we make.”
Mr. T—’s eyes become glassy as the hypnotic spell takes hold. Lemurel orders him to partly undress and put on the Cardinal costume—complete with carbon fiber body harness and hook—that Lemurel took with him, which goes with the Hunchback character. Lemurel helps him, to speed things up.
“We’ll go outside,” Lemurel the Hunchback says, “where we’ll bow to the crowd and then swing down like Spiderman.” The hypnotized Mr. T-0 nods as if in agreement, and out they go, Lemurel making sure to close but not lock the door to the balcony.
—scherzo: Sturm und Drang—
They walk to the edge of the roof, where Lemurel and Mr. T-0 the Cardinal—impelled by Lemurel and the hypnotic trance—take a quick bow to the audience below. Lemurel anchors the electrowinch’s rope to a nearby chimney, tests its strength to his satisfaction and then wastes no time by hooking himself and Mr. T-0 to it. He grips the unresisting Cardinal, tightens the rope and then jumps off the roof while slowly unreeling the rope through the electrowinch.
Under the encouraging cheers of the street crowd, they swing down like superheroes and land safely on the roof of the Courtyard by Marriott. It takes all Lemurel’s strength, and then some. But somehow he pulls it off, and after landing safely they take their parting bow to the audience below. Quickly, Lemurel leads the heavily hypnotized and slightly euphoric Mr. T-0 to the elevator’s service closet, well out of sight of any onlookers above and below.
Inside, his doppelgänger—Mr. T-1 the Court Jester—is awaiting in a similar hypnotic trance that is beginning to fade. Before the original Mr. T-0 can be surprised, Lemurel sedates him with an anesthetic syringe.
The whole operation took ten minutes flat. Now onwards to get Mr. T-1 back into the Ritz-Carlton Suite. It already took all Lemurel’s strength to get the original down, so it will take all the small yet powerful electrowinch’s battery pack’s power to get them back up. With both hypnotized, Lemurel orders them to swap costumes, and helps them to speed up the process. Once that’s finished, Lemurel wakes the doppelgänger from his hypnotic slumber with a carefully preconditioned double snap, and leads him out onto the roof of the Courtyard by Marriott.
At its edge facing the crowd below, they wave and take a few enticing bows. Then Lemurel the Hunchback quickly connects the electrowinch to the still hanging rope, tests its security, and up they go, under loud cheers. In the far distance, Lemurel sees the hurricane’s eye wall approaching so there are only a few moments of relative quiet left. Using the electrowinch’s momentum, Lemurel swings the two of them over the Ritz-Carlton’s ledge, both his muscles and the foundation of the anchoring chimney creaking under the combined weight of the two jokesters.
A final bow to the maddening crowds, then Lemurel and Mr. T-1 sprint to the Ritz-Carlton Suite, which they enter seconds before Ivana’s eye wall passes over the luxury hotel. Nobody’s in there yet, as Mr. T—’s security detail is—hopefully—still busy clearing away the last of the Krewe of Endymion.
He tells Mr. T—’s doppelgänger to undress, helping him in the process. Then he tells Mr. T-1 to go to bed and to sleep. To be certain, Lemurel sedates him with an anesthetic syringe, as well. He pulls the covers up to the slightly snoring Mr. T-1’s chin, swiftly picks up the Cardinal’s costume and gets out, closing the door and then—with a trick of the trade—locks it from outside.
In this way the security detail may only find out about the swap the next morning. By then, the real Mr. T— should be long gone.
—presto: a teacup through the tempest—
Outside, Ivana is battering the French Quarter once more. In a matter of seconds, Lemurel gets soaked to the bone but doesn’t care much. The crowd in the street has dispersed—probably moved on to safer indoor spaces where plenty of drinks are served—and the drenched Hunchback does not bother to introduce himself to them a third time. Instead, he gets down as fast and as unnoticed as possible through the flying storm.
With a quick snap command, the rope unlocks at the chimney, and Lemurel reels it in with the last remaining battery power. Down below, he sees an empty pickup truck approaching. He takes careful aim—the small and heavy electrowinch will not be moved much by the wind, even at hurricane force—and throws it in the pickup’s trunk.
Onwards back into the elevator’s service closet to change back into the Harlequin outfit. As Mr. T-0 already wears the Court Jester costume, Lemurel wakes him up and hypnotizes him again. He leads his quarry down the fire escape stairs, the rattling of their steps drowned in the fury of Ivana’s gusts and relentless deluge.
At the bottom of the stairs, he leads Mr. T-0 into the nearby parked rental car. Once his quarry is snug in the passenger seat’s safety belt, Lemurel sedates Mr. T-0 one more time and starts driving. He carefully moves through the tick crowd, whch gradually thins as he moves away from the French Quarter. He takes his time, drives around the Big Easy at random to make sure he isn’t followed. Once he’s certain nobody’s tailing him, he heads for his delivery point.
It’s an amphibious house at the shore of the Mississippi, on the edge of the city. Amphibious houses became part of New Orleans and the Louisiana coastline at large once people realized these—when carefully anchored by self-tensioning winches—could not be flooded, and were tested as hurricane-proof.
This particular amphibious house—the Robespierre—was owned by an eccentric Creole family who used it for art exhibitions and soirées for the artistic demi-monde. Unbeknownst to them, the amphibious house has a double bottom. On the river side of this double bottom there is a watertight hatch with a quick-connecting, high tensile rubber seal that can connect to a similar watertight hatch on a mini-submarine.
In deepest secrecy, this connection was only used to get certain people in and out of the United States. The butler—signaled by Lemurel—is already at the rental car’s passenger door before Lemurel has switched off the engine.
“Ah, Monsieur L—” the Butler says, all apologetic as if the cyclone was his fault, “You and Monsieur T—who has passed out, I see—are still drenched. Let me get you something dry right away.”
He carries the sleeping Mr. T— out of the car and they enter the boathouse via the second—barely visible—ramp and a side door out of sight from the partying crowd. Through a small corridor they enter the secret double bottom of the amphibious residence. The ceiling is low, so they have to crouch, yet somehow the Butler manages to drag the unconscious Mr. T— in with him.
“You’ve done this before,” Lemurel says in admiration.
“Pas de problème,” the Butler says.
On his haunches, LeJeune is inside next to the watertight door, eyeing a sparsely lit panel. “Excellent timing, Lemurel,” he says, “the petite DeGrasse is approaching.”
“Fine,” Lemurel says, “my job’s done. I’m leaving.”
“You don’t want to see your, well, package delivered?” LeJeune says.
“No, I leave that to you people,” he says with a nod towards the Butler, “I’d rather park the rental car far away from here, to remove any possible trail.”
“Always the professional,” LeJeune says, “Many thanks, and until we meet again.”
“Until we meet again,” Lemurel says and takes his leave.
After he left, Mr. T—the original—is delivered to the crew of a mini-submarine that has entered the Mississippi in all stealth. Staying mere centimeters above the bottom, they barely noticed the hurricane raging above the surface. The securely anchored Robespierre made connecting the airlock routine, and they’re away in scant moments.
As careful as it made its run upriver, the petite DeGrasse moves downstream, taking extra care not to be detected. After a few hours, it leaves the Mississippi and enters the Gulf of Mexico. A few hours later, well outside the USA’s territorial waters, the petite DeGrasse meets its mothership, a latest generation submarine of the highest stealth class, docking in its underwater bay. While it does not carry nuclear weapons at this time, the payload that is delivered to it will be quite explosive in a completely different manner. A force de fracas rather than a force de frappe.
The DeGrasse then heads for a certain island in the Caribbean, where the original Mr. T— is set on a plane to Europe. In the meantime, Mr. T-2—the doppelgänger to replace the doppelgänger—is officially arrested—much to the relief of the double doppelgänger—on behalf of the ICC. A trial date is announced well after the arrival of the real Mr. T— in Europe.
—coda uno: after-party—
The beers and cocktails flow freely in the Krewe of Endymion’s clubhouse, and the atmosphere is very merry, indeed.
“Everything was going swimmingly as we made our way up to the top floor,” one Krewe member says, “and initially, things were fine up there, as well.”
“Especially as we explained to the guests how spiked our jellybeans were.” Another says.
“But then this bunch of bouncers came out of the Ritz-Carlton Suite,” the first one says, “Ordering us to leave immediately.”
“And we would’ve gone, if they’d asked gently,” the other says, “but they bossed us around as if they’d owned the place.”
“Still things might’ve remained calm if one of them didn’t push Little Jake up the wall,” the first one says, tapping said Jake on the shoulder, “well in sight of Jonah and Boyd.”
“No shit,” one the Krewe’s members who increasingly regrets that he didn’t join that particular outing, eyeing the afore-mentioned, freshly retired American football player and ex-welterweight champion.
“Then it was clobberin’ time,” the huge ex-Saints player says, “as nobody pushes Lil’ Jake like that.”
“We’re sorry about the damage,” another Krewe member says, “but they left us no choice. And we’ll settle it with our bonuses, right?”
“Yes,” the rest of the Krewe says, “one for all and all for one!”
“That won’t be necessary,” the club secretary says, “as I just received a huge donation from the same source that provided our bonuses. ‘For unforeseen expenses,’ it reads, ‘and a job well done’.”
—coda duo: after-effect—
As Mr. T— is led before the court in The Hague, enabled through the assistance of a service that shall not be named, a few diplomats go through a carefully whispered exchange.
“This should not have been necessary,” one says, his affable expression remaining as if painted on his face, “You could have taken his double, which would have been a win-win.”
“How so?” The other says, his amiable bearing slightly broken by a somewhat superior smile.
“You still would have gotten your trial,” the first one says, “and our protest would have been much more muted. Everybody happy.”
“The majority amongst us decided not to settle for an empty j’accuse,” the second one says, “and wanted the actual culprit to face justice.”
“Too bad,” the first one says, “now our diplomatic relationship suffers a huge strain.”
“It’s gone through much worse, in particular during the President that shall not be named,” the second one says, “and otherwise a precedent would have been set; meaning the truly rich can avoid standing trial through surreptitious means. Making this trial a façade, not an actual deterrent. The super rich would not change their ways.”
“They never will,” the first one says, “everything I’ve said is purely off the record, of course, but you can quote me on this: you cannot cure the intense greed of the super rich. It’s a disease stronger than cancer, it’s anchored in them like a genetic trait.”
“Then the only way to stop them is the actual threat of standing trial,” the second one says, “QED.”
—coda tres: aftermath—
‘NEW ORLEANS WITHSTANDS IVANA’
The Times-Picayune headline reads. ‘Three dead,’ the article continues, ‘which can be read as only three in comparison with Katrina’s body count of eighteen-hundred-and-thirty-three. On the other hand, it could have been two less if those Mardi Gras revelers had just stayed inside. Without the Carnival celebrations, we might have lived through Ivana without having to bury anyone. Which is what we hope when the next hurricane—inevitably—arrives. This seems to be a price our revellers are willing to pay.’
[…]
‘Apart from the dead and wounded, the city and its wide environs withstood Ivana admirably. So far, the estimated 125 million dollars damage dwarfs in comparison with Katrina’s estimated 250 billion dollars. “This alone has made the 80 billion dollar investment in Hurricane-proofing absolutely worthwhile,” Mayor LeCorbusier says, ‘and we can only urge other cities on the Gulf Coast to follow our example’.”
—coda quattro: afterglow—
Lemurel sits down at the table in Dieu du Ciel, facing LeJeune who is—as usual—indistinguishable from a Prohibition-era gangster. At this meeting in Montreal, he’s looking forward to a great meal with—if possible—even greater drinks. His eyes, though, almost roll out of their sockets when the waiter sets their beer flight on the table.
“…fifteen, sixteen, seventeen,” Lemurel says, counting, “that’s insane.”
“There are so many fantastic beers here,” LeJeune says, “and I couldn’t choose. Now I don’t have to.”
“At this rate we’ll be drunk before dinner.” Lemurel says, flashing a sardonic smile.
“They’re only small glasses,” LeJeune says, “and we have not had time to celebrate your—let’s call it—Crescent City Symphony.”
“That’s true,” Lemurel says, “but I suppose we’re not here just for that.”
“Correct,” LeJeune says, “there’s this gentleman staying at Hotel Le Crystal…”
Support this writer:
Like this post!
Re-stack it using the ♻️ button below!
Share this post on Substack and other social media sites:
Join my mailing list:
Author’s note: this story was originally published in Mardi Gras Mysteries on January 12, 2021. I will be busy this weekend so expect one post that I’ve timed to fill the gap.
Welcome to another new subscriber and many thanks for reading!