Dead water - Barbara Hambly [43]
Brinton House——New Orleans
Hannibal had a fine collection of other people's cards, and never wasted the opportunity to add to it.
“They're probably gone by this time,” he said. He briefly jingled the pick-locks in his coat pocket, then led the way around to the front of the Imperial Hotel again, January falling respectfully into step behind. The cab that had brought Weems and Mrs. Fischer certainly no longer stood in the drive; January ventured to hope that they could simply cross through the lobby and into the yard, where the porters, seeing the card, would allow Hannibal to open the trunks on pretext of needing something inside.
And then, with luck, thought January, we can find an officer of the law, present Granville's documents, and head back to New Orleans by the next boat. . . .
Only one of his three wishes was granted.
“Are you Mr. Hannibal Sefton of New Orleans?”
Hannibal stopped in surprise at the question, asked by a youngish, squint-eyed man in a rough woolen coat who stepped from the hotel doors as he and January mounted the steps.
“I am.” The information was readily checkable on the boat, though January later realized that at this point either Hannibal should have lied or the two of them should have immediately turned tail and dashed in opposite directions to divide pursuit. . . .
“And is this your man Ben?”
“Yes.”
“Then I place you under arrest,” said the newcomer, opening his lapel to reveal the badge of a deputy sheriff of Adams County. “For slave-stealing.”
“This is absurd.” Hannibal tugged his arm protestingly from Deputy Rees's grip as the deputy escorted him down Commerce Street toward the jail. “I demand to be confronted by my accuser!”
“You will be.” The deputy's grip on his arm didn't slack, though the man didn't spare more than a glance back at January to see that he was following. A reasonable assumption of docility, January reflected bitterly, given a fugitive black man's chances if an alarm was raised, in the upper town at least. “That feller Granville said he'd be back here at two, to meet with Sheriff Gridley and give evidence.”
Weems, January reflected dourly, seemed to have made as free about lifting Hubert Granville's cards as Hannibal had about helping himself to one of Weems's. The deputy thrust Hannibal through the gate of a dusty yard behind a brick building. In the middle of the yard a hard-jawed young man was chaining a slave to the six-foot timber in the center of the yard that served as a whipping-post. “Tom, lock up Sambo here,” Rees ordered with a jerk of his head, and Tom fastened the final manacle to the chained slave's wrist and came to grab January's arm.
“This way, Chimney-Chops.” Tom thrust January toward the slave jail at the back of the yard, a brick building whose only windows were a frieze of gaps in the brickwork up under the eaves.
“And I demand to see the warrant issued for my arrest,” added Hannibal as Rees pushed him toward the rear door of the police station. He didn't trade so much as a nod with January, but January knew his friend had the wits to realize that the deputy was not the person to be shown Granville's letter demanding cooperation—not until they knew beyond the shadow of a doubt what was in those trunks.
Even in that event, January would have been unwilling to risk it: no judge could have been found to issue a warrant in the fifteen minutes between Weems's arrival at the Imperial Hotel and Hannibal's arrest. Therefore, Deputy Rees had almost certainly been bribed.
Undoubtedly with Jubal Cain's four hundred blackmailed dollars—with enough left over for lunch.
“You'll see it when the sheriff gets here,” said Rees as they vanished inside, confirming January's guess. January himself, he was well aware, was only an adjunct to the whole process—merely stolen property to be secured until those who were legally human determined guilt or innocence.
So he had to force himself silent as he was walked across the yard, past the man chained at the whipping-post, to the door of the slave-jail. Tom keyed open the padlock. Trapped