Chapter 15 Too Late

“Sheriff, what ya doing here on a Sunday morning?” Deputy Pierre asked standing at the Sheriff’s door.  “Isn’t this your day off?”

“Couldn’t sleep, thought I might as well be here.  Spent most the night on that couch over there.”  Renee yawned.

“I have a kid out here that says he has to see you.”  Deputy Pierre stated.

“Okay, let him in.”

A young bare-footed boy about eleven stepped inside Sheriff Renee’s office.

“Aren’t you Armon?  Marie’s brother,” Sheriff asked.

“Yes, yes, I am… Sheriff, I had to come and tell you.  Dat evil man named Gator…he come to see my mama last week.  He threatened all of us with his knife.  Said he kill us all if’n we didn’t tell him who killed his brother.  Mama would not tell him so he got Sally and put a knife to her throat.  I knowed he would kill her sure as day is long.  Mama cried and begged him to let her go.  He a mean man.  Sally was screaming and fightin’ him and den he cut her throat.  I tried to stop him and he stabbed me in my arm.  When mama saw all de blood she told him.  Den he dropped Sally.  God help mama she couldn’t help it.  Now, Mr. Sheriff, he’s going to New Orleans to kill Marie…you got to help her.  I would have com ‘fore now but I couldn’t paddle my pirogue.”  Armon rushed on with his words so fast the Sheriff could barely understand his broken English.

“Is your baby sister okay?” 

“Yes, she be okay, just a flesh wound but it like to have killed my mama she be so afraid.  Please Sheriff; don’t let that monster kill Marie.”    Armon began to cry.

“Armon, you go on back home and tell your mama she won’t lose her daughter to that bastard.  I’ll stop him.  You don’t worry, you hear me.” 

“Deputy Marcel, I want you to follow Armon out to Bayou Cane and stay with his family for a few days. 
Take plenty of ammo and if anything suspicious…shoot first and ask questions later.”

“Right Sheriff, I feel I owe his family that much.”  Deputy Marcel jumped up and began gathering several high powered guns and ammo.

“I’m on my way to New Orleans.  Deputy Pierre, call Chief Renfro in New Orleans and let him know I’ll be there as soon as I can. “
Renee drove home as quickly as he could… loaded his car with a few things; told Miss Maybelle to not expect him home   for a few days and left stirring up dust from the oyster shell driveway.
It usually took him a little over two hours to get to New Orleans.  He got to Rosewood House in one hour and ten minutes.  He was too late.  Still crying and wiping her eyes Miss Moselle told Renee what had happened the night before.

“Sheriff, she’s at New Orleans General.  I don’t know how she doing.  Lord, oh Lordy, she look bad when I see her dis morning.  All butchered up all downs her poor back.  I don’ know what dat chile ever did to deserve dat kind of meanness.”  Miss Moselle continued wiping her eyes.

“Thank you.  I’m going to the hospital now.  Did anyone see the man that did this?”

“No sir…I can’t say I did but somethin’ ain’t right.  Somebodies lets him go up to her room.” Miss Moselle shook her head.

Sheriff Renee spoke with the Chief Renfro at the crime scene and told him all that he knew then left for the hospital.
 
Marie lay on her stomach in a room by herself with a uniformed police officer outside the door.  Sheriff Renee showed his badge to him and was allowed into the room.  Marie was knocked out with just a thin sheet covering her buttocks, but he could see the deep bruises on her back and legs.  Her back was covered with bloodied bandages and gauze.  She was pale, very pale with her black hair matted and tangled around her face.  Long black eyelashes fluttered ever now and then and she moaned as if she was dreaming a nightmare.    “I’m so sorry, Marie.” Sheriff Renee leaned over and whispered in her ear.  “I will get this bastard.  I promise you.  You sleep and heal.  I’ll be back soon.”

Renee left with anger in his face and determination in his soul.  He was going to get this man for every evil deed he had done if it was the last thing on earth he did.  He would stay in New Orleans and help the police as much as possible.  When Marie was well enough to go home he would take her to Houma and watch over her until this monster was caught or dead whichever came first.  He knew if he found him first he would be dead.  This was a new feeling for Renee, he could honestly say in his heart he had never wanted anyone dead before.
 
Nell, Marie’s friend, came to the hospital and was allowed in only because she told them she was her nearest kin.  Day   and night she sat by Marie’s side and watched her wrestle with her demons in a semi-conscious state.  She knew that Marie’s body would heal but wasn’t so sure about her emotional scars.  Nell had quit Rosewood House when she discovered what had really happened.  She had thought that Madame Gigi was a tough woman but never suspected she would allow something as cruel and brutal as what had happened to Marie.  Oh, the story came down that she had only meant to get her money back by allowing the tall dark man to sleep with Marie.  He had paid her $500. to give him undisturbed access to her all night.  Madame Gigi said she didn’t know he had planned to almost kill her, but Nell wasn’t so sure she wasn’t lying.  
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It had been a month and Marie was healing from her injuries.  The herring bone cuts on her back had scabbed over without getting infected.  The scars were deep and ugly.  Marie could not bear to look at them.  Nell had been there daily and assured her that she was still beautiful and would feel much better once she got out of the hospital and to Sheriff’s Renee’s home in Houma.  So far, Marie had been very silent.  She sat and stared off into space but she didn’t cry anymore.  Nell could see a deep cold hardness in her that she had never seen before.  Would she ever be that girl Nell had first met, again?  Nell wondered.