‘A veve?’ He picked up the card. ‘Oh, yeah,’ he said. ‘Why not?’ He tucked the card into his shirt pocket.
‘What are you going to do?’
‘I’m going to wait until morning, because I don’t want to appear too eager.’ He laughed. ‘And then I guess I’ll go down to the Buccaneer Inn and give Otille a call.’
Donnell dropped in his money and dialed. A flatbed truck passed on the road, showering the booth with spray from its tires, but even when it had cleared he could barely make out the pickup parked in front of the bar. The rain dissolved the pirate’s face above the shingle roof into an eyepatch and a crafty smile, smeared the neon letters of the Lone Star Beer sign into a weepy glow.
‘Yes, who is it?’ The voice on the line was snippish and unaccented, but as soon as he identified himself, it softened and acquired a faint Southern flavor. ‘I’m pleasantly surprised, Mr Harrison. I’d no idea you’d be calling so quickly. How can I help you?’
‘I’m not sure you can,’ he said. ‘I’m just calling to make a few inquiries.’
Otille’s laugh was sarcastic; even over the wire it conveyed a potent nastiness. ‘You obviously have pressing problems, or else you wouldn’t be calling. Why don’t you tell me about them? Then if I’m still interested you can make your inquiries.’
Donnell rubbed the phone against his cheek, thinking how best to handle her. Through the rain-washed plastic, he saw an old hound dog with brown and white markings emerge from the bushes beside the booth and step onto the road. Sore-covered, starved-thin, dull-eyed. It put its nose down and began walking toward the bar, sniffing at litter, unmindful of the pelting rain.
‘I need three tons of copper,’ he said. ‘I want to build something.’
‘If you’re going to be circuitous, Mr Harrison, we can end this conversation right now.’
‘I want to build a replica of the veve on your calling card.’
‘Why?’
At first, prodded by her questions, he told half-truths, repeating the lies he had been told at the project, sketching out his plan to use the veve as a remedy, omitting particulars. But as the conversation progressed, he found he had surprisingly few qualms about revealing himself to her and became more candid. Though some of her questions maintained a sharp tone, others were asked with childlike curiosity, and others yet were phrased almost seductively, teasing out the information. These variances in her character reminded him of his own fluctuations between arrogance and anxiety, and he thought because of this he might be able to understand and exploit her weaknesses.
‘I’m still not quite clear why you want to build this precise veve,’ she said.
‘It’s an intuition on my part,’ he said. ‘Jocundra thinks it may be an analogue to some feature of my brain, but all I can say is that I’ll know after it’s built. Why do you have it on your card?’
‘Tradition,’ she said. ‘Do you know what a veve is, what its function in voodoo is?’
‘Yes, generally.’
‘I’m quite impressed with what I’ve heard about you,’ she said. ‘If anyone else had called me and suggested I build the veve of Ogoun Badagris out of three tons of copper, I would have hung up. But before I commit… excuse me.’
The hound dog had wandered into the parking lot of the bar and stood gazing mournfully at Mr Brisbeau’s tailgate; it snooted at something under the rear tire and walked around to the other side. Donnell heard Otille speaking angrily to someone, and she was still angry when she addressed him once again.
‘Come to Maravillosa, Mr Harrison. We’ll talk. I’ll decide whether or not to be your sponsor. But you had better come soon. The people who’re watching you won’t allow your freedom much longer.’
‘How do you know?’
‘I’m very well connected,’ she said tartly.
‘What guarantee do I have they won’t be watching me there?’
‘Maravillosa is my private preserve. No one enters without my permission.’ Otille made an impatient noise. ‘If you decide to come, just call this number and talk to Papa. He’ll be picking you up. Have that old fool you’re staying with take you through the swamp to Caitlett’s Store.’
‘I’ll think about it,’ said Donnell. Gray rain driven by a gust of wind opaqued the booth; the lights of the bar looked faraway, the lights of a fogbound coast.
‘Not for too long,’ said Otille; her voice shifted gears and became husky, enticing. ‘May I call you Donnell?’
‘Let’s keep things businesslike between us,’ he said, irked by her heavy-handedness.
‘Oh, Donnell,’ she said, laughing. ‘The question was just a formality. I’ll call you anything I like.’
She hung up.
