The House

So Bonnie has called me out, and she wants to hear the story of what happened in The House in Louisiana. Now, normally I’d be hesitant to tell this tale, but I haven’t posted anything in a while, so now seems like the time. So Bonster, this one's for you.
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It all started, as these things so often do, with a dead guy in Cleveland. His name was Lloyd Blood Catrall, 97, of the Kingbury Run area of Cleveland. He died, believe it or not, in a freak climbing accident, and left behind him a legacy that haunts me to this day.

I was loafing around Cleveland on a three day layover, waiting for a shipment of paper goods to take to Denver. I was bored as hell and looking for something to do when I discovered on Craigslist an estate sale taking place at a nearby home. Knowing that they often wind up selling old guns at these things, I jumped in my rig and drove down.

The house was easily seventy years old, and the inside looked like the house of a fussy old aunt. Everything was neat and orderly, but the old man just had so much stuff. Shelves and shelves lined every room, and was filled with the mementos of an exciting and memorable life. Fifty year old skis and poles, a surfboard that looked to have been built in the ’40’s. Rifle racks that were empty now and old sailing gear. A pair of spears that had a pitting on the blades, the kind you see hunters skewer wild boars with. A parachute hanging in a corner, even.

I talked with the man’s nephew Karl, who told me his uncle had been in the OSS and fought behind the lines in France during World War II. Looking around, I could tell. This Lloyd Blood Catrall had been a wild man, even in his nineties. It seemed a shame for his family to be selling off the contents of his house. The place was a shrine to an adventurer, and adventurers don’t really exist anymore. They’re a dying breed.

I guess the word hadn’t got out about the sale, because I was able to score the old man’s very nice Fitzed Colt New Service (which I ultimately sold to a collector), and a nicely built steamer trunk that was one of a set of four. The trunk I wanted was the most beat up one that had all of the souvenir stickers on it, and when I pulled it out from the stack, found it was still heavy with cargo. I’d assumed the man’s nephew had already looted the case for valuables, but I was hoping to root through the thing to see if I could find anything interesting. The nephew said his kids had already gone through the trunks, and that I was welcome to keep whatever was in it, or I could throw it all away. I wished I had more money at the time, ‘cause I would have filled my truck with stuff if I had.

So with the help of a handtruck and some sweat, I wrestled the steamer trunk outside and got it in my rig. Once I got back to the truck stop, I opened the lid on the heavy trunk, and it was like Christmas inside.

Old men tend to accumulate things through their lives, interesting objects from traveling the world, going to war, and working in exciting places. Lloyd Blood Catrall was no different. He’d had nearly a hundred years of acquiring cool stuff, and though Catrall’s nephew had claimed to have gone through the locker, there was no way they would have left some of the stuff that was in there. This particular locker must have been overlooked by his family. Either that or they were just ignorant as to what is valuable or not.

There wasn’t just a bunch of random junk in there. There were folders of papers and newspaper clippings that looked interesting. An old brass spyglass, the kind that collapses, like you see in old pirate movies. An antique Ka-bar switchblade and Marine fixed-blade knife. A Fairbairn-Sykes commando dagger. An old gold-plated watch. Several small statues and ornaments on chains that looked to be some kind of 3rd world charms or amulets. A pair of antique silver-framed Matsuda sunglasses. An old leather gauntlet with steel strips sewn in between the two layers of cowhide. A battered brass Zippo lighter with the name Blood engraved on the bottom edge. A tarnished silver flask. A piano-wire garrote with to wooden pegs for handles that was stored in a leather pouch. A pocket knife that had ancient lock picks instead of blades that probably wouldn’t work on any modern lock. Another folding tool with a wire cutter that I remembered was called an Escaper’s knife during WWII—the precursor to the modern day multi-tool. A gas mask with new filters.

This old boy had everything. His mementos of war and a adventurous life.

Among the papers, I found an accordion folder tied together with a leather piggin’ string. Inside, I noticed the thick file contained documents from what appeared to be two separate subjects. The first were case files and newspaper accounts of what was assumed to be a serial murderer called The Cleveland Torso Killer. Evidentally, old Lloyd Catrall had been a Cleveland cop in his ‘20’s and been assigned to the case in the 1930’s.

Very interesting stuff, but an internet search later confirmed that even though there were dozens of men working the case, and even the legendary Eliot Ness led the team for awhile, the Torso Killer was never officially found. These documents, however, had all kinds of reports and crime scene photos and witness statements; enough for an enterprising soul to write a book about. I made a mental note to contact a few writers online and see if any fish would bite. These documents could be worth something.

The second part of the file looked to be a witch hunt that Catrall had been waging in the fifties, looking into the affairs of what he referred to as “The damned mysterious Saber’s of Lafitte,” a secretive network of politicians and businessmen, all movers and shakers within the upper crust of New Orleans’ high society mucky mucks.

That was the part of the file that had me intrigued. I could find no mention of a secret society called The Sabers of Lafitte, but the name itself conjured images of that notorious pirate and smuggler Jean Lafitte, who had been all over Louisiana during the War of 1812 and after. I already knew a little something about historical New Orleans thanks to my prodigious reading, and the idea that a former cop and spy had been looking into the activities of a secretive group in the south had my curiosity piqued.

From everything that I had seen of Lloyd Blood Catrall, the man had been nobody’s fool, and he would not have been involved in conspiracy plots lightly. Hell, for a few years at least, conspiracies had been the man’s bread and butter, and I was willing to bet he hadn’t been a kook. The man had dossiers on a dozen people who were supposed to be high-ranking members of the Sabers of Lafitte which included family genealogies, pictures, and fingerprint cards. He’d done his homework, and written copious notes detailing his thoughts on the group.

It took me weeks to pore through the papers when I got home, and what I discovered once I had read them over a dozen times was compelling, to say the least. I became nearly obsessed with the file, and began to make regular visits to the library and the internet to get a handle on the history of Catrall’s secret society.

The Sabers of Lafitte had indeed been formed during the War of 1812 by the pirate and Privateer Jean Lafitte and his brother, Pierre. Despite how the history books made them sound, they had evidently been more patriotic than most historians believed, and had been at the forefront of creating a society of hidden revolutionaries, who would defend and protect the citizens and the city of New Orleans from all comers.

According to Catrall, this group had been responsible for building much of the city and defending it not only from the British, but from the Union during the Civil War. As far as secret societies go, this group was pretty effective, and had successfully done its job and kept the city safe for nearly two-hundred years.

The dozen members of the SoL whose dossiers Catrall had accumulated had been active members during the 1950’s, but there were no new records after that. Catrall said in his notes that he was warned off the trail by a pair of huge men who had been in his hotel room in the French Quarter when he woke up one morning. They had managed to enter without waking him, which was a difficult feat given Catrall’s warrior senses that had never atrophied, the ones that had kept him from being captured by the Nazis during the war. The ease with which these men had gotten close to him had shook him to his core, and he decided to drop the matter entirely, but he did note that after their little visit to his hotel room, the group seemed to have gone underground, and virtually disappeared in the 1960’s. He was almost positive, though, that the New Orleans-based community organization The Sons of Louisiana was a false front for the SoL, and that the society was still in operation.

The weirdest part, though, was the manila file that contained fifty or so pages referencing the occult underground of New Orleans’ ethnic poor. The Voodooists, the Santeria and mayombe practicioners. The hex doctors that moved within the Cajun bayous. Spirits, ghosts, and men and women possessed by unearthly forces. His notes were detailed and a bit disturbing when he recalled some of the things he had seen, and he wrote down his defenses against what he had termed “baleful forces”. It made for fascinating reading, and I soaked it all up.

However, despite Lloyd Catrall’s detailed notes, I could find no reason other that the SoL being a shadowy secret society, to make him spend the better part of a year dogging their every step. It was a complete mystery, and eventually I got bored with the subject and put it out of my head, moving on to other things.

All of this was nearly forgotten until three years later, when I found myself surfing the internet one night and I stumbled upon a conspiracy theory message forum called Powerful Secrets. The forum members who posted seemed to be made up of nothing but wack-jobs and skitzoes, but they were otherwise a pretty fun group and unsurprisingly willing to entertain the most outlandish crap that anyone threw against the wall. They’d hash over and debate every wild-ass theory that came out of left field, and thought of the world as one big network of hidden compacts and back-room deals. This was one of those places that the mention the Illuminati and Prieuré de Sion is met with serious scowls of utmost solemnity.

In other words, they were the kind of people who might have heard of the Sabers of Lafitte or the Sons of Louisiana, and might give me a little understanding of what Catrall was looking for.

On a lark, I dug out the files and read them through once again, hoping that looking at them through fresh eyes would give me some new insight. No luck. The purpose of Catrall’s hunt was as elusive as ever.

In a last ditch effort to get answers, I went onto the Powerful Secrets Forum and started a thread that mentioned both Lloyd Catrall and the elusive Sabers of Lafitte, already thinking that there was no way anyone would know about either subject.

I was right. None of the members had heard of either, though a couple of members from Baton Rouge had heard of the Sons of Lousiana, given the group’s Feed the Poor and community outreach programs. But other than that, the Baton Rouge contingent knew nothing.

Once again, I had struck out.

Figuring that I had come to the end of the line, I stuffed the papers into the bottom of my closet and put ancient conspiracy theories and spies out of my mind and went back to living life. I stuck around Salt Lake, driving truck and gaming, and going shooting every once in a while. Life got back to normal.

I had spent the day running freight out to the Dugway Proving Grounds, and I was enjoying the mild Salt Lake summer, when I got a call on my Nextel from my boss, asking me for my location. I told him that I was going on my lunch and that I’d be hanging out at one of my favorite places to spend my lunch breaks—a grassy area near the airport where I could sit and think about nothing, maybe feed the seagulls a little and read. He told me to stay there for a while, and take an extra hour on my lunch.

I was okay with that and I didn’t think to ask him why. I figured that he had a pick up or something he wanted me to do before I came in and was just waiting on the particulars. It had happened before.

I had been there for a half hour, and was sitting on a picnic table, eating lunch and reading a book, when I heard footsteps coming up behind me. Suddenly paranoid, I turned around to see who was sneaking up on me.

To my surprise, it was a girl. A very attractive, dark brunette with flashing eyes in a low cut crop-top. She was looking right at me and smiled, and then waved from across the lot. I turned my head and looked to see if she was waving at someone behind me, but we were alone in the middle of a big, wide open field.

I raised one eyebrow and waited for her to come to me.

Girls don’t ever approach guys like me unless they want something. It’s a universal truth. Usually they want money or a favor of some kind. Maybe get me to jump their car or give them money for the train—something like that. I was curious to hear what her pitch was going to be, and I quickly stuffed the book I’d been reading into my pack and zipped it up, just in case I wanted to leave in a hurry.

She saaauuntered up slowly, crinkling those shaded eyes at me and flashing a toothy grin and she spoke.

“Hi, Dan. Nice the meetcha, Sha.”

What the Hell!?

“I’m Miri,” she said. “Miri Levon. I’ve been trying to find you for a week, now. You’re a canaille gent, me—hard to track down, yeah.” Her voice was smooth and throaty, but her accent was thick and hard to follow. It sounded Cajun to me, but she was less Justin Wilson and more Southern Belle. And a hundred percent freakin’ charming.

“Uhh…hi.” Lord, I’m slick with the ladies. “Why are you looking for me, exactly?”

“You posted a thread over at Powerful Secrets. ‘Bout a fella named Catrall and the Sabers o’ Lafitte. You were lookin’ for anyone what knew about ‘em,” she said.

“Uh, huh,” I said. “But how do you know that was me?”

“’Cause, it was you what posted it. Ain’t you the fella named Centennial Red?” She asked.

“Yeah, but how did you know it was me? I never use my real name online.”

“Oh, that. I’m a moderator on the forum, yeah. Ya used your right name when ya registered, and I tracked your IP,” she said. “And I knew I was gonna need to come and see ya in person, so hear I am.”

That’s the last time I use my real name online, I thought.

“Yeah, but how the hell did you find me here?”

“Oh, I asked your boss how to find ya. Brian, it was.”

“And he just told you where to find me?”

“Well, he might’a got the impression I was your girlfriend from back home come to visit.”

“The impression…” I said.

“I never said it outright. Just told him I really needed you right now, and I had to find you.”

“He didn’t question you at all?”

“No,” she said. “He seemed so happy that you had a girlfriend, he jus’ gave you up right there.”

Yep, sounds like Brian, I thought.

“So, whaddya you want, exactly?” I asked.

She smiled. “I think you figured out the answers to some questions my Pop and Nonc been hunting after for nigh forty years, Beb. Like where a fella named Blood disappeared to in the ’50’s, and what he was hunting for down in Nawlins around then. We thought the Sabers made him disappear, but now it looks like he just up and left.”

“What’s a hell’s a nonc?”

“My Uncle Alyosius,” she said. “You said in that post of yours that you found Catrall’s papers and such?”

Suddenly it occurred to me that a woman who had spent a week tracking me down from where I supposed was Louisiana didn’t come all this way just to talk. She was onto something bigger. Something real. And I was suddenly hesitant to mention the papers at all or let her know I had them. I was beginning to feel the excitement I’d first felt when I’d found those papers, and no one was getting any information about them unless I was in on the deal.

“Papers, pictures, files, notes. I had them all,” I said. And then I hedged my bets. “I wish I still had them.”

“What, you don’t have them anymore?”

“No,” I lied. “They kind of got stolen in California when I went out there last. They were in my backpack, and some freakin’ thief ran off with it when I set it down for a minute on the beach.”

“You mean the papers are gone? I come out here for no good?”

“I wouldn’t say that,” I told her. Her eyes lit up, and she got a hopeful gleam in them. “I read the damned thing fifty times if I read them once, and I’ve got a good memory.”

“You did. You remember what was in ‘em?”

“Yes, of course. I remember things I read. I could probably draw out the diagrams again if I need to. What all were you hoping to know?”

She squealed like a girl and threw both arms around my neck and squeezed. I felt vertebrae pop in my neck and I chuckled. She pulled back and kissed me on the cheek three times.

“I knew you’d be the one! I jus’ knew it, yeah! Dannyboy, you magnifique grand beede’,” she said, and hugged me again. “We got lots to talk about, Beb. You, me. Let’s go.”

Laughing, I said, “But I got work, still.”

“Not today you don’t,” she said. “I told your boss I was makin’ away with you for the rest of the day.”

“What did he say?”

She winked at me and my toes tingled. “He said to tell you that you were a lucky bastard.”

Indeed.