The Heat of the New Orleans Night

The Heat of the New Orleans night pressed against the window like an urgent lover.
Jack Karaquazian stood sleepless, naked, staring out into the sweating darkness as
if he might see at last some tangible horror which he could confront
and even hope to conquer.

‘Tomorrow,’ he told his handsome friend Sam Oakenhurst, ‘I shall take the Star up
to Natchez and from there make my way to McClellan by way of the Trace.
Will you come?’

(The vision of a sunlit bayou, recollection of an extraordinarily rich perfume, the
wealth of the earth. He remembered the yellow-billed herons standing in the
shadows, moving their heads to regard him with thoughtful eyes before returning
their respect to the water, the grey ibises, seeming to sit in judgement of the others;
the delicate egrets congregating on the old logs and branches; a cloud of monarch
butterflies, black and orange, diaphanous, settling over the pale reeds and,
in the dark green waters, a movement might have been a copperhead or alligator,
or even a pike. In that moment of silence before the invisible insects began a fresh
song, her eyes were humorous, enquiring. She had worked for a while, she said,
as a chanteuse at The Fallen Angel on Bourbon Street.)

Sam Oakenhurst understood the invitation to be a courtesy. 'I think not, Jack.
My luck has been running pretty badly lately and travelling ain’t likely to improve
it much.’ Wiping his ebony fingers against his undershirt, he delicately picked an ace
from the baize of his folding table.

For a moment the overhead fan, fueled by some mysterious power, stirred the cards.
Pausing, Mr Oakenhurst regarded this phenomenon with considerable satisfaction,
as if his deepest faith had been confirmed.