That next Sunday afternoon, Marcy swung by Cay's apartment. She doubled parked and ran up the back stairs to Cay's apartment. She pushed her way through the unlocked door, headed right to Roux, Cay's mutt of a dog, and scratched him under the chin. Roux allowed the loving to go on exactly 13 seconds before rolling over n his back and exposing his belly for some loving too. Cay had seen this routine a dozen times.

After a respectful belly rubbing, Marcy patted his belly with a loud "thump thump" and left Roux to his own blissfulness. She grabbed an extra beignet off Cay's kitchen table and folded herself into one of the easy chairs in Cay's living room.

Without even a hello, she asked Cay. "Do you think they will let me play the tambourine? I think I have a good sense of rhythm. Don't you think I have a good sense of rhythm?"

"Let's go. We're going to be late."

Marcy asked the tambourine question at least twice more as they zipped around the streets in her little Nissan, passing through narrow alleys and on to some narrow and shabby streets. Cay watched with rising apprehension as she found herself heading into neighborhoods she had always considered dangerous and wise to stay away from. Housing had turned into narrow, peeling painted shotgun houses with their sagging stoops. Bars and package stores dotted the neighborhood and the plethora of ripped chain fences providing feeble protection against neighborhood crime.

"Where are we going again?" she said, as she tried to casually lock the door with her elbow. Marcy didn't notice.

"Zy said the Broken Arrows meet for practice every Sunday at Dash's Bar down in the old Gert Town area. She asked again. "Do you think I will be able to play tambourine or something? Maybe I could second line it back with Zy if I make a good impression?"

Cay realized she didn't have a clue of what she was getting herself into, but she figured that Marcy would have no trouble finding a way to be a part of the scene. Cay had placed the package in the trunk and decided she was going to keep it there in case Eliah wasn't there. But truth be told, she was hoping she could deliver that package today, drop this case, and get back to the safety of her apartment.

"There it is!" Marcy said triumphantly and did a quick U turn to grab a parking place around the corner. Cay got out of the car and quickly jumped back in to lock Marcy's side. Two young men, slackenly standing on the corner watched them pass by and one emitted a low whistle toward Marcy's way. She didn't seem to hear, still obsessed if she would be able to get a chance to play with the band.

As they pushed through the tired, worn down and filthy door, Cay heard a sound that she would never have before connected with Mardi Gras. There was a steady rhythm of drumming, and what sounded like a call and response gospel tune being played at too high of a speed. It had a definite Plains Indian kind of feel. She could see from the crowd that she was the whitest face in the crowd. The place was packed, and despite the cool bit to the wind, the bar was sweaty, warm and humid.

A small, lean man stopped them before they were two feet into the space. He wore a grey tweed hat and a polyester yellow short sleeves shirt over a pair of shiny black pants. He spoke politely, but deftly blocked the entrance into the larger bar by extending his sinewy arm.

"Ladies, are you looking for something?"

Marcy smiled and touched his arm. "Tags invited us down. My name is Marcy and this is my friend Cayenne."

Cay wasn't sure if it was Marcy's smile or the mention of Tags, but the man relented, returning a grin that revealed a gold tooth. "Enter my lovelies," he said, and waved them in.

Over in the corner, crowded onto a tiny stage was about a half dozen men, all black, with drums, tambourines and a slightly out of tune piano at the center. The piano player was just clapping his hand during the chant, but at the middle, wearing a headdress of beautiful beads and bright turquoise feathers was an older man leading the chant. He was clapping his hands and working up a sweat. His raspy strong voice carried over all the loud rhythm instruments that seemed to pulsate in the walls.

She shifted up onto the balls of her feet to get a better look. This must be the Big Chief, Cay thought. The man moved with incredible grace and rhythm, his eyes closed, sweat pouring down his face. It was more of a chant than a song, with the Big Chief chanting the song and the whole rest of the group calling out the response.

_{FIRE WATER IN MY BLOOD
Arrows Gonna Let It Fly!
SPY BOY SWIMMING THROUGH FIRE AND MUD
Arrows Gonna Let It Fly!
BLOOD SHIFFA HOONA DON'T KNOW HOW
Arrows Gonna Let It Fly!
MARCHING ARROWS DON'T KNEEL, DON'T BOW
Arrows Gonna Let It Fly!
MY FLAG BOY HE MAKE CHA WA
Arrows Gonna Let It Fly!
LOOK SO PRETTY, MAKE NO HUMBAH,
Arrows Gonna Let It Fly!
HEY HEY PAK E WAY!
Arrows Gonna Let It Fly!
HEY HEY PAK E WAY!
Arrows Gonna Let It Fly!}

All around the group, people were dancing and swinging low to the ground. It was mostly an older crowd, but in the corner near the Dixie Beer sign, a young couple did a hip hop dance to the rhythm.

Marcy started swing her hips and clapping along on the refrain. "This is way cool." Then she started waving. "Zy! Tags! Hey, over here!"

Zy and Tags strolled from over near the bar. Zy leaned over and gave Marcy a strong kiss. He gave a nod to Cay, and his look seemed a little less threatening than it had at the Rock 'n' Bowl.

"Hey, darling. Looking good." Tags nodded his head and smiled. "I got to set my drums up but didn't want to pass up saying hello."

"This music is great, Zy. What exactly is it?" Marcy again started snapping her fingers.

"Oh, it's a dash of this, and a dash of that," Zy answered. "Every tribe brings somethings different, so some have a real Indian beat, some are more jazz and blue. Others, like the Wild Tchoupitoulas, well they got the funky groove going there and that's a lot of fun. You'll hear some Indian in Professor Longhair's stuff, and Dr. John. Sometimes you'll even catch the accent in the Neville Brothers. And that my dears, " he said with a smile, "is as committed as I would like to get. What can I get you to drink?"

Cayenne let Zy get them a couple beers and listened and watched through another song before she broached the real reason she was here.

"Hey Zy. Is there a guy around here named Raynaldo?" She tried to look disinterested and took a sip of her Miller. "I think I know his girlfriend."

"You on the job?" He asked suspiciously.

"Hey, I just have a message for her and I don't know how to reach her. No one has died."

Zy looked her up and down calculating her words before he raised his hand and waved it toward the back of the bar. "Raynaldo is the tall guy in the Nike jacket." He grabbed Marcy's hand. "Let's go find the dance floor."

Cay headed toward where Zy's hand had pointed and immediately saw a young, swaggering black man talking intently to a young, beautiful in long, tied back cornrows and a revealing spaghetti strapped cami. She seemed to hang on every one of Raynaldo's words, and the body language from the young man encouraged her. Cay was hoping that would be Eliah, so she could close this case quickly, but one look told her it was not the woman in the photo.

Cayenne came up upon the couple slowly and inserted herself into Raynaldo's sight. "Raynaldo, I'm Cayenne McKenzie Del Roi. I'm looking for your girlfriend Eliah."

The young woman recoiled as if stung by a snake. Then she patted Raynaldo on the arm and whispered something in his ear before she walked away.

"Who are you?" he said, pissed and defiant that she had broken up his potential tryst.

"I'm Cayenne McKenzie Del Roi. I've been retained by Frank Montana to find his daughter."

"Why every one so interested in that old con all of the sudden?" He sized up Cayenne, not waiting for an answer. "Last guy bought me a couple drinks. What you offering?"

Cay could see why Mo thought that Raynaldo was less than stellar marriage material. But she needed to find Eliah, give her the package and get her bill in the mail to Rufus.

"What are you drinking?"

She pushed her way to the bar and after a few moments of deliberately ignoring her, a bartender took her order for two Miller Lites.

Raynaldo took his time finishing his flirty conversation with another girl and lazily, almost arrogantly, took the proffered beer from Cayenne. He drank it quickly and motioned Cay to get another one. Cay grit her teeth but did as she was bidden.

Finally, Cay got his attention away from the pretty girls and asked him about Eliah.

"Why do you want to talk to her?" Raynaldo growled.

"I have a package from her father that he wants me to give her. He doesn't know where she is."

Suddenly, Raynaldo perked up and seemed interested in talking. He also remembered his manners. "Hey, thanks for the beers. You want to sit or something?" He indicated a table. "A package from the Big Chief? Listen, I can save you a trip and get it to her."

Every red flag in Cay's body shot up the flag pole and demanded attention. Giving Raynaldo the package was the last thing she wanted to do. She decided to appeal to his baser side.

"Hey thanks for the offer. But you know how it is. I don't get paid if I don't deliver it with my own hands." Inside, she was telling herself that Raynaldo probably hadn't done a legal day's work in his life.

The charm spout that Raynaldo turned on suddenly turned off again. "Well, I don't think she would want me talking about her to a total stranger. Good luck with the package." He tipped his beer in her direction with an arrogant sneer on his face and started to walk away.

Cay caught his sleeve. "At least give my card to Eliah and ask her to call me." She fished out a business card from her jeans pocket and forced him to take it.

"Yeah, right," he said and swaggered away, sticking her card in his back pocket.

She watched him for a while after their conversation. He scanned the crowd and seemed distracted as others talked to him. He returned to the table to grab his leather coat. He fished a piece of paper out of an inside pocket and a cell phone out of another pocket. As he walked toward the back door, he dialed a number obviously written on the piece of paper. He walked out the back door, his ear glued to a cell phone, waiting for someone to pick up on the other end.

Cayenne stayed Dash's until late that night dancing with Tags, Zy and Marcy. Once folks found out she was with Zydee Bob, they begrudgingly treated her with some respect, though she never was able to get folks to talk seriously to her for more than a few minutes. People would answer simple questions about the songs, but no one would answer her questions about the Marching Arrows and no one admitted knowing Eliah.

At one point during the music, Tags motioned Marcy over to him and handed her a cowbell. Her eyes lit up with delight as she started banging out a rhythm. Tags coached her by tapping out the right rhythm on his top hat and soon she had a Bo Diddly kind of rhythm going

"She's in heaven," Cay said out loud, enjoying watching her friend's enthusiasm about all things Mardi Gras.

All night long, people were dancing, and shouting. At one point, a man in the corner balanced a glass of beer on his head and strutted like a rooster. From behind a card table set up in the corner near the restrooms, a middle aged woman with red streaked hair filled paper plates with mound of rice and ladled some steaming red beans and ham chunks from a crock pot. Poor man's Saturday night on a Sunday afternoon, Cayenne thought as she surveyed the scene. She thought of the headdress waiting in the trunk of Marcy's car. Did Mo wear it at sings like this? Where did the Yellow Magnolias hold their practice?

At one point, when she seemed to finally be getting along with Zydee Bob again, she asked him about the Yellow Magnolias and asked if he had ever second lined it with them. The two men on either side of him grew uncomfortably silent. One excused himself. The second man didn't wait too much longer, high fiving it with Zy and excusing himself from Cay's company with a curt nod of the head.

Zy turned on her. "Listen, girl. Don't come asking about the Yellow Magnolias on Arrows ground. Everyone here knows that you don't know much about the Indians and they're cutting you slack. But you go asking about the Mags and I can't help you much. That tribe doesn't march anymore, but they have never been welcomed around here."

He motioned for another beer from the bartender. "Relax. Have fun. Enjoy the music. That's what today is all about."

Zydee Bob Beaux clicked his glass to hers. He toasted in a slightly menacing tone. "Long live the living. For tomorrow," he paused to take a long, slow sip of his beer, "we die. Isn't that right, Cayenne?"

Coming January 15, 2005:
CHAPTER FOUR: We Meet Mr. Dumont La Tourne

Copyright by Aileen M. McInnis, 2005. All Right Reserved.