I’ve been chomping at the bit to share some snippets of the new characters in The Commune, the next book in the Parata series, and I want to begin with a little old lady. Meet Miss Thelma: 

Baton Rouge, Louisiana: 9:37 AM, Tuesday, December 11th, 1984

We left for the two-hour drive to Baton Rouge first thing the next morning, me driving and Rae soaking up the sights from the passenger seat. Our first stop was the Louisiana State Archives, where Rae had been kind enough to volunteer to look for the articles of incorporation for Psikinépikwa, a task I was more than happy to hand off. I was to go check Father Walsh’s room at the boarding house, then meet her back at the archives.

The ‘boarding house’ was a beautiful old two-story shotgun just a few blocks northeast of the cathedral. I parked on the street, straightened my suit, and ambled up to the door. The morning was crisp and clear, though a bit chilly.

A few moments after knocking, I was greeted by a wizened old black lady, her hands so gnarled and arthritic looking that I felt sympathy pains shoot through my knuckles.

She stared up at me with eyes that were gentle, but completely unafraid. “Yessir, what can I help you with?” she asked in an accent that would have been right at home in a period piece about the Civil War.

“Morning ma’am. I’m Rev Parata, a PI working for Father Kelly in New Orleans. I believe he called ahead to let you know I was coming?”

The woman nodded matter-of-factly. “Oh child, he sure did. You just come right on in now, no need to stand outside in that chill,” she said as she grabbed the cuff of my jacket and gently but insistently pulled me inside.

I let myself be led, confusion and amusement rendering me helpless in equal measures. I grinned down at the top of her head as she fussed over getting me inside and shut the door.

“Good lawd, cold mornins and warm afternoons are how you catch your death, my mama always said. Mama weren’t always right, but ain’t no need to tempt the almighty,” the lady continued.

I got the feeling she was chattering away more out of a desire to hear herself speak than to actually share information.

“Yessir, you just follow me now and I’ll take you right to Father Walsh’s room,” she said, and took off without looking back to see if I was following.

I followed dutifully as I admired the home. The lady kept talking, almost in a constant stream, as she led the way.

“Was it a long drive from down there in N’awlins?”

“It wasn’t too ba—” I began, but she continued as if I weren’t even there.

“Lawd, it must be. That trip was mighty painful even before they put in that Interstate. You drive on that thing? Lawd help me, last time I tried to drive it, must have been right after they built it, I got so scared I turn’t around and come home, you believe that?”

“I—”

“People just screaming by, like you weren’t even there! I was so afeared I liked to died right there.”

I followed in silence. The old lady turned to look at me as she walked, mild annoyance in her eyes.

“You hear me, young man?”

I nodded. “Yes, ma’am, I—” I began, but she was off again.

“Why I told Father Romero, he was the priest over at Saint Joseph’s before Father Richard, I says to him, ‘You just go on and make that trip yourself, if you so jumpy. The hounds of Hell couldn’t drag my bony backside down that road again. Yessir, that’s what I said to him, and I meant it. Ain’t been down that way since.”

The lady unlocked the back door of the house and led me back outside.

“Lawd, such a chill out here, my mama always said it was the temperature difference that got you sick, you see, not the cold. Something about how the body just can’t cope too good when you go from hot to cold real fast. Used to get real upset when us kids would go from in front of the fireplace to outdoors in winter, yes sir, my mama got real ill indeed!”

By this point we had crossed the short backyard to a smaller, more modern structure with a single door framed by two windows. The old lady stopped in front of the door and fiddled with a thick keyring, still talking as she did so.

“Now, I couldn’t tell you one way or the other if that’s for true, but I’ll tell you one thing. I’m seventy-eight years old, and I still got my mind and my body still works well enough so I can take care of all these old white men what ain’t got sense enough to care for themselves, so something must have worked. You believe that?”

“Yes ma’am, I surely—”

“Well that’s good, at least one man around here got some sense, even if he is just a baby. Anyway,” she said, turning from the now opened door, “I reckon I just about talked your poor ear off, so I’m gonna head back in the house. Just lock up when you done, and don’t you take nothin’. God’ll know, and so will I.”

I nodded, face solemn. The lady turned and headed back for the main structure.

“I mean it now,” she said as she walked away. “You take somethin’, and I’ll know, you believe that?”

“I do indeed,” I said, but she was already back in the main structure, her voice still chattering away. I grinned to myself and entered the small abode.