early days of Louisiana, in which Natchitoches played a pivotal role. Like a bloodhound, Nick hated to let go of a good scent. Stretched out on his couch, he refreshed his memory regarding the tag-team wrestling match between the French and the Spanish and various Indian tribes before the Louisiana Purchase, until the combination of satisfying food, mediocre wine, and fatigue brought the curtains down on the day’s performance.
“Coldbread?”
“Stay where you are, Mr. Herald! I’m warning you!”
“Put that gun away,” Nick said. “What are you doing in my apartment at–what is it–three in the goddamn morning? You must be crazy.” Nick had stood up, but now decided against making a break for his bedroom and the fire escape.
The neatly and expensively dressed, pallid, flabby little man stood in the corner of the room that served as Nick’s bad excuse for a study. There was a dangerous look in his visitor’s eyes, a mad glaze; a few sad strands of hair hung over his perpetually indignant face. He had been rooting around in Nick’s papers and books, ineptly and not so subtly. Nick could see he didn’t know much about the small-bore revolver he held unsteadily; he didn’t want to use it, obviously, despite his unconvincing threat.
“That’s what my father used to tell me: crazy,” said Coldbread, lowering the arm with the gun, as he returned to the old slight that apparently burned in his soul. He sighed deeply. “Oh, this. It’s not loaded. I don’t have the heart for this kind of thing, you know. I am but a humble scholar. My father desired ardently that I should be a lawyer, a diplomat, a statesman, as our family tradition dictates. To move in the circles of great men, to enhance the standing of the family with my Ciceronian declamations from the forum of public service. But then I discovered it!”
“‘It’?”
“The treasure! Well, not exactly the treasure itself, but the legend of the treasure, and through the years the irrefutable evidence of its existence.”
There were few words that could make Nick more skeptical than “irrefutable.”
Coldbread rambled on, as if Nick were his well-paid shrink: “He cut me off without a dime, but my saintly mother supported me for many years and then restored my inheritance on her death. Now, I have the means to attain my rightful status in history. I will be the Schliemann of New Orleans!”
“That’s great, Coldbread. I’m happy for you. What’s all this got to do with me?”
“I found this in the trashcan at the Plutarch.”
He held up a piece of scratch paper with Nick’s scribblings on it.
“I’m flattered you think my scrawl important enough to dig for in the trash,” Nick said, vowing to himself to be more careful from now on. Maybe he’d get more sleep. Maybe he’d live longer.
“You’re looking for a man named Balazar. You know! You know, don’t you?”
“Know what?”
Coldbread seemed to be weighing his options; he scowled at Nick from below his sparse eyebrows. “Oh, all right! You know that Hiram Balazar fought with Lafitte as an underage volunteer, and that he was one of a handful of men near Pakenham when the latter fell, mortally wounded, screaming like a madman the whereabouts of the gold the British officers had secreted after stealing it from a sinking U.S. gunboat in Lake Borgne.” He was on the verge of sobbing. “I’ve been looking for Balazar for three years, and now you’ve found him first and you’re going to find the treasure and be famous and stinking rich instead of me!” He broke down and staggered over to the couch.
“No, I haven’t found him, Coldbread,” said Nick, sitting beside him, at the same time wondering why he was comforting a man who had just threatened him with a gun.
“I don’t even know the given name of my Balazar,” Nick continued. “They might be two entirely different individuals. You were going to shoot me over a mistake? There, that’s all right. Stop crying. Give me that gun. Look, I’m a genealogist, not a treasure hunter. It’s just pure coincidence that my guy may be part of your project. I’ll make a bargain with you: anything I find out I’ll share with you; in return, you share the treasure with me. Half.”
“Seventy-five, twenty-five.”
“Half, Coldbread, or no deal.”
“Oh, if you insist! But I get publication rights.”
“Agreed,” Nick said, vowing to check his lock from now on.
Nick didn’t trust him; Coldbread didn’t trust Nick; Nick didn’t believe in the treasure; Coldbread didn’t believe in the coincidence. Their