Evan Horne [04] Bird Lives!

by Bill Moody

  “Evan Horne. I’m—I was—a friend of Greg’s. I’m just checking things out for his family. I wanted to return his horn.”

  “Where’s the horn?”

  “It’s in my car.”

  “I don’t know you,” he says, “and you didn’t know Greg.” He sighs deeply. His head dips forward. He shakes it from side to side. He opens the door wider.

  I feel a chill come over me. I want to say, Sony to bother you, turn, and go back down the stairs, tell Andie there’s nothing here. But it’s too late. He looks at me, knows know.

  “Come in,” he says. “I’ve been expecting you.” He stands aside to let me in.

  “I’m Greg Sims.”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  I step inside. Greg Sims shuts the door and leads me down the hall, back to the kitchen. We pass a bedroom, and I catch a glimpse of unmade twin beds. “It’s all right,” he says, turning to Robert, who is close behind us. “Why don’t you go watch some TV, okay?”

  Sims is very soft-spoken, polite but firm, as if he were speaking to a well-behaved child. Robert nods, gives me one more wary look, then goes into the living room. A few seconds later we hear the television blare, tuned to some game show.

  “Sorry,” Sims says to me. “Robert’s hearing is not too good. Coffee?” He fills up a kettle and puts it on to boil, then turns around.

  “Sure.” We stand facing each other in front of the stove. Sims shifts from one foot to the other, then gets a jar of coffee and two mugs from the cupboard. “Sorry, I only have instant.”

  “That’s fine.” I can’t help staring. It’s not every day you find someone you thought was dead. I feel like I’ve stumbled into a dream, disoriented by hazy unfocused images, confused feelings. Any minute I expect Rod Serling to appear and announce we’re in the twilight zone.

  Sims glances at me. “You’re surprised,” he says.

  “I’m floored. I didn’t expect to…Well, you know.” I turn around and sit down at a small table while Sims waits for the water to boil.

  He sighs again. “I guess I knew somebody would find me eventually. Actually, I’m kind of relieved. I just didn’t want it to be…Gillian. Did she send you?”

  “No, I’ve never even met Gillian.”

  “Who, then?” Sims asks. He looks at me strangely, his eyes clouded with apprehension.

  “I’ve only talked to her on the phone.” He doesn’t even ask if something has happened to her.

  “I don’t understand.”

  “There’s a lot to tell. It’s a long story, Greg.”

  He spoons coffee into the mugs. He knows, but he doesn’t want to hear it yet.

  “You told Robert you have my horn. Is that right?”

  “Yes, I have it with me. Do you want me to get it?”

  “Yes, would you mind?” he says. He turns toward me. A light of interest flickers in his eyes.

  “Be right back.”

  Robert looks up when I pass the living room. I go out and back down the stairs two at a time, my mind whirling with questions. I dodge a couple of cars and run across the street to Andie. She’s looking straight ahead, then does a double take when she sees me.

  “What?” she says. “Did you talk to Robert?” I get the horn out of the backseat.

  “Yeah, and I also talked to Greg Sims. He’s alive.”

  “What?” She starts to get out of the car, but I put my hand on the door.

  “No, not yet. Stay here. I have to talk to him first. Let me see how it goes.”

  “Evan—”

  I dart back across the street before Andie can protest. Robert lets me in. He eyes the horn case, then returns to the living room, the television still blaring.

  “Here,” I say to Sims, handing him the horn. He looks at it for a moment, then takes it from me, sets it on the counter, fumbles with the catches, and opens the case slowly. He reaches out with one hand to touch the horn, then steps back, unsure. He shakes his head and lifts the horn out of the case like a child opening a gift Christmas morning.

  “Didn’t think I’d see this again,” he says. The apprehension dissolves into a slight smile. “Robert tried to get it back for me.”

  The water is boiling then. He holds the horn under one arm as all tenor players do, pours water into the mugs, and hands me one with a spoon already in it. I stir my coffee and watch him assemble the horn.

  He pulls the cap off the mouthpiece, wets the reed, and blows a few tentative notes. He laughs at the sound. “Been a long time,” he says, glancing at me.

  He tries again, a few bars of a blues line. It’s jagged, erratic; most of the notes don’t come out. He stops, shakes his head again. His eyes flick over to me, then he blows once again but stops, laughs halfway through, and sets the horn down in the open case, stares at it for a moment.

  Robert peeks around the corner at Greg. His eyes dart from me to Greg and back again. Greg senses him, turns around. “It’s all right, Robert. I’m fine.” Robert nods and slips away.

  Greg looks at the horn again. “Wow, been a long time,” he says again. He joins me at the table and stirs his own coffee, takes a sip.

  I remember the feather, take it out of my pocket, and hand it to him. “Why the feather?”

  He takes it, spins it back and forth between his fingers, then drops it on the horn. It clings to one of the keys.

  “Kind of a good-luck charm. You know—Bird, Charlie Parker.” His eyes cloud over as he remembers. “You’re a musician, huh?” He doesn’t say “too,” because he’s not anymore.

  “Yeah, piano. How’d you know? Robert?”

  Sims nods. “He heard you talking about me at the church, Sister Deborah inviting you to come play. That’s why I was expecting you.”

  “Is that the only reason?” I’ve known from the moment he let me in he was going to tell me everything, but it’s going to be in his own time, his own way, a delicate balance I have to try and maintain.

  I visualize Andie sitting out front, checking traffic, watching the entrance, getting more irritated by the minute. I don’t want her charging up here and spooking Greg Sims.

  “If it’s not for Gillian, I guess I’m just kind of wondering why. Are you and Gillian—”

  “No.”

  “No, I didn’t think so.” He turns and stares out the window, which opens onto a courtyard in back. There are a few trees and a small patch of grass. The window is like a mirror, sparkling clean like the rest of the kitchen.

  “You know how long it takes, how much work, but no matter how much you put into it, how much you love it, there also has to be talent, a lot of it.” He shrugs, smiles slightly. “I had some, but not enough.”

  “But is that a reason to—”

  “I also had a driving, pushy, obsessed sister—Gillian. She’s a few years older than me. Our parents split when we were kids, and our mother died shortly after. Never heard from my father again, but he left all his records. Quite a collection.”

  Sims smiles again as he remembers. “Lester Young, Coleman Hawkins, big bands, Dizzy, Bird, he had everything. God, I loved those records. I listened to them a lot, made me feel I had some connection with him.” He speaks softly, in a detached kind of way, as if he’s talking about someone else, but he looks beaten, used up. He looks at me. “Is that crazy?”

  “Not at all.”

  “Thanks,” Sims says. “Anyway, Gillian kind of raised me. She was determined we were both going to do well, despite what had happened.”

  “Gillian what? What’s her last name?”

  “Payne. She took it from my dad, pain, I mean, and she gave it out. That’s the name she took. She always liked to play with words.” He doesn’t even pause. It’s as if he’s been carrying this around, wanting to let go of it, for a long time, and I’m the first to know.

  “When I joined the junior high band, Gillian decided right then I was going to be a musician. It was fun at first, but I knew even then I didn’t have that edge, that extra something, but she never let up.”


  Sims sighs and shakes his head. “I managed a scholarship to Berklee, but I knew the first day I was out of my league. I wanted to quit, do something else, but Gillian wouldn’t hear of it. So I just took off, came out here, tried to disappear, but she found me. She’s very good at that. Kept saying I just needed a chance, blamed it on the music business, how jazz had changed.”

  “Greg, did you know a musician at Berklee named Bobby Ware, called himself Cochise?”

  “Sure,” Greg says. “I knew him slightly at Berklee; he became a big star. He didn’t learn that music at Berklee though. Not my kind of jazz. When I read about it, I couldn’t believe someone I knew had been killed.” Sims laughs nervously. “Everybody called me Zoot at Berklee because of my last name and all, but I was more into Trane.”

  I haven’t touched my coffee. I push my cup aside and lean forward. “Greg, listen to me. The killer was your sister, Gillian.”

  He looks at me. His eyes dart around, his mouth is half open. “What? What do you mean?” He rocks back in the chair.

  “Greg, there were three others. Do you understand what I’m telling you?” I wait a moment, see the truth forming in his eyes. “Gillian has killed four people, all musicians.”

  His eyes are wide now, panicked. “Gilly? Oh God, no, that can’t be.” But I can see he knows it is. He gets up from the table and slowly walks around the kitchen as if movement will still the panic. “How can you be sure?”

  “With two of them, she left a white feather. She wrote Bird Lives! on the mirror of Ty Rodman’s dressing room in L.A. It was Gillian. She’s been calling me, pushing me to investigate your suicide.”

  He backs up a couple of steps, like he’s been pushed. “I don’t understand. Why? Why are you here?”

  I sketch in the story, tell him about her threats, as quickly as I can, right up to finding him. Greg listens but doesn’t say a word until I’m through. He sits down again, still shaking his head. “You’ll never catch her,” he says. “Never, she’s too smart.”

  “We have to, Greg. You can help us, you know her, stop her from killing more. She needs help, Greg.”

  “Oh, no,” he says, crossing his hands back and forth in front of him, like a referee calling time out. “I can’t see Gillian again. She thinks I’m dead, and that’s the way I want to keep it. I can’t go through that again.”

  I reach across the table and touch his arm, keep my voice low and steady. “Greg, I know this is hard, but you’re the only one who can stop her. Think about it. You don’t want her killing anybody else, do you?”

  “No, of course not, but…it’s just so hard to believe.” I know he’s wrestling with it. His fear of Gillian is real, though. “What would I have to do?” He asks, but he doesn’t want to know.

  “Look, I’m just a go-between here, Greg. The FBI is handling this, and one of their agents is with me. She’s outside right now. Let’s talk to her, see what’s the best way to handle things, okay?”

  “The FBI? I, I don’t know.”

  “Listen to me, Greg. They’ll protect you from Gillian.” I take a deep breath, blow out air, and jump in with both feet.

  “If they don’t, I will.”

  Natalie was right all along. Deeper by the minute.

  I don’t want to leave Sims, but I know if I don’t get Andie soon, she’ll come up on her own. I’ve got to convince her this is the right thing to do.

  When I get downstairs, she’s standing by the car, fuming. “Goddammit, Evan, don’t do that again. What is going on? You’ve been up there a half-hour.”

  “Get in the car. Please.” Her eyes are blazing, but she gets in, and I join her in the front seat.

  I recount my conversation with Greg Sims. She listens without interrupting till I’m finished.

  “I don’t think I even want to hear what you’ve got in mind,” she says.

  “Greg Sims is shaky. He’s very afraid of Gillian. He’ll help, I think, but we’ve got to protect him from her. He’s got to know that. She could be up here in San Francisco now, watching us. If she sees Greg before we’re ready, she’ll freak.”

  Andie is watching me warily now. “What do you mean, before we’re ready?”

  “I mean we’ve got to keep Greg under wraps for now.”

  “We?”

  “Look, I don’t know or care how you do it, but you’ve got to fix it so we can keep Greg safe until the right time.”

  “And when will that be? Jesus, the man faked his own suicide.”

  “So what, that’s not illegal. Remember Gillian’s bargain. I’ve not only found him, I’ve found him alive. That might be enough to get her to come in.”

  Andie sits very still for a few moments, staring out the windshield, gripping the wheel. Finally she turns to me. “Wendell Cook will never go for this.”

  “He has to. C’mon, what else have you got?” I light a cigarette and watch Andie as she plays with the idea, and whether to trust me. I keep checking the apartment entrance, half expecting Greg Sims to bolt.

  “All right,” Andie says. She grips the steering wheel with both hands. “But I want to spend some time with Sims before I call anybody. Then we’ll go from there.”

  “Fair enough. Let’s get him out of here, back to our hotel.”

  “What about Robert?”

  I already have my hand on the door handle. “Robert will be fine.”

  At the Travelodge, Greg sits slumped in a chair while Andie talks to him softly, carefully, reassuring, spelling everything out, while she makes notes. She’s good and has quickly established a rapport but been firm at the same time.

  I listen but really don’t know what to do. I imagine this is what it must be like debriefing a defector in a safe house. Andie glances up at me every once in a while until she finally has to say something to me.

  “Evan, why don’t you take a walk or something?”

  “Yeah, maybe I will. You okay?” I ask Greg. He looks tired. I wonder if he knows how different his life is going to be from now on.

  Back at the apartment, I watched him say good-bye to Robert and patiently explain that he was going to have to go away for a while. They shook hands solemnly, and Greg threw some things in a small bag and went down to the car. I turned back once and saw Robert watching us all the way down the stairs.

  “Okay, I’ll be back in a while.” I start for the door.

  “Here,” Andie says, tossing me the cell phone. “Don’t forget this.”

  I catch the phone, put it in my pocket, and get out, leaving Andie and Greg Sims to finish up.

  I wander down to Fisherman’s Wharf, dodging the crowd of tourists and try to find some sense of reality and optimism about finding Greg Sims. Even Gillian would have to consider this a success, actually finding her brother alive; but if I’m right, she’s going to be very angry with Greg when she finds his suicide was faked and why. She’ll feel betrayed, want to strike out at someone, and I’ll be handy.

  I walk to the edge of the wharf, lean on the railing, and look down into the cold, gray water. The sun has broken through, and most of the fog that shrouded the Golden Gate Bridge earlier is gone. Sightseers of all ages swarm around me: I watch one group of Japanese line up for the ferry to Alcatraz; I’m feeling the urge to join them, when the cell phone rings.

  A little girl about eight or nine sees me grab the phone. “Look, Mommy, that man has a phone in his pocket.” Her mother takes her hand and pulls her away.

  I turn away from the railing and walk toward the middle of the parking lot. “Where are you, lover?” Gillian says. There’s a click, then Chet Baker’s trumpet eases into “The Very Thought of You,” frail, delicate, the air almost before the notes.

  “Don’t you know?”

  “Don’t play with me, Evan. I’ve been busy, and I hope you have been too.” I look up at the sky. If she knew where I was, she’d let me know; Gillian must still be in L.A.

  “Yes, just like you said. Working on it.”

  “Working on Agen
t Lawrence too.” There’s a smile in her voice.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Oh, you know exactly what I mean, Evan. You’re curious about her, aren’t you? Natalie giving you a hard time? Well, that’s okay, I don’t mind if you play a little, long as you keep focused.”

  “I’m not curious about her. She’s an FBI agent.”

  “Of course you’re curious, Evan. She’s an attractive woman. Do you really think it was an accident they assigned her to you? She came to see you at Chadney’s, and your Natalie didn’t. When two people are thrown together like that, anything can happen.”

  Chet Baker airily slides into the next phrase. A necklace of poignant, almost blue notes, strung together on the changes of his life. “Nothing is going to happen with Andie.”

  Gillian laughs. “Oh, it’s Andie, is it? Maybe not, but you’ve been thinking about it, haven’t you, Evan? Wondering what she’d be like.”

  “I’ve got to go, Gillian. You want me to stay on this, don’t you?”

  “Have fun, Evan. You better have something for me soon.” She’s gone then, as Chet Baker surrenders to the pianist.

  At San Francisco airport Andie flashes her FBI badge, and we bump three people to get on the flight. We’re even allowed to board first. Greg Sims remains quiet and withdrawn. Once we’re airborne, he settles into the seat next to me and dozes. Andie is across the narrow aisle, reading from the notes she’s made on Greg. I still haven’t told her about Gillian’s latest call, and I wonder if I should.

  There was nothing in the call that pertained to the case, but I was unprepared for the impact Gillian’s words had on me. She’s right, of course. I’m very curious about Andie Lawrence, very attracted to her, and now very confused about my relationship with Natalie. What really bothers me is Gillian’s suggestion that Andie was not assigned to me by accident. Did Cook see it too? Did Andie push for it?

  I glance at Andie. Her elbow is on the arm of the seat, her chin in her hand. I lean across to her, my voice muffled by the drone of the engines and the conversation around us. “Why you?”