by Jan Burke
He took two or three sips from the cup, set it down, then went to stand by the window. The phone rang, but he didn’t answer it. “Let the machine get it,” he said in a strained voice. “I can’t talk to anybody else right now.”
The answering machine picked up on the fourth ring. We heard Buzz’s happy-go-lucky outgoing message, then the beep, then, “This is Parker’s Garage. The part we were waiting for didn’t come in, so the Chevette won’t be ready today. Sorry about that.”
“Aw, Christ, it only needed that!”
“Look, Buzz,” I said, “if you need a ride anywhere, we’ll take you.”
“I’ve imposed enough on you. And after the last twenty-four hours, Frank has undoubtedly had his fill of Buzz Sullivan.”
“No. Not at all,” Frank said.
The phone rang again. This time he answered it.
“Hi Mack.” He swallowed hard. “Not too good. You?” After a moment he said, “Already? . . . Yeah, all right.”
He hung up and shook his head. “The club wants us to have our stuff out of there before tonight. They’ve already asked another band to play. Guess it’s the guys who were going to start there when we went to Europe.”
“You need a ride?” Frank asked.
“Yeah. I hate to ruin your weekend—”
“We’re with a friend,” I said. “It isn’t ruined. What time do you need to be down there?”
“Soon as possible. He said the detectives want to talk to us down there. Club owner, too—he told Mack, ‘I’m not too happy about any of this!’—like anybody is!”
Q: What’s the difference between a bull and an orchestra?
A: An orchestra has the horns in the back and the ass in front.
We arrived before the others, and found the door locked. We walked around to the narrow alley, reaching the back door just as the owner pulled up—the bartender from the night before. He looked like he wanted to give Buzz a piece of his mind, but thought better of it when he took a look at Frank. Frank is six-four, but I don’t think it’s just his height that causes this kind of reaction among certain two-legged weasels. (I asked him about it once and he told me he got straight A’s in intimidation at the police academy; I stopped trying to get a straight answer out of him after that.)
The owner grumbled under his breath as he unlocked the door and punched in the alarm code, then turned on the lights. I walked in behind him. I had only taken a couple of steps when I realized that Buzz was still outside; without being able to see him, I could hear him sobbing again. Frank stepped into the doorway, motioned me to go on in. I heard him talking in low, consoling tones to Buzz, heard Buzz talking to him.
I squelched an unattractive little flare up of jealousy I felt then; a moment’s dismay that someone who had only known Buzz for a few hours was comforting him, when I had been his friend for several years. How stupid to insist that the provision of solace would be on the basis of seniority.
My anger at myself must have shown on my face in some fierce expression, because the owner said, “Look, I’m sorry. I just didn’t get much sleep. This place don’t close itself, and now at eleven o’clock, I’ve already had a busy morning. But I really am sorry about that kid out there. He’s the nicest one of the bunch. And I think he had eyes for the little spitfire.” He shook his head. “I never would have figured her for the type to off herself, you know?”
“I didn’t really know her,” I said. “I just met her last night.”
“She had troubles,” he said. “But she had always been the type to get more mad than sad.” He shrugged. “I don’t know. She was complicated—like that music she sang.”
He started moving around the club, taking chairs off table tops. I helped him, unable to stand around while he worked. In full light, the club seemed even smaller and shabbier than it had in the dark.
Soon Buzz and Frank came in. Frank started helping Buzz to pack away his equipment. Within a few moments other people arrived: the detectives, then Mack and Gordon.
None of the band members seemed to be in great shape. The detectives recognized Frank and pulled him aside, then asked the owner if they could borrow his office.
They asked to talk to Mack first. He went with them. Gordon climbed the stage steps and began to put away his cymbals.
Frank surreptitiously positioned himself between Buzz and Gordon. They worked quietly for a while, then Gordon said, “I’m sorry, Buzz. I—I never would have said anything to her if I thought . . .”
“It’s not your fault,” Buzz said wearily, contradicting his earlier outburst. He finished closing the last of his cases and began helping Gordon.
Mack came out, and told the bar owner that the detectives wanted to talk to him next. By then, most of the equipment had been carried into the backstage room. All that was left was a single mike stand—Joleen’s.
I walked onto the stage and stood where she had stood during “A Fine Set of Teeth.” I thought of her voice, clear and sweet on those first notes, her smile as she listened to Buzz’s solo. I looked out and wondered how she saw that small sea of adoring faces that must have been looking back at her; wondered if she had known of Buzz’s loyalty to her; remembered the bite and figured she had. I thought of her giving the sound man hell; she had both bark and bite.
I saw Mack, standing at the bar, at about the same moment he saw me. He stared at me, making me wonder if I was causing him to see ghosts.
Feeling like an interloper, I stepped away from the empty mike stand, then paused. I had the nagging feeling that something about the stage wasn’t right. When I figured out what it was, I called my husband over to my side.
“Tell your friends in the office not to let Mack leave,” I whispered. “There’s something he needs to explain.”
“Are you going to tell me about it, or has being on this stage gone to your head?”
“Both. Where is Mack’s equipment?” I asked.
Frank looked around, then smiled. “I’ll be right back. And maybe you should try to stand close to Buzz. This will be hard on him.” He took a step away, then turned back. “How did you know it was murder?” he whispered.
“I didn’t. Not until just now. Ligature marks?”
He nodded.
I walked into the backstage room. Gordon sat on the couch. Buzz was sitting at the piano bench. I sat down next to Buzz and lifted the keyboard cover. “You play?” he asked.
“Sure.” I tapped out the melody line of “Heart and Soul.” “It’s one of two pieces I can play,” I said.
One corner of his mouth quirked up. “The other being ‘Chopsticks’?”
“How did you know?”
“People just seem to know those two,” he said, reminding me about the missing sarcasm gene.
“Come on,” I said. “Play the other half.”
“Half?” he said, filling in the chords.
“Okay, three-quarters.”
Gordon laughed.
“Come on,” Buzz said, “there’s room for you, too.”
“I’ll pass,” he said, “I don’t even know ‘Chopsticks.’ ”
We stopped when we heard Gordon shout, “What are you doing to Mack?”
We turned to see Mack being led out in handcuffs.
“They’re arresting him,” Frank said as they left. “For Joleen’s murder.”
• • •
“So tell me again how you figured this out,” Buzz asked later, when we were back at his apartment. We were sitting on the floor, around the coffee table.
“Okay,” I said. “We were the first ones at the club this morning, right?”
He nodded.
“You and Gordon both had equipment to pack up. Your equipment was still on the stage, because when you left Club Ninety-nine last night, you had every intention of coming back the next night. But one band member knew he wouldn�
��t be back. He packed up his equipment and took it home last night.”
“You figured that out just standing there?”
“I was thinking about that dirty trick the sound man pulled on her—making her hear her own voice a half-step off through the monitor. But the mike and monitor were gone. I knew you didn’t pack them up, neither did Gordon. You had only worked on your part of the stage, or to help Gordon. So Mack must have taken Joleen’s mike and monitor—but he hadn’t been up on the stage this morning. I looked around and noticed his equipment was gone. It’s not as elaborate as your rig, or Gordon’s kit.”
“And the marks you were talking about?” he asked Frank.
“You’re sure you want to hear about this?”
“Yeah.”
“There were two sets of marks on her neck—the one horizontal, across her neck—the other V-shaped, from her chin to behind her ear. The second marks would be typical of a suicide by hanging, but they were made by the rope sometime after she was killed. The first were the ones that marked the pull of the rope when someone stood behind her and strangled her.”
He was silent for a long time, then asked. “Why?”
“He probably told her the truth at the restaurant,” Frank said. “He had lost a lot of good players because of her attitude. Just as it looks like things have stabilized and The Waste Land’s big break is coming along, she starts making trouble with Gordon.”
“But she was the heart of the group! Her voice.”
“Gordon was going to offer him a new singer,” Frank reminded him.
“Susan?”
“I suppose he would have worked with Susan on the songs he had already written with Joleen, then taken Susan with the band to Europe.”
Buzz frowned. “You’re right. He had already given her a couple of them to learn. Susan sang them on the tape Gordon brought last night.”
“Mack wanted to make sure he had sole rights to the songs.”
“Oh, and then what?” Buzz asked angrily. “What did he think would happen down the road? Have you ever heard one of Mack’s songs? Dull stuff. Technically passable, but nothing more. He just provided the wood. She set it on fire. With her dead, who would have provided that fire?”
“Now,” I said, “I think you’re getting closer.”
They both stared at me.
“Buzz,” I asked, “until you wrote ‘A Fine Set of Teeth—’ ”
“You mean, ‘Draid Bhreá Fiacla’?”
“Yes. Until then, had anyone other than Mack written a song with her?”
“No, but he didn’t understand that either, did he?” he said, and looked away. “No, he couldn’t.”
I didn’t contradict him, but I wondered if he was right. Perhaps Mack understood exactly what it meant, and perhaps Joleen, who had known Mack better than the others, also believed that the safest course was to hide any affection she felt for Buzz. I kept these thoughts to myself; bad enough to second guess the dead, worse if the theory might bring further pain to the living.
When we were fairly sure he’d be all right, and had obtained promises from him that he’d call us whenever he needed us, we left Buzz’s apartment.
We were in the stairwell of the old building when we heard it—the first few notes of ‘Draid Bhreá Fiacla,’ the notes a woman with a fine set of teeth used to sing with eyes closed.
The notes were being played on an Irish harp, and a young man’s voice answered them.
A Man of My Stature
You are no doubt surprised to receive word from me, my dear Augustus, but although I have been poorly served by my obedience to impulse, in this case I think it best to give in to my compulsion to communicate with you now. If I have already tried you beyond all patience and forbearance, you cannot be blamed, but I hope that your curiosity—upon receiving a letter from a man you believe to be dead—will be strong enough to lead you to continue.
• • •
I have written a letter to Emma, denying, of course, that I had anything at all to do with the death of Louis Fontesque, and telling her that she must not believe what will soon be said of her husband. I will leave that brief note to her here, to be found tomorrow in these rooms I have taken at the Linworth Hotel. But tonight, after darkness falls, I will venture from this establishment one last time; I will make the short journey to the letter box on the corner, not trusting the desk clerk to mail this to you. He is an honest enough lad, I’m sure, but after all, he now believes me to be Fontesque, and when the hunt for Fontesque’s killer inevitably leads law enforcement officers here, the young man’s memory may prove too sharp by half. I would not bring trouble to your door, Augustus.
I think it best to give you some explanation of events. There are too many who, out of envy, would be pleased to see a man of my stature in the community fall as far as I have—and in my absence, I fear Emma will become the target of their ridicule. I will have more to say on that score in a moment.
But first, old friend—I hope I may yet count you my friend—let me offer a sincere apology to one who once refused a very different opportunity. Because of your refusal, you alone among my friends are safe from the repercussions of my downfall. You alone never supported my notion of creating a new formula for synthetic silk, you alone thought me bound for failure.
I was baffled by your reticence, having been so certain you would be eager to invest in Hardwick Chemical and Supply’s latest venture. I knew your objections were not of a technical nature, for although you have great business acumen, you are no chemist. Of course I made no acknowledgment of your professional abilities to our friends, but I was rather quick to point out (in my subtle way) your lack of scientific expertise. I took pains not to be the one who belittled you before them; still I planted seeds of doubt here and there, and made the most of any other man’s critical remark. For your wisdom, for your foresight—I punished you.
I might now excuse myself by saying that my company had done well for its investors in the past, or that I desperately needed not only their cash but their faith, or that I was myself wounded by your criticism of my dreams. But even before the formula failed, I saw that I had wronged you, Gussie, and was never more burdened by regret than when I realized that I had done so.
In those early days I was heedless, and imperiled not only my own fortune, but those of my family and friends. But as I sit here in a small hotel in an unfamiliar city, possessed of little more than a stranger’s traveling case and my own thoughts, I do not miss my standing in the community, or my wealth, or much of anything, save Emma and my friendship with you. And so it is to you, Gussie, that I entrust my final confidence.
What happened to me? I seized an opportunity, Augustus, and no serpent ever turned and bit a man more sharply.
My world began to fall apart a few days ago, when my shop foreman—have you met Higgins, Gussie? A good man, Higgins. Trusted me. Just as all one hundred of my employees trusted me.
Higgins came into my office that morning and told me that one batch of material had been sent through a partially completed section of the silk manufacturing line, to test the machinery. Rolling the brim of his cap in his hands, he muttered his concerns; there seemed to be some sort of problem with the process. “Maybe I just ain’t seein’ it as it oughta be, Mr. Hardwick,” he said, “but a’fore we go any further, you’d best take a look.”
I was not yet uneasy. Why should I have been? As I followed him out of the office, I could not help but feel a sense of pride. We walked through the older portion of the factory, where most of the workers were busy with our usual line of products. Men smiled and nodded, or called out greetings as I passed. Higgins was talking to me about the problem, which still had not seemed significant. We reached the new section, the place where several large crates of equipment stood unopened. Higgins was going on, blaming the suppliers, of course, certain the trouble was with the raw ingredients and not the
product itself.
I listened to him with half an ear as I studied the machinery and the failed batch and—I saw it then, Gussie, though how I kept my face from betraying the horror I was feeling, I’ll never know. The process—my process, useless. A small flaw I could not detect in the laboratory, now magnified on the floor of the factory—after so many thousands of dollars had been spent on the equipment.
Higgins was looking to me for an answer, as were a dozen or so of the men working near that section of the line. Looking at me, some with anxious hope, others with unwavering faith in my abilities. I kept my features schooled in what I prayed would pass for concentration on the problem.
“Well, Higgins,” I said, “this will simply require a minor adjustment in the formulation. I expected that some little changes might be needed—no cause for alarm. You and your men have done a fine job here, it’s nothing to do with you. Go on with installing the equipment, and I’ll work on a new formula.”
I heard audible sighs of relief. I told Higgins that I had some business outside the office that morning, and left the building.
I walked aimlessly for several hours, thinking the darkest thoughts imaginable. The humiliation, the financial ruin—if it had only been me, and not so many others who would suffer, I might have borne it. And there was Emma to think of.
I am sure that if you place yourself in my shoes, you will understand how terrible it was to contemplate any suffering on Emma’s part. If I am not mistaken, you have a special fondness for her, Augustus. I am not suggesting that you have ever behaved in any other than an exemplary fashion, my friend. On the contrary, you have been all that is polite and respectful. But I know your affections for her will let you see what others may not, and hope you will not blame me for contemplating the fact that I was worth more to Emma dead than alive.
This was not an original thought—any man with life insurance policies as large as mine will consider such a fact, even in better times. The investors had insisted upon this very reasonable precaution, and no one ever questioned my buying additional coverage to protect Emma should I meet with some accident and predecease her. I knew that even if I died by my own hand, the investors would be paid. But while the investors would receive a payment under nearly any circumstances, Emma would be denied the death benefit were I to commit suicide.
