Marley Z and the Bloodstained Violin

by Jim Fusilli

  Easy. Three, four, five and six.

  But how to express it in a word problem?

  And why?

  “Dad!”

  “Can’t help you, Marley,” he shouted. He was giving Skeeter a splashy bath. Soap bubbles floated into the hall.

  She speed-dialed Teddy.

  “Ha!” he said. “It’s so simple. . . .”

  Easy for him, she thought, as she hung up the phone. He was good at math, though he wasn’t the genius his father demanded.

  She tried Wendell via e-mail, really just to see if he’d reply. He didn’t.

  Finally, Marisol.

  “Mr. Justice apologized,” she reported, “and he was nice. Very nice.”

  “Really?” Marley was lying on the bedroom floor, her long legs and bare feet up on the bed. On her desk, her algebra book was propped open against her computer monitor. Scrap paper surrounded her wastebasket.

  “He said he would tell Wendell to catch up with Teddy at school,” Marisol told her friend. “He didn’t know Teddy attended Collegiate too.”

  Marley smiled as she spun around to sit cross-legged, her back to her floppy, disheveled bed. Now Teddy would be happy again, and shy Wendell would have a friend.

  Everybody was happy.

  Except her.

  That word problem!

  Mr. Noonan! How could someone so boring be so much trouble!

  Marley waited on the top front step a few minutes before midnight. The lights from the window to her father’s office shone behind her as he watched her from his perch at his drafting table.

  He knew why she was there. “You don’t have to explain,” he said as he kissed her forehead before she went out. “But don’t neglect your sleep.”

  Marley’s father believed every teenager needed ten hours of sleep a night. Said it was a scientific fact. In the Time Traveler, his character Mike Barnett was always drowsing off someplace or another because he didn’t get his ten hours a night. No wonder—Mike was sixteen years old and stuck in a time warp between the 1939-40 and 1964-65 New York World’s Fairs. He solved crimes in both eras. That was enough to make anybody tired.

  And she had to admit that she could use some sleep. Last night’s hadn’t been very satisfying—she tossed and turned with worry about Marisol—and then she was up early for her meeting with Mr. Noonan. Marley felt that if she stretched out on the brownstone steps, she’d be asleep in seconds, nestled comfortably under the smattering of stars in the night sky.

  Instead, she watched as Dr. Gachet wrestled with his French bulldog Claudette, scolding her in their native language. That little cream-colored dog was stubborn, and Marley knew she wouldn’t relent until he let her visit Central Park West. A lot of puppies, and big old mutts too, hung around up there on the way to the park.

  “Perhaps you would like a dog, Marley?” Dr. Gachet said with a thick French accent. “For you, there is absolutely no charge.”

  He followed Claudette as she trotted slowly toward the violet streetlights to the east.

  Ten minutes later, a black town car pulled in front of the Zimmerman home.

  Wrapped in her red hoody, Marley stood to greet it.

  Is everything all right?” Mrs. Zimmerman asked as she stepped from the backseat.

  Marley came down and met her at the curb. She said, “I’ve got troubles, Mom.”

  Without a second thought, Althea Fontenot Zimmerman put down her briefcase and took her daughter in her arms.

  After the long, satisfying hug ended, Marley said, “Can we use the limo?”

  Mrs. Z frowned in curiosity. "I suppose. . . .” She knew her daughter wasn’t frivolous. If Marley asked for a limo, Marley needed a limo.

  She opened the door and Marley hopped inside, asking the driver to head south along Columbus Avenue toward Lincoln Center.

  And then she told her mother about her long, long day. As she spoke, she used her red sleeve to wipe the lens of her father’s mini-binoculars, which had a Time Traveler logo on the focus adjuster.

  Mrs. Z recounted, “A meeting with a teacher, a full day of school, a visit to the Met to talk to a curator, seeing your friend Bassekou—”

  “I thought he was my friend. Our friend.”

  Mrs. Z dropped her hand on her daughter’s thigh. "Let’s not be rash, all right?”

  Marley turned to look out through the tinted windows. The Juilliard School was on the right, and a handful of people were filtering down the steps of the Walter Reade Theater next door, enriched after seeing a film from Serbia, Namibia, Borneo or some such faraway place. “But Bassekou said ‘only American instruments,’ Mom.”

  Mrs. Z had already heard what the boy from Mali said to Mahjoob. Her husband told her when he e-mailed an update.

  “So you have several suspects . . . ,” she led.

  “With that video of Marisol taking the bloodstained violin, ” Marley replied, “it won’t be enough just to say she didn’t do it.”

  Except for a few chatting people who ringed the sprouting fountain, ice-cream cones or coffee cups in hand, the Lincoln Center plaza was empty. The lights behind the arches of the Metropolitan Opera House had already been dimmed to a golden hue.

  “Make a right here, please,” she said.

  "One of your suspects?” Mrs. Z asked, as the car turned.

  Stifling a yawn, Marley asked the driver to pull next to Damrosch Park.

  A minute or so later, her mother followed her as she headed cautiously along a winding concrete path lined with thick bushes. If they continued to the path’s end, they’d wind up at an open space with a band shell used for outdoor concerts.

  Trees rich with plump leaves just about blocked out the moon and stars.

  “Marley—”

  “Shhh!” she replied. Whispering, she added, “Those high heels!”

  Mrs. Zimmerman wore three-inch heels that perfectly matched her trim dark-brown suit. “Sorry,” she said sheepishly.

  Even in the dull light of the park, Marley could see her mom was up for the adventure. “Listen,” Marley said. “Do you hear it?”

  The sound of a gentle Eastern European ballad played on a violin wafted toward them.

  “Hunch down,” Marley instructed.

  The sad, sweet music continued.

  “Come on,” Marley said.

  The two of them proceeded along the shadowy path, their backs like turtle shells as they edged through the darkness, moving closer to the lovely yet melancholy sound.

  When they were maybe fifty yards from the band shell, Marley nodded toward a bench. Squirrels scrambled as she and her mom slunk toward it.

  They both sat.

  "Who is it?” Mrs. Z whispered.

  “It’s Tabakovic,” Marley replied softly. “But the real question is ’What is it?’ ”

  Mrs. Z thought, There’s pain in that music. It sounds like a cry from a broken heart.

  Marley climbed up and stood on the bench, then squatted down. She showed her mother the binoculars.

  “Ready?”

  Mrs. Z nodded.

  Marley raised up quickly, her mother’s hand supporting her. She looked through the binoculars.

  With her index finger, she focused the lenses.

  Tabakovic was standing in front of the band shell. A streetlamp provided a spotlight.

  Eyes closed, his body swaying, he continued to play his poignant song.

  The binoculars brought Marley so close that she could see the gray stubble on Tabakovic’s chin, his frayed shirt collar and the grime under his fingers as they flitted along the violin’s narrow neck.

  She could also see the instrument’s scroll and peg box above that neck. Pale light shone on the violin’s soundboard and waist.

  “It’s not the Habishaw,” she said as she stepped down. “No bloodstain.”

  She handed her mother the binoculars.

  As Marley sat, Mrs. Zimmerman stood tall. “That poor man,” she moaned as she watched Tabakovic swoon while he played. “That poor
, heartsick man.”

  Marley said, “Let’s go, Mom.”

  They held hands as they left the park.

  In her floppy old pajamas, Marley said good night to her parents and retreated to her room. One o’clock was way too late to be up on a school night, but she was satisfied she’d done good work. From Mr. Noonan, she’d learned about rare violins and their history, and Bebe Douglass at the Met confirmed it was unlikely a serious musician had taken it—which, a few hours later, led her to eliminate Tabakovic as a suspect.

  Her next step was to find out what Bassekou was up to.

  But first, she needed a good night’s sleep.

  As her head sank in her pillow, Marley stared at the printout of the e-mail attachment Marisol had sent, her diary of the day the Habishaw was stolen.

  Marley read it again and again as if there was a secret message hidden in the words.

  Shower

  B’fast

  Walk to school on Columbus

  Met MZ at school

  Classes

  Lunch w/ MZ

  Classes

  Leave for Riverside Dr. for violin lessons

  55 w/ Mr. Gabor

  Food shopping

  Home at 5:45, as usual—confirmed by my dad

  Helped brothers with homework

  Cooked dinner

  Mom home at 7:15

  Dinner

  Homework

  TV/Online

  Bed

  The note fluttered from Marley’s fingers as she nodded off to sleep.

  chapter 8

  By Tuesday afternoon, all was forgiven.

  Everybody agreed Marisol’s decision to visit Mr. Justice turned out to be a good idea.

  Wendell was no longer snubbing Teddy, as he had yesterday. Teddy’s feelings were restored—how much better the world was when he was happy and carefree!

  “Wendell was waiting for me this morning on 84th and Columbus, ” Teddy explained, when he called Marley at lunchtime. “He apologized and said his uncle had a much better appreciation of us. Oh, Marley, his cheeks were all red. . . .”

  "Ted . . .”

  "Perhaps we shouldn’t say anything to him when we meet later.”

  "Ted . . .”

  “Not even about whether we’re going to continue to be Kingston Cowboys.”

  “Ted . . .”

  “I’m pretty sure he doesn’t know Marisol went to see his uncle—”

  “Ted!”

  Teddy, who had wandered over to the west side of Broadway to make his call, yanked the phone away from his ear. “What?” he complained.

  “I’ve got algebra in five minutes,” she explained. “Look at what I texted you. Please.”

  He studied his phone’s screen. It read X +(X+1) +(X+2) + (X+3) =18.

  With stubby thumbs, he typed, "U got it!”

  When he put the phone back to his ear, he heard Marley say, “Good news about Wendell, Teddy. See you at the coffee shop.”

  After signing off, Teddy waited for a Zabar’s van to pass, then started back toward Collegiate.

  Three hours later, he was waiting with Wendell in their booth when Marley arrived.

  “Where’s Marisol?” Wendell asked.

  Marley noticed he’d loosened his tie and unbuttoned his top collar.

  “She has a violin lesson,” she replied as she slid in, her denim shorts gliding across vinyl.

  Ruthie, the waitress who claimed to be ninety-nine years old, shuffled over with Marley’s avgolemono soup and placed the hot bowl in front of one of her favorite customers. With warm fingers, she pinched the tip of Marley’s nose, as if she were stealing it. And then she said what she always said: “You know, I took your father’s nose the same way. . . .”

  When Ruthie retreated, Teddy said, “Marisol’s dedicated to those violin lessons. . . .”

  “She can really play, can’t she?” Wendell asked. He watched the steam rise toward Marley’s sienna eyes.

  Teddy exclaimed, “One day she will be in an orchestra. We can say we knew her when. . . .”

  “When she didn’t show up at the coffee shop,” Marley added, holding back her hair so she could blow on her soup.

  Marley was dragging. After waiting up to see Tabakovic in Damrosch Park, her night’s sleep had felt like a nap rather than a long, cozy stretch under the covers.

  And yet she had been in a dead slumber, oblivious to what went on around her. Sometime before dawn, for instance, her mother snuck in and taped a note to the handle of her luggage.

  “Be smart,” it read. “Love, your proud mom.”

  There was a P.S.

  “Downloaded Prokofiev’s Sonata for Two Violins. That’s what Tabakovic was playing—but with one violin missing! So, so sad!”

  At the end was a smiley face with the smile turned down.

  Marley took the note and slipped it in her bottom desk drawer where she kept all her notes from her mom. When this was over, and Marisol’s good name was restored, she would look into Tabakovic’s history. Her mom was suggesting his troubled behavior came from heartache. Maybe so. Maybe he had lost a wife or good friend with whom he played duets on the violin. . . .

  From the hook on the back of her closet, Marley retrieved her Time Traveler towel—the hard-to-get blue-and-orange one with a forlorn Mike Barnett stuck inside the Unisphere—and stepped into the hallway, bare feet slapping the hardwood floor. She had to get going: It was now almost three full days since the Habishaw was stolen, and two since Marisol was accused of taking it. A lot of time had passed and, to her mind, not much had been accomplished toward clearing her friend and finding the rarest American-made violin.

  "Hey Dad I’m taking a shower,” she sang-shouted

  Oh, I need to brush my teeth, she thought. Yuck.

  Just as she reached for the knob to the bathroom door, she stopped, seized by a sudden thought.

  She remembered that when she walked along Fifth Avenue with Bassekou on the day they met, passing his “friend” Mahjoob, he knew what Tabakovic was playing.

  What did he say . . . ?

  Tchaikovsky. That’s it. Tchaikovsky. The finale of the Concerto in D Major.

  In Mali, do they listen to Tchaikovsky? Or violin concertos?

  By the time Marley was dressed for school, pink bowling shirt with the name Lloyd in script on the breast, she knew how she would approach Bassekou.

  Down in the kitchen, she shared a slice of her peach with Skeeter, who was seated in her high chair wearing only a diaper and one green sock. WNYC clattered from the radio on the fridge top.

  She tapped out a phone number as she washed down her vitamin with raspberry-flavored water.

  “Where are you?” she said quickly, her words almost colliding.

  “Waiting for Wendell,” Teddy replied, “on Columbus. Hear the traffic?”

  “Have you told Bassekou about Marisol?” she asked, just as fast.

  “Other than to say hi, I haven’t spoken to Bassekou since last Friday night,” he replied. “You know, when we were kicked out. . . .”

  She told Teddy she’d call later.

  Zeke Z shuffled into the kitchen, wrapped in his ratty bath-robe, his hair a worse mess than usual. As Marley squeezed by, hurrying sideways, she looked down and noticed he was only wearing one green sock too.

  “Solidarity,” he explained, stifling a yawn. “Whatever Skeeter’s for, I’m for.”

  She stopped and looked up at him.

  Then she took off.

  “Want to get to school before Marisol bye.”

  “Do well,” he said as she continued her flight down the corridor.

  As the door slammed, he added, “Return intact.”

  From the moment she saw her in homeroom, Marley was assured—reassured, actually—that Marisol was totally innocent. The look on her face was a combination of embarrassment and stubborn pride: embarrassment because she knew there would be people at Beacon who would think of her as a thief, pride because she knew she was not. She had
returned to school to declare her innocence and retain her rightful place among some of the city’s best, brightest students.

  “I can feel it,” she told Marley as they walked over to sunny Amsterdam Avenue after lunch. “In the cafeteria, they were looking at me.”

  That’s right, Marley thought. They were. “Marisol, they don’t know what to think,” she said. “But no one’s down on you. I’m not hearing that.”

  Marisol looked up at her friend. “What have you heard?”

  “The tape we watched from Juilliard? Ben Rosenberg gave it to me. The guys in Film are with us.”

  Marisol nodded solemnly.

  “We’re not alone, Marisol.”

  She hoped those words would make the afternoon a little less painful for her friend.

  The rest of the school day came and went without incident. Even Mr. Noonan’s algebra class. He called on Marisol early in the session, his voice and manner as blah as usual. When she answered, correctly, he moved on. Marley thought, That’s cool. He just told the class Marisol is one of us. Cool indeed.

  After the final bell, with a pretty good plan well rehearsed in her head, Marley walked from the Beacon School directly to the Sissoko apartment on East 69th, calling Teddy to tell him where she was headed. Since the Kingston Cowboys didn’t meet at the coffee shop on Friday afternoons, her time was more or less her own.

  The Kingston Cowboys; is there such a group anymore? Though it looked like Marisol had succeeded in her talk with Wendell’s uncle, the band hadn’t yet discussed when it would resume practice—or even if they would continue together. How did such a good idea, such a fun thing, go so wrong so fast?

  The half-hour stroll to the East Side brought her along the south ridge of Central Park and past a queue of horses and their hansom carriages. The horses, whose tails swooshed aimlessly, ignored the sound of Marley’s luggage that, bloated with textbooks for weekend study, rattled behind her on the six-sided cobblestones. As she walked along, she read from her notebook.

  Looking up, Marley shook her head in dismay when she came upon the Plaza, once a very cool old hotel that had changed a lot when they turned half of it into condominiums. Marley stopped as she remembered when her father brought her to the hotel’s Oak Room for her eighth birthday. The maitre d’ welcomed her as if she were the most important person ever, and then, at the table, her father handed her a gift he’d wrapped himself—a copy of Eloise, by Kay Thompson and Hilary Knight. Then he reached into his backpack and brought out a wrapped gift for himself—F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby. Turned out both books had scenes at the Plaza—in fact, six-year-old Eloise lived at the Plaza. Lifting his iced tea, Marley’s dad offered a toast. “To the coolest people in the world,” he said, a big smile on his face. “Readers!” Then they sat at their table for two and read, and soon Marley felt like she was a character in a story.