Fiddlers (2 page)

All over the walls, there were photographs of a balding, gray-haired man playing a violin.

�Stephane Grappelli,� Hawkins explained. �You want coffee? What the hell, I�m awake now.�

Barefooted and in his bathrobe, he stood at the kitchen counter, measuring out coffee by the spoonful.

�Greatest jazz violinist who ever lived,� he said. �Died in Paris seven years ago. Still playing when he was eighty-nine. You know what he said when he was eighty-five? A reporter asked him if he was considering retirement. Grappelli said, �Retirement! There isn�t a word that�s more painful to my ears. Music keeps me going. It has given me everything. It�s my fountain of youth.� I feel the same way. I�m almost fifty, lots of people start considering a condo in Florida at that age. Hell, I could get a job down there easy, same as the one I have here at Ninotchka, playing gypsy music for old farts. But you know something? I moonlight at jazz clubs. Sit in with some of the best musicians in this city. That�s what keeps me going. You ever hear of Django Reinhardt? The great jazz guitarist? You never heard of him?�

�I heard of him,� Carella said.

�Grappelli used to play with him. Can you imagine that sound? They took the world by storm! The stuff they did with the quintet? At the Hot Club in Paris? Nothing like it, man, nothing on earth. He�s my hero. If I could ever play like him�� Hawkins let the sentence trail. �I hope you like it strong,� he said, and set the coffeepot on the stove to perk. �So this is about Max, huh?�

�It�s about Max,� Meyer said.

�I figured. You know what Grappelli once said? He said, �I play best when I�m happy or sad.� I think Max played best when he was sad. In fact, I don�t think I ever saw him happy.�

�Sad about what?� Carella asked.

�His lost sight? His lost youth? All his lost opportunities? When he played gypsy music, he made you want to weep. The codgers tipped him lavishly, believe me.�

�What lost opportunities?� Meyer asked.

�He had a great career ahead of him as a classical musician. Before he got drafted, he was studying with Alexei Kusmin at the Kleber School of Music here. Max was one of the more promising young violinists around. Then� Vietnam.�

�Any idea why anyone would want him dead?�

�Senseless,� Hawkins said, and shook his head. �You want some orange juice?� Without waiting for an answer, he went to the refrigerator, took out a bottle. �This is fresh-squeezed,� he said, pouring. �I get it at the organic market, it�s not from concentrate. I mean, who would want to kill a blind man? Why? Grappelli also said he played best when he was young and in love. I don�t think Max was ever in love. In fact, I don�t think he was ever young. The Army grabbed him for Vietnam, and that was the end of his youth, the end of everything. He came back blind. Tell that to all these fuckin macho presidents who send young kids off to fight their stupid fuckin wars.�

�What makes you say he�d never been in love?� Carella asked.

�Do you see a woman in his life? I�m sorry, but I don�t see one. A wife? A girlfriend? Do you see one? I see a guy who was fifty, sixty years old, wandering around in the dark with a violin tucked under his chin, playing music could break your heart. That�s what I see. This is done. How do you take it?�

They sat at the kitchen table, drinking coffee.

Hawkins was silent for what seemed a long time.

Then he said, �Grappelli once said, �I forget everything when I play. I split into two people and the other plays.� I had the feeling Max did the same thing. I think when he played, he forgot whatever it was that troubled him.�

�And what was that?� Meyer asked.

�Well, we�ll never know, now will we?�

�Did he ever specifically mention anything that was bothering him?�

�Never. Not to me. Maybe to some of the other musicians. But I have to tell you, Max kept mostly to himself. It was as if his blindness locked him away in darkness. You ask me, the only time he expressed himself was when he was playing. The rest of the time�� Hawkins shook his head. �Silence.�

* * * *

On the way down to the street, Carella said, �The rest is silence.�

Meyer looked at him.

�Hamlet,� Carella said. �I played Claudius in a college production.�

�I didn�t know that.�

�Yeah. I could�ve been famous.�

�I�ll bet.�

They came out into the street, began walking toward where they�d parked the car.

�How about you?� Carella asked.

�I could�ve been Picasso.�

�Yeah?�

�When I was a kid, I wanted to be an artist,� Meyer said, and shrugged.

�Ever regret becoming a cop?�

�A cop? No. Hey, no. You?�

�No,� Carella said. �No.�

They walked toward the car in silence, thinking about paths not taken, dreams unborn.

�Well, let�s check out this other musician,� Carella said.

* * * *

�I play at Ninotchka only when I�m between pit gigs,� Sy Handelman told them.

They figured a �pit gig� was a job that was the bottom of the barrel. The pits.

�The orchestra pit,� Handelman explained. �For musicals downtown, on the Stem.�

He was twenty years old or so. Wore his hair long, like an anachronistic hippie. They could imagine him playing violin outside a theater downtown, collecting tips in a plate on the sidewalk. A busker. They could also imagine him in a long-sleeved, white-silk, ruffled shirt, playing violin for the senior citizens at Ninotchka. They had a little more trouble visualizing him in the orchestra pit at a hit musical; on their salaries they rarely got to see hundred-dollar-ticket shows.

�I like pit work,� Handelman said. �All those good-looking gypsies.�

They got confused again.

Was he now talking about his work at Ninotchka?

�The chorus girls,� he explained. �We call them gypsies. You sit in the orchestra pit, you can see up their dresses clear to Manderlay.�

�Must be an interesting line of work,� Meyer said.

�Can make you blind, you�re not careful,� Handelman said, and grinned.

Which led them to why they were here.

�Max Sobolov?� Handelman said. �A sad old Jew.�

�He was only fifty-eight,� Meyer said.

�There are sad old men who are only forty,� Handelman observed philosophically.

�Ever tell you why he was so sad?� Carella asked.

�I got the feeling it was guilt. We Jews always feel guilty, anyway, am I right?� he said to Meyer. �But with Max, it was really oppressive. What I�m saying is nobody acts the way Max did unless he did something terrible he was sorry for. Never smiled. Hardly even said hello when he came to work. Just got into costume� we wear these red-silk ruffled shirts

Okay, so they�d figured white.

�� and tight black pants, give the old ladies a thrill, you know. Then he went out to do his thing. Which was to play this dark, brooding, gypsy music. Which he did superbly, I must say.�

�We understand he was trained as a classical musician.�

�I didn�t know that, but I�m not surprised. Where, would you know?�

�Kleber.�

�The best. I�m not surprised.�

�This terrible thing he did, whatever it was��

�Well, I�m just guessing.�

�Did he ever mention what it might have been, specifically?�

�No. He never told me any of this, you understand, he never said, �Gee, I�m so guilty and sad because I threw my teenage sweetheart off the roof,� never anything like that. But there was this� this abiding sense of guilt about him. Guilt and grief. Yes. Grief. As if he was so very sorry.�

�For what?� Carella asked.

�Maybe for himself,� Handelman said.

* * * *

First time Kling ever called her was from a phone booth in the rain. Less a booth, really, than one of these little plastic shells, rain pouring down around him. He was calling from a similar enclosure today, the heat rising from the pavement in shimmering waves he could actually see, talk about palpable.

He hadn�t spoken to her in six days, but who was counting? You go from sharing apartments, his and hers, alternately, to simply not speaking, that was a very serious contrast. He was calling her at her office, he hoped he wouldn�t get the usual medical menu, hoped he wouldn�t get a nurse asking him where he itched or hurt. Sharyn Cooke was the police department�s Deputy Chief Surgeon. Bert Kling was a Detective/Third Grade. Big enough difference right there. Never mind the fact that she was black and he was white. Blond, no less.

�Dr. Cooke�s office,� a female voice said.

He was calling her uptown, in Diamondback, where she had her private practice. Her police office was in Rankin Plaza, across the river. They knew him at both places. Or at least used to know him. He hoped she hadn�t given orders otherwise.

�Hi,� he said, �it�s Bert. May I speak to her, please?�

�Just a moment, please.�

He almost said, �Jenny, is that you?� Knew all the nurses. But she was gone. He waited. And waited. Heat rose from the sidewalk and the street.

�Hello?�

�Sharyn?� he said.

�Yes, Bert.�

�How are you?�

�Fine, thanks.�

�Shar��

Silence.

�I�d like to see you.�

More silence.

�Shar, we have to talk.�

�I can�t talk yet,� she said.

�Shar��

�I�m still too hurt.� Heat rising.

�You don�t know how much you hurt me,� she said. � Fire truck going by somewhere on the street. Siren blaring.

�Please don�t call me for a while,� she said.

There was a click on the line.

For a while, he thought.

He guessed that was a hopeful sign.

* * * *

Alicia was certain someone was following her. She�d confided this to her boss, who told her she was nuts. �Who�d want to follow you?� he�d said, which she considered a bit of an insult. Like what? She wasn�t good-looking enough to be followed?

Alicia was fifty-five years old, a tall Beauty Plus blonde (what they called Honey Melt, actually) with excellent legs and fine breasts, a woman who�d provoked many a construction-worker whistle on the streets of this fair city - so what had Jamie meant by his remark? Besides, she was being followed, she was certain of that. In fact, she checked the street this way and that the minute she stepped out onto the sidewalk that Friday evening.

Beauty Plus was located in a twenty-seven-story building on Twombley Street midtown. The Lustre Nails Care Division was located in a string of eight offices on the seventeenth floor of the building. Fanning out from these offices every weekday were the twenty-two sales reps Beauty Plus hoped would vigorously sell its nail-care products to the four-thousand-plus manicure salons all over the city. Alicia had written out her day�s report by a quarter to five, had mentioned to Jamie Dewes that she hoped she wouldn�t be followed again tonight (hence his snide remark) and was stepping out onto the sidewalk at a few minutes past five.

The June heat hit her like a closed fist.

She looked up and down the street again. No sign of whoever it was she felt sure was following her. She stepped out in a long-legged stride, heading for the subway kiosk on the next corner.

* * * *

Detective/First Grade Oliver Wendell Weeks had lost ten pounds. This caused him to look merely like a hippopotamus. Patricia Gomez thought he was making real progress.

�This is truly remarkable, Oll,� she told him. �Ten pounds in two weeks, do you know how wonderful that is?�

Ollie did not think it was so wonderful.

Ollie felt hungry all the time.

Patricia was still in uniform. She told Ollie she�d signed out late because her sergeant had something brilliant to say about the way the team had handled a joint operation with Street Crime. Seemed a confidential informant wasn�t where he was supposed to be when the bust went down, some such bullshit. Her sergeant was always complaining about something or other, the old hairbag. Ollie told her he�d have a word with the man, ah yes, get him off her case. Patricia told him to never mind. They were strolling up Culver Av, in the Eight-Eight territory they called home during their working day. If she wasn�t in uniform, he�d have been holding her hand.

�Are you nervous about tonight?� she asked.

�No,� he said. �Why should I be nervous?�

Actually, he was nervous.

�You don�t have to be,� she said, and took his hand, uniform or not.

* * * *

On the way to Calm�s Point, Alicia kept eyeing the subway crowd. The man who�d been following her was bald, she was sure of that. More of a Patrick Stewart bald than a Bruce Willis bald. Tall slender guy with a slick bald pate, had to be in his mid-to-late fifties.

He scared hell out of her.

She�d spotted him on two separate occasions now, just quick glimpses, each time ducking out of sight when she�d turned to look.

There was only one bald guy in the subway car, and he had to be in his seventies, sitting there reading a Spanish-language newspaper.

* * * *

Ollie guessed he expected everybody to be speaking Spanish. Her mother�s name was Catalina, and her two sisters were Isabella and Enriquetta. Her brother - who played piano - was named Alonso. First thing the brother said was, �Hey, dude, I hear you play piano, too.�

�Well, a little,� Ollie said modestly.

�He learned �Spanish Eyes� for me,� Patricia said, beaming.

�Get out! her sister said.

�I mean it, he�ll play it for us later.�

�Well,� Ollie said modestly.

�Come,� Patricia�s mother said, �have some bacalaitos.�

Ollie almost said he was on a diet, but Patricia gave him an okay nod.

* * * *

The owner of the Korean grocery store around the corner from her apartment greeted Alicia warmly when she stopped in to pick up some things for dinner. He told her he had some nice fresh blueberries today, three-ninety-nine a basket. She bought half a pound of shiitake mushrooms, a dozen eggs, a container of low-fat milk, and two baskets of the berries.

It was while she was making herself an omelet that she heard the bedroom window sliding open.

* * * *

�Oh, Spanish eyes��