refrigerator.
“It is very valuable,” Clive said. “Willem gave it to me many years ago. I named a piece of music after him so we were all square, but I think I got the better deal.”
That set the two of them off, jabbering about modern art, a subject about which Nancy seemed quite knowledgeable. Will loosened his tie, checked his watch, and listened to his belly rumbling. It had already been a long day. If not for Mueller’s hole in the heart, he’d be on his sofa now, watching TV, swigging scotch. He hated him more and more.
Knuckles were rapping against the front door. Will drew his Glock. “Take him to the bedroom.” Nancy wrapped her arm around Clive’s waist and hurried him away while Will peeked through the peephole.
It was a police officer holding a huge paper sack. “I got your ribs,” the patrolman called out. “If you don’t want ’em, me and the guys’ll have ’em.”
The ribs were good-no, great. The three of them sat in a civilized circle around Clive’s small dining room table and ate greedily, scooping up sides of mashed potatoes, mac and cheese, sweet corn, rice and beans and collard greens, chewing and swallowing in quiet, the food too delicious to be spoiled by small talk. Clive finished first, then Will, both of them cross-eyed full.
Nancy kept going for another five minutes, keeping the forkfuls coming. Both men watched with a kind of grudging admiration, politely killing some time by tearing open packets of moist towelettes and fussily cleaning barbecue sauce off each finger.
In high school Nancy had been petite and athletic. She played second base on the softball team and was a winger in varsity soccer. During her first year away from home she started gaining weight, succumbing to freshman syndrome. She packed on pounds in college, and more in law school, and became positively dumpy. Midway through her second year at Fordham she decided she wanted to join the FBI, but her career advisor told her she’d have to get in shape first. So, with crazed determination, she blitz-dieted and jogged herself down to 120.
Assignment to the New York Office was a good news/bad news story. The good news: New York. The bad news: New York. Her GS-10 grade carried a base salary of about $38,000 with a Law Enforcement Availability Pay kicker of another $9,500. Where were you going to live in New York making under fifty grand? For her, the answer was back home in White Plains, where she got her old room back bundled with mama’s cooking and special bag lunches. She worked long hours and never saw the inside of a gym. In three years her weight steadily escalated again, padding her small frame.
Will and Clive were watching her like she was a contestant at a hot-dog-eating contest. Mortified, she blushed and laid down her utensils.
They cleared the table and washed up like a little family. It was nearly ten.
Will parted the curtains a few inches with his finger. It was inky dark. Tiptoed, he looked straight down and saw two cruisers at the curb, where they were supposed to be. He let the curtains close and checked the dead bolt on the front door. How determined was this killer? With a police cordon, what would his move be? Would he back off and accept defeat? After all, he’d already murdered an old lady less than twenty-four hours ago. Serial killers weren’t typically high-energy types but this guy was killing in bunches. Would he come crashing through the wall of the adjacent apartment? Rappel down from the roof and blast through a window? Blow up the whole damn building to get his victim? Will didn’t have a feel for the perp but he was an outlier and the lack of predictability made him very uneasy.
Clive was back in his favorite chair trying to convince himself that time was his friend. He was bonding with Nancy, who seemed entranced by the slow precise cadence of his voice. The two of them were talking about music. It sounded to Will like she knew a fair bit about that subject too.
“You’re kidding,” she said. “You played with Miles?”
“Oh yeah, I played with them all. I played with Herbie, I played with Dizzy and Sonny and Ornette. I been blessed.”
“Who was your favorite?”
“Well, that would have to be Miles, young lady. Not necessarily as a human being, if you know what I’m sayin’, but as a musician, my my! That was not a trumpet in his hands, that was a horn he got straight from God. Oh no, that weren’t no mortal thing. He didn’t make music, he made magic. When I played with him, I thought the heavens was going to open up and angels was going to pour on out. You want me to put on some Miles right now so I can show you what I mean?”
“I’d rather hear some of your music,” she replied.
“You are trying to charm me, young Miss FBI! And you are being successful.” He said to Will, “You know your colleague here is a charmer?”
“This is our first day together.”
“She’s got a personality. You can go far with that.” He pushed himself up from the chair and made his way to the piano, sat on the stool and made a few fists to loosen his joints. “I got to play soft now, on account of the neighbors, you see.” He began to play. Slow, cool music, obliquely tender, with haunting hints of melodies that disappeared into the mist to return anew down the line. He played for a good long time with his eyes closed, occasionally humming a few bars of accompaniment. Nancy was mesmerized but Will kept up his guard, checking his watch, listening through the notes for taps or scratches or thumps in the night.
When Clive finished, when the last note faded to nothingness, Nancy said, “Oh my God, that was beautiful. Thank you so much.”
“No, thank you for listening and for watching over me tonight.” He sank back into his easy chair. “Thanks to both of you. You’re making me feel real safe and I appreciate that. Say, chief,” he said to Will, “am I allowed to have a nightcap?”
“What do you want? I’ll get it for you.”
“Over in the kitchen cupboard to the right of the sink, I got a nice bottle of Jack. Don’t you go puttin’ no ice in it.”
Will found the bottle, half full. He unscrewed the top and sniffed. Could someone have poisoned it? Is that how this was supposed to go down? Then, an inspired thought: I need to protect this man and I could use a drink. He poured himself two fingers and downed it fast. Tasted like bourbon. A nice little buzz started. I’ll wait for half a minute to see if I die, if not, the man gets his nightcap, he thought, impressed with his own logic.
“Find it, chief?” Clive called out from the other room.
“Yeah. Be right there.”
Since he’d survived, he brought out a glass and handed it to Clive, who sniffed his breath and remarked, “Glad to see you helped yourself, my man.”
Nancy glared at him.
“Quality control, like a Roman food taster,” Will said, but Nancy looked horrified.
Clive started sipping and talking. “You know what, Miss FBI, I’m going to send you some CDs of my group, the Clive Robertson Five. We’re just a bunch of old-timers but we still got our thing going on, if you know what I’m sayin’. We still cookin’ with gas, though my man, Harry Smiley, on drums, he passes plenty of gas too.”
Almost an hour later he was still talking about life on the road, keyboard styles, the music business. His drink was finished. His voice trailed off, his eyes fluttered closed, and he began to softly snore.
“What should we do?” Nancy asked quietly.
“We’ve got an hour till midnight. Let’s have him stay right there and wait this out.” He got up.
“Where’re you going?”
“To the bathroom. You okay with that?”
She nodded sullenly.
He hissed at her. “What? Did you think I was going to get another drink? For Christ’s sake, I needed to make sure it wasn’t poisoned.”
“Self-sacrifice,” she observed. “Admirable.”
He took a leak and came back angry.
He strained to control his volume. “You know, partner, you need to get off your high horse if you want to work with me.” He demanded, “How old are you?”
“Thirty.”
“Well, sweetheart, when I got into this game, you were in junior high, okay?”
“Don’t call me sweetheart!” she hissed.
