days.”
“I’ll hold that cheerful thought,” Nudger said. “Go easy on yourself, Billy. You deserve it.”
“Hey,” Billy said feebly, when Nudger had opened the door. “You still got that jazz-record collection of yours?
Nudger shook his head no. “I had to sell most of it. I could only save the best.”
“You save any of mine?”
“Sure I did, Billy.”
The contorted hand yanked the curtains closed again. “That’s right,” came the thin voice from the darkness, “you did say the best.”
The relentless banging of metal on metal was still coming from beneath the wrecked car as Nudger walked down the street to his Volkswagen and drove away. The hammer bounced once after each blow: BANG-bang! BANG-bang! BANG-bang! . . . sending up a flat rhythm. The weary, frustrated sound hung over the ghetto like a cold, inhuman heartbeat that Nudger could hear for blocks. A dirge for dead dreams.
He stopped at a hardware store and bought a cheap two-speed box fan and paid extra to have it delivered to Billy Weep’s address. It wasn’t an air conditioner, but it was all Nudger could afford at the moment and it would help, if Billy took the trouble to switch it on.
Nudger had spent some good hours at Rush’s listening to Billy Weep’s smooth and plaintive alto sax. It was time he gave something back.
When he left the hardware store he drove east on Olive toward downtown and the Third District police station. On a scrap of paper from the glove compartment, so he wouldn’t forget, he scribbled the name Jacqui James.
VII I
need to know about a Jacqui James,” Nudger said to Hammersmith, in Hammersmith’s office in the Third
District station house. “Spelled with a q-u-i.”
Lieutenant Jack Hammersmith leaned his obese self back in his comfortable upholstered desk chair and motioned for Nudger to sit in one of the straight-backed wooden chairs before the desk.
“You been gone for two days, Nudge,” Hammersmith said, “then you walk in here without even phoning you’re coming, and ask me about somebody I never heard of. You in some kind of a rush?”
“Sort of.” Nudger sat down. He knew it wouldn’t be for long; Hammersmith’s visitors’ chairs were torture devices designed to keep conversations short and to the point, so the lieutenant would have plenty of time alone for business and smoking his malodorous greenish cigars without anybody complaining or vomiting.
“I phoned your office, Nudge, and talked to nothing but a machine,” Hammersmith said. “I phoned your apartment, Claudia’s place, Danny’s Donuts, all your haunts.” Hammer smith’s blue eyes were twinkling; he was enjoying this. “No
Nudger. All gone. Frankly I was concerned.”
“Maybe you should have notified the police.”
Hammersmith smiled, got a cigar out of his shirt pocket, and laid it on the desk in the way a suspicious poker player might lay a revolver on the table before the deal. There would be no nonsense here, or there would be fire and smoke.
“I was in New Orleans,” Nudger said.
“Hard-earned vacation?”
“Business. Why were you trying to contact me?”
Hammersmith toyed with the cigar, rolling it back and forth a few rotations each way on the desk. He liked to tease before answering a question. “I thought you ought to know that Hugo Rumbo is out on bail.”
Hammersmith was referring to a house-sized person who had made life dangerous for Nudger during his last case. Nudger nodded. “Thanks for letting me know, Jack.”
“You worried?”
“I should be but I’m not. I don’t think Rumbo is bright enough to hold a grudge.”
“Maybe not,” Hammersmith said. He stopped rolling the cigar. “So what’s a Jacqui James?”
“A female of the disappeared type. She was the gir ifriend of a jazz musician here in town about four years ago when she dropped from sight.”
Hammersmith raised his sleek eyebrows. “Foul play?”
“No, he’s a hell of a pianist.”
Hammersmith unwrapped the
“I’ll hold that cheerful thought,” Nudger said. “Go easy on yourself, Billy. You deserve it.”
“Hey,” Billy said feebly, when Nudger had opened the door. “You still got that jazz-record collection of yours?
Nudger shook his head no. “I had to sell most of it. I could only save the best.”
“You save any of mine?”
“Sure I did, Billy.”
The contorted hand yanked the curtains closed again. “That’s right,” came the thin voice from the darkness, “you did say the best.”
The relentless banging of metal on metal was still coming from beneath the wrecked car as Nudger walked down the street to his Volkswagen and drove away. The hammer bounced once after each blow: BANG-bang! BANG-bang! BANG-bang! . . . sending up a flat rhythm. The weary, frustrated sound hung over the ghetto like a cold, inhuman heartbeat that Nudger could hear for blocks. A dirge for dead dreams.
He stopped at a hardware store and bought a cheap two-speed box fan and paid extra to have it delivered to Billy Weep’s address. It wasn’t an air conditioner, but it was all Nudger could afford at the moment and it would help, if Billy took the trouble to switch it on.
Nudger had spent some good hours at Rush’s listening to Billy Weep’s smooth and plaintive alto sax. It was time he gave something back.
When he left the hardware store he drove east on Olive toward downtown and the Third District police station. On a scrap of paper from the glove compartment, so he wouldn’t forget, he scribbled the name Jacqui James.
VII I
need to know about a Jacqui James,” Nudger said to Hammersmith, in Hammersmith’s office in the Third
District station house. “Spelled with a q-u-i.”
Lieutenant Jack Hammersmith leaned his obese self back in his comfortable upholstered desk chair and motioned for Nudger to sit in one of the straight-backed wooden chairs before the desk.
“You been gone for two days, Nudge,” Hammersmith said, “then you walk in here without even phoning you’re coming, and ask me about somebody I never heard of. You in some kind of a rush?”
“Sort of.” Nudger sat down. He knew it wouldn’t be for long; Hammersmith’s visitors’ chairs were torture devices designed to keep conversations short and to the point, so the lieutenant would have plenty of time alone for business and smoking his malodorous greenish cigars without anybody complaining or vomiting.
“I phoned your office, Nudge, and talked to nothing but a machine,” Hammersmith said. “I phoned your apartment, Claudia’s place, Danny’s Donuts, all your haunts.” Hammer smith’s blue eyes were twinkling; he was enjoying this. “No
Nudger. All gone. Frankly I was concerned.”
“Maybe you should have notified the police.”
Hammersmith smiled, got a cigar out of his shirt pocket, and laid it on the desk in the way a suspicious poker player might lay a revolver on the table before the deal. There would be no nonsense here, or there would be fire and smoke.
“I was in New Orleans,” Nudger said.
“Hard-earned vacation?”
“Business. Why were you trying to contact me?”
Hammersmith toyed with the cigar, rolling it back and forth a few rotations each way on the desk. He liked to tease before answering a question. “I thought you ought to know that Hugo Rumbo is out on bail.”
Hammersmith was referring to a house-sized person who had made life dangerous for Nudger during his last case. Nudger nodded. “Thanks for letting me know, Jack.”
“You worried?”
“I should be but I’m not. I don’t think Rumbo is bright enough to hold a grudge.”
“Maybe not,” Hammersmith said. He stopped rolling the cigar. “So what’s a Jacqui James?”
“A female of the disappeared type. She was the gir ifriend of a jazz musician here in town about four years ago when she dropped from sight.”
Hammersmith raised his sleek eyebrows. “Foul play?”
“No, he’s a hell of a pianist.”
Hammersmith unwrapped the
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