On Wednesday I lifted the shade at 6:00 A.M. and looked out. No fusillade of gunfire crashed through the glass. Daylight wasn’t full yet, grayed by a light rain, but the morning walkers and runners were stroking past undeterred. I envied them their discipline and dedication to routine, their clinging to this fragile balloon of life, as if by clutching tightly to its string they could keep it from floating away. I turned over and burrowed back to sleep. The phone woke me at eight.
“My God, I just heard. Are you all right?” It was Phoebe.
“Catch a breath. I slept like a baby.” I gave her the story as I knew it, which she said was about what the morning paper had.
“Do the police think it has to do with the carnival murder?”
I said it was unlikely, mostly to calm her; the truth was I had no idea. “Probably just somebody worried about property values,” I said. “You let in one and before you know it the neighborhood is all PIs. Ought to be a law”
When we’d signed off, I retrieved the city newspaper from the bushes, shucked off its plastic raincoat, and skimmed the front section with my coffee. The carnival murder continued to occupy page one, with
a related story about the growing tension in the city over the case. A sidebar noted that Flora Nuñez’s funeral would be held that morning at Señora Nuestra del Carmen church. The shooting at my place had made page four. Showered, I peered into my cupboards, but the Welcome Wagon hadn’t come by in my absence and filled them. I made a mental note (again) to pick up some provisions. For garb, I pulled a dark suit out of its dry-cleaners’ wrap and chose a solid charcoal silk tie over a white shirt. I took along a raincoat. On my way out I gave the unpacked boxes on my living room floor a parting glance.
The parking lot at the Owl Diner was full, as usual. Rodrigo was at his usual place by the short order grill, the band of his chef’s hat sodden with perspiration. He gave me only the briefest nod when I said hello, then went straight back to cracking eggs, pouring batter, and slapping down rashers of bacon. I headed for an open booth, where the waitress brought me coffee. On the TV mounted high in a corner, a cocky-looking Gus Deemys was talking. “Turn it up, hey,” a counter patron called. Without even a glance at the set, Rodrigo reached a hairy arm and raised the volume.
“ … invite potential trouble to our community,” the DA was saying, “by bringing in these shows. With no reasonable way of doing background checks on the workers, we put ourselves at the mercy of a flawed system. Would any sane individual invite known criminals into their home? Bullies, thieves, and sex offenders?”
“Is he talking about the Boston Archdiocese, Matt?”
“Shh.”
“Murderers? No!” Deemys was saying. “This shocking crime has made one thing tragically clear. We have no choice but to protect ourselves, and if that means banning these archaic, renegade shows, then that’s a price well paid. Therefore, when I—”
“Give him the hook,” said the patron named Matt. “We heard enough.”
Again without a glance, Rodrigo lowered the volume, leaving Gus Deemys jawing away determinedly, in pantomime.
“‘Renegade shows,’” Matt said. “Did he really say that?”
“But he’s making a point, isn’t he? Over the top, sure, but still …”
“No, I know what you’re saying.”
“I mean, there’s crime that is ours—”
“—and there’s crime that shouldn’t be here. I hear you.”
“It’s a question of balance.”
“My kids are grown, so we don’t go to the carnival no more anyways.”
“Am I right?”
“Seems we ought to do something.”
“Besides talk.”
But I didn’t see it happen. I was mopping up egg yolk with a crust of rye toast when Rodrigo came over. “Sorry,” he said, “I didn’t want to break my rhythm.” He sank into the seat opposite me, blotting his shiny face on the hem of his apron. “In this racket, lose your groove and you’re toast, no pun intended. You wind up with egg on your shoes, pissed-off waitresses, and thirty customers who won’t be back.”
“I hate when that happens.”
“You’re all dressed up. How can I help you, my friend?”
In my work you took your information where you found it. I told him I was headed for a funeral and explained what I was doing here. He was nodding before I finished. “I can tell you how it looks from back there.” He hooked a thumb toward the griddle. “The guy the cops arrested is as good as guilty—but it doesn’t rest there. Mood around town is turning ugly. You heard it just now. And that was mild. Some of the talk, you’ve got people ready to go over there to the carnival with ball bats. And the thing is, what makes it sort of surreal—how often is a woman with a z on the end of her name going to be the center of sympathy?” I asked a few more questions, probing him about anything specific he might have overheard about the killing, but he didn’t have a thing. With a new round of short order slips starting to dangle from the carousel over the grill, he rose and went back to work. I left a sizable tip: whatever the opposite of hush money was.
As I got to the car, my cell phone rang.
“Mr. Rasmussen?” said a hesitant-sounding female voice. “This is Nicky.”
I drew a blank.
“Nicole. Mr. Rasmussen … it’s Pop. He’s sick.”
What I got from her was that he’d had a “stomach attack,” which I
took to mean his ulcer had started to bleed. An ambulance had come for him. She and Moses Maxwell were at All Saints now, waiting to learn more. He was conscious when they admitted him, but he was obviously in pain. I looked at my watch. “Do you want me to come over?”
“I don’t think there’s anything you can do. No visitors allowed right now. I just wanted to let you know. Say a prayer for him if you can. And … something else. Um … we’re gonna have a meeting tonight at the hotel, at nine o’clock. Mr. Rasmussen, some of the people here are scared and … nervous. I know I shouldn’t be troubling you with our problems, but I was wondering … Mr. Maxwell and I were wondering. Do you think you could come, too?”
“Are you expecting trouble?”
“With Pop in the hospital, I guess I don’t know what’s going to happen. I just thought … maybe you could talk to us?”
Wonderful. I should have followed up on that leadership award. I had absolutely nothing to tell them, zero, and yet I’d heard how awkward it had been for Nicole to ask. “I’ll come and listen,” I said, “and if I’ve got two cents to add, I’ll toss them into the pot. Nine o’clock. If there’s any news about Pop, call me.”
She promised.