Death Notes

out that he was wrapped up with that kind, it could be that nobody’d want to touch him. I just want to close the deals first, see?’
    ‘If anybody wanted to kill you, you were wide open last night.’
    ‘I know, honey. Now I don’t know what to think. Why would anybody want his sax?’
    She looked so plaintive, so dejected and confused, I was starting to believe she really didn’t know what was going on.
    ‘I need the truth from you now, Sharon. It’s important. Your life could depend on it.’
    ‘Sure, honey. I understand.’
    Her eyes were more feral than ever but there was an earnestness in her tone I hadn’t heard before.
    ‘Post said Match’s killer was a pro.’
    ‘Everybody Match knew was some kind of pro.’
    ‘Did Post say why he thinks it was a professional hit?’
    ‘The coroner told him it was, honey. Either that, or dumb luck. But Lieutenant Post said no amateur would be smart enough to murder somebody in a room full of people without anybody noticing. So it has to be a pro.’
    I asked her if Match had seemed nervous Saturday and she thought for a moment.
    ‘Why, now that you mention it, honey, he was kind of a wreck.
    Ever since he started back with his music again, he’s always been real particular about his sax and the scores. He made me promise I’d go up there to the stage and collect them after every set and put them in a folder. And the sax, he’d leave it on the stand on stage, but he made sure somebody was there to watch it.’
    ‘Who?’
    ‘One of the band. I hadn’t ever seen him like that, honey. It was probably stage fright, you know. He hadn’t played in years.’
    ‘I don’t suppose you asked him about it?’
    ‘Why would I? What could I do?’
    At least she was realistic. I asked her about the twenty thousand dollars Match had borrowed from Malone.
    ‘I don’t know anything about it, honey. Did Siggy say what Match wanted it for?’
    ‘No. Do you have any idea?’
    ‘Huh-uh.’
    ‘Can you check your financial statements? That’ll tell us where the money went.’
    The paper trail would say a lot.
    ‘It didn’t go anywhere, honey. I would have known about
    it.’
    ‘But you did. You knew Match had loans. That’s why you asked me to talk to these guys.’
    ‘I didn’t think any of them were recent loans. I thought Match meant from years and years ago, honey. If it was recent, I would have known all about it ’cause I handled all the money.’
    ‘Maybe Match had an account he didn’t tell you about?’
    ‘No.’
    I gave up and point-blank asked her if she still wanted me to talk to DuPont and Tobinio.
    ‘No, honey. Forget it. I don’t care anymore.’
    So I asked her for a check to cover an hour of my time and the ten miles I’d spent driving around town. She wrote it out, then announced she needed to rest. That was all I needed to hear. I was out the door like a bullet.
     

21
     
    Halfway down the walk to the Toyota, I noticed a grayhaired man poking around under the hood of a blue vintage Mustang at the curb a couple of doors down. Tools were laid out precisely across a soiled towel draped over the car’s front fender. Post said a neighbor had called the robbery in. Rocky somebody. I pocketed my keys and crossed the lawn.
    Up close, in spite of his grungy coveralls, the man looked more like a Spanish literature professor than a home mechanic. He had eyeglasses, a receding hairline, and a serious, intelligent expression on his narrow copper face. He smiled warmly when he saw me approach and his thin mustache curved up at the ends.
    ‘Julio Piedras.’ He gave his right hand one final swipe with a pink rag, then offered it to me. ‘My friends call me Rocky.’ Bingo.
    ‘So the little widow, how’s she taking it?’
    ‘All right.’ It seemed inappropriate to say the little widow had been wheeling and dealing like a street vendor.
    ‘My wife’s going to take something over to her later, something to eat.’
    His eyes rested on Sharon’s front door.
    ‘Did that burglar scare her?’
    ‘The burglar?’
    ‘I saw him. Not the one last night but the one before.’
    And Post had told me he had nothing.
    ‘Rosario - that’s my wife - she woke up. The lights and yelling woke her up, so she woke me up, and made me look out the window. All the lights were on over there and Sharon was cursing like she’d seen a ghost. I saw somebody run down the street. He got into a black car.’
    ‘Black? What was the make?’
    ‘I don’t know. Black,