Death Notes

He could have been leery about talking, or maybe he felt a little left out. I looked at him but addressed them both.
    ‘At the end of the last set Saturday night, Match turned around and said something to somebody, then threw his head back and laughed. Remember?’
    They both stared at me, faces blank.
    ‘Was he talking to either one of you? Did you hear what he said?’
    They both shook their heads like monkeys on a stick.
    ‘You know,’ Hank said. ‘It’s a good thing somebody else is looking into this. That stone-faced cop that’s supposed to be working on it’s a real nobody. They’ll never find the guy if that’s all they’ve got to offer.’
    Les suddenly came to life. New curiosity sparked in his feral eyes.
    ‘Did you know something was going down? Is that why you showed up?’
    ‘Hardly. I just went to hear Match play.’
    ‘No shit? So it was just, like, coincidence?’
    ‘Exactly.’
    Hank was fumbling with a pack of Gitanes now. All of a sudden he seemed jittery. He could have been needing some nicotine or it could have been something else.
    ‘Did you say you were on stage with Sharon when Match was killed?’ I asked him.
    Hank shoved the cigarette back into the pack, like he’d just remembered the no-smoking-in-clubs law. His green eyes narrowed.
    ‘That’s right.’
    ‘Who else was up there with you besides Sharon?’ I turned to Les. ‘Were you?’
    ‘Yeah.’
    ‘Cheese Herman?’
    Hank shook his head. ‘Uh-uh.’
    ‘Dickie said—’
    ‘Dickie doesn’t know freakin’ shit.’
    ‘Where were the other guys in the band, then?’ I pulled out a pen and drew the Riff’s floor plan on a napkin but when I asked them to show me where everybody was, they argued about every single person. I ended up without a single X on the drawing.
    Seemingly out of nowhere, Les said, ‘Don’t forget Rochelle.’
    ‘Where was she?’ I said, ever hopeful.
    Hank said, ‘Doesn’t matter.’
    ‘The hell it doesn’t! She—’
    ‘Aw, she’s just cranky, Les, that’s all. She’d never kill anybody.’
    ‘Why are you stickin’ up for that cow?’
    Les looked puzzled and annoyed. ‘You don’t owe her. Besides, we’re hosed, man. No Match, no gig, no band. We’re busted up for good.’
    Hank ignored him, so Les turned to me.
    ‘Rochelle’s a pig. She hates everybody. Ev-er-y-body. Hell, she pulled a knife on me once. I’ll never forget—’ He started, nearly jumping out of his chair. ‘Hey! What the...? Quit kicking me, Hank! Damn!’
    Hank ignored him. ‘I was there. It was nothing.’
    ‘Nothing, hell! She threatened to cut my balls off.’
    ‘Like I said, it was nothing.’
    Les sputtered angrily, but Hank winked broadly at him, laughing and jabbing his ribs.
    ‘It’s a joke, you chump. I was making a joke.’
    When Les didn’t laugh with him, Hank shook his head, partly in disgust.
    ‘You drink too much, Barton. You’re so drunk you can’t even get a lousy joke. Why don’t you go home?’
    Les did seem pretty looped. We’d been drinking steadily since we’d sat down, but he’d outpaced both Hank and me. I had a pretty good buzz on myself, but I was sober enough to see that Hank was nervous about Les.
    We closed the place without me getting much more out of them other than the bit about Sharon’s call and Rochelle Posner and the knife.
    When Hank went to the john, though, Les confided that Cheese Herman was half blind and didn’t like to wear his glasses onstage, so if Cheese said he hadn’t seen anything, he was probably telling the truth.
    When the bartender yelled out ‘last call,’ Hank tried to hustle Les out the door, but Les wouldn’t have any of it. Then Hank tried to get rid of me. When that didn’t work, he caucused privately with Les across the room. From where I stood, it looked like Hank was talking sternly to Les, giving him orders. Then Hank gave up and left the club without us.
    It was two a.m. and I’d finally got Les all to myself.
     

48
     
    W e stood - not falling-down drunk, but wobbly - outside the closed-up Riff Club, watching people walking to their cars and driving off into the darkness.
    ‘I know a great after-hours place,’ Les said, looking more like a gigolo than ever. ‘Jazz and some blues, too. How about it?’
    I told him I wanted a cafe instead. Some place where we could sit and talk. He didn’t miss a beat.
    ‘I know a great place for that too. Parking’s not great, but I can drive and bring you back here for your