Jazz Funeral

realized how out of character it had been for her gray-haired, dignified husband to storm a French Quarter apartment with a gun. He was hurting. Beguiled by the action, she’d forgotten that. Overcome with a need to help, to make him feel better, she rubbed his leg. That was all she dared do.
    Finally she said, “Are you hungry?”
    He didn’t answer at first. After twenty blocks or so, more it seemed like, he said, “Yeah.”
    “Yeah?” She’d forgotten what she asked.
    “I’m starved.”
    “Me too.” Neither of them had eaten during the day.
    When they reached home, they went in and fixed themselves sandwiches, ham for him, roast beef for her, with potato salad on the side. There was plenty of everything today. It was a house of mourning.
    Sitting with her husband, munching in the middle of the night, Patty forgot Ham, forgot even Melody. For a while she felt euphoric, knowing they were together, that in some way he was enjoying her company.
    “Patty, I’m going to find her.” He looked so impossibly sad. “If Fike didn’t lie, she’s here. We’re her parents, we can find her.”
    He had said “we” again. Patty tried not to show emotion, to let him know how much that meant to her. She nodded solemnly. “Yes. If we can’t, nobody can.”
    He seemed to perk up at that, to want so much to believe her that he actually did. He gave her another half smile, and she would have given her trademark blond hair to see a real smile, would have turned backflips while baking an apple pie, if he’d been into that sort of thing. But he wasn’t, and, despite this afternoon’s encounter, sex didn’t tempt him either. Silence was what he seemed to want from her. Tonight she gave it willingly, thinking of it as “silent support.”
    Tomorrow, together, they would find their child.
    “Ti-Belle, honey, you’re gettin’ yourself in a tizzy.”
    She wasn’t in a tizzy, she was in a fury. And with Nick, of all people. Nick, who I’d have killed to be with — oops, don’t say that, Ti-Belle.
    Well, it’s true. I’d have killed to be with him before I was. This is the fucking man of my dreams. How can he be such a shit ?
    “Tizzy? Tizzy! That’s all you can say?”
    “Baby, calm down. Try to tell me slowly what you’re so upset about.”
    “I can’t, goddammit! I can’t speak without sputtering!”
    “Honey, can I get you a drink or anything?”
    He was so damn solicitous she could puke. This was the way he was—she was learning that about him. He wouldn’t confront, he just got nicer and nicer—and farther away from the subject.
    “Did it ever occur to you I might be a suspect in my lover’s murder?”
    “Well, honey, I don’t suspect you? How could I?”
    “That is the point, Nick Anglime—don’t you see that?” Her voice had taken on a quality that was belligerent and whiny at the same time. It was probably the very definition of shrewish, she thought, but she could no more stop herself than turn black. The pressure had built and something had to blow. “Wait a minute, dammit.”
    She went in the bathroom and splashed her face and counted to ten. She still felt just as nutty and furious as she had before, so she did it again. And then she did it a third time.
    When she came out, she said, “Yes. You can get me a drink.”
    He was on the floor of the library, in the lotus position. He unwound his long, muscular legs. “Gin and tonic?”
    She nodded, went to the open window and breathed in jasmine. She was still furious, but she thought if she sipped the drink she might be able to speak without sputtering.
    “Okay,” she said when he handed it to her. She composed herself, remaining near the window. She thought the tableau probably looked romantic, and didn’t want to move. She was wearing a retro-style dress, white with old-fashioned “princess lines” and a halter top, short flared skirt. Marilyn Monroe style. She hadn’t exactly dressed for pleading for her life, but as long as she was reduced to that, the dress was probably a plus.
    “Okay, look. We were together when Ham was getting killed. Therefore, I couldn’t have done it. So a cop asks where you were when Ham was killed, and you don’t even alibi me.”
    “Sweet cakes, I didn’t get the feelin’ she was interested in you—I kind of got the idea she thought I might have been the guilty party.”
    “‘Oh, Ti-Belle, you selfish bitch. Ti-Belle, you must think the world revolves around you.’ Do you have to be