Spiral

jukebox began playing a new song, still that country twang to the now-male singer’s voice. ”I have a feeling your daughter’s death might be connected with a case I’m working.”
    ”Yeah, well, might have been nice if y’all came around about Sundy’s case.”
    ”Nobody from Homicide visited you?”
    ”Oh, they ‘visited,’ all right. Some asshole with a Marine bird burnt into his arm. But you been poor most of your life, you can tell when the police are just going through the motions. All he really cared about was could I alibi Ford, and”—the eyes went away again—”may the Good Lord send me to hell and back, I could.”
    ”You and Mr. Walton were together.”
    The eyes returned. ”You’re a polite man, Mr....?”
    ”Cuddy, John Cuddy. And I’m not police.”
    ”I don’t—sorry.”
    Moran reached a palm up to blot her tears. The cigarette in her ashtray was mostly gone, and she moved away to get the pack.
    ”Hey, Donna,” said Luke of the Peterbilt, ”that boy making you cry?”
    ”Got smoke in my eyes,” Moran replied. ”And mind your damn game afore Hack runs the table on you.”
    That got a barnyard sound from Hack of the Bandanna. Moran came back to me, lighting up. ”All right, Mr. John Polite, what do you want to know?”
    I decided to save my Ford Walton questions for last. ”Can you tell me something about your daughter as a person?”
    ”As a person?” A cloud of smoke came out with her words. ”Well, Sundy couldn’t learn from the lessons of others.”
    ”Others like you?”
    The smoke stopped, then came out more diffused. ”For instance.”
    ”Which lessons did you try to teach her?”
    Moran hardened, pointing the burning end of the cigarette at me. ”And I thought you was polite.”
    ”You said it.”
    ”Yeah, well, ain’t but one person I talked to about Sundy dying, so I’m guessing that reporter girl is who put you on to me.”
    I took a calculated risk. ”Just by reading her story in the Sun-Sentinel, combined with what the police told me.” More hardening. ”Why you really come out here?”
    ”Ms. Moran, if I can find a connection between my case and your daughter’s, I might be able to solve both of them.” Now skeptical, the eyes closed to slits as she inhaled more tar and nicotine. ”Find out who killed my Sundy?”
    ”I hope so.”
    Moran seemed to study me, then quickly blew out the smoke she’d been holding and set the cigarette down in the ashtray next to its dead mate. ”Ask your questions, then. Straight out.”
    Taking Moran at her word, I said, ”You know of anybody who’d want to kill your daughter?”
    ”Lord, I’ve been thinking on nothing else. But aside from”—Moran leaned toward me, dropping her voice— ”maybe one of her customers, I can’t.”
    ”Any one in particular?”
    ”Sundy didn’t never talk names, just ‘this tall fella’ or ‘this short fella.’ And she said most of them weren’t so much bad as lonely.”
    ”Hey, Boy,” yelled Luke from the pool table, ”you jew Donna down to twenty dollars, Hack and me’ll go halves with you.”
    Another barnyard sound from the Bandanna.
    Moran barely bothered to turn. ”Yeah, Luke, and Hack can hold your damn cue for you, too, so it don’t keep slipping out.”
    Nervous laughter from around the bar, reinforcing my impression that Luke in the Peterbilt cap was cock of this particular roost.
    I said, ”Ms. Moran?”
    She turned back to me. ”Yeah?”
    ”If there’d be a better time...?”
    A shake of her head, dislodging some strands of hair from the scrungie. ”Ain’t no good time for this kind of talk, so let’s finish it.”
    ”How about anybody not a customer?”
    ”What, who’d want to kill Sundy?”
    ”Yes.”
    Moran picked up her cigarette. ”No. Ford Walton on the worst drunk of his life, maybe, but, like you said, he was with me.”
    ”The whole time?”
    Her eyes went to slits again. ”Mr. John Polite, let me draw you a picture, all right? Ford and me was in my bed or within sight of it for all of that Sunday into Monday, and he was gone maybe half an hour when the sheriff s car come into the park, telling me they’d found my Sundy over to Lauderdale an hour before that. So, no way—”
    A song burst from the jukebox, thunderously loud. Another female vocalist this time, yowling something about satin sheets and satin pillows.
    I glanced over to the machine. Luke and Hack were leaning on their cues, grinning so widely their mouths