‘Sad about what?’ Carella asked.
‘His lost sight? His lost youth? All his lost opportunities? When he played gypsy music, he made you want to weep. The codgers tipped him lavishly, believe me.’
‘What lost opportunities?’ Meyer asked.
‘He had a great career ahead of him as a classical musician. Before he got drafted, he was studying with Alexei Kusmin at the Kleber School of Music here. Max was one of the more promising young violinists around. Then… Vietnam.’
‘Any idea why anyone would want him dead?’
‘Senseless,’ Hawkins said, and shook his head. ‘You want some orange juice?’ Without waiting for an answer, he went to the refrigerator, took out a bottle. ‘This is fresh-squeezed,’ he said, pouring. ‘I get it at the organic market, it’s not from concentrate. I mean, who would want to kill a blind man? Why? Grappelli also said he played best when he was young and in love. I don’t think Max was ever in love. In fact, I don’t think he was ever young. The Army grabbed him for Vietnam, and that was the end of his youth, the end of everything. He came back blind. Tell that to all these fuckin macho presidents who send young kids off to fight their stupid fuckin wars.’
‘What makes you say he’d never been in love?’ Carella asked.
‘Do you see a woman in his life? I’m sorry, but I don’t see one. A wife? A girlfriend? Do you see one? I see a guy who was fifty, sixty years old, wandering around in the dark with a violin tucked under his chin, playing music could break your heart. That’s what I see. This is done. How do you take it?’
They sat at the kitchen table, drinking coffee.
Hawkins was silent for what seemed a long time.
Then he said, ‘Grappelli once said, “I forget everything when I play. I split into two people and the other plays.” I had the feeling Max did the same thing. I think when he played, he forgot whatever it was that troubled him.’
‘And what was that?’ Meyer asked.
‘Well, we’ll never know, now will we?’
‘Did he ever specifically mention anything that was bothering him?’
‘Never. Not to me. Maybe to some of the other musicians. But I have to tell you, Max kept mostly to himself. It was as if his blindness locked him away in darkness. You ask me, the only time he expressed himself was when he was playing. The rest of the time…” Hawkins shook his head. ‘Silence.’
* * * *
On the way down to the street, Carella said, ‘The rest is silence.’
Meyer looked at him.
‘Hamlet,’ Carella said. ‘I played Claudius in a college production.’
‘I didn’t know that.’
‘Yeah. I could’ve been famous.’
‘I’ll bet.’
They came out into the street, began walking toward where they’d parked the car.
‘How about you?’ Carella asked.
‘I could’ve been Picasso.’
‘Yeah?’
‘When I was a kid, I wanted to be an artist,’ Meyer said, and shrugged.
‘Ever regret becoming a cop?’
‘A cop? No. Hey, no. You?’
‘No,’ Carella said. ‘No.’
They walked toward the car in silence, thinking about paths not taken, dreams unborn.
‘Well, let’s check out this other musician,’ Carella said.
* * * *
‘I play at Ninotchka only when I’m between pit gigs,’ Sy Handelman told them.
They figured a ‘pit gig’ was a job that was the bottom of the barrel. The pits.
‘The orchestra pit,’ Handelman explained. ‘For musicals downtown, on the Stem.’
He was twenty years old or so. Wore his hair long, like an anachronistic hippie. They could imagine him playing violin outside a theater downtown, collecting tips in a plate on the sidewalk. A busker. They could also imagine him in a long-sleeved, white-silk, ruffled shirt, playing violin for the senior citizens at Ninotchka. They had a little more trouble visualizing him in the orchestra pit at a hit musical; on their salaries they rarely got to see hundred-dollar-ticket shows.
‘I like pit work,’ Handelman said. ‘All those good-looking gypsies.’
They got confused again.
Was he now talking about his work at Ninotchka?
‘The chorus girls,’ he explained. ‘We call them gypsies. You sit in the orchestra pit, you can see up their dresses clear to Manderlay.’
‘Must be an interesting line of work,’ Meyer said.
‘Can make you blind, you’re not careful,’ Handelman said, and grinned.
Which led them to why they were here.
‘Max Sobolov?’ Handelman said. ‘A sad old Jew.’
‘He was only fifty-eight,’ Meyer said.
‘There are sad old men who are only forty,’ Handelman observed philosophically.
‘Ever tell you why he was so sad?’ Carella asked.
‘I got the feeling it was guilt. We Jews always feel guilty, anyway, am I right?’ he said to Meyer. ‘But with Max, it was really oppressive. What I’m saying is nobody acts the way Max did unless he did something terrible he was sorry for. Never smiled. Hardly even said hello when he came to work. Just got into costume… we wear these red-silk ruffled shirts
Okay, so they’d figured white.
‘… and tight black pants, give the old ladies a thrill, you know. Then he went out to do his thing. Which was to play this dark, brooding, gypsy music. Which he did superbly, I must say.’
‘We understand he was trained as a classical musician.’
‘I didn’t know that, but I’m not surprised. Where, would you know?’
‘Kleber.’
‘The best. I’m not surprised.’
‘This terrible thing he did, whatever it was…’
‘Well, I’m just guessing.’
‘Did he ever mention what it might have been, specifically?’
‘No. He never told me any of this, you understand, he never said, “Gee, I’m so guilty and sad because I threw my teenage sweetheart off the roof,” never anything like that. But there was this… this abiding sense of guilt about him. Guilt and grief. Yes. Grief. As if he was so very sorry.’
‘For what?’ Carella asked.
‘Maybe for himself,’ Handelman said.
* * * *
First time Kling ever called her was from a phone booth in the rain. Less a booth, really, than one of these little plastic shells, rain pouring down around him. He was calling from a similar enclosure today, the heat rising from the pavement in shimmering waves he could actually see, talk about palpable.
He hadn’t spoken to her in six days, but who was counting? You go from sharing apartments, his and hers, alternately, to simply not speaking, that was a very serious contrast. He was calling her at her office, he hoped he wouldn’t get the usual medical menu, hoped he wouldn’t get a nurse asking him where he itched or hurt. Sharyn Cooke was the police department’s Deputy Chief Surgeon. Bert Kling was a Detective/Third Grade. Big enough difference right there. Never mind the fact that she was black and he was white. Blond, no less.
‘Dr. Cooke’s office,’ a female voice said.
He was calling her uptown, in Diamondback, where she had her private practice. Her police office was in Rankin Plaza, across the river. They knew him at both places. Or at least used to know him. He hoped she hadn’t given orders otherwise.
‘Hi,’ he said, ‘it’s Bert. May I speak to her, please?’
‘Just a moment, please.’
He almost said, ‘Jenny, is that you?’ Knew all the nurses. But she was gone. He waited. And waited. Heat rose from the sidewalk and the street.
‘Hello?’
‘Sharyn?’ he said.
‘Yes, Bert.’
‘How are you?’
‘Fine, thanks.’
‘Shar…”
Silence.
‘I’d like to see you.’
More silence.