Jazz Funeral (45 page)

Melody screamed, “Oh, my God! Oh, my God!” and sat up. She seemed fine, hadn’t been hit.

Skip stared up at her executioner, wondering if she’d keep firing, one shot after another, to make sure she was dead.

But Patty pointed the gun at Melody. Her eyes looked red, as if she’d been crying, and her hands were shaking. She kept staring at the girl, losing her grip a little more and a little more, her hands getting shakier and shakier. Skip didn’t say a word. This was a woman capable of shooting her own daughter, at least at that moment. She was having trouble with it, but that didn’t mean she wouldn’t do it. Hoping Melody would have the sense to keep her mouth shut, Skip held her breath. She saw Patty bunch her muscles, gathering her strength, and braced herself for the report. But Patty didn’t move. A tear fell from her left eye.

And then she turned and bolted, dropping the gun.

Skip scrambled up, ignoring the pain, and ran after her, chased her down the street, tackled her, hit her in the face she was so mad. Blood dripped onto her, onto Patty’s nose, and she screamed. The blood had come from Skip’s head. How long could she stay conscious?

Melody said, “Don’t move.”

She was pointing Patty’s gun at the two of them. Damn! Why hadn’t Skip thought of that scenario?

“Uh … do you need your cuffs?”

“That’s okay. I think you should put the gun down, though.” She put a knee in Patty’s back, pulled her cuffs from her belly pack, but saw that simple cuffing wasn’t going to be good enough. She was going to pass out any second, and Melody still had the gun; if Patty tried to run, she might shoot her.

“Come on,” she said, but Patty didn’t budge.

How much strength did she have left? Mustering all of it, she dragged Patty off the sidewalk and cuffed her to the rail of an iron fence.

Then she put out her hand for the gun. Its comforting heft in her palm, she gasped, “Call 911.” And sat down gratefully, waiting for oblivion. Melody pulled off her T-shirt, applied it to Skip’s head, and disappeared.

But as her breathing slowed, Skip realized she didn’t even feel faint. And yet she must have lost a lot of blood, not to mention having a bullet in her skull. She pulled herself up and caught her reflection in a car window.

The bullet wasn’t in her after all. She was fine. But what she saw made her feel a lot fainter than the wound—the thing had taken out a path of hair as it traveled along the right side of her head.

Well, no way was she going to the hospital. No way! These two were hers and she was doing the questioning.

O’Rourke was surprisingly docile about it.

Maybe he thinks I’ll bleed to death.

She got some first aid from colleagues while she waited for George Brocato and two lawyers to arrive—one for Patty and one for Melody. After Melody conferred with her father and lawyer, Skip joined her in Juvenile. She seemed in good spirits, glad to see Skip. “Hi. You look good. Do you feel okay? You were really white for a while.”

She’d been wearing Rwanda’s wig at the garage. Now her hair was a lifeless white, with the purple streak Flip had described.

She managed a smile, and it was pretty. There was something about her face—an alertness, an eagerness, a willingness to meet the world—that reminded Skip of the look in the eyes of a six-week-old kitten. A look of optimism a cat would outgrow the first time it met a German shepherd. A baby-animal look so vulnerable, so hopeful, it made you want to rush right out and repair the hole in the ozone. Skip had done nothing but worry about this child for a week, and now Melody was worried about her.

“I’m fine, thanks, but my hairdresser had a stroke.”

“You should get a CAT scan.”

“I will. How about you? You okay?”

Melody nodded.

“I’ve been worried about you.”

“They told me you were looking for me. Thanks, I guess.”

“I almost caught up with you once. At Madeleine Richard’s. But someone else got there first.”

“My mom, I guess. I think she borrowed my Aunt Des’s car. Is she all right?”

“I haven’t seen her yet.”

“I’m sorry I beat her up.”

“I guess you were mad.”

“That’s an understatement.”

George cleared his throat.

Skip took the hint. “Do you feel up to talking?”

George said, “Does it have to be now?”

“It’s okay, Daddy. I’d rather.”

“Only if I sit in,” said George. He was wearing a Ralph Lauren polo shirt, dressed for a Sunday. Tension showed in every inch of him.

Melody said, “Ummm. I don’t know.”

“What?”

“Uh, could it be just Anthony?” Her lawyer.

“There are things you don’t want me to hear?”

“Not yet. I’ll tell you, but not yet, okay?”

Skip got Melody some coffee, and when they were settled, she said, “Melody, I have to ask you something important. Did you actually see her kill Ham?”

Melody opened her mouth to answer, closed it again, stared out the window for a while. Finally she said, “I guess I heard it. I didn’t want to think that’s really what it was, but”—she looked down at her lap—“I guess it was.”

“What happened. Melody? You overheard them fighting?”

“Well, I had a bad day that day—”

“I know all about Flip and Blair.”

A slight tinge of pink appeared on Melody’s cheeks. Even with the blond and purple hair, her young skin managed to look healthy. “I guess you do. I went to Ham’s all upset and just let myself in, as usual. But he and Patty were yelling so loud they didn’t hear me.” Patty, not Mother.

“I heard my name, so I tiptoed down the hall and listened. He was trying to get her to do something, I guess—it must have been about selling the business. They had this offer that they were all fighting over. Patty had a vote, but she always took my father’s side. He didn’t want to sell, but I guess Ham did. I know he’d put a lot of his money into Second Line Square and he’d lent a lot to Ti-Belle. I guess he needed the sale because he needed money.” She shrugged. “I mean, I’ve had several days to try to piece it together, and that’s what it must have been. I guess she refused and he threatened her—and that’s about where I came in. He said he’d tell Dad and he’d tell me. About—you know. But then, I didn’t know. That’s why I listened.

“I couldn’t believe what he said. I couldn’t forget it, though: ‘What would Melody think if she knew I was her father?’” She closed her eyes and shook her head.

“I still don’t believe it. Do you know how it is when you’ve thought one thing all your life—the most basic thing, the simplest thing—and that thing isn’t true? Your world’s upside down— nothing is right. You just can’t figure anything out. And then there was Blair and Flip and all—I just didn’t have a life anymore. I had to leave. I don’t believe what a baby I was. How innocent.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Because when I left, I thought that was the worst thing that could happen to me.”

She must have awakened the next day to the news that her brother was dead and known then that her mother was the murderer—and that she was the only witness.

“You poor kid.”

Melody looked away, embarrassed.

“What happened when you heard all that? Did you say anything?”

“I jumped her. Just like I did this morning.” She shook her head again—this was something else that wouldn’t sink in. “I tried to kill my own mother. Twice.”

Her lawyer started: “Melody!”

“Why did you stop?”

“Ham pulled me off and I ran out of the house. Didn’t think, just ran. I had to get the hell out.”

“Did you hear anything else?”

“No. Well, maybe. It might have been my imagination.”

“What?”

“I thought I heard a scream.”

“Patty screamed?”

“No, Ham, I thought.”

“Did he say anything?”

“No. Just yelled, like …”

“Like what?”

“Well, I guess … I mean I thought later … I guess that’s when she did it.”

Skip tried to keep her face impassive. She couldn’t say “poor kid” again. “And that was all?”

“I just kept running.”

“Okay, let’s stop for now. Your dad can take you home.”

“I can go?”

She sighed. She’d gotten through the interview fine. For the first time she looked frightened. “What am I going back to?”

It was the moan of a motherless child.

Skip went to get Patty. “Is George still here?”

“He took Melody home. But your lawyer’s waiting for us.” Gray Renegar was one of the best criminal lawyers in the state. George was nothing if not a good provider.

Patty sighed. “George’ll be unhappy. He doesn’t like Gray’s advice.”

Skip wondered what she meant. As they made their way to the interview room where they’d meet Renegar, Patty said, “I’m sorry I shot you. I guess I went a little crazy.”

A more accomplished southerner than she, Skip thought, would come up with a polite reply. She couldn’t.

When they reached their destination and everyone was seated. Skip said, “Do you understand your rights?”

Patty nodded. “I want to waive them.”

“What?” She stared at Renegar, who spoke automatically to Patty.

“I have to advise you against that.”

“George wants me to.”

“Patty, has it occurred to you that you and George might have a conflict in this thing? I’m your lawyer and I’m telling you to keep your mouth shut.”

Patty looked surprised, apparently unused to such talk. She said, “He’s right, Gray. I want to plead guilty. If I stand trial, Melody will have to testify. Neither of us wants that.”

What do you know—a shred of maternal feeling. Or is she just mouthing George’s words?

The latter
, Skip thought.
Definitely the latter.
She felt oddly let down. She’d expected more of a fight. But she could hear Melody’s words of a few minutes before, now metaphorically fraught: Patty had a vote, but she always took my father’s side.

“He doesn’t know what happened,” Patty said. “He just knows I killed Ham. I told him that.”

Her hair was the hair of a woman used to having others groom her; it was sticking out all over, stiff with spray and sweat. Crying had eroded her makeup. She looked haggard and beaten.

Renegar said, “Patty, I have to advise you—”

“Shut up!”

His eyes were the color of his name, and hard. “Could we just get it on the record, please?”

She kept quiet while he told her again to keep her trap shut. And then she said, voice dripping with sarcasm: “May I start now?” A lot of anger was about to come out.

“He turned my own child against me—and now my husband. My own husband would rather see me in jail than … oh, never mind.

“He threatened me—he threatened to tell George and Melody if I didn’t vote to sell the business. They only needed one vote, you see. But I couldn’t do that, it wasn’t what George wanted, so of course I wasn’t about to.”

“And what did he threaten you with?”

“Oh, about being Melody’s father.” She seemed distracted, wanting to get on with it—she’d already told this story.

Renegar looked as if he were going to have a cow.

“I thought he’d forgotten.”

“Forgotten!” Skip blurted it, unable to keep quiet.

“Well, it only happened two or three times. I mean, I just—waited until George was out getting drunk and Ham was asleep. Then I’d take off my clothes and get in bed with him. He didn’t say a word. He was seventeen—would any seventeen-year-old boy in the world say no?”

Still a child.

Skip wondered if she’d let him down easy or even mentioned the fun was over.
Probably not,
she thought. And of course she’d have been sure to seduce George around that time—or told him she had if he was the kind of drunk who wouldn’t remember.

“We never said a word about it.”

“You and Ham?”

She shook her head. “Until the other day. I really thought he—I don’t know—didn’t even know, maybe. Thought he was dreaming or something.”

Oh, sure.

“Anyway, she was really George’s baby. Ham’s genes were his genes.”

Renegar cleared his throat. “Can we get on with it, please?”

Skip said, “So Ham threatened to tell George and Melody he was Melody’s father.”

“He called and asked me to come over—I knew it was going to be bad, I knew it. He’d asked me before, about the vote. He’d been begging me. The bastard, it was none of his business. And then he sounded so serious on the phone. He said, ‘Look, it’s to your advantage to show up.’ So I had some wine before I left, and then I had some with him. I was drunk. I didn’t know what I was doing.”

“What did you do when he threatened you?”

“Nothing. Melody just came out of nowhere and started beating me. He pulled her off, but I realized what had happened—he’d turned my own child against me. The lowlife, scum-sucking bastard! I work all these years to raise this beautiful little family, and along comes Ham and poof—my own child tries to kill me. I could just—”

“And you did, didn’t you?”

“Yes, goddammit! I did. I didn’t even think. I was in a white-hot rage—I can get in it again just thinking about it—and I picked up the knife before I thought. I don’t remember stabbing him, but I must have because—” She stopped, sobered for the moment, color draining.

“Because what?”

“He made a horrible noise.”

“Like a scream?”

“Like a snuffle. And the knife was in him.”

He’d probably been dead before Melody hit the sidewalk.

Later, telling Steve about it, Skip said, “So Renegar asked, ‘How’d you feel then, Patty? Sorry?’ And do you think she took the hint? Oh, no. Poor man. It didn’t even occur to her to pretend she knew she’d committed a tiny little sin against society.”

“What did she say?”

“She said she was scared so she left. Just drove aimlessly for a while, but did the horror of what she’d done take hold? Hell, no. She remembered she was supposed to pick up Melody, and then she caught on she could be in big trouble. So she coolly goes back—goes back, can you believe it?—to wash the glasses and wipe the knife. Then she drives over to Blair’s, saying she’s late because she stopped at the store to get something for dinner. And then she actually does go shopping so the story will check out. Arrives home with a pound and a half of shrimp.”