“Hugh, I’ve known Danny for years. He wouldn’t — ”
“You knew Anna Lia too. And look what happened.”
“I know my friends. Danny would never touch a gun. And damn it, Hugh, don’t tell me who to spend time with. I mean, seriously — ”
“Libbie — ”
“I’m not the obedient-little-wife type, okay?” What the hell was she saying? How had she gotten so irritable? Weariness? Pre-wedding jitters?
“I know. I miss you, Libbie. That’s all. I’m worried for you.”
“I’m sorry, Hugh. I miss you too. But I can’t abandon my friends.”
After a few more apologies, they agreed to meet this afternoon, maybe go to the church and speak to the priest.
Now she knelt beside Danny. He smelled of beer. “Have you talked to Gustavo?” she asked. “Do you know what he wants to do?”
“No, I — no. No.”
She rubbed his arm. Crespi clasped his hands behind his back. Carla barreled in. “Sorry,” she said. “Betty was out of orange juice.” Quickly, she and Libbie made arrangements with Crespi for Danny to phone Gustavo in Rome. The call’s cost would be added to the funeral expenses. While Carla followed Danny to a back room, Libbie pulled Mr. Crespi aside. “Danny — Mr. Clark — gave the police permission to conduct an autopsy as part of their investigation — ”
“Yes, yes. Unfortunate, but not a problem. I’ve worked with autopsy cases before. I assure you, Ms. — ?”
“Schwinn.”
“—Ms. Schwinn, we can accomplish miracles these days in the preparation phase — ”
“You mean the embalming?”
“Yes. Leave it to me. She’ll be ravishing.”
Libbie shivered at the thought. “I assume Gustavo will want the body shipped to Rome,” she said. “You were recommended to Danny because you can do that, right?”
“Of course. But naturally, before Ms. Clark begins her overseas journey, her friends here in Houston will want to see her and express their final good-byes?”
“Sure, we’ll have some kind of service … but I don’t — ”
“Again, leave everything to me. Ms. Clark is in very good hands.”
She heard Danny weeping down the hall. “I’m sorry, Gustavo. I’m sorry,” he said.
He hung up and asked for a bathroom. Carla said Gustavo was too shocked to make any plans. They’d have to call him back. Libbie couldn’t picture Anna Lia’s father wearing anything but a brand-new tuxedo. She imagined him gripping the phone, tears falling from his face, staining his shiny silk tie.
“In the meantime,” Carla said, “we should set up something here, don’t you think?”
Libbie agreed. Danny returned from the bathroom, wiping his nose.
“Well then, shall we step into the display room?” Crespi asked. He led them into a spacious, red-carpeted chamber. Coffins stood like fishing boats in neat little rows. “Ms. Clark might be at home in this casket. Its design is based on contemporary European models. Ms. Clark is European, isn’t she?” Danny nodded. “As you can see, this unit comes equipped with a fully satin-lined interior, a fine mahogany gloss. Or here’s the White Pearl. One of my favorites.”
Danny turned to Libbie and Carla. “I don’t know,” he said. “What do you think?”
“Take the cheapest and be done with it,” Libbie said. “That’s what Anna Lia would tell you.” But she wasn’t sure this was true. Simplifying was Libbie’s approach. She’d told Hugh that when they’d first discussed their wedding. The huge church, the lengthy ceremony, these were Hugh’s ideas. She would have settled for a justice of the peace in the privacy of an office.
But Anna Lia’s vocabulary didn’t include simplicity. The truth was, if she were here, she’d probably opt for the costliest box. Lying inside it would be like snuggling into one of her daddy’s suits.
Carla walked Danny around the room. Libbie approached Mr. Crespi. “The whole cost, everything — embalming, the box, transportation — what are we looking at, roughly?”
“Medium-range casket, say two thousand. Refrigeration and preparation, another four hundred. Escorting Ms. Clark from the police facilities … I estimate anywhere from three to five hundred. The journey to Rome, of course I’ll have to check. Prices are scheduled to rise this summer.”
“I see,” Libbie said. How many more times this week could she be knocked on her ass?
“Ah, it looks as though Mr. Clark has selected the Classic Royal. Excellent taste. I must say, it’s been a pleasure meeting you, Ms. Schwinn. This weekend — say, by two Sunday afternoon — Ms. Clark will be waiting for you here in the Slumber Room.”
The radio station occupied the eighth floor of a glass highrise just west of the 610 Loop. This surprised Danny. He’d listened to the crap they called “programming.” Cut-rate salsa, slicked-up in fancy recording studios in L. A. or New York. None of the real stuff, the rollicking Afro-Latin rhythms — Fela, Isadora Lopez — or the mournful Indian ballads of Urubamba, which Anna Lia had taught him to appreciate.
He’d figured KKLT for a nickel-and-dime outfit, playing whatever earwax the studios’ A & R men told them to push. He wasn’t prepared for … well, serious money.
Clichés are so damned annoying, he thought. They pop up everywhere, just to mock us. Crespi at the funeral home. Tall, thin, bald — The Undertaker in every old movie Danny had ever seen. And with big, chilly hands, naturally.
Now this: a flat glass facade, bright polish, ultramodern glamour. The station had anchored itself in a brand-new, high-concept business park, whose every Plexiglas surface screamed “Hip!” The owners had probably polled dozens of focus groups (eighteen- to thirty-five-year-olds, cash cows — Danny knew this from his weekends at the record store), picked a market niche they could fill, then hired the standard DJs: busty, blue suede bimbos, Ray-Ban goofs.
Sure enough, the biggest goof of all was on the air now. Danny leaned across his steering wheel to turn the volume up. “Roberto Capriati here, the Love Stallion, filling in for my buddy Tiger today. We just heard the heart of Cuba, Francisco Repilado, a.k.a. Compay Segundo. If you don’t know his work, friends, you need to — good for the soul. For decades now, Compay has been the voice of the guajiros, the peasants in Cuba’s tobacco fields. We’ll be right back, amigos, with more son from Havana.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” Danny muttered. The Love Stallion. Shit. Voice like breaking glass …
“Sit back, relax, friends. Coming at you now, ‘De camino a la vereda’ by the great Ibrahim Ferrer …”
Danny’s head swam. He ate a couple more Excedrin. He felt better now than he had at Crespi’s; less dizzy, more alert. Maybe last night was finally letting go. He had a vague memory of a man in the restaurant … something to do with Libbie. But mainly, he remembered Marie’s mouth on his forehead as she kissed him good night. She’d insisted on driving him back to her place, laying him out on her couch. She’d called Libbie and Carla at his apartment and told them he’d meet them at the funeral home in the morning.
He remembered sliding the gun beneath the couch, so Marie wouldn’t see it, before she helped him slip off his shirt and crawl beneath a big cotton blanket. Then she pressed her lips to his brow. He told her she was beautiful. “Hush,” she said. He tried to touch her hair, and she batted his fingers away. What else had he done? Where was Ricky? Had he seen anything? Danny would have to call Marie and apologize.
He felt the Seecamp now, flush against his belly, stuck inside his pants. What the hell had pulled him into that rotten pawn shop? The encounter with Smitts, the anger, his sorrow.