Claudia switched off the drier and began brushing her hair in front of her dresser mirror, slouching down slightly with a dancer's grace to fix her entire reflection in the glass. She was using an odd-looking brush with blunted, widely spaced bristles, the sort of thing that sold for something-ninety-nine via TV mail-order commercials.
"How's work?" Nudger asked, meshing his fingers behind his head on the pillow.
"It's fine." She caught his gaze in the mirror and smiled ever so slightly as their eyes locked. Nudger had helped to get her the position as teacher in a private girls' high school in St. Louis County. Apparently she'd taken to her return to teaching after her stint as a waitress, and everything Nudger heard indicated that Stowe School had taken to her. "I've got to go in to work later today," she said.
"It's Saturday."
"I know. I have to grade some tests."
"You could have brought them home."
"I'd rather work at the school." The brush made surprisingly loud, abrupt swishing sounds as she forced it through her still-damp hair. It was a sound Nudger didn't care for. "What kind of case are you working on in New Orleans?" she asked.
"Something to do with a jazz pianist." Nudger didn't elaborate. She knew he didn't like to discuss his cases except when he was ready, if at all, and she wouldn't push. Occasionally there were things about his work that Claudia preferred not knowing.
"Sounds interesting" was all she said. Shhhhk! went the brush.
"The layovers in the other cities were to gather background information."
Claudia nodded, not looking at him. Shhhhk!
"Stop that, will you?"
"Stop what?" she asked, putting down the brush.
"Never mind." Nudger swung out of bed and padded barefoot toward the bathroom to shower. The hardwood floor was pleasantly cool to walk on.
"One egg or two?" she asked, as he passed her on the way to the door.
"I thought we'd have breakfast out."
"I don't mind cooking," she said. "I still enjoy playing with the kitchen." She had only been in the south St. Louis apartment on Wilmington a little over a month. Considering the roach palace she'd occupied downtown, Nudger could understand why she liked her new kitchen.
"Two eggs," he said, and stepped over his wadded white J. C. Penney underwear where he'd tossed it last night in the throes of passion. Fortunately he kept a complete change of clothes at Claudia's.
In the spacious old tiled bathroom, he stood beneath the stinging needles of a hot shower and thought about Claudia. Her world had improved vastly since her suicide attempt only nine months ago. She had her job, the new apartment, a self-respect she'd thought was lost forever. And Nudger liked to think he was an incentive for her to keep on living. It was nice to be needed.
He began to lather his travel-tired body. The soap was perfumed and had the consistency of whipped cream, but it would have to do.
Nudger felt better after showering and dressing. By the time he walked into the kitchen, the fresh-perked coffee scent had honed his appetite. He sat down across the table from Claudia. She had his sunny-side-up eggs ready, along with black coffee, buttered toast, and three slices of bacon. Working woman though she was, Claudia liked to cook and was good at it. Nudger and his stomach appreciated this touch of domesticity in his otherwise unruly life.
"Are you going to see Nora and Joan today?" he asked, sprinkling too much salt on his eggs. Nora and Joan were Claudia's thirteen- and eleven-year-old daughters by her unfortunate marriage. The girls lived with their father, Ralph Ferris, in north St. Louis County.
Claudia took a sip of coffee. "No, Ralph is taking them out of town this weekend. Or says he is. The bastard."
Nudger smiled. Bastard. It was good to hear her refer to Ralph that way. Emotion out in the open. "In touch with her feelings," was the jargon. Her psychiatrist, Dr. Oliver, would like that. Besides, Ralph was undeniably a bastard.
"I'll spend most of the day reading my English Two class's essays on Shelley," she said.
"Winters or Berman?"
"What are you going to do today?" Claudia asked. She had learned to tune out his nonsense. She doused ketchup over her eggs. Nudger didn't understand how she could eat them that way. Or even look at them directly.
"I'm going to see an old friend," he said. "He's not nearly as literate as your English Two class; he communicates best through a saxophone. But he does it oh so eloquently."
Claudia looked up from her colorfully abused eggs and frowned at him. For a moment he thought she was going to ask him to elaborate, but she didn't. She picked up her fork instead.
"Eat your breakfast," she said simply.
Nudger did. Then he kissed her good-bye and left, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. Ketchup. Billy Weep lived in a second-floor apartment on Hodimont Avenue on the city's north side. That wasn't his real name, Billy Weep. Nudger had been told what it was one time long ago, but he'd forgotten it. He figured it didn't matter. Not to him, probably not to Billy.
Nudger trudged up narrow dim stairs that reeked of stale urine, then knocked on the first door on his right.
He stood for a few minutes, then knocked again. Harder. There was a faint noise from inside that Nudger chose to interpret as an invitation to enter. He tried the knob, found the door unlocked, and pushed it open.
The one-room apartment smelled worse than the stairwell, but different. It had about it that unmistakable acrid odor of perspiration and futility that suggested illness. Nudger stopped and stood still, as if he'd been hit, when the heat and stench of the place reached him.
The curtains on the single window were pulled almost closed. Squinting in the dim light, Nudger saw an unmoving figure seated in a small chair alongside the window. For a moment he thought he'd walked in on a corpse, then the figure jerked slightly and turned a lean, silhouetted head to stare at him.
"Billy?" Nudger said.
"You askin' or tellin'?" came a high-pitched, weary voice from the chair. It was a voice that had been made monotonal by pain.
"It's Nudger, Billy. I used to come hear you play at Rush's a few years back. We had some drinks together. I did some work for you once."
"Few years back, shit," Billy Weep said. "That's been eight years ago I had you follow Laverne."
Nudger thought about it. Maybe it had been that long since Billy had hired him to get the evidence he'd needed to divorce the wife he didn't trust. It had been one of Nudger's easier tasks, until a strung-out trumpet player had leapt out of Laverne Weep's bed and tried to strangle him. Laverne had joined the struggle, wielding a high-heeled shoe like a club. Nudger had barely gotten out of there alive and still had scars from that night.
"Where'd you get my address?" Billy asked.
"The Musicians' Association down on Fifty-ninth Street. I had to talk it out of them; don't you want to be found?"
"Not these days."
"Why not?"
"These days ain't the old days." A thin, almost twiglike arm rose against the faint light and pulled open the curtains. "Arther-itis," Billy said, holding up his hands in the sunlight so Nudger could see them clearly. The long, slender fingers that had once danced on Billy's alto sax keys were unbelievably contorted. Billy flexed the pathetic fingers to show Nudger that they wouldn't meet the palms of his hands. "Arther-itis is a bitch, Nudger."
Nudger tried to keep the pity from pulling at his face. It wasn't only Billy's hands that looked bad. The man himself couldn't weigh more than ninety pounds, most of that flesh-draped, protruding bone. Billy Weep, who had done magic on the sax, didn't look now as if he had the strength even to stand up with the heavy instrument. Arthritis is a bitch, all right, Nudger thought. Time is a bitch. Eventually, for all of us.