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“That Rebecca Gibson’s killer is brought to justice. That whoever killed her pays for it.”

“Rebecca Gibson’s killer has been brought to justice,” she said flatly.

“That’s still to be decided, isn’t it? Innocent,” I said, though I wasn’t sure even I believed it, “until proven guilty.”

“My understanding from the police and from the newspaper accounts is that the physical evidence, the circumstantial evidence, and the testimony of eyewitnesses proves that Rebecca’s ex-husband killed her. They’d fought off and on for years. He has a violent history.” She wove her fingers together into a tent. “Seems pretty conclusive.”

“On the other hand, what was the motive? If it was just a passion murder, your typical domestic explosion, why didn’t he kill her years ago when the fireworks were really flying? There’s no evidence he wanted her back, so it’s not a question of him being a spurned suitor. And while he inherits the song catalog-that is, if he’s acquitted-the truth is he stood to benefit more in the long run if she lived. The bottom line is he had no reason to kill her. He doesn’t really benefit from her death.”

“But no one benefits from her death!” Faye Morgan leaned forward and planted her elbows on the desk. It was the first hiccup of excitement I’d seen in her. “If that’s the deciding factor, then nobody murdered her!”

“And you can’t hold Slim accountable for a revenge motive unless you consider everyone else who might have had the same motive.”

“What do you mean?”

“C’mon, Ms. Morgan. Rebecca Gibson wasn’t exactly the most beloved person in the cosmos. Even your secretary-”

“Gladys talks too much,” she interrupted.

“Don’t be angry at her,” I said. “She’s not the only one who’s said that to me.”

“Rebecca Gibson was just another Thoroughbred,” she said. “Like many others.”

“Is that how agents think of their singers? Horseflesh?”

“The similarities are amazing, Mr. Denton, especially toward the posterior end of the animal. If every difficult artist wound up being murdered, the entire industry would collapse.

“No,” she continued, “you don’t have much of a case here. It’s straightforward. Slim Gibson beat his wife to death and now all of us will suffer for it.”

“Which leads me to another question. If you don’t mind my asking, how much will you suffer?”

She relaxed in the chair and let her arms drop onto the armrests of the chair. “For some reason or other, Mr. Denton, I think I’ll be candid with you.”

She returned my smile, which made me like her, even though I had no reason whatsoever to trust her. “I appreciate that,” I said.

“IBA is a B-level booking agency. We handle all the big stars before they become big. We don’t take on the new kids, unless there’s something truly spectacular and promising about them, and by the time they start running around in the major leagues, they’ve gone on to somebody else. That’s okay. My partners and I have made a good living in the last ten years or so booking Rebecca Gibsons into one-, two-, and three-night stands in places like Abilene and Tulsa. I know every honky-tonk operator from here to Bakersfield and back, and they all know me. Rebecca Gibson’s death was a blow to all of us, yes. But we’ll survive.”

“How long had you represented Rebecca?”

“I’d have to check my records for an exact date, but about eighteen months.”

“And it’s been in those eighteen months that her career started to take off.”

“Yes,” Faye Morgan said. “And she would have stayed with us through the release of her next album. If that turned out to be the breakout for her that everybody expected, then she would have left us shortly thereafter.”

“Isn’t that frustrating?” I asked. “To work so hard to build up an artist’s career, only to have them dump you just when they could start to make you some real money?”

She smiled, but above the smile, her eyes darkened.

“Is the owner of a Triple-A ball club frustrated when George Steinbrenner calls his best players up to the Bronx? It’s the nature of the business.” She shrugged her shoulders.

“Sounds more like the nature of the food chain,” I commented.

“That may be the most apt analogy I’ve ever heard.”

I leaned forward and, without thinking, said: “You seem like a nice lady. Why do you put up with it?”

She pursed her lips, then rolled her lower lip inward and bit it nervously.

“Sorry if that’s too personal,” I said. “Bad habit of mine.”

“That’s okay. I’m just not sure I can answer it.”

I stood up and pulled a business card out of my shirt pocket. “Look, I’m trying to help out a friend who’s in trouble. All I want is to find the truth. If the truth is that Slim killed Rebecca, then that’s where I’ll be led, and that’ll be the end of it. If you can recall anything that might help, I’d sure appreciate it.”

I laid the card on her desk. She picked it up and studied it for a moment. “If I can help,” she said, “I’ll call you.”

“Then I won’t take up any more of your time.” I turned for the door.

“Mr. Denton,” she said.

“Please, call me Harry.”

“Harry-” She hesitated. “There was a time when I loved this business. Loved being a player, loved the music. Loved hanging around with the celebrities, swimming with the sharks. But that wears off quickly. Now I just do it because it’s all I’ve ever done. It makes me a comfortable living.”

“But the cost is high, isn’t it?”

She grinned again, waving me off, all seriousness gone. “Everything’s expensive these days. Inflation …”

I opened the door to her office and stood there for just another moment. “I hope you don’t mind my saying this,” I said. “I think you deserve better.”

“You’re a gentleman, Harry,” she said sadly. “I don’t meet many of those in my business.”

“Yeah, well, nice guys finish last.”

She leaned her head back against the back of the chair. “So I’m told.”

I liked Faye Morgan. There was something subliminally attractive and appealing about her. For a woman who couldn’t have weighed more than one ten, one fifteen tops, though, she sure carried a lot of weight around inside her.

I wondered what secrets she’s got.

The light turned at Wedgewood Avenue and I started to ease out into the intersection, then realized the fool to my left had no intention of stopping simply because the traffic light facing him had turned. He roared through the intersection doing about fifty in a red Nissan pickup truck, ignoring the blaring horns and the raised middle fingers. In this town, green doesn’t mean go; it means look both ways and, when all the idiots have finished running the light, proceed cautiously.

I cut over to Belmont Avenue, then out Belmont to one of the side streets. I managed to make my way over to Marsha’s apartment in Green Hills without getting caught in the end-of-rush-hour traffic.

Her mailbox was jammed again, this time with a mixture of catalogs, junk mail, and windowed envelopes that looked like bills. I let myself into the apartment and was amazed how lifeless and cold it seemed. It felt good to be there, though, like it was my only connection to her. Sometimes it seemed like she’d just gone away on a business trip or something, and soon I’d be picking her up at the airport.

I milled around aimlessly, then decided I needed focus I opened the curtains and then the windows, letting the fresh air fill the place and drive out the stale. I pulled a beer out of the icebox-these things go bad, you know, if you let them sit around too long-and sat down at the dining-room table. I stacked the mail into separate piles: junk, this can wait, this can’t. The pile that couldn’t wait included her electric bill, the phone bill, the water bill, a couple of credit-card bills, and something that looked like a notice from the insurance company.

I opened up the bills and got them in order. There was a couple of hundred on her VISA card, another hundred or so on a Platinum American Express. The charges were all recent. I figured Marsha paid her cards off every month, unlike some of us who have to bloody well live off them.