The Right To Sing the Blues by John Lutz Read Free Book Online Page B

eavesdropping.
    “How well do you know Ineida Mann?” Nudger asked.
    “Well enough to know you’ve been bothering her,” Hol lister replied, with the bored yet wary expression of an animal sunning itself on a rock. “We don’t know what your angle is, but I suggest you stop pestering Ineida.” He seemed almost lulled by his own smug confidence. “Don’t bother trying to get any information out of me, either.”
    “No angle,” Nudger said. “I’m interested in jazz.”
    “Among other things.”
    “Sure; like most people, I have more than one interest.”
    “Not like me, though,” Hollister said. “My only interest is my music. You might call it my consuming passion.”
    “What about Miss Mann?”
    “I told you that’s none of your business. You don’t listen worth a damn.” Hollister stood up, neatly but ineffectively snubbed out the cigarette he’d been smoking, and seemed to relish leaving it to smolder to death slowly in the ashtray. “I’ve got a number coming up in a few minutes.” He tucked in his Fat Jack’s T-shirt and looked severe, squaring his shoulders. Obviously this was threat time. “I don’t particularly want to see you anymore, Nudger. Whoever, whatever you are, it doesn’t mean burned grits to me as long as you leave Ineida alone.”
    “You shouldn’t joke about grits south of the Mason-Dixon line.”
    “You’re the only one taking it as a joke,” Hollister said, moving toward the door.
    “Before you leave,” Nudger said, “can I have your autograph?”
    Incredibly, far from being insulted by this sarcasm, Hollister scrawled his signature on a nearby folded newspaper and tossed it to Nudger, as if it were of great value and might serve as a bribe to keep Nudger away from Ineida. Nudger took that as a measure of the man’s artistic ego, and despite himself he was impressed. All the ingredients of greatness resided in Willy Hollister, along with something else.
    Nudger stuck the folded newspaper in his sportcoat pocket and walked back out into the club. He peered through the throng of jazz lovers and saw Fat Jack at the bar. The crowd was lively tonight, lots of talk and laughter, and there seemed to be a larger than usual percentage of females. Maybe it was ladies’ night.
    Marty Sievers was leaning with his back against a wall near the stage, his gaze sliding back and forth over the crowd.
    Sidling around a knot of revelers, Nudger made his way across the dim room toward the leviathan form of Fat Jack, so they could talk before Hollister’s next set. Just then he spotted Ineida across the room. She was wearing a sequined green blouse that set off her dark hair and eyes and gave her a faintly Gypsy air. Nudger regretted that she couldn’t sing as good as she looked. She glanced at him sloe-eyed, recognized him, and quickly turned away to listen to a graying, bearded man who was one of the party at her table. He seemed pleased and surprised by her sudden interest; he removed a curve-stemmed pipe from his mouth, and began to gesture knowingly with it as pipe smokers habitually do. Nudger wondered if his own IQ would rise if he took up smoking a pipe.
    “Hey, Nudger,” Fat Jack said, when Nudger had reached the bar, “you sure you know what you’re doing, old sleuth? You ain’t exactly pussyfooting. Ineida asked me about you, said you’d bothered her at home. Hollister asked me who you were. The precinct captain asked me the same question. I feel like I’m on ‘The Joker’s Wild’ and you’re my category.”
    Nudger’s stomach tightened. “A New Orleans police captain?”
    Fat Jack nodded. “You betcha. Captain Raoul Livingston.” He smiled broad and bold and took a sip of absinthe. “You make ripples big enough to swamp boats.”
    “Do you know anything about this Livingston?”
    “Sure,” Fat Jack said. “In my business, I’d better know about him. He acts like he’s the one that wrote the law and can damn well change it if he wants to as he goes