Free The Soprano Wore Falsettos by Mark Schweizer Page B

Father George?” Meg asked me on Sunday evening.
    “Yep. I called and told him this afternoon. He actually answered his cell phone. I must say, he was quite upset.”
    “Rightfully so.” Meg was sitting at my kitchen table watching Archimedes eat his supper and contemplating recent events. “Don’t you find it odd and a bit unnerving that St. Barnabas has had such a crime wave in recent years?”
    “Not really,” I said. “You forget. I heard her play.” I held up another mouse, and Archimedes took it gently from my hand with his beak.
    “Your bad joke aside, isn’t it weird? And this is the second person to be murdered in the choir loft.”
    “That’s why I used to keep my 9mm Glock under the organ bench. You never know who’s going to take offense at a Hammerschmidt passacaglia. I wanted to be prepared.”
    “Well, I think it’s weird,” said Meg.
    “It’s coincidence,” I said. “It’s not really a crime wave. There have been a couple of murders, sure, but not anything outside the realm of statistical probability for a town this size. And accidents happen all the time.”
    I gave Archimedes the last of the three mice I had taken out of the freezer to thaw. Archimedes was a barn owl that had shown up at the cabin a couple of autumns earlier. I fed him regularly and, over the years, he had become quite used to us. So much, in fact, that I had installed an automatic window in the kitchen so he could enter or leave as he pleased. In the freezer, I kept a supply of mice and a few baby squirrels that I got from Kent Murphee, the coroner in Boone. Where he got them, I never asked. I opened the fridge door and got out the last of Pete’s Wicked Ales, turning back around just in time to see the owl hop up into his windowsill and disappear silently into the dusk.
    “He’s amazing, isn’t he?” said Meg. “I never get tired of watching him. I’m glad he’s stayed around, but I guess he’ll vanish one of these days, and we’ll never know what happened to him.”
    “I guess,” I agreed. “But he’s not that old yet. He may be around for a while. Lord knows, he doesn’t have to scavenge much for food. And he does look pretty well fed.”
    “Speaking of ‘well fed,’ did Father George talk to you about playing this week?”
    “Yes. And what has ‘well fed’ got to do with anything?”
    “Nothing. I just thought it was a nice transition,” said Meg. “That, plus you need to go on a diet.”
    “What?”
    Meg giggled. “It’s called ‘stream of consciousness.’ It’s a book I’m reading. You’re supposed to say whatever you’re thinking.”
    “Well, stop it,” I said.
    “Speaking of diets,” Meg continued, “do you think you might consider playing this week? Just through Easter?”
    “Only if you stop,” I said.
    “Done and done,” said Meg, holding out her hand for me to kiss. I missed her hand entirely.

    • • •

    I walked down to the corner and turned right, then right again, left, then right, right, straight, right, straight and a quick left. I popped a mallard into a hotel lobby and looked around for the lounge. It wasn’t hard to find. I’d been here before. I strolled up to the bartender.
    “ What’ll it be, Mac?” he snarled in a low grunt, casually wiping down a glass.
    “ A shot of Four Roses and an answer,” I said, laying a sawbuck on the bar. “I’m looking for a palooka that goes by Pedro LaFleur. Big guy, about two eighty. Cauliflower ear. Flat nose. Three-inch scar under his eye. Sings counter-tenor for the Presbyterians. Hard guy to miss.”
    “ Sorry Mac, I ain’t heard or seen nobody like that.” He reached for the sawbuck, but I covered it with my badge--
    the one I’d swiped from Detective Krupke. He gave a nod toward the back of the bar and slid the bill out from under the badge. I smiled and took my drink for a little walk.
    Pedro LaFleur and I had been partners in a past life. We had been closer than two cousins in a Kentucky hayloft,