heavy metal music from the downstairs neighbour started up again, rattling the halfempty tequila bottle on Dad's army footlocker that Garrett used as a coffee table.
Garrett looked down at the floor with tired resignation, then he reached over to pick a new CD.
"Hope you can sleep to music," he said.
17
"Mr. Navarro, isn't it?"
Miranda's dad shook my hand with both of his ^r and most of the rest of his body. This was a good trick, considering that to do it he had to put his walking stick in the crook of his arm and lean on his good leg and still keep from falling over.
"Navarre," I said. "But call me Tres."
Willis Daniels kept shaking my hand. His face was bright red, beaming like he'd just run the Iron Man triathlon and loved every minute of it.
"Course. Navarre. I'm sorry."
"No problem," I said. "San Antonio. Navarro. Historical connection. I get that all the time."
We were standing in the doorway of Silo Studio on Red River near Seventh. The studio was a singlestory refurbished warehouse with metalframed windows and brown stucco outer walls the texture of shredded wheat. The main door was at the rear of the building, where the parking lot was.
The Widower's Two it Step 119
We were standing right in the doorway, me on my way in and Mr. Daniels on his way out and the guy with a dollyful of electrical equipment waiting two feet behind Daniels shit out of luck. Daniels didn't seem to notice him.
The old man squinted and leaned his face into mine, like a preacher about to offer me important words of comfort as I filed out of church. He smelled like wet leather and Pert.
"I apologize for last night," he said. "Hard situation, Cam getting out of control like that.
I surely didn't mean to misjudge you."
"Don't mention it."
"Cam was fired, of course."
I nodded amiably.
The guy with the dolly cleared his throat loudly. Daniels kept beaming at me.
With the solid red flannel shirt and black jeans and the curly gray hair now minus straw hat, Daniels looked even more like Santa Claus than he had the night before. He was mighty perky for somebody over sixty who'd played music until two that morning.
"You know you do look Hispanic," he decided. "I suppose that's why I thought Navarro.
It's the dark hair. Bit of a swarthy complexion. You don't mind me saying so?"
I shook my head. Swarthy. Maybe I should have kept the parrot. Gotten myself a cutlass.
"I hear you might be coming to our party tomorrow night," he continued. "I surely hope you can make it."
"Do my best."
"Fine."
We nodded at each other, both smiling.
I pointed to the parking lot, the way he'd been heading. "You're not helping with the recording today?"
He looked surprised, then chuckled and let out a whole string of little no's. "Just dropping off Miranda. Old man like me couldn't keep up."
He said his goodbyes with more handshaking and smiling and then finally noticed the guy with the dolly. Daniels made a big deal about getting out of his way and telling him to have a good day.
I watched Daniels drive off in a little red Ford sedan. The guy with the dolly disappeared around the corner of the building.
I crouched down and looked at the cement steps at my feet. Nothing. I looked up at the sides of the walls. The bullet hole was a puttycoloured gouge in the brown stucco, about four feet up, just inside the doorway. My index finger fit up to the first joint. The rim of the hole was scarred where the police had removed the slug but I could still get the basic trajectory. I looked south and up. Parking garage next door. Probably the third floor. Probably a .22—a stupid shot from so far away, more effective at scaring than killing, unless you got lucky. The police might've been up there looking for casings. Still . . .
I took a fiveminute excursion next door. I had a nice talk with a parking attendant about garbage collection days, then went up to the third floor and found what I wanted on the first try, right by the elevator. I put my prize in my backpack and walked back to Silo.
The studio's lobby was a remodelled loading dock. There was one door on the far wall marked PRIVATE and a sickly ficus tree in the corner that apparently doubled as an ashtray.
Next to the ficus tree, an Anglo guy in a sleeveless Hole Tshirt and Op shorts