Black Cherry Blues (Dave Robicheaux 3)

“It’s going to pass,” I said. “Just don’t drink today.”

But his eyes were forlorn, and I well understood the peculiar chemical misery he was experiencing at the moment; I also knew that my words would mean more to him later than they did now.

“While we’re out here, let me tell you about something else,” I said. “I’m going to receive a phone call this afternoon. I don’t want you to answer it.”

“All right.”

“It’ll be from Sally Dee. I don’t want him to know you’re living here.”

“You’re putting me on?”

I continued sweeping the floor mat with the whisk broom.

“Dave, that ain’t true?”

“It’s complicated.”

“So is shit. This is some kind of nightmare. What are you doing, man?”

“Just don’t answer the phone.”

“I wouldn’t touch the sonofabitch at gunpoint.”

An hour later the phone rang. But it was Tess Regan, not Sally Dio.

“Jason, the eighth-grader I told you about, the one who talked with the man in the yellow car, he just came over on his bicycle,” she said. “Last night he went to the Heidelhaus for dinner with some of his relatives. He saw the yellow car behind the restaurant. He’s sure it’s the same one. He remembered that the back window was cracked and there was a University of Wyoming sticker on it.”

“What kind of car?”

“A Mercury.”

“Did he get the license number?”

“No, I asked him. He said he didn’t have a piece of paper or a pencil. Kids don’t quite pull it all off sometimes, Dave.”

“He did just fine,” I said. “It was at dinnertime, you say?”

“Yes. He said the Mercury was there when he went into the restaurant, and it was still there when he left. He tried to tell his uncle about it, but it was a birthday party and adults tend not to hear children sometimes.”

“Thanks very much, Tess. Tell Jason I appreciate what he’s done.”

Alafair and I drove over to the Heidelhaus, a large Bavarian-style restaurant on the south side of town. The lunch crowd had started to come in, and the parking lot was half filled with cars, but none of them was a yellow Mercury. I drove behind the building and around the sides but had no luck there, either. I took Alafair for an ice cream cone, returned in a half hour, and still came up empty.

When we got home Dixie Lee was reading the newspaper on the front steps.

“It ain’t rung. At least not while I was here,” he said.

“How was church?”

“It went okay. They asked me to play again Wednesday night. They ain’t a bad bunch for people that probably left their toast in the oven too long.”

Alafair went inside just as the phone rang.

“Damn, there it is,” Dixie Lee said. “Go easy, boy. Let’s stay on the sunny side for a while.”

Alafair had picked up the receiver, but I eased it out of her hand before she could speak. I stepped into the bathroom and closed the door on the cord.

“You had time to think, Robicheaux?” Sally Dee said.