by Gerald Elias
‘How do you know that?’ Nathaniel asked.
‘Where the truck stopped, the tires sank into the snow a lot deeper. And you could tell that the driver had a heckuva time trying to get it moving afterward. And you know that first set of parallel tracks with the footprints I was telling you about from the house? Those went out to the truck tracks.’
‘So maybe if it wasn’t a delivery, couldn’t it have been that Borlotti was sending something?’ Nathaniel added. ‘Like a violin?’
‘Possibly. But when the truck started up again, the tracks going away were deeper than the approaching ones. Even when you take into account that that would be the case anyway, because the approaching tracks would have had some time to fill with snow, I still think something pretty heavy must have been put in it. Heavier than a violin.’
‘A lot of speculation,’ Jacobus muttered. ‘At this rate, they’ll be playing Summertime and we’ll still be sitting here.’
He found a spoon and stirred his coffee, not that there was milk or sugar in it, which was unthinkable, but to give himself time for the thinkable. This whole business reminded Jacobus of that most famous, most debated chord in music history at the beginning of Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde. Until one mysterious layer after another was peeled away, no one could tell where it would finally resolve.
‘Who’s this best friend of Borlotti’s you mentioned when we were out on the tundra?’ Jacobus asked Benson.
‘That would be Jimmy. Jimmy Ubriaco. Sixtyish, like Borlotti. Lives here in town. Directs the high-school band and orchestra. Plays string bass at parties and stuff to pick up some extra cash. You can imagine what the school pays the music teachers. Jimmy’s a real do-it-yourselfer type.’
‘How long have they been friends?’
‘Since they were in knickers. Jimmy came down to the station yesterday morning.’
‘On Christmas Day?’
‘Believe it! He was fit to be tied when he heard about the fire and that Borlotti was missing.’
‘How did he find out about it so quickly?’ Nathaniel asked.
‘Where do you live, Mr Williams?’
‘New York City. Most of the time.’
‘Well, in small towns like Egremont Falls, good news travels faster than the Internet, and bad news faster than the speed of light. We’ve already been offered a bushel of theories how the fire got started.’
‘Were any of them constructive?’ Yumi asked.
‘One was that Borlotti burned his house down to cover up the fact that he had hidden his mad wife in the attic all these years and was really in love with his housekeeper.’
‘And?’
‘Borlotti never had a wife, housekeeper, or attic.’
‘What a romantic story, though!’ Yumi said. ‘Someone should write a novel.’
‘No one would ever believe it,’ said Jacobus. ‘You said this Ubriaco directs the band and orchestra and plays the bass. I gather since they’re friends and in the same profession they’ve done business together also.’
‘You bet they do,’ said Benson. ‘Borlotti fixes up all the school orchestra’s string instruments. Poor Jimmy was beside himself because he had left most of them at the shop over the holiday vacation for Borlotti to do some maintenance work. The school had its big Winter Festival concert just before Christmas, and Jimmy says the instruments always get pretty beat up by the kids getting ready for that.’
‘And now they’re a pile of ash,’ said Jacobus. ‘Maybe you should have a follow-up with Jimmy. Maybe he knows where his good buddy might be.’
‘I was actually hoping you’d do that, Jacobus,’ Benson said. ‘You know, one musician to another.’
Jacobus wanted nothing more to do with the situation beyond a free breakfast.
‘He’s not a musician,’ Jacobus said. ‘He’s a band director. Have Scott the server talk to him.’
Benson ignored his remark.
‘Let me know what you learn.’
‘Sleep in heavenly peace,’ Mathis sang.
This is not going to end well, Jacobus thought, but only grunted.
‘Sleep in heavenly peace.’
SIX
Roy Miller dropped Jacobus, Nathaniel, and Yumi off at the curb in front of Jimmy Ubriaco’s house and arranged to pick them up when their interview was finished. He then drove off on the snow-packed road to rejoin Sigurd Benson and the fire crew.
Jacobus probed with his cane. The paved walk leading to the front door had been shoveled clear. He poked holes in the snow on either side and determined that the path was wider than the one Benson had described to him that led from Borlotti’s house to the unaccountable delivery truck. All that Jacobus discovered along Ubriaco’s path was that he had no need to wipe snow off his shoes on Ubriaco’s welcome mat. Jacobus rang the doorbell, which chimed the first five notes of Haydn’s famous ‘Surprise’ Symphony melody. Jacobus had little tolerance for kitsch and took no pleasure from surprises, but even with his probing, analytic mind, he could not entirely discount omens.
‘Come in! Come in! Door’s unlocked!’ Ubriaco hollered from somewhere in the house, interrupting an animated phone conversation.
‘Eggnog in the kitchen. Help yourself.’
‘He didn’t even know we were coming,’ Nathaniel said. ‘That’s very welcoming of him.’
‘Only if you like eggnog,’ Jacobus said.
Yumi helped Jacobus divest himself of his outermost layers of clothing.
‘Doilies everywhere,’ she whispered. ‘A real old lady house.’
‘I know,’ said Jacobus. ‘The Glade is making me wheeze.’
Nathaniel and Yumi escorted Jacobus to the kitchen counter where they found the carton of eggnog next to a bottle of rum and a tin of nutmeg. Nathaniel helped himself and served Yumi, but Jacobus, repulsed by the idea of diluting good rum in a colloidal concoction, took his straight.
They waited. Nathaniel was about to help himself to seconds when they heard Ubriaco talking to himself in another room.
‘Christ Almighty, those insurance agents are a pain in the ass!’
‘Holy mackerel!’ Ubriaco said, changing his tune when he saw three strangers in his kitchen. ‘Who are you folks? Jehovah’s Witnesses?’
‘We look that sanctimonious?’ Jacobus replied.
‘Well, I could tell right off the bat you weren’t the three Magi kings because one of you is a girl, so I thought I’d go for my second choice.’
Nathaniel introduced the three of them and explained the reason for their impromptu visit.
‘Have a seat,’ Ubriaco said. And to Jacobus, ‘May I help you to the couch, sir? People should be more considerate of the disabled.’
‘Who’s disabled?’ Jacobus answered, and demonstrating virtuoso cane skills found a seat on his own, though narrowly avoiding knocking over the flocked Christmas tree next to it. ‘Tell us about your pal, Borlotti.’
‘I’m worried sick about Amadeo,’ Ubriaco said. ‘Him and me, we go way back. Jesus! Missing! I haven’t had a minute of sleep!’
‘How way back?’ asked Jacobus.
‘Our parents, they met on the boat to Ellis Island in 1919. Our papas were stonecutters and found work at the marble quarries around here. Amadeo and me, we went to grade school together. It wasn’t like today where you have all these centralized schools, like factories. Egremont Falls still had a one-room schoolhouse. We had one teacher, Mrs Scagliotti, for six years! Boy, was she tough – but fair! I deserved all the detention she gave me, I’ll tell you. But she started the school’s first student orchestra and taught every instrument. Amadeo played violin and they gave me the bass because I was bigger. So Amadeo and me, we see plenty of each other. We’re what you’d call bosom buddies. Hey, you want to hear a string bass joke?’
‘Yes, please,’ Yumi said, before Jacobus could decline.
‘OK. There’s this little kid and all he wants to do is learn to play the bass. The father says, “Why can’t you learn a smaller instrument? A bass i
s too big to schlep around.” But the kid cries and cries and finally the father says OK. So they get a bass and the father takes the kid into town for his first lesson. He picks him up after the first lesson and the kid says, “Dad, I learned to play with one finger.” The father picks him up after the second lesson, and the kid says, “Dad, I learned to play with two fingers.” The father picks him up after the third lesson, and the kid’s not there! The father becomes frantic and looks everywhere but can’t find him so he goes home and waits. The kid finally eases into the house at three in the morning, smelling like cigarettes and booze, and the father, asks, “Son, where the hell have you been?” And the kid, real nonchalant, says, “Oh, I had a gig.”’
Ubriaco burst out laughing at his own joke. Yumi and Nathaniel joined him. Even Jacobus had to smile.
‘You said you and Borlotti see plenty of each other. How recently?’ Jacobus asked.
‘Why, Saturday morning!’
‘The day his house burned down and he disappeared?’ Jacobus asked.
‘Hey, friend, don’t try to read anything into that.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because Amadeo and I see each other every morning. Six days a week at the café in town and Sunday at church. And when the weather’s nice we play bocce and have a little homemade grappa together. I built my own court out back. Regulation size. If it wasn’t covered with two feet of snow I’d show it to you.’
‘I’ll put it on my bucket list,’ Jacobus said. ‘What’s the name of the café?’
‘The Last Drop. Everyone goes there. It’s the only place in town for real espresso. Actually, it’s the only place in town, period. Why do you ask? You’re going to check up on me?’
‘Maybe. Maybe I just want coffee. Why were you so hot and bothered with the insurance agent on the phone?’
‘Because at the same time I’m worried to death about Amadeo, I’ve got to file insurance claims for all the school instruments that were at his shop getting fixed up. There’s no way they could have survived that fire. It’s a disaster and not one of those son-of-a-guns will give me a straight answer.’
‘Didn’t the school insure them?’ Nathaniel asked. By established practice, Jacobus let Nathaniel take over when his field of expertise entered the arena. For one, the intricacies of instrument insurance made Jacobus’s eyes glaze over, sightless though they were. But more importantly, Nathaniel’s calm, sympathetic questioning made interviewees more at ease after being badgered by Jacobus. Nathaniel was grateful for the paradox; that it was only when he was with his wizened, seemingly helpless, blind friend that white folks didn’t feel intimidated by his blackness and large stature. Though Jacobus wasn’t sure whether to accept that as a compliment or not, he didn’t disagree with Nathaniel’s assessment.
‘Yeah, sort of,’ Ubriaco answered, bringing Jacobus back to the present. ‘But they’re handing me this line that the fine print says the instruments are only covered within the physical limits of the school property.’
‘But Borlotti must have had a policy, too,’ Nathaniel delved. ‘Instruments often automatically have temporary coverage under a shop’s policy.’
‘Don’t you think I’m trying to find that out?’ Ubriaco was almost shouting. ‘His company is Concordia and the school’s is Northeast Mutual. Amadeo’s guys at Concordia won’t even talk to me. They’ll only talk to Amadeo, so until he gets back I’m stuck. Meanwhile, my guy gives me this mumbo jumbo about Bailee’s agreements and mysterious disappearance, and—’
‘Those are typical clauses,’ Nathaniel said calmly. ‘Bailee’s agreements just determine who’s responsible for left items. It’s not restricted to musical instruments at a shop. It can be a shirt you leave at the dry cleaner or your car in a parking garage. It’s pretty much your responsibility unless it’s explicitly stated otherwise. “Mysterious disappearance” is a common exclusion in insurance policies. It’s up to you to prove it, which isn’t easy. You need to have a snap, crackle and pop case, or at least a smoking gun, metaphorically speaking.’
‘Like I said, mumbo jumbo.’
‘How many instruments are we talking about?’ asked Jacobus. He was getting restless and the conversation didn’t seem to be getting anywhere.
‘Nine violins, one viola, two cellos, and four basses.’
‘Only one viola and four basses? What does your orchestra play, “Asleep in the Deep”?’
‘Well, you’re a musician. You know. No one wants to play viola, but bass is cool, and like I said, you learn two notes on a bass and you think you’re ready for stardom.’
‘How much were the instruments insured for?’ Nathaniel asked.
‘That’s another problem. The district has been having budget issues – surprise, surprise – and to make ends meet they raised the deductible to five hundred dollars per instrument, and most of them—’
‘Aren’t even worth that much,’ Nathaniel surmised correctly. ‘I see your problem. Even if they accepted your claims, which they might not, you’d only get back thirty, forty cents on the dollar. You’d end up netting a loss after paying the deductible, meaning it would make more sense to buy new instruments, even though they’d cost a lot more. But since the school doesn’t have the money, you could end up losing the orchestra. Is that the problem, Mr Ubriaco?’
‘You left out one thing,’ he said. ‘Without an orchestra I could end up losing my job, too! Not that it pays a helluva a lot, but at least it’s a job, you know?’
‘Anyone you know who isn’t Borlotti’s bosom buddy?’ Jacobus asked. ‘Someone who might want to do him harm?’
‘Nah! Everybody loves Amadeo. He’s got a gentle soul. He’d fix someone’s fiddle and if he likes them – and he almost always does – he won’t charge a dime. He fixes all the school’s instruments for next to nothing, plus every year he donates to the orchestra scholarship fund. He’s a sucker for charities.’
‘That was the impression I had,’ Yumi reflected. ‘But I only met him once and that was a long time ago.’
‘If it is determined that the fire was arson,’ Jacobus pursued, ‘and it’s also true that Borlotti is universally beloved and no one would have a reason fix his fiddle, you tell me what logical conclusion there can be other than he torched it himself and took off?’
‘That would never happen!’ Ubriaco protested. ‘Impossible! He’d have nowhere to go. Amadeo’s not a wealthy man. And he’d never do that to his customers, with all those instruments there. Never! Would you burn your own house down, Mr Jacobus? For any reason?’
‘Sounds like we’re going around in circles,’ said Nathaniel, interceding before Jacobus gave Ubriaco a handful of reasons he’d burn his own house down, not least of which was that in its present condition it could well fall down without much outside assistance.
‘Jake, I think we should let Mr Ubriaco get back to his insurance situation.’ Nathaniel gave Ubriaco his business card and offered to help him if he continued to make no progress.
‘Thank you,’ Ubriaco said. ‘And I’ll give you a heads-up when I hear from Amadeo. Jeez, I hope he’s OK. And Christmastime, too. You folks want another eggnog? One for the road?’
‘No, thanks,’ said Jacobus. ‘My doctor said I should try to stay away from poison.’
When they were outside, waiting for Miller to pick them up, Yumi said to Jacobus, ‘When Mr Ubriaco made that comment about helping the disabled it was nice of you not to get angry.’
‘Don’t draw hasty conclusions.’
SEVEN
Miller drove them to the Egremont Falls town hall. The building had once been the local school before the county went to a centralized system. Benson chaperoned them to the combined police and fire department office, formerly the school principal’s office. Jacobus, sitting in an uncomfortable, straight-backed, wooden school chair and getting woozy from the ineradicable residue of ancient mimeograph, felt transported back to his childhood. It was as if he had once again gotten into hot water and was being sent to the o
ffice. Now, as then, he cringed at whatever punishment would be meted out. But he knew, one way or other, it was coming.
‘This is what we have so far,’ Benson said to his unlikely inner circle. ‘Mind you, we haven’t gotten to the basement yet, only the first floor, but so far there is no sign of a body.’
‘Good news and bad news,’ said Jacobus.
‘Why do you say that, Jake?’ Miller asked.
‘Well, it raises some basic questions, doesn’t it? Was it accident or was it arson? That leads to a whole train of other questions. If there’s no body, and if the fire was an accident, why flee? And if he fled, how did he amscray? His car’s still in the garage. Did someone in a delivery truck that just happened to be passing by in a blizzard stop to give him a lift? Or was it planned long in advance? And why no trace since?
‘On the other hand, if he intentionally set the fire, why? And ditto, how and why did he leave without a trace? There’s also the possibility that someone else set it. If that’s the story, did they take Borlotti with them, and if so, was he a willing accomplice or did someone have to twist his arm? Or neck?’
‘Exactly!’ said Benson.
‘Exactly what?’ asked Jacobus.
‘Those are exactly the questions we have to answer.’
‘Well, thanks for the merit badge. I’m glad we’re making so much progress. Is there anything else you haven’t found that you’d like to tell us about?’
‘Tuners,’ said Benson. ‘We found the remains of some of Borlotti’s bigger tools – a router, I think, a band saw, sanders, table saw – but we didn’t find a single one of those violin fine tuners you told us to look for.’
‘You must be kidding!’ Jacobus exclaimed. ‘What are you, blind?’
‘I’m perfectly serious. We even combed through the rubble with strainers because you said you thought it was important. We wasted a lot of man hours looking for those tuners.’