Murder in a Minor Key Read Free

Fletcher, thank you. You make us see our own city with fresh eyes.”
    He checked his watch.
    “We’re coming to the end of this session of Book Club Breakfasts, but we still have time for a few more questions.”
    The lady in the flowered dress waved her straw hat at Charlie. “I have a question for Doris Bums, too,” she said.
    “Go ahead, ma’am.”
    “Ms. Bums, do you have another project you’re working on?”
    “I’m so glad you asked me,” she said, beaming.
    Doris Bums was a historian, the youngest woman ever to be made full professor at Princeton. She was striking, tall and narrow with an angular face, lively brown eyes, and short brown hair that curved softly toward her delicate chin, not precisely what you’d expect a historian to look like, but just right somehow.
    “Mrs. Fletcher is right about the wonderful possibilities in New Orleans. I’m currently researching a book on the history of cult religions. Since a sizable percentage of the population practices voodoo, this is a great place to start. As long as I have the floor, I’ll add that I’m staying at the Royal Hotel for the next two weeks, and would appreciate hearing from any of you in the voodoo community. I’m making tape recordings of what voodoo means to those who practice it, and how their traditions may differ from their neighbor’s. If you can give me a half hour or so, I’d love to get you on tape.”
    There was a rustle of papers around the auditorium as people noted the name of the hotel. Wayne leaned forward and pulled the table microphone to him. “Speaking of recordings,” he said, “as long as we’re asking for research assistance here—this okay with you, Charlie?”
    Gable nodded. “We’ll let you have the final word, Wayne, in this question-and-answer session.”
    Wayne fingered the floppy yellow paisley bow tie that rested on his royal-blue shirt. He took his time pulling a large white handkerchief from the jacket pocket of his cream-colored suit and dabbing it across his shaved head. The spotlights pointed at the stage were hot; it was nearly noon and the air conditioning in the large room was struggling to counter the heat wave outside.
    Finally, he spoke.
    “As my good friend Jessica Fletcher noted, we have an appreciation for our past. And like my colleague Ms. Burns, I’m also interested in recordings, but old ones, not new ones. In fact, I’m looking for original cylinder recordings made in Thomas Edison’s day.”
    He paused.
    “You can help.”
    He fell silent again to let his suggestion sink in.
    “As many of you know,” he continued, “I’ve been hunting details on the life of Alphonse LeCoeur, known as Little Red. He played trumpet ’round about the same time as Buddy Bolden. They may even have known each other, perhaps played together. No surviving recordings of either of these talented gentlemen have ever come to light, but rumors about Little Red’s recordings have persisted, and I believe he did, indeed, put down some tracks on wax cylinders.”
    I listened as Wayne mesmerized the audience with tales of a moody, cerebral horn player, an introspective man who lived his life in the bayous, and rarely played in public, but one who deserved a place in the pantheon of jazz greats. He described how the celebrated musicians of the day found their way to Little Red’s shack, to coax him to perform with them, or just to listen in wonder to a talent shared with so few. Wayne’s voice rose and fell like a preacher exhorting his congregation.
    “He drew the other musicians of his day like ants following a trail of honey,” he intoned. “They were hungry for his sound, in awe of his skill, his ‘chops’ if you will, and jealous of his talent. Some claimed Little Red was possessed by a voodoo spirit, a loa. When under its spell, the notes that poured from his horn were magic—sweet, melodic, inventive music, in sharp contrast to the boisterous style of Buddy Bolden that was so popular in the