Songs in the Key of Death Read Free

some tonic, four glasses, and a bucket of ice. “Why couldn’t they ask us up to their place?” he whined. He felt poor, as if he was back in his parents’ shabby house near the bay.
    “His wife probably wanted to come out,” Inch said. He was accustomed to pacifying his partner. Writers were all the same—if they weren’t bitching about how terrible everything was, they were going over the top with enthusiasm over some minor success.
    “I don’t think he likes our idea,” Pullman said.
    “Then we’ll sell it to him.”
    “Maybe we should line up another singer.”
    “Latchford’s the best. We agreed we’d start with the best.”
    “I’m worried about how we finish,” Pullman said grimly.
    The Latchfords arrived in a mood of manufactured euphoria. Carol was wearing a crimson-silk jersey dress and charcoal nylons above plastic shoes without backs. Pullman fell in love with her legs immediately. He ordered the beer she requested and, when it came and he had opened one, placed himself where he could see every one of the frequent crossings of those smooth, shiny legs.
    Everybody except Latchford drank a lot and the party was a reasonable success. By midnight when they were devouring room-service sandwiches and Carol was into her seventh pint of beer, Pullman was referring to her as the small-town girl. She was like the girls he remembered from the tea dances in the gymnasium at Baytown High School. Carol was flattered. “Let this guy write your lyrics, Barry,” she said. “He’s a magician with words.”
    Latchford tossed his head back, pretending to laugh without actually producing any sound.
    In the taxi on the way home he grumbled, “I should go see a psychiatrist, agreeing to do this.”
    “We’ll go to Montreal. We’ll have some fun for a few days,” Carol said. Her head was back on the upholstery, her eyes closed. “What can you lose?”
    “You’ll have fun. I saw you encouraging that bush-league lover. I should put you across my knee.”
    “Right now, I’d be grateful for even that.”
    Flora Inch, Norman’s wife, selected the song that Latchford would record. She came out of her study in the bungalow across the river in St. Lambert with the portable cassette player in one hand and a page of notes in the other. “Here’s my choice,” she said.
    “ ‘Summer Silence,’ ” Norman read from the list. He tried not to look too pleased. “I like that one too.”
    Flora moved a flower pot so she could perch on a window ledge. Her broad shape obscured most of the view of the Montreal highrise panorama in the distance. Richelieu, a tiny dog of indeterminate breed, limped from the kitchen, saw the woman he loved, took a skittering run, and leaped onto a lap that barely existed. Flora saved the dog from falling and cuddled it to her tank-topped bosom. She had the shoulders of a Channel swimmer, the cropped hair of a woman who wants a rest. Her face was as pretty as a doll’s.
    “Richie, Richie,” she crooned. Then, after a pause in which her eyes went out of focus, “The lyric could use a little fixing. Would you like me to do it?”
    “I don’t want a hassle with Steve.”
    “You want a good lyric. Steve Pullman has blind spots. I know—I wrote copy in the next office for three years.”
    “You may be right, but leave it alone. We have a delicate operation here. Stay home and write your novel.”
    “God help me, I’ve written it three times. Let me up.”
    “You’re the one who cried out for artistic freedom. Write the book.”
    “I’m coming to that recording session. I’m not going to miss the rematch between Latchford’s wife and our little Stevie!”
    Carlo’s Recording Center was a compact set of rooms engineered and hand-built by the owner. Carlo sat at the console, straight-backed, Spanish eyes alert, watching Barry Latchford through the glass partition as if the singer might fly at any minute and it would be his responsibility to trap him in a net. Norman Inch