Mariachi Meddler Read online

  “Give me a percentage,” Joey told me when we reached the crosswalk next to his building.

  “Twenty.”

  “Twenty per cent it was her?”

  “Twenty per cent it wasn’t.”

  Joey sighed as we paused again outside his office building. “Want to meet with some potential clients for me?”

  He was only half kidding. He disliked initial meetings with clients because they asked questions that couldn’t be answered until a project had started. When they found out how much their visions would cost, the clients often ran the other way. Joey could have sent me in his stead because not even his secretary would have noticed the difference. We’d grown up switching places because we were successful at it. As young adults only our parents could tell us apart.

  “I’ll pass on the meeting. I wouldn’t be able to concentrate.”

  With a single swipe, he removed the sweat from his forehead. “You better not keep this bottled up. Come over after work tonight and we’ll talk more about it.”

  “I won’t get off until late.”

  “I’ll wait in the living room. If I fall asleep, let yourself in and wake me up.”

  ***

  Joey and his wife lived a few miles east of my apartment next to the community theater in Lemon Hills, a higher-class version of Squid Bay. He and his family occupied the middle house of a set of three on a dead-end street that had been truncated to make way for a highway that hadn’t yet been built. I climbed the backdoor steps quietly, mindful of sleeping children.

  I unlatched the door and entered the living room where Joey was stretched out on one of the oversized couches, dozing peacefully. The glass-top coffee table before him was clean except for an empty carton of chocolate ice cream. I sat on the love seat catty-corner to him and coughed until he heard me.

  He struggled to a sitting position. “Grab me a glass of water, will you? There’s cold in the fridge. Get something for yourself.”

  I brought two glasses of water and sat quietly while Joey drank most of his.

  Joey blinked. “You look worse than before.”

  “It was a strange evening. Yiolanda never showed up, so the restaurant had to run on automatic.” I kicked off my boots and plunked my feet on the coffee table.

  “Why does that seem strange? She hates the restaurant anyway.”

  “She’s supposed to be in charge while Rolando is out of town.”

  Joey rubbed a wrinkle on his forehead. “He took off during the tourist season?”

  “He went to San Carlos to become the godfather of his sister’s new granddaughter. He left a couple of days ago.”

  “Yiolanda is in charge? How have she and Rolando been getting along?”

  “All right as far as I can tell.”

  Joey finished his water and set the glass down with a ping. “Who took care of business this evening?”

  “Dennis ran back and forth from the cash register to the tables all night long. He should have worn running shoes.”

  “That’s Dennis for you. He takes his job so seriously.”

  “We all do. If we hope to keep working, we can’t afford to give customers a bad experience.”

  “Yes, Andy. I know that. Yiolanda never appeared?”

  “She came by to open the doors for Corinna and the cooking crew in the afternoon, but she evaporated before I got there.”

  “Who closed up tonight?”

  I pulled the glob of keys from my pocket. “I did. Yiolanda called and asked me to. I didn’t talk to her.”

  Joey examined the mass of metal. “You have enough keys for a mansion.”

  “Yeah. I could be the butler.”

  Joey went to the kitchen and brought back an ashtray and a pack of Benson & Hedges. We both lit one. “Good crowd tonight?”

  “All right. Tomorrow we’ve got reservations for two hundred. We didn’t tally the receipts, but I helped Dennis count nearly two thousand in cash.”

  He yawned. “Who went to the bank?”

  “Nobody. We have to pay the electricity bill tomorrow. Rolando left Dennis instructions about it. We left the money in the cash register and locked up.”

  “And supposedly you are the only one with the keys?”

  I felt a chill. “Why do you ask?”

  “Curious. Why wouldn’t Yiolanda have given you an extra set?”

  “I don’t know. But she said she’d swing by my apartment tomorrow afternoon to get them.”

  “If I were you, I’d make my own copy. After all these years, they ought to trust you enough to let you keep a key.”

  “I’m not sure I want the responsibility.”

  “It sounds like you’ve got it anyway.” Joey clasped his hands behind his head. “Tell me about the whole night. Did you notice anything unusual?”

  The sixty passengers who arrived on a tourist bus dominated the early part of the evening, but such a group was usual. Large tables of locals dominated the latter part of the evening, shouting so loudly to one another that I had trouble hearing myself, but that was usual too.

  “It was a regular night.”

  Joey readjusted a cushion and sat against it. “Did Yiolanda sound like her normal self?”

  “As I already told you, I didn’t talk to her.”

  Joey frowned. “Right, right. Sorry. She called while you were on stage.”

  I blew a smoke ring that immediately faded apart.

  “She leaves her husband’s business unattended and can’t be bothered to show up at closing time. Instead she delegates the responsibility to you. What do you think she’s up to?”

  My second smoke ring fizzled too. “I don’t know.”

  “I’ve never understood why she married Rolando in the first place.” Joey smashed his back against the cushions. “They’re unsuited for one another.”

  “I assumed she wanted the stability of marrying a businessman.”

  Joey nodded, but he didn’t agree.

  “Do you think I should go to the police about what I saw last night?”

  “It’s not an easy question. Do you know if Yiolanda can fire a gun?”

  “It hasn’t come up in conversation.”

  “You can’t afford to accuse her wrongly. She’d hate you afterwards and so would Rolando. You know what you need? A new job.”

  “So you've told me. Here’s the bigger problem. You could argue that her little affair with Marco Antonio was her business. What if her actions implicate the restaurant? If Noche Azul gets tied to a murder, our business could plummet.”

  “Or skyrocket. Publicity usually works in a business’s favor.”

  “I don’t want to take chances on ‘usually.’”

  “Andy, for now there’s not much you can do.”

  I nodded. My brother rarely spoke so directly. “You think I should keep my suspicions to myself?”

  “You should probably stop meddling.”

  “So you think I’m overreacting?”

  “I think you need to be careful.” Joey yawned and then tried to hide it. “Sorry. I got up early this today. Why don’t you crash here? We can talk about it in the morning.”

  “Thanks, bro.’ Another time.” As I closed his back door, the lights went out behind me.

  I swung onto my motor scooter, inserted the key, and squeezed the left handle. Nothing happened. I tried again. After a couple more tries, I’d flooded the engine. I started to reconsider Joey’s offer about the couch. I was about to knock on the door when he opened it.

  “When are you going to fix that thing?” he asked.

  “It almost always starts.”

  “Do you want me to help you jump-start it?”

  “If you don’t mind.”

  “I’ll fetch my shoes.”

  We ran alongside the scooter until I could use the momentum to swing into gear.

  “Get it checked,” Joey called out.

  I waved without looking back, afraid the motor might die if I slowed down.

  CHAPTER FIVE


  I felt better after seeing Joey. Since he was more suspicious than I was, my problems no longer seemed imaginary. To be on the safe side, though, as soon as I hit Squid Bay I drove straight to the restaurant to make sure everything was all right.

  I parked my scooter under the dead neon sign just as a man came walking by with a black and white mongrel. We were so surprised to be sharing the deserted street at such a late time of night that our immediate response was to pretend not to see each other.

  “Hey!” I said as he passed. “Did you—were you—last night....”

  He was an earnest-faced man in his twenties. “I live around the corner.” He pointed up the street. “But last night I walked towards the market. It’s horrible about Gutiérrez. I heard about it from Peter.”

  The baker thrived on gossip. It kept his neighbors inside the bakery for long periods of time, giving their nostrils more time to be enticed by sweet breads. I’d succumbed many times.

  “The man didn’t even live in Squid Bay,” he continued.

  “No. It doesn’t make much sense that he was wandering around it late at night,” I said.

  “Here we are, doing the same,” the man said, frowning. “But I guess we didn’t make trouble at the wrong place.”

  “I guess we didn’t.”

  After the man moved on, I took Rolando’s keys from my pocket. I could identify the key for the front and back doors, the upstairs office, Rolando’s car, and his motorcycle. One of the smaller keys would open the cash register. I assumed another key unlocked his condo in Corona del Mar.

  That left six unknown keys. Noche Azul had a wine cellar, but I didn’t think Rolando kept it locked. I couldn’t think of any more aspects of Rolando’s life that required security. He didn’t have hobbies besides Yiolanda and spent most of his time at Noche Azul.

  For a moment I thought I saw a light go on inside the restaurant, but it was the flash of headlights from a car coming up the street. I pretended to fumble for the keys while the car went by. I checked for other passersby before I opened the door and slipped inside the building.

  I didn’t want to arouse attention by flashing on lights, so I stood still, adjusting to the dark. Moon slivers beamed through the window, illuminating the dining room in gray and white. When the phone started ringing, I worked my way over to the cashier’s desk.

  “Hello?”

  The dial tone buzzed in my ear. I hung up and surveyed the room. Since I was used to the constant ruckus of waiters and customers, the silence hung like a veil. My feet pierced it. Careful not to trip over vacant chairs, I wound among the tables and out the back door. From there I ascended to the office, but nothing seemed unusual.

  I meandered back through the restaurant. When I got to the cash register, I decided to double-check the cash totals. After three tries, I jiggled the key correctly enough to pry open the drawer. It was empty. I blinked and hit my temple with my palm. No bills, not even under the tray. Only a few hours earlier, I had stood there and watched as Dennis locked $1896 in the drawer.

  I felt imaginary eyes looking over my shoulder. I closed the cash register and left the restaurant as fast as I could. My scooter started without a problem.

  ***

  The next morning I followed Joey’s advice and made a copy of Rolando’s keys. Then I devoted myself to cleaning. Since Stefani had always preferred her place to mine, I hadn’t had visitors for weeks. In the meantime, daily matters had gotten out of hand. I rushed around the apartment straightening piles of magazines I hadn’t bothered to read and sorting mail I’d tossed into a corner. By the time I shook the red living room rug over the balcony and washed every last dish in the sink, my shirt was wet. I didn’t expect to impress Yiolanda with my living quarters, but I didn’t want her to notice the mustard that had dried on the floor or the toothpaste that had stuck to the bathroom mirror and make catty comments afterwards.

  I rehearsed questions I would ask Yiolanda about the restaurant’s cash flow so that I could casually ask about the intake from the night before. I should have saved myself the trouble. The woman never appeared. I waited until mid-afternoon before taking the keys to the restaurant myself because I knew that’s when Corinna and the rest of the kitchen staff arrived. I wanted witnesses for when I officially opened the cash register and found it empty.

  When I arrived at Noche Azul, I discovered a more serious problem. Corinna, Dennis, the other two waiters, and both kitchen hands stood outside the restaurant dumbfounded. One of the south windows had been broken, leaving a gap big enough for a thief to crawl through. I didn’t have to act surprised.

  “Where is Yiolanda?” Dennis was a wiry man in his fifties. Responsibility unnerved him, and he hopped from foot to foot without keeping his balance.

  “I don’t know. She never came to my apartment to pick up the keys. Does anybody know what happened?”

  No one replied.

  “Did George hear anything?” George owned the beach shop across the street. He and his wife lived above it.

  “He was taking a nap,” Corinna said. “The sound of glass woke him up, but he didn’t bother to look out the window.”

  George was in his eighties, so I wasn’t surprised he’d ignored the disturbance. Unfortunately he was our best source. None of the other neighbors had a direct view of the south windows, and in the mid- afternoon heat, the street would have been as deserted as it was in the middle of the night.

  “We have to call the police,” I said.

  “I called fifteen minutes ago!” Corinna snapped. “Did you call Yiolanda?”

  “Twice! But there was no reply.”

  I unlocked the door and we rushed in. Shattered glass sparkled from the tabletops closest to the broken window, and half a dozen chairs had been shoved out of place.

  “Oh, my god!” Dennis pointed to the cash register whose empty drawer stretched open. He rushed over to inspect it. “That drawer was full! How can we explain this to Rolando?”

  “We locked up together,” I reminded him. “We did everything right.”

  “I was supposed to pay off the electricity bill. It’s due today by five o’clock, all twelve hundred dollars of it.”

  “Is there a grace period?”

  “Not when you’re already late.”

  “Rolando hadn’t told me there were money problems.”

  Dennis shrugged. “There are and there aren’t. He knew we would take in enough money to cover the bill. But now what? If we’re half-way through the evening and Squid Bay Power cuts off our lights, we would have a roomful of angry customers.”

  “Can’t you pay the bill out of your personal account?”

  Dennis planted his hands on his hips. “I’m a waiter, Andy. I don’t have extra money lying around. Do you?”

  “Are you sure the bill has to be paid today?”

  “How am I supposed to know? It’s not my restaurant. Yiolanda and I were standing right there, and Rolando said, ‘Who’s going to take care of the electricity bill? It has to be paid by the close of the business day.’ That’s all I know.”

  “I’ll call the bank. I think I can cover it.”

  “I was supposed to take money from that drawer for groceries,” said Corinna. “We need tomatoes for tonight, and we’re almost out of olive oil.”

  “And onions,” piped her assistant.

  I took the hundred from my wallet that I always kept for emergencies. “Will this cover what you need for tonight?”

  “It’ll have to.” Corinna scooted her main assistant, Tomás, toward the front door while she disappeared into the kitchen. The rest of us got to work.

  The staff rose like a phoenix from ashes. For all the bickering they did on a daily basis, in this time of perceived crisis, they mounted a united front. While I hassled with the financial details, the junior waiters swept the glass from the floor, and Dennis made calls to see about replacing the broken windowpanes. Corinna left messages at Yiolanda’s condo while she stirred pots of frijoles and chopped ingredi
ents for fresh salsa. The entire staff did its best to prepare for the evening, all the while throwing back and forth theories on the robbery. When the police officers arrived, the staff enthusiastically shared everything they could think of. The most important information I kept to myself.

  When Pablo reached the restaurant, he herded us together. “I got a call from Yiolanda right before I left the house. She said she couldn’t get ahold of either of you at home,” he pointed to Corinna and me, “and the restaurant line has been constantly busy.”

  Corinna waved a sticky spoon dotted with rice. “She knows damned well she can reach me on my cell. Where is she?”

  “Her mother took a turn for the worse. Yiolanda flew to Vegas to visit her. She’s not sure when she’s coming back.”

  The phone summoned Dennis to the front desk while the rest of us explained the day’s commotion to Pablo. I grilled him, but he couldn’t tell me much. Yiolanda had sounded hurried and stressed. He hadn’t asked her any further questions.

  Dennis returned to the huddle. “A woman named Liliana is asking about Rolando. What should I tell her?”

  “Ask her to wait,” I said. “I’ll take it in the office.”

  I’d met Rolando’s sister several times. She was pleasant in a dreamy way. Whenever she came from Mexico to visit, she walked around dazed as if everything in California was a surprise to her.

  I sat at the desk. “This is Andy. I’m not sure you remember me, but I picked you up at the airport the last time you came to visit.”

  “Of course I remember. You play in the band.”

  “That’s right. But how can I help you?”

  “Could you please tell me where my brother is?”

  “He already left for San Carlos.”

  “But he hasn’t arrived! We expected him last night!” From seven hundred miles away, I could tell she was about to cry. “I’ve left messages on his cell phone, but he won’t answer.”

  I opened the top desk drawer. As usual, Rolando’s cell phone was nestled inside. He disliked being connected and found every excuse to ignore calls that weren’t urgent. I felt exactly the same way. Who should need to contact me? When I wasn’t at my apartment or the beach, I was at the restaurant.