Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 124, Nos. 3 & 4. Whole Nos. 757 & 758, September/October 2004

Leah. Maiden name Leah Burke, of the humorless, no-imagination Burkes; father and mother had no sense of humor, either. Country-club ice tinklers, mean-spirited gossips, hoarding their Old Money like it was — money. They couldn’t understand Jack’s love of the practical joke. “What’s practical about it?” her father often demanded, frowning hard enough to sink an oil tanker, black mood spreading like insidious crude through his family’s life. Morbid old bastard.

Leah is Mrs. Jack Hafner now, over three years. But still no sense of humor; ’course, his first two wives hadn’t had any sense of humor, either. Maybe it was just women, a gender thing. Or maybe wives.

“I know it’s just a wrong number, Leah, like to have some fun with it is all — sue me.” Emphasizing the remark with both hands, palms up, allowing his lower lip to droop, gestures he knew irritated her.

Thinking: My God, woman, a person’s gotta have a sense of humor, gotta laugh once in a while or you get depressed; life’s enough of a disappointment, not seeing the funny edge on things makes it even worse.

His wife was ranting. “You need to work, dammit — just ’cause we have money doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be doing something productive.” Glaring at him like he was on a street corner with his hand out, for Christ’s sake.

“Oh yeah, Miz Pro Bono — help the needy and the smelly,” he said, the retort punctuated with an enduring chuckle.

—and there she goes, flouncing out of the room like a spoiled debutante after some guy at her coming-out ball has just spilled a drink on her, galactically pissed that things weren’t going her way. Spoiled rotten. Short blond hair bouncing impatiently as she walked out of the room — slitted black skirt with a crimson blouse, probably those barely-there black bikini panties she favored, though he hadn’t seen her dressing. Stair-stepper calves, an indoor tan. And high heels?

He leaned to his left to see past the couch, get a glimpse of her retreating feet. Yup. Stilettos. Bloody-murder red.

Jack collapsed into the deep couch, air whooshing from the cushion, stared at the silent phone, running scenarios, trying out dialogue — editing, parsing, changing a word here and there and then starting over again. He did this for five minutes, polishing his act. With a wide grin he decided he’d definitely get some fun out of this little game. Arturo Zuniga might not think so, but who would give a rat’s ass? Probably not even Mrs. Zuniga, if there is one.

Practicing aloud: “Yeah, hey, saw you called, what’s up, amigo?” Saying this to the empty room.

Shook his head, not satisfied. Better to act as if he knew what the guy was calling about, but friendly, like they were lifelong pals. Again, “Hey, buddy, where you been?”

Yeah, he’d play this guy like a cello when the call came in, pretend they were old buds, take it as far as—

His wife’s BMW roared to life, revving again and again, the racket coming from just outside in the driveway, then a low rumble — headlight glare pierced the gauzy fabric languidly swaying in front of the floor-to-ceiling window — then the whining, chattering sound of a car backing away too fast in reverse, headlights swinging in an angry arc, sustained screeching of tires, and the little Bavarian set of wheels was on its way out of the upscale Denver suburb, probably plastering late-night joggers against trees or knocking strollers into hedges.

Jack glanced down at his Rolex: Eight-eighteen.

Arturo Zuniga looked at his black Seiko.

Eight-twenty. But the damn thing ran fast so it was time to make the call. He should have gotten a Rolex by now, money he was making, but his mother had given him this watch twenty years ago and it was still running. Dependable, except for the tendency to get ahead of itself.

He thought of Murphy. Where had that little shit been the last three days? Supposed to be at the number three nights ago, between eight and eight-twenty.

Zuniga picked up the phone and punched in a one, area code of three-zero-three, and — checked his note again — then punched in the number Murphy had given him; the loquacious redhead had said he lived just a block and a half from Mile High Stadium, probably a lie. Going off on his neighborhood having a lot of big trees, telling Arturo about indigenous foliage, like he’d be interested. Murphy was a motor-mouth gofer, but he was connected.

Son of a bitch had better be there tonight, though, or he’d wish he’d never screwed this up. Arturo had ways to make a guy’s life miserable and beyond miserable, all the way to downright excruciating. He could put a major hurt on the Irish twit.

First ring.

Pick up, you pea-brained little—

Second ring.

Damn him to hell.