The Violin Conspiracy(3)

When was Nicole coming back? Ray couldn’t remember. His hands were trying to hold on to something that wasn’t there. It was gone, of course it was gone. How could he have imagined that he could have kept it, that he was worthy?

Everything that everyone had ever thought about Ray—about people who looked like Ray—was now turning into reality with an inevitability that he almost welcomed, it was so expected. He was bringing their words to life. He was exactly what they said he was. Incompetent. Irresponsible. It was all true, true, true. He not only wasn’t good enough, but he’d never been good enough. He would always, now and forever, be the dumb nigger who lost the most important thing in his whole worthless life.

For hours he paced, roaming the bedroom and adjoining living room/kitchen/dining room, turning the television on and off, opening the door to ask the police officer outside if there’d been any news, if he could help. They’d taken his suitcase, taken the clothes he’d been wearing, and the T-shirt and jeans he now wore felt wrong, strange, not his.

Nicole called him again. Her flight was boarding in forty minutes; she’d been calling for an hour but he hadn’t picked up to talk. But suddenly the silence of the room hurt his ears and he was desperate to hear the sound of someone else’s voice—a voice saying something other than his own internal accusations. When her name flashed across the phone, he answered.

“Stop pacing,” she said to him.

“What are you—”

But she was talking over him. “Stop pacing. Sit down. Close your eyes. I’m here. Take a deep breath.”

He stood in the middle of the room, phone pressed tight to his ear. Tears burned as they slid down his cheeks, and he closed his eyes.

“Seriously. Sit down,” she said. “Listen to me. Take a deep breath.”

He sat, the mattress giving beneath him. He tried to breathe but his lungs no longer breathed air.

“You know, I really would have just come to Charlotte,” she said. “You didn’t have to do all this just to see me again. When you want something you really go for it, you know that?”

Despite himself he released a breath, a strangled guffaw, and suddenly the air was flowing into his lungs again. “Nicole, I—”

“It’s not your fault. You hear me? It’s not your fault.”

“It is, I—”

“It’s not. Nobody—nobody—could have taken better care of that fiddle. And you know what else? They’ll find it. You’re going to get it back. You will. I absolutely believe it.”

The tears were coming soundlessly, his breathing ragged, and he closed his eyes against the world, now reduced to the exact size and shape of her voice.

“Who’s there with you?” she asked.

“What do you mean? A bunch of cops.”

“Did you call Janice? Your aunt? Is anyone else coming?”

“I called Janice. I didn’t call the others. I couldn’t talk to them.”

“Not even your aunt Rochelle?”

“Especially not Aunt Rochelle.”

“Why? You should give her a call.”

The one person in his fucked-up family—besides his grandmother, but he couldn’t even think of her—who had faith in him. “I can’t,” he said. I can’t tell her that I lost it. I can’t tell her that I failed her, and everyone, and most of all, Grandma Nora.

“Well, what does Janice say?”

“I don’t remember. No, she said she’s coming. I think she said she’s coming.”

“I talked to her, too. She’ll be there tomorrow morning.”

“Oh. Yeah.”

“She told me that she was sure they’d find it,” Nicole said. “She said that people almost always get it back in a couple days. A week at most, she said. Remember Yo-Yo Ma got his cello back in a couple hours? He’d left it in a cab in New York City.”

“Oh,” he said. “Right.”

“I’ll be there in two hours, okay?”

“Okay,” he said.

“Look, we’re boarding, I’ll be there soon. Just stay calm. It’s not your fault. Ask the police if there’s anything else you can do in the meantime. Get some food. Maybe one of the cops brought vegan doughnuts.”

“Haha,” he said without humor. They hung up.

The evening folded into night, and a blustery, beer-gutted guy in a suitcoat that didn’t begin to cover his paunch knocked and entered, introduced himself: Bill Soames, head of the FBI’s art crime unit. He led Ray through the same questions that the other cops had asked.

When was the last time Ray locked the case? He locked it only when the violin was out of his sight, and it hadn’t been out of his sight for days.

When was the last time Ray had actually seen the violin? A little after 6:00 p.m., between 6:05 and 6:15, when he’d finished practicing for the day. He’d slid the violin in its case before jumping into the shower and heading out for dinner.

Who else had access to the violin? Just Ray. And his girlfriend. Yeah, she was on her way back, she’d be here in an hour. And maybe some of the housekeeping staff, but he was always there when housekeepers came in.

Who had a motive to take it? Ray couldn’t help thinking, Is this guy fucking high? Everyone had a motive. Everyone. Did any of these cops even talk to each other? He’d already told this to at least four different detectives. And, meanwhile, the people who should be investigated—the Marks family, for starters—were probably laughing their fat asses off, thinking they got away with it. “Black people are so dumb,” they were probably saying. For once, he agreed with them.