Still Waters by John Harvey

Minor Complex,” “G Minor Complex”—bop meets Bach. After that, she clearly felt relaxed enough to talk, and played her way through two sets of standards and originals that held the crowd’s—and Resnick’s—attention fast.
    By the time he walked back out into the London night some hours later, he knew he had been in the presence of something—someone—special.
    I should care , the words came to him, I should let it upset me . When he dialed Hannah’s number from the callbox on the corner, the answerphone had been switched off and it rang and rang and rang till he broke the connection with his thumb.

Fourteen
    Resnick had been sitting there no longer than it took to prize the top off his first cup of coffee, when he saw Jackie Ferris approaching from the opposite corner of the square. This morning she was wearing a tan raincoat, open over a rust-red cotton sweater and blue jeans. Black and white Nikes on her feet.
    It was a well-kept space surrounded by railings, flourishing shrubs, and trees; flower beds marked the perimeters of close-cut grass. The cafeteria was a low prefabricated building in the northeast corner, a paved crescent in front of it dotted with tables and chairs. On all sides, red or green buses trailed one another through the heavy morning traffic and the pavements were busy with people on their way to work.
    â€œYou found it okay, then?”
    â€œNo problem.” Russell Square was less than a ten-minute stroll from Resnick’s hotel.
    Jackie nodded toward his cup. “Ready for another?”
    â€œNot yet.”
    Resnick leaned back against the metal chair and waited; the coffee was slightly bitter but at least it was strong. Jackie re-emerged with a polystyrene cup of her own and two slices of toast on a paper plate. Before trying either toast or coffee, she lit a cigarette.
    â€œSo how was last night?”
    â€œFine.”
    â€œEnjoy the jazz?”
    â€œVery much.”
    Watching Jackie Ferris take her first bite, Resnick wished he had ordered himself some toast.
    â€œYou know, I read something about her. Jessica Williams, right? One of those magazines. Took her—what?—twenty years before she could get any sort of proper recognition. She’d play around these bars, California somewhere—Sacramento, I think that’s what it said—just waiting for a break. Anyway, according to what I read, it wasn’t just the fact that she was a woman held her back. More that she was gay.” She looked across the table at Resnick, squinting a little behind her glasses. “Did she make anything of that, last night?”
    Resnick shook his head.
    â€œAnd you wouldn’t have known, you couldn’t tell from the way she played?”
    â€œI don’t see how.”
    â€œNo.”
    Jackie stubbed out her half-smoked cigarette. “It’s easy to get fooled sometimes, you know? You look at someone like k.d. lang filling Wembley Arena umpteen times over and you think things have changed, but really it’s not true. I don’t know, but how many jazz players are there, women who’ve really made it, got through to the top? Not singers, but musicians.”
    Barbara Thompson, Kathy Stobart, Marian McPartland—Mary Lou Williams, of course, Melba Liston—that Japanese pianist whose name he could never remember. “Not many,” Resnick said.
    â€œMan’s world, eh, Charlie? Even now.”
    â€œMaybe.”
    â€œLike the police.”
    â€œI thought things were getting better.”
    Jackie Ferris laughed. “How many women, what percentage, inspector and above?”
    â€œThere’s you for one.”
    â€œAnd don’t think it didn’t cost me, Charlie. What, you don’t want to know.”
    Resnick finished his coffee and held up his empty cup. “Time for another?”
    â€œPlenty.”
    This time, he remembered the toast.
    â€œI’ve talked to my