Page 7 of The Sound of Harmony

“It’s about your piano,” Mitch said.

Kendrick pointed to his head. “Full?” he tried. “Full up?”

“I’m at Grandma’s house,” Mitch said, swinging his phone away to show the front door. “I mean, your house.”

Now it was Kendrick’s turn to wince. He hated when Mitch reminded him of the discrepancy in their inheritances. But he didn’t have time to dwell on that right now. “And?”

“And the piano movers are here,” Mitch said.

“As arranged.”

“They can’t get your piano inside.”

“What?” Kendrick yelped. “That’s impossible. It’s a huge house.”

“It’s an old house,” Mitch said. “With a small door leading to a small entryway. No one accounted for the dogleg.”

“The what?”

“The turn thing,” Mitch said. “The front door practically opens into another wall.”

“Back door?”

“Worse. And a grand piano doesn’t bend.”

“You hired professionals for a reason.”

“Doesn’t mean they can walk through walls.”

“Everyone has an excuse these days,” Kendrick said. “Nobody wants to break the laws of physics on your behalf.”

“Stupid of me to hire piano movers instead of magicians,” Mitch said.

“Can I talk to the movers?” Kendrick asked.

Mitch turned him over to someone named Nick Silva of Silva Specialty Moving. Silva was about sixty, with thinning hair and a deeply tanned face marked with age spots on his cheekbones. “Your entryway is four inches too small,” he said after they’d exchanged introductions.

“You measured?”

“Wouldn’t know my job if I didn’t.”

“We hired you because you’re the best at delicate work,” Kendrick said.

Silva puffed up a bit. “I’ve never scratched anything in my care.”

“Want to?” Kendrick asked. “Maybe it’s time to do some indelicate work. A little hack saw, a little hole in the drywall, get my piano around that corner, and I’ll patch it up later. Deal?”

“What are you talking about, drywall?” Silva asked. “That’s lath and plaster. And that closet there means studs too. Most of the time, if someone wants to make this happen, it’s the piano that gets taken apart.”

“You’re not telling me what I want to hear.”

“Whether you want to hear it or not, this is what’s happening, Mr. Bell. I’ve got a legless piano up to your porch and no farther. Two of my employees are standing here drinking Gatorade and the other Mr. Bell is pacing around, sizing up the place like he wants to stick a ‘for sale’ sign in the front yard.”

“Mitch always looks like that,” Kendrick said. “But I still don’t understand why my piano is outside, where it doesn’t belong, and not inside, where it does. If it were an upright, I could see the problem, but grand pianos are more portable. Once you take the legs off, the body is supposed to slide through like the morning after burrito night.”

Silva wrinkled his upper lip. “Are you trying to tell me my job? Because I’ve been moving pianos for nineteen years.”

“Your work comes with a guarantee.”