“Take a number.”
He smiled. “You have other problems?”
“My car is possessed by the devil.”
“You should try my mechanic.”
“You have a good mechanic?”
“The best. Bucky Seidler. You remember him from high school?”
“He got suspended for letting a bunch of rats loose in the girls' locker room.”
“Yeah. That's Bucky.”
“He calm down any?”
“No. But he's a hell of a mechanic.”
“I'll think about it.”
Morelli thumbed through a stack of cards he kept in his wallet. “Here it is,” he said, passing the card over to me. “Mr. Fix It. You can keep the card.”
“Bucky Seidler, proprietor.”
“Yeah,” Morelli said. “And resident crazy man.”
I ordered a Coke and French fries. Morelli ordered a Coke and a cheeseburger.
When the waitress left I leaned my elbows on the table. “Do you think Mo could actually have something to bargain?”
“The rumor going around is that Mo is claiming he didn't kill anybody.”
“Being an accomplice to murder is the same as pulling the trigger in Jersey.”
“If he was cooperative and had something vital to give us . . .” He made a palms-up “who knows” gesture with his hands.
The waitress set the plates on the Formica-topped table and returned with the drinks.
Morelli snitched one of my French fries. “What did you ever see in Dickie Orr?”
I'd asked myself that same question many times and never found a satisfactory answer. “He had a nice car,” I said.
Morelli's mouth curved. “Seems like a sound basis for marriage.”
I poured ketchup on the fries and started working my way through them. “You ever think about getting married?”
“Sure.”
“Well?”
“It's been my sad observation that cops don't make wonderful husbands. In all good conscience, I'd have to marry someone I didn't especially like, so I wouldn't feel crummy about ruining her life.”
“So you'd marry someone like me?”
Morelli's face creased into a broad smile. “I hate to admit this, but I actually like you. You're out of the race.”
“Jeez,” I said. “What a relief.”