Erroll Garner: Laura

The hardboiled jazzman went to the dead girl's apartment to work, not fall in love. Her friends were staging a wake and required mood music. But that portrait over the mantle got to him. Slouched at the baby grand, caressing the popular theme from a mystery film, he sensed those delicately drawn eyes gazing into him. She was more mysterious than any movie, lovelier than anything coaxed from a baby grand. But suddenly, cruelly, the mood was shattered as a radio across the airshaft began blaring Spike Jones's send-up of the song. When the hardboiled jazzman left that night, he had $15 in his pocket and a hole in his heart.