Midnight
Mechanic
I got out of work well after sundown, again. I work in a law office high above
Coop’s
is one of those “locals secrets” that exists on the fringe of the maddening
crowd. While there are lines around the block to get into the much more famous
Antoine’s just 3 blocks away, you can sit right down at Coop’s any day of the
year. It costs about a tenth of what Antoine’s does for a plate of food, and
it’s just as good. The main difference is your waiter will have a few tattoos
instead of a bow tie, and the menu includes duck and rabbit jambalaya instead
of Trout Ponchetrain. It also has a huge mahogany bar that serves the most
reasonably priced drinks in the Quarter, and I really wanted one or two or ten
tonight….
As I slammed my second
scotch and water, the stress of the day started to evaporate and I ordered a
third to sip on. On the tiny corner
stage there was a young kid setting up to play.
He was shaved bald and wore a gold stud in his nose and about 15 rings
piercing his eyebrows. I was thinking to
myself that I was going to have to finish this scotch and water quickly and eat
dinner elsewhere or else be subjected to some painfully distorted thrash guitar
in a few minutes. But when the kid
plugged up his amp for a sound check, he let loose with a smoking blues riff
that made the hair on my arms stand up.
So instead of dashing for the door, I ordered a plate of the rabbit
jambalaya and settled back in my chair to hear the kid play.
I
finished my food and ordered one more drink and an after dinner cigar while the
kid took a break. He was GOOD – he made that guitar laugh and cry at
will. I was glad I’d stayed. Two chairs
down from me was an older man that looked to be in his seventies. Ready for a little conversation, I said, “The
kid sure plays a lot better than he looks, eh?” The old man spun to look at me,
and he looked even older in the face. He
looked me over, as if deciding whether to respond or just look at me like I was
stupid. I think he finally decided that
I wasn’t some drunk looking to pass the time between drinks, and said, “Yep –
he’s pretty good. I’ve only heard a few
better.”
“Like
who?”
“Like
‘Magic Sam’ Maghett, Robert Johnson, and Otis Rush in the old days, and more
recently Clarence ‘Gatemouth’ Brown and Ronnie Earl when he first started playing
that sunburst Stratocaster.”
I
was talking to a man who knew his Blues! “What do you think of Robert Cray and
Eric Clapton?”
“They’re
pretty good. Neither of them play the
blues like they used to…” he trailed off.
“Well
– who’s the best you’ve ever seen?” I asked.
The
old man looked at me and squinted, like he could look into my eyes and see if I
was just asking to be polite, or if I really wanted to know. I guess he was satisfied with what he saw,
because he said “Son, that’s a question that requires another drink.”
So
I bought another scotch for me, and a shot of Old Grandad for him, and waited
to hear his story as he bummed a cigarette and then asked me for a light.
The
old man began his story. “I was a young
kid back in the summer of ’48 selling encyclopedias door to door in
nowhere-Mississippi. It was a crap job,
because at that time, half the people around there couldn’t even read. Like you, I’d drown my frustrations with a
little booze and blues in my favorite watering hole. One night, there was a 13-year old kid that
came in, and he could play the guitar like nothing I’d heard before. He could
sing too – better than that fella on stage tonight.” He paused for a taste of his Jack Daniels. “The show finished up, but I wasn’t done drinkin’
until they started picking up the tables. I stumbled outside and started to
drive back to the tiny hotel room that was home until I sold 10 more sets of
encyclopedias.”
The
old man continued, “Only I’d only gotten about an hour outside of town before
the radiator started to overheat. I pulled to the side of an old country road
and tried to figure out how far I was going to have to walk. The nearest town
either direction was 30 miles or so.
Just
then, a beat up old pickup truck ground to a halt by my old Chevy. A lanky man over six foot tall and barely 150
pounds unfolded himself from the truck.
He had reddish, unkempt hair and wore a dirty white T-shirt and a
cigarette hung from his upper lip by sheer luck and a little dried spit. He took three long, slow strides and he was
around the front of his truck and nearing my still smoking car.
“Broke
down, mister?” the stranger asked.
“Nah
– I just pulled over to admire the view.”
The old man explained, “I was a little drunk and awful frustrated and I
really didn’t think this hick was going to be any help.”
“Looks
like your radiator just puked all it’s water out.” said the stranger, ignoring
the sarcastic remark.
“I
don’t suppose you could be any help?”
“Well
– I know a little trick that might fix your car long enough to get you to a
mechanic. But we’ll have to wait for it to cool down a bit first.”
“OK.”
I said, grateful that I might’ve been wrong about this old guy. I noticed a
guitar on the passenger seat of the old pickup. “Do you play?” I asked.
“I
do.” “I can play a little to pass the
time while your motor cools off.”
“I
just heard a 13 year old kid play, and I swear he’s the best I ever heard!” I
told him.
“I
know the kid. In fact, I’m on my way to deliver this guitar to him tonight. But
I’m running a bit early, so I suppose I’ve got some time to play a little for
you.” There was more than a little
cockiness in his voice when he said this. “Besides, kids can always use a
lesson in patience, right?”
The bartender came by to
check on us and empty the ashtray. I
relit my cigar – I was so engrossed in the story I’d let it go out. The old man bummed another cigarette and a
light before he took a long drag and continued.
“The stranger slipped the
strap over his head and slid a bright red pick from under the strings. “I call this one “Trouble In A Blue Dress”,
and he lit into song like a possessed man. His bony fingers flew up and down
the neck of that guitar, bending notes until they sounded like a herd of
scalded cats. It was a powerful sound – something that reached straight for
your spine through your heart. His eyes flashed with fire in the moonlight, and
that guitar seemed to grow warm, and then hot!
I was hypnotized watching him play. Time slipped away, and I don’t know
how long it was before he stopped mid-song. I felt as if I was awakening from a
trance. The stranger looked pleased that
I was so engrossed.”
“Let’s
see what we can do with that radiator.” He said suddenly.
He
filled the car from a 5-gallon can of water, and when I started it up, there
was a thin stream of water coming out of the radiator. “Just like I thought.”
he said, as he popped his head back in the truck. “My old man showed me this trick years ago –
I wouldn’t go far like this, but I believe this’ll help you make it into
“Give
it about 10 minutes to set proper, then drive straight to town.” With that, he hopped back into his truck and
drove off. “I’m due for my appointment now.
Good luck!”
The
old man signaled the bartender that we were ready for another round.
While
we waited for our drinks, he continued, “I did as he said, and as I was driving
down the road, I saw him talking to the kid at the next crossroads. The kid was
holding the guitar he had just played for me.
The next time I saw that kid was about 5 years later. He was holding that same guitar in a newsreel
about the newest sensation to hit
I
think back to that night every so often and wonder if I hadn’t indeed heard the
devil himself play – and I’m glad that perhaps even Satan would occasionally
stop to help a man stranded by the side of the road.”
The
bartender put two drinks down in front of me just as the kid started into his
next set with a cover of the Elvis song, “Devil In Disguise”. When I looked back, the whiskey glass was
empty and the old man was gone…
The
End
