Chapter One

The purple Cadillac thumps over the sidewalk and rumbles to a stop in front of an alley where Jook has spotted his estranged wife, Bursitis, standing in the rain. He gets out of the car and hurries around to where she stands, takes her by the shoulders, and moves her out of the downpour. Jook’s loose-fitting pinstriped suit turns a darker shade of brown in the rain, and water drips profusely from the rim of his beat-up, black fedora hat. Jook is eighteen, short, walks with a limp, and he is blind in one eye, which is white and surrounded by a scar.
Bursitis is in her early twenties; she is beautiful and buxom. On any other day she would certainly be the most beautiful Black woman on the planet, but in the rain her Mascara has made ugly stains down her face, there are bruises around her eyes, and her dress is torn.

“Bursitis,” Jook says to her, “what are you doing out here? Where is Razor Bill?”
“He don’t want me no more. I borrows money from him to bet against you and lost everything. He borrow money from everybody to bet against you and lost everything. You gots all the money in the world now, Jook.”
The young man has noticed something. “Bursitis, do you realize that’s the first time in our lives you’ve ever called me Jook?”
“Oh, Baby, maybe I was wrong about your music, I just not never listen to it real close-like before. But I been standin here listenin to you play over there at the Shackshanny Bar; I was wrong about your music, Jook, you sounds real good. You can play for me any time you wants.”
“Why didn’t you come in?”

“I was embarrassed bout making myself such a fool last night. This mornin I waked up and I realized the grief I been puttin you through, and it make my heart heavy to think you been sufferin so. Can you find it in your heart to forgive me, Jook?”
“Bursitis, I’ve been forgiving you all my life.” He smiles at this. “And you’re wrong about me suffering. It was all too amusing to get too upset. You had me feeling low there a couple times, but my music always pulled me out of it.”
Bursitis looks both ways up and down the street, her voice becoming a whisper. “They more, Jook; they more you don’t know about. When I goes to get your guitar back from Boozer, he done went and give me the yellow-drippy disease. I pleaded with you not to make me go over there, but you had to have that damn guitar.”
“Listen, Bursitis, you’ve got to start taking responsibility for yourself.”

“Boozer done give me the yellow drippies, and I done went an give em to Razor Bill. You know what that mean? That mean Bursitis gonna die. Razor Bill say he gonna kill me when he find me. Please, Baby, please take Bursitis back. She got nobody now, an you finally got enough money you can take care of Bursitis the way she always knew one day you would.”
Jook reaches into his pocket and pulls out a roll of thousand-dollar bills, and stepping closer, peels off a hand-full and gives them to Bursitis. “Give that to your mama, and you two move somewhere. She won a lot of money, too, and all together you should be able to move somewhere nice. And don’t worry about Razor Bill. Remember, he borrowed a lot of money and lost it all. He’s going to be the one hiding for a while.”
Jook takes a handkerchief from his pocket and wipes away some of the mascara that has melted down Bursitis’ cheeks. He tells her, “Look, I gotta go. Everything is okay. I wouldn’t have met Elbow or MonaRoma if I hadn’t gone off from home looking for you. I wouldn’t have written all these good songs. Things worked out fine. I wish you the best. Take care of yourself, Bursitis.”

Jook steps into the rain to return to his car, but Bursitis’ hand on his shoulder causes him to stop and turn around. In her hand is a large pistol, and in her eyes is a look Jook has never seen before. She tells him, “I got nobody now, Big Moses.” She corrects herself, “Jook. I’ll call you Jook. Hell, I call you any damn name you wants if jus takes me back.”
Jook tips his hat, “I’ll see you around, Bursitis.”
“You know I always loved you more than I did them others,” she tells him.
“It’s too late, Bursitis. I’ve got other plans now. A friend told me about a river where the Catfish bite all year round. Can you imagine the chances of me catching one, if they’re biting like that?”
Bursitis does not understand. She pleads, “But, you my husband, Big Moses. I won’t bother you about no alimony if’n you come home with me now.”
“Have you ever heard of something called consummating the marriage?” he asks.
“But we is married, Big Moses. We man an wife in the eyes o’ God.”
“Well, maybe, but we’re not married in the eyes of the law. You and I have never once in our lives had sex. You have to have sex for a marriage to be legal.”

She tells him, “I had a dream one time about we was having sex. At least, I think that was you.”
“That’s not good enough, Bursitis, you have to actually touch each other. But it’s not your fault; nothing is anybody’s fault; we always had a choice. Now, go somewhere and get out of this rain. You don’t look too good. Do like I told you and give Mama that money; and you and her move somewhere nice.”
The pistol is heavy and Bursitis is now struggling with both hands to hold it level. She tells him, “If’n I can’t have you, Big Moses, they not nobody gonna have you.”
Jook realizes she is serious and about to kill him, so he motions with his hands for her to lower the gun. But it is no use. He watches her knuckles turn white squeezing the trigger. The phenomenon Jook had always heard about, where a person’s entire life flashes by before their eyes just before they die, happens now.

* * *

In a blinding array of pictures from his past Jook experienced his life all over again: birthday parties with relatives and friends, Thanksgiving dinners with a huge turkey, the family opening gifts on Christmas morning. He sees childhood friends and speaks to them, and there’s even a short scene of the old drunk who lives down behind the railroad station. He had taught the boy some guitar chords, and his face was in there too. But the last scene was especially vivid. It was the morning he began the incredible adventure that led to this final moment in his life. The scene is of him standing beside a dirt country road winding its way through a Louisiana pine forest. He is talking with an old woman. At his feet is a guitar case with a bag of harmonicas tied to its handle. His bedroll lay over that, with a bag of sandwiches balanced on top.

The old woman is Jook’s grandmother, Evangeline Cruder. She is sixty years old, her black hair is streaked with gray, her skin is very black and touched with wrinkles, and her eyes are brown and sparkle with life. Evangeline and her husband raised Jook after his mother died in an auto accident when he was six. After forty years in the Louisiana school system her influence as a teacher included home-schooling the boy and raising him as best she could. Though well educated, Jook is afflicted with shortcomings that would put an ordinary boy down. He stands only five foot four, walks with a limp from one leg being shorter than the other, and one eye is white and surrounded by scars from a cockfight gone bad. But Jook transcends it all with his music and his personality, his passion for life a sponge waiting to be filled.
In the background his grandfather, Little Moses, can be seen working beneath the hood of their old truck. Jook’s grandparents have brought him to the highway to see him off on first trip away from home.
“Well, Son,” Evangeline says to the boy, “try to remember the road you’re traveling so you’ll always know your way back.”
“I be know my way back, Ma.”

“I wish you had paid more attention to your English lessons.”
“I can’t help but talk like Pa sometime,” he said, teasing his grandmother. “I be work on it.” They looked at each other; he smiled but she did not. He asked, “What is Pa doing with the truck engine?”
“It’s his way of giving us time to say good-bye. I had some things I wanted to say to you, but now I can’t remember what they were. I guess it’s just that it feels strange watching my boy step out into life on his own for the first time.” She paused a moment, then asked, “Will you be looking for Bursitis?”
“I guess so, Ma. Seems like nothing else in my life is going to make any sense until I find her and see how she feels about me.”

“She left without a word; that should tell you something.”
“Yes, well, maybe she was in a hurry. Her dad died. Could have been anything. And it doesn’t matter; I write songs that are perfect when I’m thinking of her, and one of these days she’s going to listen to one of them long enough to realize how much I love her. And then we’ll be happy for ever more.”
“She’s five years older than you.”
“She’s five years more grown up and responsible than I am, that’s true. It’ll be a good move. Oh, and by the way, my name is Jook now. I changed it because I’m going on the road as a Blues musician.”
“And Big Moses Cruder wasn’t Bluesy enough? Honey, the Cruder name’s been through slavery and back again; how bluesy do you want it? That name has seen pains I hope you’ll never know in your lifetime.”

“Turtleneck named me Jook, Ma,” the boy explained, “the same day he gave me his guitar.” Jook taps the case with the toe of his shoe. “It plays the most beautiful blues on this earth, Ma, it lets me go where my soul wants to go. It’s Turtleneck’s music I want to play. That old man used to sing those field calls just like he was standing out there in the rows, and that’s where I first heard the sound I wanted to build my music around. I’ve got to keep the stage name Turtleneck gave me.”
There was a sound of the truck hood slamming shut, and Jook’s grandfather, Little Moses, came to where they stood. Little Moses was two years older than his wife, very large and agile, with scars around his neck from scars he had worn when he was young. At six-foot-four, Little Moses was still an impressive figure. “You sure you won’t take Roan?” he asked his grandson. “He be get you anywhere you be gots to go. And long’s you got Roan, you kin always get yo’self a meal by plowin somebody’s field.”

“Don’t intend to get that hungry, Pa. And besides, you need the mule. I wouldn’t know how to get him back to you, and I don’t intend to be feeding nothing but myself for a while.”
“Aspiration be got saloons,” his Pa considered. “If’n you wants to play music in a saloon, why don’t you try there first.”
“I don’t want to play Civil War songs, Pa. It’s nineteen forty-seven, I want to play the Blues, and I need to go to where the Blues are being played; Memphis, New Orleans. I don’t care if not one person listening has a nickel to drop into my guitar case. If nothing more comes of my music than it makes that little part of the world a better place to be for a moment, then that would be fine with me.”

Evangeline told him, “That sounds wonderful, Son.” Then she asked, “So, how will you find Bursitis?”
“I’m not sure. She’s up in Shackshanny, Mississippi somewhere; went to stay with her mother. I know you people don’t like Bursitis very much, but I need to tell you that when I find her I intend to ask her to marry me. It’s just one of those things I believe I’m supposed to do in my lifetime.”
“Son, you be in love with this girl?” his grandfather asked.
“Every time seems like the best time, and every time it’s true.”
The old man shook his head. “Doin it like two possums out in the cornfield not love, Big Moses. You gots to have some foundation; you gots to have someone who always take your side.” Little Moses nodded to his wife in apology for his frankness, then put a huge hand on his boy’s shoulder. “Son, you know yo Ma and me never cut no words with you about how we feel about Bursitis, but you get that gal in trouble, Son, you not ever gonna know the light of happiness on this side o’ Glory again.”

“What I said was just making fun, Pa, Bursitis and I have never done anything at all. But she promised me I would if I live long enough.”
Little Moses was not amused. “Well, you just keep that sense of humor, Boy, and you’ll at least die happy. So far, all she done is show you the bottom of her shoes goin out the door. When yo money gone, she gone.”
“That’s the way it’s been,” Jook admitted. “But I know now that Bursitis was just spending all my money so that I would go out and work even harder. She only wanted me to be my best.”
“I hopes you still jokin. You havin to go look for her be a sign of what she think o’ you. If’n she love you, won’t she be standin here wid us?”
“I don’t know, Pa. I feel she loves me but doesn’t realize it yet. Or doesn’t know how to tell me. I’m going to try to find her so I can ask her in person, and maybe I’ll pick up a dollar or two playing my music along the way.”
Evangeline put her arm around her husband. “We’ve been over this enough times at home to realize your mind is made up, Big Moses,” she said. “But please be careful, and write.”
The boy corrected her, “Jook.”

“Ah, yes, Jook. Well, whatever name you use, I’m sure you will succeed at whatever you do. And I know that the Spirit will always be with you.”
“Thanks Ma.”
His grandfather told him, “Son, I hopes someday you be find you a good girl and spend yo life with her; I hopes you be as blessed in that matter as I be.”
“I know, Pa,” Jook said. “I be working on it.”
The three of them came together in a hug with their arms around each other. Then Jook stepped back, picked up the bag of sandwiches, threw the bedroll over his shoulder, and lifted his guitar case. Against Jook’s small stature, the guitar case looked large. “Got my guitar and my bedroll,” he said, “can’t think of anything else I’ll need. Thanks for everything.”
Evangeline, a couple inches taller than Jook, stepped forward and kissed him on the forehead. “Good-bye, Son, we’ll see you when you come home for Thanksgiving; or any time you can. Bring Bursitis if you find her; maybe there’s a side to her we haven’t seen yet. Everybody deserves a second chance.”
“Yes, they do, Ma, thanks.” Jook watched the old couple go back to their truck, get in, and, with the morning sun streaking through the pines, drive a wide circle back onto the woods road toward home. With one last wave, they were gone. Jook stepped out on the highway and began walking east toward Mississippi. An hour later he saw a car coming and stuck out his thumb.

Chapter Two

Jook was following a map of Mississippi on which he had marked out the way to Shackshanny, and at the end of the first day he found himself a hundred miles short of his destination. People always liked to pick up a hitchhiker carrying a guitar, and Jook was always glad to play for his ride. He had been standing at the intersection of two back country roads, when he saw a red pick-up truck approaching in the distance.
The truck was fairly new and was being driven by a black man. Jook stuck out his thumb and the truck pulled to a stop beside him. The driver said, “Looks like we goin in the same direction, friend; you need you a ride?”
“Thanks, I appreciate it,” Jook said, and lifted his bedroll, guitar, and bag of harmonicas onto the flatbed in back, securing them beneath a blanket he found there. Beneath a blanket he noticed another guitar case already stuck away there. Taking his bag of sandwiches, he opened the passenger door and climbed in.
The driver put out his hand. “My name’s Elbow Snakeeyes.”
Jook shook his hand. “I’m Jook; glad to meet you.”

Elbow Snakeeyes was very tall, his head actually touching the roof of the truck cab. He was slender, and looked to be a couple years older than Jook. Elbow was handsome in unusual ways, with a head that was long and a nose that covered most of his face. His big, brown eyes never seemed to be all the way open, but always hovered half-closed. Elbow said. “I see you got a guitar. That guitar case most bigger n’ you.”
“Yes, I know. But I can’t seem to go anywhere without it.”
“What kinda music you play?”
“I play the Blues. How about you?”

“Oh, I don’t play.” Elbow smiled and nodded back to the flatbed. “I won that guitar shooting pool over in Dasperville. Actually I’d much rather had the money; least then I’d be able to buy gas for this truck. I never dreamed I’d be meeting somebody who could teach me something about playing the guitar.”
“I’d be glad to show you what I can, Elbow, but I’m getting off at the Shackshanny turnoff.” Jook was intrigued by this nicely dressed black man, driving a new 1947 Ford truck across the back roads of southern Mississippi. The man’s shirt was clean and his jeans were like new. That the jeans were over a foot too short for the man’s legs, and the sleeves of his shirt too short for his lanky arms, Jook considered to be natural for a man as tall as Elbow. He found Elbow interesting immediately, and the more he listened, the more he liked him. Elbow’s smile was true, and trouble of any kind seemed foreign to his nature.

“How far that turnoff?” Elbow asked.
Jook had to crick his neck to look up into the man’s face. “According to my last ride, it’s about forty-five miles ahead. I’m looking for my girlfriend, Bursitis.”
“I knew that was comin,” Elbow nodded. “You start talkin the Blues sure enough a woman bound to come up in there somewhere. Look, I know what you aughta do. You need to forget all about Shackshanny and come on down to New Orleans with me. I can make enough money shootin pool to see we never go hungry.”
“I’d like that, Elbow, but I have to find my girl first. My heart can only belong to one obsession at a time, and right now it’s Bursitis. She left Aspiration a week ago and went to live with her mother over in Shackshanny.”
“You think they not got girls down in New Orleans? I seen one or two myself down there. An how can you say your girl is your girl if’n you gotta go lookin for her?”

Jook changed the subject. “This is a nice truck, Elbow. How long have you had it?”
“Couple hours. It’s not actually mine; I borrowed it. Say, where you get that white eye?”
“Cockfight gone bad.”
“That eye disarmin, my friend. I’m sorry, but I gots to be honest.”
Jook explained. “The rooster I was betting on leaped over the wire and clawed me in the eye. Never knew what happened until it was over.”
“Now, ain’t that just like life to jump over the fence and claw you in the face.”
“Wasn’t life, Elbow,” Jook corrected him. “It was definitely the Rooster.”
Elbow continued, “And here you are out in the world looking for a girl what don’t sound like she wanna be found.”
“I should have asked her to marry me before she left home. Her father dying, everything happened so quick.”
“Has she seen that white eye?”

“Yes, certainly.” Jook opened the bag of sandwiches and handed one to Elbow. He took the last one for himself. “One day she told me, ‘Big Moses? I’ll lift my skirt for you if’n you buy me some candy.’ Spent all my money in one place that day, Elbow.”
They both laughed at this, taking bites of their sandwiches. “That sounds like love all right,” Elbow agreed.
“I fooled around some with the girls who’d come over for my grandma to tutor them on weekends and during the summer,” Jook mentioned, “but Bursitis is the only one I fell in love with.”
“Well, Jook, I got about forty-five miles to change your mind; New Orleans with the greatest pool-shooter in the history of Billiards, or wearin out the soles of your shoes lookin for your phantom girl. Look, I’ll tell you what; it’s only forty-five miles; you help me with the gas and I’ll drive you there. Who knows; your girlfriend mighta died or something.”
Jook thought about it. “Well, yes, there’s always that chance. Okay, sure; I’ve got about fifteen dollars.”
Elbow pointed ahead, “Look, there’s a gas station coming up.” He pulled the truck off the highway and stopped next to one of two pumps. A young white man in grimy overalls came out of the building and stepped along a gravel path and up to Elbow’s window. He unscrewed the gas cap and put in the nozzle. “How much you need, friend?”
“Make it an even three,” Elbow instructed him. “And don’t spill none.”

“I don’t spill none,” the attendant responded. “Only spilled gas once’d in my whole life, and that was on purpose just to see if it was possible. Mighty nice truck ya got there.”
“Why, thank you, Friend. She been doin me real fine.”
The attendant finished pumping the gas, then removed the nozzle and placed it back on the pump. After screwing the cap back in place, he took a five from Elbow and counted out the change from his pocket. The attendant mentioned, “Your truck looks just like one that was stolen from the High-Sheriff over in Spitwater around noon today; same color and everything. Deputies been through here lookin hard for that truck. Yours has that same dent in the roof like the Sheriff’s where a limb fell on it.”
“Well, that is a coincidence,” Elbow said. “My dent come from some poor fool’s head who wasn’t mindin his own business.”

The attendant laughed at this. “I’m just telling you so’s you’ll know. Sheriff Sam Smellgood is the meanest lawman what ever lynched a nigger in Mississippi, friends. Ya’al have a nice day now.”
Elbow started the engine and pulled back onto the highway. After a minute or two, Jook looked at Elbow and asked, “They’ve got a sheriff named Smellgood?”
Elbow only smiled. The truck rolled on and the miles spun steadily out behind them, Mile after mile of fields and shotgun shacks going by, dust rising behind men plowing in the fields behind mules, endless white cotton and green sugar cane, wash hanging out on lines in the wind, kids playing around broken cars, and slowly the humming of the wheels caused Jook to drift off to sleep, his jaw settled into the crook of his arm. He found himself in a dream in which he had finally located Bursitis, and he could see himself knocking at her door. Bursitis opened the door. She is as beautiful as he remembers her. She asks him, “How the hell did you find me, Big Moses? I thought I done hid my tracks.” She tries to push the door closed, but Jook has it blocked with his foot.

“Bursitis, wait!” Jook hears himself begging. He sees himself falling to his knees with his fingers gripping the hem of Bursitis’ skirt. “Bursitis,” he pleads, “please forgive my selfishness, Darling, turning to my music for comfort when I should have been crawling to you. I know you hate my music, but without you, music is meaningless. So, Bursitis, if you want me to, I’ll give up my music for you…I’ll give up my music for you…I’ll give up my music for you…I’ll give up my-”
Jook suddenly found himself being shaken awake by Elbow. “Are you all right, friend?” the tall man was asking. “You look like you done seen a ghost.”
Jook struggled to catch his breath. “I’m all right; just a slight nightmare. Where are we?”
“Welcome to Shackshanny, Mississippi.”
Jook looked around as the truck bounced over a railroad track, to find they were entering the outskirts of a small town. The sun was almost down and streetlights were coming on. Over the next hill, on the other side of a railroad track, the truck engine began to cough and sputter, and Elbow pulled to a stop next to the curb. “We’re out of gas,” he announced.
Jook pointed up the street. “Look, there’s a gas station on the next block.”
Elbow took notice. “Looks like it’s closed; yeah, look, there’s a closed sign out front”
“We’ve got more money,” Jook pointed out, “Why didn’t you get more gas?”
“Because I got other plans for your money just as soon as we find a pool hall.”
“Well, we can just wait here until morning.” Jook suggested.
“We can’t do that.”

“Why not? You can sleep in the truck; I have my bedroll. When the station opens in the morning you can gas up and be on your way.”
“Jook, I have to tell you something; I didn’t borrow this truck, I done took it from that high-Sheriff that gas-station man was talking about.”
Jook’s mouth fell open.
Elbow explained, “Early this mornin I was walkin the same road you were, only it become humiliation to my self-respect, the dust and the heat an all. So, just the other side of Spitwater, I was lookin off across a field and there I saw this pasture with a horse standing in it. Of course, I was gonna let the horse go soon as I got to New York, or somewhere hitchhiking stood a better chance of getting me a ride. I was climbin over the fence to go talk it over with the horse, when in the back yard of the farm house, I see this pretty red truck.
Jook nodded expectantly, “And?”

“And that’s where I got this truck. The key was even in it.”
Jook could not help an audible gasp. “Y-you stole this truck?”
Elbow looked down at his clothes. “An this shirt and pants, too. I saw them hanging on the clothesline and grabbed them on the run. The law’s bound to be lookin for this truck by now. We need to get ourselves as far away from it as we can!”
Even as Elbow said this, Jook was already out the door and gathering up his guitar and bedroll from of the back.
“Wait up, Jook,” Elbow called to him. “I’m comin with you.”
The neighborhood looked deserted with no one around. After grabbing his own guitar from the back Elbow ran after Jook, catching him with three strides of his long legs. “Wait up. What you worried about? We okay. Everbody inside they houses eatin supper and listenin to they radio.”
Even as he said this, a woman came out the back door of her house carrying a garbage can, and she brought it down the steps and out to the street. Jook instinctively stood behind a light pole with his guitar case upright beside him, but Elbow was caught off guard and could find nowhere to hide. He did a poor imitation of a light pole as the woman went back to the house. She stopped at her door and took a long look at him before going inside.
“I think she saw you,” I whispered to Elbow.
“Saw me? Why me?”

“Elbow, they can see you in Sacramento.”
“It’s too dark. That street light not bright enough.”
Jook moved his guitar from one hand to the other, straightened his bedroll over his shoulder, and began walking away from the truck as fast as his mismatched legs would carry him.
“Jook, wait up!” Elbow called out, running after him. “Wait a minute! That woman didn’t see me.”
“Elbow, I don’t think it’s right to steal a man’s truck.”
“Well, unless you got a better idea, we’re gonna be stealing us another one to get outa here.”
“Oh, no. I’m not going to steal a ride. I’ll wash dishes first.”
“Jook, this is the real world. In the real world you gotta steal you a truck now and then. I think it’s time for Elbow Snakeeyes to take charge of yo education.”
“Well, look where it’s got me so far.”

“You were trying to get to Shackshanny. Well, look around you, son; you in Shackshanny.”
Jook nodded in reluctant agreement, and looking around, noticed the railroad track. “There’s a train goes through here.”
“Son, I said I’d go to New Orleans with you, I didn’t say nothing about Canada.”
“You’re right, I don’t know much about these things. I do think we need to go into town, ask around and try to find Bursitis. Surely she’ll put us up. We were neighbors all our childhood. But I won’t be part of stealing another truck. What you do is your own business, and I appreciate the ride, but I’m not going to help you steal anything.”
“I’ll tell you what. You give me another two dollars, and I’ll buy us a truck.”
The neighborhood was nice, clean, with a couple two-story buildings that made up the downtown area. Jook waited while Elbow crossed the street and got directions from a storeowner closing up his shop. When Elbow returned he told Jook, “Around the block; it’s called the Zuma Street Pool Hall.” Noticing the concern on Jook’s face, Elbow told him, “Trust me, Jook, they nobody on this earth better at shootin pool than me. The fortunes of Kings have trinkled through these fingers, my good man, and I can get money anytime I get hold of a pool cue.”

“Even if you shoot pool half as good as you say you can, Elbow, playing pool for money is still gambling.”
“Shows what you know. Truth is, the Angels in Heaven still sing about the night the boss let em come on down here to earth to see with their own eyes the most lethal man with a pool cue in the history of the game; the Rack-Master, Elbow Snakeeyes.”
“Billiards will always have one monumental truth, Elbow, when your money is on the table, it can vanish at the drop of a ball. And I learned my own lesson about the evils of gambling.” Jook was pointing to his blind eye.
“Shootin pool is not gambling to me, son. It’s more like takin candy from babies.”
“There you go stealing again.”
“You can’t have it both ways, little brother. Just stand back; your education is about to get intensified.”
Around the corner they saw a sign looming out over the sidewalk reading, ZUMA STREET POOL HALL. They entered the door with their guitar cases in hand. The room was long and narrow, with a window down the street side that was broken in places and covered over with cardboard. Two men sat at a bar at the far end, drinking beer and talking quietly with the bartender.

A man was shooting pool at the first table. He was dressed in a double-breasted black and white pin-striped suit, very sharp, a black, wide-brimmed zoot-hat coveried his eyes. As the boys entered, he stroked the cue ball and the nine dropped with a clunk into a pocket.”
“Nice shot,” Elbow offered.
“Of course. I’m the best! My name’s Cloven the Chosen. Maybe you boys heard o’ me.”
“Nope,”
“Well, if you not heard of Cloven the Chosen, then you musta just dropped off the back of a potato truck. Maybe we should shoot a game of pool and get acquainted.”
“No, no, not me, friend,” Elbow told him. “We just come in to ask directions. We’re new in town, but we didn’t fall off no potato truck. Why would I, a complete novice at the game of … what did he call it, billiards? want to shoot pool with a man who the first thing he tells me is how good he is? You must be one of them hustlers I heard about.”
“Then you have heard of me,” Cloven The Chosen smiled. “Well, then, maybe I could shoot a game with your friend there, how about it, Shorty; five on the five, ten on the nine. Or are you a scared like your tall friend here?”
Jook knew that Elbow had a plan in mind, and looked to his eyes for a sign but there was none. “Okay,” he said, setting his guitar on the floor next to Elbow’s. Jook walked over to a wall rack and went through the motions of selecting a cue, while Elbow got three beers from the bar. He handed one to Jook and the other to Cloven the Chosen.”
“Thanks, stranger,” Cloven said.

Not knowing what he was supposed to do, Jook returned to the table with the cue he had selected. “I used to shoot a little,” he told everyone, “back home in Aspiration. There was this table in back of Fitzer’s grocery store. But I never played for more than a dime, and usually lost that to the owner’s five-year-old granddaughter.”
Cloven took a sip of his beer. “Yeah,” he considered, “you sounds like you gonna be a real challenge. Tell you what; I’ll play you a game of nine-ball for a dollar. Even them what falls off a potato truck’s got a dollar.”
“We’ve got a dollar,” Jook agreed, still unsure as to what he was supposed to do. “Sure, I’ll play you; go ahead and break.”
Cloven the Chosen hung his head. “Well, well, potato truck boys. Why don’t we just skip all this hustle stuff and get right down to shootin some pool?”
Elbow understood, but Jook didn’t have a clue.

“Man willing to let another man break in a game of Nine Ball,” Cloven pointed out, “is a man what don’t know much about the game.” Cloven turned to Elbow. “I think you’re the ace, tall man, so how about it? I bet you got pool chalk behind your ears.”
“The name’s Elbow Snakeeyes. And this here’s Jook, the finest blues musician in Mississippi.”
Cloven grinned. “Well, maybe he can play you a funeral dirge after I’m finished with you.”
Elbow and Cloven both laughed at this. Jook was slightly amused, but not to the point of laughing. He took a seat in one of the large wooden chairs against the wall, while the bartender racked the balls and collected a nickel from Elbow. Elbow selected his own cue from the wall rack and stepped easily to the table.
Cloven the Chosen suggested, “Why not we just start with a game of nine-ball for ten dollars.”
“Sounds good to me,” Elbow replied, looking to Jook for verification.
Jook nodded. Lifting the lapel of his coat he unpinned a ten-dollar bill his grandmother had secured there, and handed it to Elbow.

Placing the bill on the edge of the table, Elbow said to Cloven, “Do I detect from your frivolity earlier, Cloven the Chosen, that you believe yo’self to be a shooter of pool?”
“Like the name say, string bean boy, I am Cloven, the handsomest man in Mississippi, what been Chosen by God to whip ass of every would-be pool shark what come down Zuma Street. Oh, by the way, you not the two strangers what just come into town in a stolen truck, are you?”
Elbow remained stone-faced, but Jook gasped out loud and stood up, ready to run.
“Hey, boys, it’s none o’ my business, but Sonny Boy, the Deputy man from over in Spitwater, was in here not five minutes ago looking for a black man carryin a guitar case. Seems they got an eyewitness who saw the man what stole Sheriff Smellgood’s truck. Sheriff Smellgood’s that lawman who was in the news last year for lynching them four niggers what had the uppidyness to walk on the same side of the street as a white girl. It’s him what owns the truck; it’s him you need to worry about. Look, don’t mind me none. I was planning on stealin that truck myself one day; it’s mighty pretty.”
Jook still couldn’t believe it. “You’ve got a Sheriff named Smellgood?”

“Not us,” Cloven said. “Spitwater, the town where you stole the truck, about fifty miles west of here. It’s the home of the Klan, and they got a prison there, too, a work farm, like the one the stealer of that truck’s gonna be whilin away a lot of his time in. That is, if the Sheriff lets him live.”
Jook said to Elbow, “I think we should be going. I think it’s our duty to find that deputy and see if we can help him find that truck thief.”
Cloven laughed. “Look, they was just in here. That Deputy won’t be back til midnight; surely you got time for one game of nine-ball.”
Elbow reminded Jook, “We not goin nowhere without some travelin money, and I can tell this gentleman got all we need.”
Cloven appreciated the remark, smiled, and raised his bottle in a silent toast.
“Okay,” Elbow agreed. “One game of nine-ball for ten dollars.”
Cloven took out a quarter and threw it onto the felt cloth of the pool table. “Go ahead and flip that; let’s see who breaks.”
Jook went back to the wooden chair, after arranging the guitar cases side by side so as to be easy to pick up on the run.
Elbow asked, “Ready?” Upon a nod from Cloven, he flipped the coin.
“Tails,” Cloven called out.

Cloven stepped closer, and when the coin bounced to a stop he looked up at Elbow. “Heads. Go ahead and break, string bean boy, but you’d better not miss. Miss one time an you’ll be out on the sidewalk counting off concrete squares back to that potato fields, broke, but thankful for the lesson.”
The tension throughout the room was mounting, as men at the bar turned on their stools to watch the competition forming at the table. Elbow chalked his cue, laid it lightly over the railing of the table, and broke the rack. Balls rolled around the table, clicking and bouncing off the rails, and the nine-ball dropped into a far corner pocket.
“Well, well,” Cloven commented, “I hope you don’t think that kinda luck’s gonna get you by all night. Let’s play another, double or nothing.”
Jook reminded his friend, “Elbow, that Deputy could be back any minute. We had ten dollars, now we’ve got twenty. We’re rich. I think we should go.”
Elbow stepped to the window and looked both directions along the street outside. “Okay,” he said, “one more game, double or nothing.”
Jook remained in his seat, slouching as the tension weighed upon him. The bartender returned and racked the balls, this time collecting a nickel from Cloven. Elbow leaned over the table and again stroked the cue ball into the racked balls. This time the nine-ball slammed into the opposite corner pocket without even bouncing around the table first. Cloven the Chosen gasped out loud. He immediately went to the pocket into which the nineball had disappeared, and felt around inside the edge for a magnet or some gimmick that would explain what he had seen. Finding nothing, he was slightly embarrassed. “Your luck’s getting dumber and dumber, ain’t it, Snakeman?”
“That’s Snakeeyes, Sir. Please don’t deprive me of my daddy’s namesake.”
“Well, I want another game!”

Jook, the eternal voice of wisdom, said to Elbow, “Forty dollars, Elbow. That’ll get you all the way to New Orleans.”
Cloven demanded. “One more game, double or nothing!”
Elbow told him, “Look, friend, I never said I wasn’t the best. Truth is, I’ve never lost a game of pool in my entire life, except once when I was in the Convent. But I was only six, and them Nuns used to cheat like sonsabitches.” Elbow paused a moment, then nodded to Cloven. “Okay, one more game. But this has to be the last.”
Cloven took four tens from his pocket and laid them on the railing with the other bills. “I believe the break is yours.”
Elbow stepped to the table, chalked his cue, but as he lay his cue over the railing, Cloven leaned closer and said quietly, “Oh, by the way, Snakeman, I don’t think I mentioned this, but I’m needin my money to buy my Sweetie a bottle of wine and a engagement ring tonight. It was even in my plans to propose marriage to my woman, and allow her full time what I been rationing out a little bit at a time. And if you take the rest of my money, I won’t be able to do that. So, here’s a little something extra on top of our wager; the next time you sink that nine ball, I’m gonna slit your throat.”
Jook sat upright in the chair. He stepped down and picked up both guitars, ready to run, and was amazed when Elbow laughed in the man’s face. There was a flash of metal beneath the pool table light and Elbow was suddenly holding an open straight razor to Cloven the Chosen’s throat. Elbow said, “There’s other ways to get out of this game than losin, my friend.”
Immediately there was the sound of a shotgun slamming shut, and the bartender approached the table with the gun leveled at the two players. “You two gonna make trouble, you’d best take it out back.”

Jook was all the way to the door with both guitars in his hands, the bedroll over his shoulder, hissing back for Elbow to run. But Elbow had surmised correctly that at this point everyone in the place wanted to see how this game was going to end. “Okay, Cloven, my man,” he agreed, “We finish this game, then me and my friend will go help that Deputy find that truck-thief. That agreeable to everybody?”
Cloven nodded. Elbow slid the straight razor back into his shoe and picked up his cue. At this point, Cloven the Chosen had resigned himself to whatever fate awaited him. He leaned against a table and watched helplessly.
Elbow had no intention of losing. But instead of sinking the nine on the break he sank the five-ball, then the six and seven, until only the eight-ball was left on the table beside the nine. Cloven hung his head in despair as Elbow’s cue ball dropped the eight in a corner pocket, then bounced around the table like it knew where it was going, until it came to a stop directly in front of the nine. Without even taking a good breath of air, Elbow set his cue deftly across his thumb, and with the coolness of ice and the concentration of the supreme hustler, Elbow Snakeeyes flicked the pool cue forward.

Chapter Three

Elbow noticed the Gardenia perfume a moment before he stroked the ball, and he could feel the cool air across his cheek from someone entering the pool hall from the street. But when the woman stepped into his peripheral vision, just as he was making the shot, he miscued the cue ball and it bounced around three rails to scratch in a side pocket.
Cloven the Chosen was in tears, such was his relief. An incredibly beautiful woman came to stand next to him. “Boys,” Cloven said, “this is MonaRoma, the Queen of Zuma Street.”
MonaRoma was at least six feet tall. Her skin was very black, but her hair, through some genetic fiasco, like her eyebrows and lashes, was naturally orange. The long orange lashes fluttered hello, red lips smiled, and Elbow Snakeeyes was as impressed with a woman as he was ever going to be. “Of course,” he said, bowing slightly, “A mere Mary or Jane would fall far short of representin the grace and style I see before me here tonight. My name is Elbow Snakeeyes.”
“Glad to meet you, Elbow Snakeeyes,” MonaRoma smiled. “I do hope your losing the game wasn’t my fault.”
“Well, yes, Ma’am, it was,” he tells her the truth. “But, you know, Miss MonaRoma, Queen of Zuma Street, they’ll be other games.”

Elbow put his hand on Jook’s shoulder. “This is my good friend, Jook; the man what keep his Blues down in his shoes.”
“Glad to meet you, Jook,” MonaRoma said.
Cloven the Chosen looked at his watch. “Yes, well, I think it’s time to go, MonaRoma, any time you’re ready.” In spite of the blatant flirting going on, Cloven the Chosen took a tablet from his pocket, wrote something on one of the pages, tore it off, and handed it to Elbow. “If you don’t end up in jail for truck-stealing, or dead from flirting with the wrong man’s woman, you call this number. It’s my brother over in Spitwater; he might be interested in meeting you. He backs certain gambling enterprises and, well…. you shoot pretty good pool.”
Cloven put his arm around MonaRoma and led her to the door, while Jook and Elbow followed them out onto the sidewalk outside with their guitar cases and bedroll in hand.

“Well, good-night, gentlemen,” MonaRoma said. “Maybe I’ll see you somewhere around. If you know how to play those guitars, there’s a talent night thing going on over at the Shackshanny Bar. That’s another block over, at the corner of Devilment and Divine; you can’t miss it. Who knows, you might even pick up a couple bucks.”
“We might do that,” Jook responded. “Thanks.”
“Just remember,” MonaRoma reminded everyone, “life is good to the good; the best is always yet to come.”
Jook was impressed, “My grandmother says the same thing.”
“Take our advice and you’ll sleep good and live a long, long time.” MonaRoma took Cloven’s arm, and, with one last good-bye wink to Elbow, they walked away.

“Where’d she say that place was?” Jook asked.
But Elbow could not take his eyes off MonaRoma. “Devilment Street,” he mumbled. Finally “How can you forget words spoken by lips like those?”
“You mean the lips that’ll soon be smooching all over Cloven the Chosen.” Jook and Elbow began walking in the direction MonaRoma had specified.
“Well, considerin you a man what’s not hardly been outside the chicken coop,” Elbow said, “I can understand you not noticin.”
“I understand your suffering, Elbow, I know what it’s like to love a woman you’re never going to have.”
“Did you hear that name?” Elbow whispered, as if in a dream, “MonaRoma, the Queen of Zuma Street?”
“She sounds like a headhunter.”
“Oh, I hope so, Jook.”

They were still laughing at this when they rounded the corner at Devilment and Divine. Both sides of the street were fronted with rustic brick walls and plywood signs, a flickering of neon sign here and there, with a streetlight on two corners of the intersection. A hardware store occupied the opposite corner, with an office building next door, then a clothing store, several used-junk places, and a pawn shop at the far end. Used refrigerators and stoves stood out on the sidewalk overnight, windows remained propped open, and only the pawnshop door was ever locked. The street vibrated with color and style, people coming and going, and all the action in town this night seemed centered around the bar. Several people walked by carrying guitar cases. “Looks like everyone’s got the same idea,” Jook said to Elbow.
“MonaRoma said it was talent night. You feel talented?”
“I feel like playing. Lets go in and see.”

The room was large with a bar stretching across one end, large windows covered with red curtains on each side, and the door let in the light of the street lamp each time someone entered. On one side of the room there was a small stage, with tables and chairs situated around it. A poolroom on the far side crackled as balls collided, and dark shadows inside moved around the pool table light.
Above the stage a single light bulb threw a circle of smoky yellow light on the floor, in the center of which stood a woman with a microphone in her hand belting out a Blues number. A man on a stool accompanied her on a piano. The room held about fifty people, some at the bar, a few dancing, and the rest sitting at the tables watching the performance.
Jook’s eyes were wide with excitement. “Elbow,” he whispered, “I’ve never seen anything like this. This is amazing.” They found an empty table where it was dark, put their guitars underneath it, and sat down. The woman at the mic finished her song, and stepped off the stage to thunderous applause.

Jook was beside himself with musical discovery. “So, this is what it’s all about,” he said.
“You been livin in a white man’s town too long,” Elbow suggested. “You want something to drink?”
“Drink? I’ve got two dollars. Cloven the Chosen has the rest of our money.”
“I palmed us a five.”
Jook was annoyed. “Elbow, that was his money. You have got to stop stealing.” But then he thought about it. “Okay, okay, yes, I’d like something to drink. Get me a ginger ale, please.”
“You know, with the truck and the pool hall, I think you need something a little stronger to settle you down.”
“I never drank anything stronger,” Jook admitted. “And besides, if I get drunk, who’s going to do the thinking? So far you’ve got half the police in Mississippi looking for us, and thanks to that pool game, all our money’s heading down Zuma street in another man’s pocket. A man, I might add, that you should have beat with your eyes closed. But, you lost, all because of a woman.”
“You really didn’t see what I saw?”

“I saw you sink two nine-balls in a row, and then miscue because the guy’s girlfriend walked in the door.”
“Then you did see.” Elbow was euphoric over the tall woman. “Wasn’t she somethin? Did you see the way she looked at me?”
Jook shrugged. “I was too busy watching Cloven the Chosen putting our money into his pocket.”
“No, I mean, did you see the way that woman looked at me? I’m serious, Jook, MonaRoma, the Queen of Zuma Street, proposed sex, marriage, and raisin a passel of kids together in one glance from them big, brown eyes. She’s gonna dump him the first chance she gets.”
“I hope not. Cloven the Chosen looked like a bad man.” Jook noticed another performer step onto the stage. “Look,” he said. “A white girl is going to play.”
She was about Jook’s age, just out of school, the only white person in the place. With all the confidence in the world she sat down with her guitar over her knee and pulled the microphone closer. The audience applauded; they seemed to know her. Her face was long and pretty, accentuated with large, black eyes. They were so black they reached all the way across the room. She wore an old but clean white shirt, brown corduroy pants, and brogan shoes, the kind that lace up the front. “Thanks for all of you coming out tonight,” she said, “I’m going to sing a ballad I’ve done here before, a song my mother taught me. If you remember the words, please feel free to sing along.”
She strummed her guitar and began to sing.

“Listen to that,” Jook said quietly, without looking around. “Just her voice and that guitar, with only that little microphone; isn’t that incredible?”
“A Daisy of white adrift on a sea of black,” Elbow observed.
Many of the people knew the girl, and some of them sang along.
“I bid farewell to this old county
And the stream that flows from the hill where the water grows
And the girl all asleep neath the sill while the whippoorwill
Sings sweet lullabies in my dreams
“What a nice song,” Jook commented. “I wonder if she wrote it?”
Without a word, Elbow got up from his chair and moved through the crowd toward the stage. Jook thought Elbow had gone to introduce himself to the girl, and he shook his head in wonder, wishing he had the nerve to do that.
But instead, Elbow spoke briefly with a man standing by the stage with a clipboard under his arm. After a few words, Elbow returned to the table, telling Jook, “Her name is Maria.”

Jook nodded. “Why did I already know that? A girl who sings like an Angel would have to be named after one.”
Maria finished her song, bowed to the applause, and stepped down from the stage.
The man to whom Elbow had spoken took the microphone. “Wasn’t that great, people?” he said, holding his clipboard over his head. “We’ll have Maria back up here again before the night’s out. But first, we have a special guest with us tonight. I have just been informed by his manager that the greatest Blues musician in Mississippi is in our audience tonight. Jook, will you please come up on stage and honor us with a song?”
The room broke out in hushed whispers as people stretched to see the great entertainer, while Jook slumped as low as he could in his chair. But the applause went on and on and finally he pulled his guitar from beneath the table and waded through the crowd toward the stage. Taking a seat in the chair, he took his harmonicas from their bag, set one in the holder around his neck, and laid his guitar across his knee. Dragging the microphone closer Jook felt Maria’s warmth on the chair and the microphone and it made him feel good. Jook also noticed something else; rather than being nervous, he felt that at last he was in his element. “Thank you good people for that warm welcome,” he said into the microphone. He made a C7 chord, dragged it up beneath the G Fret, and with a G harp, began sucking out a slow-rolling boogie rhythm. He began to sing,
“God, I love my little woman, She got my number fine
She like to do it every evening, even do it in the kitchen in the morning time
Well, salt shaker, pepper shaker, sugar in a bowl
Scatter em on the floor tryin to get me a hold,
Oh, we’ll be up all night!”

Without ever having heard the song before, the audience joined him on the chorus.
“Up all night, up all night
Me and my baby, we’s up all night.”
Jook took a lead on the harp and the crowd was on their feet and began dancing, with those at the tables clapping along. Elbow Snakeeyes was grinning from ear to ear, the stage manager had dropped his clipboard, and the girl, Maria, had found the man she was going to marry.
Jook sang another verse, played another harp instrumental, and finished the song. The room exploded with applause as the stage manager took the microphone. “That was the best, Mr. Jook,” he said. “We have a couple more people who want to play, but after that we’d love to hear some more. Somebody buy this man a beer. Hell, give this man anything he wants!”
Jook bowed slightly and stepped down to where Maria was waiting. “Well, you certainly can play and sing,” she said. She gave him a hug. “Come, I’ll buy you and your manager a beer.”
They made their way through the audience toward where Elbow now stood at the table, smiling, applauding with everyone else.

“I’ve never heard Blues played that way before,” Maria said to Jook. “Where did you learn to do that?”
“From an old man I knew as a child. He used to be a slave, and his past lived on in the way he played.” Stopping to shake hands, and letting Jook sign a couple autographs along the way, they finally made it to where Elbow was waiting.
Elbow pulled out a chair for Maria, telling Jook, “That was amazing, my friend.”
“Maria,” Jook said, “this is Elbow Snakeeyes.”
“Glad to meet you, Elbow. Your friend here has quite a talent.”
“You both did great. And you, son; I figured you could play that thing, the way you never let it out of your sight, but I had no idea. Who needs pool halls when you can play the Blues like you can?”
“I thought you were his manager,” Maria inquired.

“More like his keeper. I’ve been tagging along to keep him out of trouble, but I sure didn’t know he could do something like this. I’ve listened to Little Walter himself, and Muddy up in Chicago, but I never heard the Blues til now.” Elbow lifted his beer in a toast, and they all clinked their bottles together.
A waitress arrived with more beers and set them on the table. “That was nice, Maria,” she said. “And your friend, too. Good song, Mr. Jook. You wouldn’t happen to have one of those phonograph records for sale, would you?”
“No Ma’am, not yet.”
“Well, you let us know if you ever do. My aunt’s got a machine that’ll play it.” After picking up the empty, the waitress winked at Jook and left.
Elbow laid the five on the table, but Maria pushed it back to him. “I doubt your money is any good around here after what Jook just did.” Then to Jook, “Elbow’s right; the people are going to want to hear more of your music.”
“I hope so. I don’t think I’ve ever had this much fun.” Jook looked at Maria. “We just met a friend of yours, an orange-haired lady named, MonaRoma.”

“The Queen of Zuma Street,” she smiled.
“One and the same,” Elbow grinned. “She smells like Gardenias down the garden path at sunset.”
Jook added, “We just played pool with a friend of hers; Cloven the Chosen.”
“I’ve seen her with Cloven now and then,” Maria said. “She’s not only the world’s most beautiful stripper, she also heads up several committees to aid the poor. As far as Cloven, I guess she figures a mobster’s donation to a good cause is as good as any politician’s.”
Elbow got up, excused himself to the restroom, and as soon as he was gone Maria put her hand on Jook’s. She liked these two young men immediately, but was already studying her unbounded attraction to the shorter one.
“Jook,” she said, “I need to ask you something.”
Jook was mildly startled by her hand on his, but leaned closer to listen, expecting to hear something about his music.
She asked, “Are you and Elbow the ones who drove into town in that stolen truck?”
“A-a truck has been stolen?” Jook stuttered.

“Deputy Sonny Boy was in here earlier looking for a stranger with a guitar case.”
Jook looked around. “Well, there are quite a few of those around tonight.”
“None of them are strangers,” Maria pointed out. “That’s where you and your friend stand out.”
Squeezing Maria’s hand, Jook lowered his voice. “Maria, look, please understand that, no matter how right we try to live our lives, we sometimes get caught up in things over which we have no control.”
“I just wanted you to know about the Deputy; none of that matters to me or anybody else around here. I guess what I’m trying to let you know is, this place has a back door.”
Jook squeezed Maria’s hand, then moved his own back to his beer. He asked, “Do you play here often?”
“I wait tables, but I’m usually here on Tuesday nights for talent night. And if things are slow, Silas lets me play a weekend now and then. But I do folk music. The people around here want to hear something more lively on Saturday nights; something more like what you were doing.”

“I like the song you did. That was a ballad. I need to learn some clean chords.”
“Well, I’m the one to teach them to you. My grandma was born and raised in the Appalachian Mountains. That’s all I know is mountain music. I’ve never been to a big city; Shackshanny is the largest town I’ve ever been to.”
“Me, too.”
“Is that your first beer?” she asked.
“What makes you think that?”
“Well, by now you would have taken a sip.”
“You were right the first time,” Jook admitted, “I’ve never had a beer before.”
“Would you like something else? I can get you ice-water.”
“That’s okay. I’m beginning to think Elbow’s right; I need something stronger than water to calm me down.” Jook still did not sip the beer, but asked, “How did you find this place?”
“You mean how did a white girl end up in colored town? I was driving through one night, heading for my grandparent’s farm over near Spitwater, took a shortcut and ended up with a flat tire out there on Divine Street. A couple people helped me fix it; then invited me in here for talent night. Everyone was so nice to me I ended up staying. I’ve lived here for six months now; got a little place up the street.

“Twenty or thirty years ago the Shackshanny Bar was known more for knife fights and pistol-packing women than anything else. In the beginning it was no more than a deserted shack on the corner of two dirt roads, but on Saturday night it became the gathering place for everyone from miles around. People would come from the cotton and the cane fields, bringing their own homebrew, riding in on a mule or wagon, or walking in with the sunset. If there was no one playing an instrument, they would pound on boxes with broomsticks. In the winter, heat was kerosene burning in the bottom of a metal drum, in the summer open windows let in the mosquitoes. But, after working all week in the fields, having the bar to go to on Saturday night made life worth living. Eventually, Silas’ father built a bar, put in electricity, bought a used microphone, and the rest is history. You’ve heard that saying about the best feeling in the world is a Black man on Saturday night? Well, that’s true, except they were really talking about a woman – black or white.”
Maria again put her hand on Jook’s. He did not know how to respond, so did nothing. “Many an old Blues artist started their career playing in places like this,” Maria went on, “just like you. We even have a kitchen, where Silas steams oysters when they’re in season. And you’ve seen the poolroom over there. Quite a place, the Shackshanny Bar.”
“I like oysters.”

“A nickel a dozen, you can have all you want. And if you happen to know a waitress who likes your music, you won’t even have to pay that.” Maria was expressing her attraction to this man by gently flirting with him. Jook had taken notice and appreciated the attention, but in his mind he was already in love with someone else.
A man appeared out of nowhere and laid a folded piece of paper on the table. He said, “I was told to give that to the tall man.”
“Not but one of those around here,” Jook said. “I’ll see he gets it.”
Just as mysteriously, the stranger vanished back into the crowd.
“Is Silas the man I need to see about auditioning here?” Jook asked Maria. “I could use a job.”
“Silas is out of town tonight. I suspect he’ll hear all about you when he gets back tomorrow. He’ll probably come looking for you.”
They sat there for a long time, then Maria leaned forward and whispered in Jook’s ear, “Jook?”
“Yes?”

“Aren’t you wondering what’s in that note?”
He looks at the folded piece of paper. “It can only mean trouble, Maria; believe me, I know.”
At that moment Elbow returned, pulled out his chair, and noticed the note. “What’s this?”
“Somebody left it for you,” Jook told him.
He picked up the note and read it, nodding his head, then leaned over and kissed Jook on the forehead, stuffing the note into his friend’s coat pocket. “Gotta go.” Elbow announced, turning to leave. “We’ll have to steal that car some other time.”
Jook opened his mouth to reply but Elbow was gone. Unable to stand it any longer, Maria reached over and pulled the note from Jook’s pocket. She began to read, but stopped and handed it back. “I’m a woman” she said, “I have to know.”
Jook held the note up to the candlelight so they could both read. “Tall man,” Jook read aloud, “meet me under the streetlight in back of the Zuma Street Pool Hall at Midnight. Love, MonaRoma.” Jook laughed out loud at this. Maria also seemed to understand what was going on.

At first Jook was happy for Elbow, but the more he thought about Cloven the Chosen, the more his mind could visualize a scenario of Elbow walking down a back alley when Cloven jumps from the bushes and slashes him with his straight razor. Without explaining himself, Jook held the note in the candle flame, and Maria slid an ashtray beneath it to catch the ashes. Apparently, her mind had experienced the same scenario.
Maria acknowledged someone waving to her from the bar. Standing up, she threw a bar towel over her shoulder. “I’d better get back to work. I get off at four if you want to hang around. I’ll keep you in food and drink.”
“Sure, thanks. I’ll wait for Elbow to get back.”
“From the sound of that note, I don’t think he’s coming back; at least not tonight. You just make yourself comfortable; I want to talk with you about your music.” She went back to waiting tables, beginning with clearing the empty beer bottles in their area.
Jook eventually finished his beer … and Elbow’s too. An older, attractive, slender, well - dressed woman gripping a cigarette holder between her teeth, leaned closer and whispered in Jook’s ear, “Music man, you can sit on my bed and play that guitar any time you want.”

Jook was struck speechless by the woman’s abrupt offer.
“Hearing you play that harmonica,” she went on, “was like having a King Cobra snake slide up and down my backbone naked.” The woman stood straight and took a puff of the cigarette. “Should you feel like playing me a song some morning, my husband goes to work at the lumber mill before sunup every day. That is, every day but Sunday; Sunday I’ll have to meet you behind the church.”
The woman turned to leave, but came back, ignoring Maria, who had arrived with another beer.
“You do go to church?” the woman asked, then walked away before he could answer.
“Church?” Maria took notice. “That’s nice. Usually she just invites men over for sex after her husband goes to work.”
Jook was disappointed. “She tells that to everybody? I was feeling special. You know, Maria, I’m getting drunk as shit.”
“You’re doing fine. Oh, and don’t worry about waiting for your friend. I have a couch at my place you can sleep on if you want.”

Jook didn’t know what to say.
She added, “Bob the stage manager said to tell you the others are through and would you please play some more songs? The crowd’s been asking.”
“I’d love to,” he told her. “Tell him yes; absolutely.”
“You go tell him. I’ll be working, but I’ll be listening.”

April 4th, 2007. If you enjoyed the sample chapters of Jook and would like to read the entire novel, I will send the full digital manuscript, free. Subject your message: Jook - Manuscript

Contact me: rudyyoung@bellsouth.net

This book has thirty more chapters.

Copyright, Rudy Young, 2007

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