Jesus is coming soon
. . .”
Jerry tried to attract Hawk’s attention, getting up from his chair, pointing at their apopletic neighbor, touching his finger to his lips. At last he touched Hawk’s sleeve timorously. Hawk stopped singing as if he had been shot and stared at Jerry as the old lady kept on heedless for a couple of bars. “Maybe we can find a room,” said Jerry pleadingly. “I mean, there are other people who are sick, you know, and maybe they don’t necessarily appreciate the music. Hawk, they’re going to throw us out of here if you don’t stop.”
“Well, maybe that wouldn’t be such a bad idea,” said Hawk meaningfully. “Maybe they just kick my old black ass out of here now, set my things out on the street, I’ll tell you something, man, that would suit me just fine.”
The nurse never came, though, the other patients subsided, and Hawk set his guitar down. Later the woman left and Hawk said he was tired. Or at least he grunted when Jerry tried to talk to him about what the doctor had said, about how he would have to take it easy for a while. Hawk just lay there staring inscrutably off into the distance, his hooded eyes mean and hard as a snake’s.
“Who was your lady friend anyway?” Jerry said as he got up to go. “I thought you liked ’em younger than that.”
“At my age it don’t make much difference. At my age, in my condition—ain’t that what the doctors say?”
“She an old friend?” Jerry persisted.
Hawk stared at him contemptuously. “That were Bertha Johnson.”
“Bertha Johnson,” said Jerry, humoring an old man. “You don’t mean—” Then he realized that that was exactly what Hawk meant. This was Bertha “Cool Mama” Johnson, who sang “I take pigmeat to Sunday school,” and who in a famous test pressing circulated among collectors had declared, “I got nipples on my titties big as your right thumb/ I got something between my legs make a dead man come!” Bertha Johnson, who had sung duets with Hawk in the ’30s, played piano with such driving force that some thought it was Cripple Clarence Lofton, even though Lofton clearly could not have been in the studio on that day. “I didn’t even know she was still alive.”
“Well, now you do,” said Hawk.
Jerry sat there, plainly waiting for more.
“Will you get away from me now, boy? You heared what the doctor said. I needs my sleep.”
Back in the dreary hotel room Jerry couldn’t help being depressed. He knew he wouldn’t be able to stick around much longer. Bouncing back and forth between hospital and hotel. Eating up twenty dollars a day in taxi fare and tips alone. Hanging around the lounge bar with all the other middle-aged hookers, drinking, brooding, feeling sorry for himself. It wasn’t fair. Hawk had always been perfectly capable of taking care of himself. He had never needed anyone like Jerry in his life before. He could probably still get along, hobbled perhaps, a little slowed down, but still as mean as ever. That was one voice. Another voice argued that anyone could have seen this day coming, Hawk had to get sick and old sometime, who was going to take care of him, protect him, if it wasn’t his manager? Shit. It was the same relationship they had had since day one, when Hawk grudgingly, amid threats and imprecations, at last accepted the help that Jerry proffered him—only it was never enough, and Jerry was never quite sure it was really helpful. He had never managed to overcome Hawk’s initial suspiciousness nor even erase his own guilt. What was the strange bond that held them together? What, Jerry thought, for the thousandth or ten-thousandth time, had he unknowingly gotten himself into?
He looked at himself in the mirror. There was gray in his hair, gray in his beard. Was this what he really wanted to do? Shepherd a flock of illiterate old black men decrepit with age and whiskey, manage the career of a woman whose destiny he would all too willingly link with his but who
. . .”
Jerry tried to attract Hawk’s attention, getting up from his chair, pointing at their apopletic neighbor, touching his finger to his lips. At last he touched Hawk’s sleeve timorously. Hawk stopped singing as if he had been shot and stared at Jerry as the old lady kept on heedless for a couple of bars. “Maybe we can find a room,” said Jerry pleadingly. “I mean, there are other people who are sick, you know, and maybe they don’t necessarily appreciate the music. Hawk, they’re going to throw us out of here if you don’t stop.”
“Well, maybe that wouldn’t be such a bad idea,” said Hawk meaningfully. “Maybe they just kick my old black ass out of here now, set my things out on the street, I’ll tell you something, man, that would suit me just fine.”
The nurse never came, though, the other patients subsided, and Hawk set his guitar down. Later the woman left and Hawk said he was tired. Or at least he grunted when Jerry tried to talk to him about what the doctor had said, about how he would have to take it easy for a while. Hawk just lay there staring inscrutably off into the distance, his hooded eyes mean and hard as a snake’s.
“Who was your lady friend anyway?” Jerry said as he got up to go. “I thought you liked ’em younger than that.”
“At my age it don’t make much difference. At my age, in my condition—ain’t that what the doctors say?”
“She an old friend?” Jerry persisted.
Hawk stared at him contemptuously. “That were Bertha Johnson.”
“Bertha Johnson,” said Jerry, humoring an old man. “You don’t mean—” Then he realized that that was exactly what Hawk meant. This was Bertha “Cool Mama” Johnson, who sang “I take pigmeat to Sunday school,” and who in a famous test pressing circulated among collectors had declared, “I got nipples on my titties big as your right thumb/ I got something between my legs make a dead man come!” Bertha Johnson, who had sung duets with Hawk in the ’30s, played piano with such driving force that some thought it was Cripple Clarence Lofton, even though Lofton clearly could not have been in the studio on that day. “I didn’t even know she was still alive.”
“Well, now you do,” said Hawk.
Jerry sat there, plainly waiting for more.
“Will you get away from me now, boy? You heared what the doctor said. I needs my sleep.”
Back in the dreary hotel room Jerry couldn’t help being depressed. He knew he wouldn’t be able to stick around much longer. Bouncing back and forth between hospital and hotel. Eating up twenty dollars a day in taxi fare and tips alone. Hanging around the lounge bar with all the other middle-aged hookers, drinking, brooding, feeling sorry for himself. It wasn’t fair. Hawk had always been perfectly capable of taking care of himself. He had never needed anyone like Jerry in his life before. He could probably still get along, hobbled perhaps, a little slowed down, but still as mean as ever. That was one voice. Another voice argued that anyone could have seen this day coming, Hawk had to get sick and old sometime, who was going to take care of him, protect him, if it wasn’t his manager? Shit. It was the same relationship they had had since day one, when Hawk grudgingly, amid threats and imprecations, at last accepted the help that Jerry proffered him—only it was never enough, and Jerry was never quite sure it was really helpful. He had never managed to overcome Hawk’s initial suspiciousness nor even erase his own guilt. What was the strange bond that held them together? What, Jerry thought, for the thousandth or ten-thousandth time, had he unknowingly gotten himself into?
He looked at himself in the mirror. There was gray in his hair, gray in his beard. Was this what he really wanted to do? Shepherd a flock of illiterate old black men decrepit with age and whiskey, manage the career of a woman whose destiny he would all too willingly link with his but who
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