WANTED:
BL. ON K&G
ANY WITH S.J.H. MASTER #’S
K&G. Key & Gate. The advertiser was searching for blues on Key & Gate, any record made in a particular session. The address at the bottom was Chester’s. On that label, the letter prefixes usually told you where something was recorded, but I couldn’t think of a town or city with the initials S.J.H. The magazine was only a couple of months old. I looked through others. The same ad had appeared in every issue of every major collecting magazine for at least five years. Long before I drove Chester to Mississippi, he’d known that Charlie Shaw did a session for Key & Gate. Even now, it sounded as if he wasn’t sure that any more material was out there. He quoted no titles, no catalog numbers, just the master number of the session. Chester had no proof anything had been released, or even recorded, except the two sides he had. But he was hungry. If something was out there, he was determined to have it in his hands.
I threw out the magazines, every one. The stink of Chester’s record-lust rose up off the pages and I could not get far enough away from its taint.
Time passed and slowly my unease began to ebb. I did normal things, ate and drank and went to movies, ignoring the faint air of unreality that had settled over the world around me. One cold and rainy fall day, I was heading down MacDougal. I had my head down and my collar up, my hands jammed into my pockets as I hurried from the bookstore to the diner where I usually ate my lunch. When Chester stepped into my path, my mind was on the blue plate special and for a moment I didn’t recognize him. He looked haggard, drained. He was wearing a filthy gray suit, the legs of the pants spattered with mud. His long wet hair was plastered down over his face.
—Damn it, he said. You stole it and by God I will have it back! His chest was quivering under his grubby shirt. He wasn’t wearing shoes, and his feet were black with city grime.
—Chester. You look like hell.
—Enough with the soft soap. As if you care about me or anyone else but your own damn self!
I realized that he must have been waiting for me, standing there shoeless in the weather. I wondered why he hadn’t come into the shop. He kept pulling a sordid handkerchief from his pocket and dabbing foppishly at his face. I raised my hands. I wanted to placate him. He looked agitated, capable of violence.
—I don’t understand. Chester. Has something happened to you?
—Don’t play the innocent. You had the gall, the goddamn effrontery to chastise me for my—well, my act of preservation, because that’s what it was. And now, I don’t even know what to say. How the hell did you do it? That’s certainly one question.
—I still don’t know what you’re talking about.
—I invested in some heavy-duty door furniture, top of the line. Never trusted that super further than I could throw the wop bastard.
—Chester, are you OK?
—Chains. A dead bolt. You are a goddamn snake, you know that? A polecat. I don’t have a clue how you got into my room but it’s gone. And you do know what I’m talking about, mister high and mighty. Your hypocrisy stinks to heaven. So what if the old woman didn’t give it to me? She was too dumb to know what she had, surely you see that. Unless I took matters into my own hands, Charlie Shaw’s legacy would have been dust in the wind. That makes me the rightful keeper of that record. I am acting on behalf of posterity.
—I don’t have it, Chester. I didn’t take any record.
—It’s mine. I want you to give it back. They’re like children to me, every one.
—I said I don’t have it.
—You’re a liar. A goddamn dirty liar.
His handkerchief bunched in one hand, he began rooting around in a pocket with the other. I thought he might pull a knife.
—No need for this, Chester.
—My collection has an integrity, you little bastard. It is a single document, a unified design. What you have done is an act of vandalism. Did you pick my lock? Is that how you did it? At least have the grace to tell me.
—I didn’t pick your lock.
—Well, did you break in? Just tell me, for the love of God.
—I didn’t break in.
There was no knife, just another handkerchief, which he bunched up with the first. By this time, the rain was coming down hard. I was shivering. I could feel water seeping under my collar. Chester looked pathetic, disordered. I didn’t have his record. All I wanted was to get away.
—I have to go.
—You goddamn thief!
As I took a pace backwards, he grabbed the sleeve of my coat and began shouting for a policeman.
—Get off me!
I pulled away and began to walk off down the street. He came after me, still shouting police stop thief. No one wanted to know, passers-by rushing to get under cover, unwilling even to look at us. I turned back, water streaming off the brim of my hat, and saw him limping far behind, unable to put his weight down on one foot. I left him standing on the curb, supporting himself against a street sign, impotently shaking his fist.