Oh, Play That Thing

  Letha Hunter could have stayed. There was no one shoving her off the stand, and Louis had stepped well back. She could have stepped up to the microphone again. There were men there, willing her to do that. But she was bright; she knew to stop just before the right time to stop. In three long minutes, she’d learnt how to play the audience. She stepped back, and let the hangings take her. She disappeared, into the blue satin. (She stayed there, behind the drums, until the night was over. There were boxes and pillars blocking her way to the wings.)

  I shook hands with the betrothed – a docker’s hand; he worked in the Brooklyn Navy Yard – and I went to the back of the hall. The place was packed now, shaken by Letha Hunter and her invisible band. I stood back, watched, and waited for the band to be seen – not the band, the one and only man.

  That song – but love, bay-bee – had been doing the rounds for a couple of years, in the clubs, matinées, intermissions, on the radios, all day, all night, and soon in cars, and on the phonographs. Neck and neck with Makin’ Whoopee, that fuckin’ tune was everywhere; it was fuckin’ dreadful, and loved. And it would always be loved. Rockwell was right: the song was going to bring millions of men and women with it. They’d cling to it. Unlike the cars, the suits and the radios, that song, those songs, would never be obsolete. A few notes, a line, would always be enough. Rockwell knew – and Louis knew better. Because Louis actually liked the song. He liked the corn; he loved the sentimental. I’d seen his face as he listened to Rudy Vallee and Guy Lombardo. I’d seen him grin when moon met June. And Louis knew: the songs didn’t matter a shite. It was the voice, the trumpet, the fingers, the brain and heart that owned the fingers. It was the man.

  And, now, Louis came at the microphone. He ran at it, knees bent.

  —Where’s the Duke? shouted a red-faced cunt to my right, with his arm around his girl.

  I tapped his shoulder.

  —Wait.

  He saw my eyes, and waited.

  Louis came at the microphone, knees bent – did Louis see Groucho, or did Groucho see Louis? – he came at it from an angle, so he’d be seen in profile. It was funnier that way – he’d told me – and set them up for something that they weren’t going to get.

  The clown was going to kill them.

  His face was an inch from the mike. He stopped.

  —Good evening, ladies and gentleman.

  It was just Louis. Gene Anderson, Fred Robinson, Zutty Singleton, Carroll Dickerson – they were the talented stiffs behind him. It was all there, in front of me. Louis was the man who was changing the world. He was going to smash through walls and play the greatest music ever played.

  And he didn’t need me.

  —My name’s Mis-ter Armstrong.

  I found Rockwell, and stood myself where I could watch him.

  —Stay away from the blues, Louie, Rockwell had warned him, earlier that day.

  And there was Louis, playing the blues for a white crowd. St Louis Blues – a good song. And Jesus, fuck, it was the wildest, happiest blues ever played. The men up there with him were sweating through their only suits and Louis was flying, charging, stopping – moving back, and at the crowd, like they were new friends he was happy and very surprised to see. And, all the time, playing, eyes gleaming or closed, his body bent over, inches from the wet floor – the sweat became sparks in the air. And he was up now, defiant, catching and throwing the light. One eye open for the high, high notes, watching for their jump from the bell. It was trumpet, and nothing else. It was Louis Armstrong.

  I looked at Rockwell. He looked happy; he wasn’t hearing the blues. I looked at the waiters. They were trying to deliver food and drinks inside Louis’s tempo. Most of them were failing. They’d never had to work at that speed before; there were golden splashes and chicken legs dropping over heads and shoulders.

  Louis charged on, and on, the white handkerchief dancing with him. And then it stopped, a clumsy, final break – he pulled the horn from his mouth – and caught the band by surprise. I saw no anger. They were up there in the heat and adoration and they knew: it was the only way they were ever going to get it. They were stunned, gasping for any breath that they could find. They were being pawed from a distance by white folks.

  And he was gone again. Same song. Stay away from the blues, Louie. And, this time, Louis sang. I looked again at Rockwell. Louis’s message was lost on him, or else had been very happily learnt.

  —SHE PULL THAT MAN ‘ROUN’—

  BY HER APE-RON – STRING—

  Rockwell was on the floor. He was throwing quarters, low, onto the bandstand, and filling willing hands around him with more. They rolled past Louis’s feet, and against his shoes. Two hundred dollars’ worth that night; they landed, rolled, and found their way to Louis.

  She rubbed her hands in her apron.

  —You like the rest of America? she said.

  —Some of it, I said.

  —I missed anything?

  —Not really, I said.

  —See? she said. —I knew.

  —You’re looking well, I told her.

  She threw back the words with a flick of her hand.

  —You, she said.

  I’d been creeping this way for weeks. I’d wanted to see her, to walk the streets, to catch a bit of what I’d left.

  It all seemed different, the Carlmor. The walls, the tables, seating – all gone, all new. But, as I sat at the counter, my arms stopped just where they should have; the same counter. The walls were big yellow, but exactly where I’d left them. There were more tables, more booths, checked cloths instead of oilcloth. The radio was bright new, a polished cabinet, but Rudy Vallee still did the crooning.

  It was good to be there.

  —You, she said. —Are different.

  There was a stiff sitting three stools up, shovelling his meat-loaf, and a kid and his girl, knee to knee, at one of the tables, eating nothing but the smoke between them, and a man who’d cut himself shaving that morning, playing with sugar on his table-top, making shapes, his coffee dead beside him. I could hear his finger rub across the fabric.

  —It’s quiet, I said.

  —Always, she shrugged.

  —What happened?

  She shrugged.

  —You brought the business to here, she said. —They followed you.

  She was messing. I’d come this early afternoon, because it was the quiet between-time, when Hettie kept the shop alone. And because the hard men who owned the Lower East Side rarely came out at this time of day.

  I looked out the window, to be sure that I was right.

  The usual – it looked and felt like just the usual; nothing and no one lingering out there. This was daylight New York. All changing; nothing different.

  I looked back at Hettie. I smiled.

  —You, she said. —Are dressed like an African. Why?

  That worried me. I hadn’t noticed.

  I looked again at the window.

  Still the shifting same.

  I hadn’t noticed.

  —Am I? I said.

  —For sure, said Hettie. —Dressed like an African dresses when he ain’t going to work. Sundays.

  She wasn’t a quiet woman. The stiff at the counter took his head out of the meatloaf and looked at me. He shrugged, and got back down to business.

  I looked down at some of myself. I didn’t see it.

  —How d’you mean? I said.

  She laughed.

  Harlem was America; it was new every morning. I liked it there. I loved it. But I had to keep forgetting that I was the white man, strolling with the black man; stopping to talk with other black men, entering the barber shop with the black man, bringing my white man’s hair in with me.

  —See more temple than I used to see, O’Pops, said Louis.

  We were sitting side by side.

  —Fuck off, Louis.

  Saying that to a black man.

  He was looking across, at me in the mirror.

  —Suits you, Pops.


  —Fuck off, Louis.

  Hearing the silence in the shop – the Elite Barbershop, on Seventh Avenue. Our hats were brushed back to new, his nails were manicured, while two of the barbers worked on our hair. And deeper in, in the poolroom behind the shop, the sudden, loud clack of the balls, and the absence of comment or curse.

  I was tolerated, because I was with the black man.

  But that wasn’t it. White men weren’t rare. Sammy, one of the barbers, was white, and he was working at Louis’s head. White families lived in Harlem, and happily, among all the black. Harlem was warm. I was never afraid – the bad men with the gats were white. I could have lived there. (I thought about going back to Chicago, for Miss O’Shea and Saoirse. I even wrote, but I didn’t post the letter.) I would have been Henry, not the white man or the Irish man. Henry, or Mister Smart. Henry Smart. I’d have been white but it wouldn’t have mattered, much – just now and again. Stay close to the wall on the days when a black man had been shot by a white cop, when a black man was due for execution, on the days when it was bad to be black. Stay in till morning; use your cop-on; have a bit of sense. It was city living. It was what I’d grown up to survive and expect.

  But I was with Louis, and that was why I was there. And that made me the white man. The ofay with Louis; Louis Armstrong’s white man. I’d been happy being that man, while we were rushing, running, while I found him his water, and let him open his own doors, by walking there beside him.

  He stood back and let me pull open the doors, but it didn’t work in reverse. I didn’t need Louis beside me to do it; it was just a fuckin’ door. No one was going to step in my way.

  I could have told them: I’m Irish, lads, one of the Empire’s niggers, and I know.

  But they’d have stood back, and maybe nodded.

  —That so?

  No one was going to ask about my fight for Irish freedom, and the freedom to open our own doors. Being Irish here just made me a cop’s cousin, and the men and women here had history of their own they wanted to get away from. So I went ahead and did the expected; I pulled the door and stepped back for Louis. I was Louis Armstrong’s white man. That was what I was – not his fault, not mine. I was Louis Armstrong’s boy.

  Hettie stopped laughing.

  —Your tie, she said.

  I looked down at it.

  —The hat.

  I looked at it, on the stool beside me.

  —The shirt.

  —Ah here.

  Not his fault, not mine.

  But only if I stopped. Innocence ended now. I had to decide, but I didn’t want to. I’d been up to my knees in big history before, but this was a different history. Louis had killed no one, and the music had sent no one off to die. There was no blood on his hands or our shoes. No fault, his or mine.

  But only if I stopped.

  He didn’t need me now, maybe never did. He had Rockwell. (He’d have Glaser.) It was 1929 – March, April, May. The Age was still roaring, and I was doing nothing.

  I had to walk away from Louis.

  —The jacket, she said.

  I’d come downtown, carefully, a block a week, hoping not to be noticed. (I’d walked past Levine’s, on Front Street; it was still Levine’s, and still dry goods.) The suit was grey, the shirt was white, the collar was white-man tight. The tie was a tie, my boots were boots. And the hat was my pearl-grey fedora. I looked out the window again. Two good hats went by, on top of two men in grey suits.

  I’d never seen a black man at the counter in Hettie’s, and I’d never seen Hettie outside. Black men came in from the alley, straight into the kitchen, lugging crates and baskets. I’d never seen one in a suit or fedora. Soil-blacked fingernails inches from my feet. Hanged men, mutilated rebel slaves, trapped forever in water that went nowhere.

  Louis had dressed me, and he’d dressed me white.

  —Nothin’ too colour, he’d told Mister Piper. —This here some serious white man.

  I’d been strict on the shirts. The reds, the yellows, the big blues hadn’t come out of their wrappers. A grey, four whites and a light, light blue.

  I was wearing one of the whites.

  —You’re talking shite, Hettie, I told her.

  —No, she said. —I know. Hungry?

  —Yeah.

  —See? I know what is.

  She turned away and got to work on an American sandwich, one that would need a knife and a fork.

  —The walk, she said, over her big shoulder.

  —What walk?

  —The way you walk. Into here.

  —You didn’t see me, I reminded her. —Your back was to me, like now.

  —I seen, she said.

  She turned to me again.

  —You walk like an African.

  She put the plate before me, and the tools beside the plate.

  —Still eat like an Irishman?

  —You tell me.

  I got dug in.

  —Yes, she said. —You are Henry.

  I wiped my mouth and chin.

  —Grand, I said.

  —Say, said the stiff down the counter from me. —Can I have some coffee here?

  —Why, yes, said Hettie; she sounded as near American as I’d ever heard her.

  She filled his cup and didn’t take long coming back.

  —So, I said. —I walk like a Negro.

  —Yes, she said. —Go, and come back to here.

  I got up and walked to the door. I turned, and the stiff was there behind me. He stared, and mumbled as he passed.

  —She’s old enough to be your mother.

  —She is my fuckin’ mother, I told him.

  I went back across to Hettie. She watched.

  —Loose, she said.

  She rolled her shoulders, as if they’d been stiff.

  —You move loose, she said. —Like an African.

  That was fine. I didn’t walk like an Irishman. I was getting there, and I hadn’t even noticed. The music had gotten right into me and I’d become a walking American.

  I sat down again.

  I was still worried. My walk might have been too American, too new, too defiant and bright. I’d have to be careful. I’d spent most of my life trying not to be noticed, and failing.

  —D’you see Mildred these days? I asked.

  —Some, she said. —Not many times.

  —She’s okay?

  She shrugged.

  —Yes.

  Mildred had tried to kill me but that seemed like a long time ago, and I wasn’t dead.

  —Does she look good? I asked.

  —Better than her momma, said Hettie.

  —Ah now.

  —She looks good, Hettie nodded.

  She rubbed her cheeks.

  —The colour, she said.

  —Good.

  —She lives clean. Has a child.

  —Boy or girl?

  —Girl.

  —That’s good.

  She shrugged.

  I nodded at the door behind her.

  —Did you keep my room for me, Hettie?

  —My room.

  —Is it still there?

  —You see the door.

  —Is the room still behind it?

  —I think so.

  —Where’s your husband?

  —Behind some other door.

  —Gone?

  She shrugged.

  —Sometimes, she said. —Bums ever gone? He’s goes, he comes back.

  —Can I look inside?

  She shrugged.

  —Old times’ sake? she said.

  —I don’t believe in it.

  —You are too young.

  —No, I said.

  —Yes.

  —I’m like you, Hettie. You don’t look back either.

  She nodded.

  —Sometimes, she said. —I am old. Sometimes the old days are near. And today is not today. I am in a day many years ago.

  —You’re not old, Hettie.

  She flicked the words away.

&
nbsp; —Throw that one in the bowl, she said.

  She opened the door. I stood up from the counter and followed her.

  The room hadn’t changed. It was too small for real change, still tiny and fat with hot air. It was late afternoon, and daylight was long gone from the airshaft. It was dark in the room, although very bright behind me. It wasn’t just the dark; it was the dirt in the air outside, on the window glass, the smoke and coal gas. Sweat started to run from my head and back.

  —See?

  —The same.

  Her clothes at the end of the bed. An apron, a stocking.

  It was good to be—

  Home.

  She stepped past me, out to the restaurant. I watched her walk – there was nothing slow, nothing stooped or old – to the door. She lifted the sign and turned it, Closed.

  I went to the bed. I put my fingers, my hand under the mattress, and felt it. The wallet. And the calfskin belt, the money belt I’d worn around my waist. Both there. The photograph and the money. My fingers, I now knew, had always expected to touch them.

  —You found.

  Hettie was behind me.

  —Yeah.

  —And you are going now?

  —No.

  I looked at her.

  —I’ll stay a while.

  She shrugged, and smiled.

  —Up to you.

  I left them under the mattress.

  —Thanks for minding them for me.

  —Too lazy to lift the mattress.

  She sat back on the bed. She laughed as it creaked. She let her shoes drop to the boards. I sat; I lay back. My head found her shoulder.

  —Boots.

  I sat up, unlaced and took them off. I lay back down again.

  He played one night to white men in the Bronx, came back to Harlem and was king by dawn, before he hit the scratcher. Harlem had room for lots of kings. Every instrument had its king, every endeavour and crime. Sex, the con and aviation – barnstormers, wing-walkers, stunters – there were kings and queens of them all in Harlem. There was the Duke, some sheikhs, and a blockful of princes. Dance, hair and literature – they all had their shifting royalty. Morning, early, the milkman was Count of the Moo-Juice. Midday, late into the night, a royal parade, never a commoner in sight. This wasn’t Dublin. For the first time in my life, I was ordinary. The only thing going for me was my colour.