CHAPTER NINE

 

Lawrence Peterson. The name triggered old memories—things better left in the past. They belonged to a different Roy Porter, a Roy Porter who hadn’t learned how life tends to cheat on you like an unfaithful wife. The name sounded familiar but slightly off key. Roy tried to grasp the memories, but they danced out of reach, teasing and tantalizing, like a woman. Like Rose.

He shook his head, trying to clear out the cobwebs.

“You all right?” Jim asked.

Jim parked the bike in front of Joey’s. The bar was on the south side of town, tucked between a convenience store and one of the slightly used clothing stores that were so popular. Roy climbed off the bike, having hardly noticed the ride over. Sometimes even bad memories had good side effects. “I’m fine,” Roy said.

Joey’s was a little place, and the atmosphere was just what Roy needed. The neon buzzed as they walked up. The W in Budweiser was burned out. The outside didn’t look promising, but inside felt like home.

Soft blue lighting kept the place mostly in shadow. Smoke clouded the air, but it didn’t gag him the way the incense had. He was used to this kind of smoke; he could live on it. There were only a few people in the booths along the side wall. The tables scattered across the floor were all clear, though a few had glasses sitting on soaked napkins.

A lone guitar wailed from the corner where a young, Black man sat on a dais singing “Steamroller Blues.” He finished the song and launched into a few original tunes then played a cover of a Jeff Healey song and ended with another original, which he dedicated to the memory of Stevie Ray Vaughan.

Jim stepped up to the bar, snagged a stool, and ordered two Buds. Roy sat next to him and nursed his beer, soaking up the blues.

After his set, the kid ambled up to the bar. Jim looked him up and down. The kid seemed a little nervous but played it off as if he were simply tired from having given so much of himself in his performance.

“Janet, can you get me a glass of water?” the kid asked. He looked at Jim as if he expected the big man to say something.

Up close, Peterson looked vaguely familiar. The bone structure of his face, the tilt of his nose. But he couldn’t be older than twenty-eight. Roy couldn’t have known him.

“You Lawrence Peterson?” Jim asked.

“That’s right.” His eyes twinkled with a flash of pride, and recognition clicked in Roy’s mind.

Roy butted in. “You’re ‘Slide’ Peterson’s boy!”

Peterson glanced at Roy and did a double take. His eyes widened just like his old man’s. “Roy Porter?” he said and Roy nodded. “Howlin’ Roy Porter?”

“Yep.”

He cracked a grin, and Roy found it contagious. Lawrence said, “My old man used to pull out the photo album and tell all about his adventures with you down in Mississippi. I always wondered how much he made up.”

“Knowing Slide, probably most of it.”

Lawrence laughed and clapped Roy on the shoulder. “Where you been staying? Dad used to say you’d taken the wrong path down at the Crossroads. He said you went searching for Robert Johnson—that the devil himself came a callin’.”

“I stay here in town,” Roy said. “So how is ol’ Slide?”

Lawrence’s smile faded and he looked at the floor. “He passed on a couple years back.”

“I’m sorry,” Roy said. “He was a good man.”

“Yeah, he was.” Lawrence turned to Jim and forced his smile to come back. “Did you know that Roy here had jam sessions with Muddy Waters and B.B. King?”

“It wasn’t a big deal,” Roy said, embarrassed. “Just a couple of songs played in small bars. I doubt if ol’ Blues Boy would even remember me.”

“Anyone who’s ever heard your voice will never forget it,” Lawrence said.

“The voice maybe, but me . . .” Roy trailed off, memories flooding in. Then he shook his head. “I’m just a nobody. I gave up that life a long time ago.”

“You know, the best show I ever saw wasn’t B.B. King or Stevie Ray Vaughan. It was you singing in a small bar in Arkansas. I was too young to be there, but the owner let me hang since he was good friends with my old man. You did a solo performance in a talent competition because you needed fifty bucks to pay the bills. You had nothing but a cheap harmonica, but you had such an amazing voice that people walking by on the street had to come in and sit down to listen. No one had ever heard such a voice.”

“That was a different lifetime,” Roy said.

“It’s not too late to get it back, Roy. Come on. Let’s play something.”

“I can’t.”

“What do you mean, you can’t? My old man told me that Willie Dixon asked you to sing with him on a record. You were invited to some major gigs.”

“That was a long time ago,” Roy said again. He had trouble believing that the offers had even been made. They seemed like something that had happened to someone else. “I wasn’t that good.”

“You were the best. From what I heard, you played a mean guitar and your voice could make a dead man dance.”

“I ain’t a singer, Lawrence.”

“Well, this is a small bar, and these people are too drunk to care how good you are. One song?”

Roy shook his head.

“You’re still hiding, aren’t you, Roy? Hiding from yourself.”

“No. I gave up singing for more important things.”

“What could be more important than the music?”

“I—”

“What, Roy? I can’t hear you.”

“I hate to break this up,” Jim said, “but we don’t have time for socializing.”

“Lawrence,” Roy said, “the guy who’s coming to my rescue here is Jim.”

“Hi, Jim. Maybe you can talk him into playing.”

“We don’t have time. We came here to ask you a few questions.”

“What kind of questions?”

“Well, I understand that you belong to a group of mystics. Have you ever heard of a man named Ken Hartford?”

“Yeah. He’s a mean son of a bitch.”

“Is he part of your outfit?”

“No way. He’s got several strings out of tune, if you know what I mean. He talks about summoning demons or some shit.”

“And no one in your group has ever tried to communicate with . . . spirits?”

“You don’t get it,” Lawrence said. “This Hartford cat didn’t want to talk to them; he wanted to conjure one up and set it free. He had a series of murders planned around one of the solstices—winter or summer, didn’t seem to matter much to him. He wanted to kill people and use their life forces to set it loose.”

“And he’d be the master, is that it?”

“No. He talked like there was this . . . thing that he belonged to and he was only following its orders.”

“And you think this thing is a demon?”

“No. That’s just what the others called it.”

“Do you think he has the power to pull it up?”

Lawrence grinned. “For me to believe that, I’d have to believe that his demon thing actually exists somewhere in the netherworld. Personally I think the guy belongs in a rubber room.”

“Back up,” Jim said. “You don’t think his demon exists?”

“To believe in demons, I’d have to believe in Heaven and Hell and God and Satan and angels and all that crap.”

Jim nodded. “I see.”

“I have another set in a minute. Roy, you sure you won’t join me?”

“My singing days are over,” Roy said.

“That’s a shame.” He turned back to Jim. “Anything else?”

“Yeah,” Jim said. “Do you have any idea where I can find Ken?”

Lawrence shook his head. “I’m afraid not.”

“Okay. Two more questions.”

“Shoot.”

“First, do you know where I can get in touch with the underground organization of mystics? They’re probably still calling themselves Safe Haven.”

“Yeah, but you won’t find Hartford there either. They have an organization of equals. They wouldn’t let him find them and even if he could, he wouldn’t be allowed to lead. He gave up on them.”

“That’s good.”

“What’s your second question?”

Jim smiled. “If you’re an atheist, how can you believe in magic?”

Lawrence returned the smile. “I don’t.” He stood up straight and took time to form his thoughts. “I believe in mystery. To a nonmusician, a guitarist seems to work magic in the creation of music. To an inartistic man, a painter seems to work magic by creating images out of color. As a mystic, I seem to work magic by seeking to experience and understand things normal men cannot. Everything I do is natural, and anyone armed with knowledge could do the same thing. There’s no such thing as magic.”