In his old blue Pontiac Catalina and his new blue K-mart pants, Lacey Lockington closed in on the Club Crossroads. It was set back some seventy-five yards south of Mahoning Avenue, the several acres surrounding it covered by neatly yellow-lined blacktop. A half-dozen uniformed men patroled the expanse, waving flashlights, shouting instructions, guiding automobiles into parking slots. It was shortly before ten o’clock on the last Saturday evening in May, the Ohio night air was balmy. There was a fragrant light breeze out of the west, there were more stars than Lockington had seen in one sky since he’d been in Vietnam, there was a huge yellow crescent moon nuzzling the flank of a wispy stray cloud. A carnival atmosphere drenched the parking area, men laughed, women tittered, and Lockington slammed the Pontiac’s rusty door, joining the holiday weekend throng in the long hike across the macadam to the big red building with the bright green neon CLUB CROSSROADS sprawled across its roof peak.
He passed a belligerent-looking security man at the entrance and he paused momentarily, taking in his surroundings before seating himself at a small rough-hewn table, the splintered surface of which supported a black tin ashtray and a guttering candle in a red glass chimney. There were more than a hundred such tables, Lockington figured. They poked mushroomlike from the sawdust floor, encircling the gaunt wooden stage in the center of the place, and better than half of them were occupied at that comparatively early nightclubbing hour. The Club Crossroads bar took up the entire east wall of the building. It was crowded, its five blue-jacketed bartenders hustling to handle the demand. A dozen or so young ladies wearing floppy western hats, sequined shirts, imitation cowhide vests, brown corduroy shorts, and highheeled cowboy boots ranged the compound, smiling, chatting, jotting orders on pads. One of them pulled up at Lockington’s elbow and he asked for a bottle of Rolling Rock beer. She nodded and moved on, pausing at other tables on her way to the service bar. Lockington leaned back on a wobbly wooden chair, lighting a cigarette, frowning an appreciative frown. In a financially depressed area the Club Crossroads amounted to a major league operation.
The beer arrived—one dollar fifty, a fair nightclub price. In Chicago it was averaging two and a half in the sleaziest of joints. Lockington handed his waitress three singles, accepting fifty cents in change. He said, “When does Pecos Peggy come on?”
The girl tilted the brim of her Stetson, glancing at an old-fashioned Sessions clock high on the wall. “Right away—about ten minutes. She works half hour on, half hour off.”
He’d just started on his second bottle of Rolling Rock when the turnout began to murmur. Then the Club Crossroads erupted in a jungle roar and Lockington turned to the stage. Pecos Peggy was coming up the steps, waving, smiling, some five feet eight inches of dark-haired lissome female clad in a skin-tight short black satin dress, black-seamed fishnet stockings, and four-inch-heeled red pumps. There was a tight double strand of pearls at her throat and a slim bold bracelet on her right wrist. John Sebulsky had been dead right—she was beautiful, nearly as beautiful as Natasha Gorky, and her eyes were as blue as an October sky. She paused on the lip of the stage, a veteran show-woman, sizing up her audience before lifting a hand microphone from its stand and stepping to centerstage, laughing now, waiting for the commotion to die down. She was queen of the Club Crossroads, mistress of all she surveyed, the darling of that multitude, and she knew it. The overhead lights dimmed and there was something undeniably regal about Pecos Peggy when she turned to her lead guitar player, a slim, bearded, hatchet-faced fellow in gray denim jacket and jeans. She said, “Marty, let’s kick it off with ‘Down to My Last Broken Heart.’” The crowd roared affirmation of her choice and Marty twanged out an introduction, repeating it several times before the torrent of sound subsided.
Then Pecos Peggy was clutching the mike with both hands, holding it as she might have held the face of a midnight lover, singing to it, not at it. Her left foot was planted forward, her right leg was slightly cocked at the knee, she was leaning into her song, feeling it, caressing it, giving of herself. This was no gravel-throated hog-caller from southeastern Georgia. Her voice was gentle, crystal clear, her tremolo controlled; she had range, dropping to low notes effortlessly, floating to upper registers with unconcerned ease. Her stage mannerisms reminded Lockington of Bobbie Jo Pickens, but they were less pronounced. Bobbie Jo’s bawdy gaudiness wasn’t there, and he didn’t miss it. She was a singer, not a belter, a portrait in oils, not a cartoon, and when she’d finished “Down to My Last Broken Heart,” Lockington found himself on his feet, joining in the tumult. He was no critic, country music had never topped his list of preferences, but if Bobbie Jo Pickens had been good, Pecos Peggy was excellent.
She sang “I Wish That I Could Fall in Love Today” and the roof nearly came off the Club Crossroads. She took a short breather, stepping to one side, snapping her fingers, doing a nifty little dance step to an instrumental of “Roadside Rag.” When it was over, she thanked her musicians, introducing them individually, then collectively as “the best darned country band in the business,” leading the applause for them. Then she took a deep breath, lifted the mike close to her lips, and slid into “Does Fort Worth Ever Cross Your Mind?” That threw the switch. Lockington counted half a dozen simultaneous but unrelated fistfights at the bar, three more at the tables. Bouncers materialized, moving in with barracuda speed, tossing the brawlers about like cordwood, sifting them, ejecting the chaff from the building. Pecos Peggy sang on, covering the ruckus with “Break It to Me Gently,” and “Old Flames Can’t Hold a Candle to You.” The big red barn on Mahoning Avenue was filling with people, swelling with sound, Pecos Peggy was an event—with one more like her, the wrong promoter could have started World War III. When she left the stage at ten-thirty, tripping light-footedly down the bouncer-lined sawdust aisle leading to her dressing room, the crowd went limp, like a fighter on his ring-stool, conserving energy for the next round.
Lockington’s waitress returned and he ordered another bottle of Rolling Rock before taking the flyer he’d come prepared to take. He tossed a five-dollar bill onto her tray. He said, “Tell Pecos Peggy that a friend of Rufe Devereaux is in the audience—tell her that he’d like to meet her.”
The girl’s face was blank, the name meant nothing to her, but she tucked the money into a pocket of her imitation cowhide vest. She said, “Rufe Dev-er-oo?”
Lockington nodded. “You got it—‘Dev-er-oo.’”
The waitress frowned. “Okay, I’ll tell her, but you’re wasting your time—Peggy doesn’t date customers.”
“Honey, I’m not trying to date her—Peggy and I had a mutual acquaintance, there’s nothing more to it than that.”
“Had, did you say?”
“That’s right, had—he’s dead.”
“Oh—well, I’m—I’m sorry. Does Peggy know?”
“Probably.”
She turned toward the service bar, picking up an order at a table of four on her way. In a couple of minutes she was back with Lockington’s Rolling Rock. She said, “I’m going on break now—I’ll talk to Peggy.”
Lockington nodded, sipping at his beer. A wild goose chase, possibly, but an empty matchbook had brought him 425 miles to the Club Crossroads, and a beautiful dark-haired, blue-eyed woman had accompanied Rufe Devereaux to Chicago, or so the story had gone. The matchbook was real, so was the thousand dollars that’d come with it, and Pecos Peggy was a beautiful dark-haired, blue-eyed woman.
In a few minutes the waitress was back, plunking a fresh bottle of Rolling Rock on Lockington’s table. She said, “That’s on Peggy.”
Lockington said, “My thanks.”
She took a small lavender-colored card from her vest pocket, handed it to him, and left without another word. Lockington cupped the card in his hand, peering at it in surreptitious fashion like a spy in a B-movie, he thought. The ink was blue, the handwriting dead-vertical, the handwriting of a woman who stood squarely on her own two feet. Clancy’s—Market St.—Boardman—1:45. Lockington finished his beer.
In the parking lot he approached an attendant, a big bushy-haired man. He said, “Where the hell is Boardman?”
The attendant said, “Any particular place in Boardman?”
“Yeah—Clancy’s on Market Street.”
“You’re new in the area, right?”
“Right.”
The attendant scratched his head. “Well, let’s see—I’m gonna try to make this simple, understand?”
“I understand.”
“Okay, a stranger’s best bet would be to drive east on Mahoning Avenue and pick up six-eighty just this side of the bridge. Check?”
“Check.”
“All right, stay on six-eighty like maybe ten minutes to the Canfield exit. The Canfield exit will put you on two-twenty-four headed west—got that?”
“Got it.”
“You’ll go a couple miles and there’ll be a big hairy-assed shopping center on your left—that’ll be Southern Park Mall and the next traffic light will be at the Market Street intersection. Okay?”
“Okay.”
“Turn left on Market—you’ll be in Boardman, heading south, and Clancy’s will be out there a little better than a mile, right-hand side—small joint, big red neon sign.”
Lockington said, “Nice place?”
“Matter of opinion—they got women and a late license, but if you’re looking for a high you don’t have to drive clear to Clancy’s.”
“No?”
“There’s a couple joints out on Meridian Road, couple more down on Steel Street.”
Lockington said, “I’ll pass.”
The attendant shrugged, turning away to handle an incoming car.
Lockington said, “Thanks, chief.”
“Any time.”
Lockington got into his Pontiac and the attendant threw him a highball with his flashlight. Lockington waved, easing out of the parking lot, liking the brusque friendliness of Youngstown people, wondering about the out-of-the-blue reference to cocaine, then shrugging. Cocaine had become a way of life in Emlenton, Pennsylvania and Anderson, Indiana. New York was up to its ears in the stuff, so was Chicago, so was Los Angeles, and there was no reason for Youngstown, Ohio, to be an exception. You could purchase it in municipal buildings, in schools, on playgrounds, in churches, and messing with it was like raising a king cobra. If it didn’t kill you today, it’d get you tomorrow—it wasn’t a matter of if, it was a matter of when. Lockington was a pragmatist—if a man was determined to commit suicide, a .38 slug through the temple was quicker and less expensive.
He’d swung right on Mahoning Avenue and he found the 680 entrance right where the parking lot attendant had said it’d be—at the west end of the bridge.