AHMM, March 2010

by Dell Magazine Authors

  "Unless you're in the slam doing twenty to life,” Deuce growled. Sweeping off his battered fisherman's cap, he held it out, upside down. “Okay guys, give it up. Chemistry in the hat, right now."

  Grumbling, Hezekiah tossed in a handful of Black Beauties, Punkin added a couple of joints and one of the roadies dropped a packet of crystal meth. That was it. Marching powder, nothing more. Despite the legends, most touring musicians don't do much dope. The road's steady grind is too brutal. Casual users find themselves in detox, serious junkies end up dead on the floor in some unholy bathroom.

  Deuce trotted backstage to the dressing room to flush the stash while the rest of the crew began ripping into the equipment like Huns sacking Rome, dismantling the sound gear and lighting FX with practiced ease.

  Leaving them to it, Murph waded back into the milling crowd, heading for Kowalski's office. First rule of the road: nem de gelt. Get the money.

  For once, getting paid was a snap. With cops crawling all over the place, Kowalski didn't gripe or try to haggle. Counted out two thousand with a tight smile instead. It was only a tenth of what the Kurves earned in their glory days, but the seventies were long gone. Kowalski thanked Murph for a great show, rebooked the band for a date in the fall, then hustled him the hell out of the office. Nothing personal. Having lawmen anywhere near his books gave Big Jim the jits.

  Murphy spent the next half hour glad handing, making nice, signing CD jackets and autographs, while pumping strangers for information. Most of them saw even less than he did; they'd been focused on the show. But he kept at it and gradually assembled a picture of what happened.

  Eddie had arrived halfway through the last set, which was unusually late for him. There was a jam at the entrance, a cluster of latecomers paying admission, getting patted down for booze or weapons. A scuffle broke out at the rear of the line. Nobody saw it clearly, but Eddie came staggering in, blood streaming down his shirt. And collapsed.

  A nurse from the crowd tried to stanch his wounds, but Eddie was already fading, eyes empty, mumbling, blood drooling from his mouth.

  "Look, I got warrants out on me, so I ain't talkin’ to no cops,” a tattooed Hell's Angel told Murph, “but I seen that poor bastard get shanked. No warning, no scuffle. He got it from behind, two, three times quick. Like a jailhouse thing, you know?"

  "Did you see the guy who did it?"

  "Ain't sure it was a guy. Had long brown hair, could've been a woman. Whoever it was followed ... what was his name?"

  "Eddie Martinson."

  "Whatever. Anyway, the one who cut him trailed him through the door, stuck him, grabbed his briefcase, and took off. One of the bouncers chased him outside, got clocked for his troubles. Heard he was still unconscious when they loaded him into the ambulance."

  Beyond that, Murph got zip. A few people remembered seeing Eddie around, but nobody knew him, not even his name. In small-town clubs, everybody knows everybody, but in big-city arenas you play to two thousand strangers.

  After Murph told Morales what he'd learned, she kept her word and cut the Kurves loose. The guys were out on the road by three a.m., rolling south for Cincy.

  "Thanks for holding up your end,” Murph said. “Unfortunately, my car's back at the motel. Can you give me a lift?"

  * * * *

  "I thought detectives always worked in pairs,” Murph said. “Why are you working this alone?” They were in Morales's unmarked car, heading for his motel.

  "In case you hadn't heard, Detroit's in the dumper, Mr. Murphy. The auto biz is migrating overseas and taking the tax base with it. The Motown force is so shorthanded, detectives only pair up for high profile cases like gang bangs or mob hits. Bar fights are fairly low priority."

  "This wasn't a bar fight, Sarge."

  "Why do you say that?"

  "Because I've seen a million of ‘em. Mostly, they start over nothing. Some guy smiles at the wrong woman or bumps the wrong stud, they trade words, then graduate to push and shove. It keeps ratcheting up until somebody gets stomped, or cut. Or maybe shot."

  "Which is death by natural causes in this town,” Morales sighed. “They don't call Motown the Murder City for nothing."

  "But this one didn't start slow and build up. Whoever did Eddie trailed him in from the parking lot and did him without a word. There wasn't any scuffle, he never had a chance."

  "And all this for a briefcase full of old records?” Morales said, her tone neutral.

  "I really don't know,” Murph said, massaging his eyes as she pulled into the motel driveway. “You want to come in for a nightcap?"

  "Are you kidding? It's four in the morning."

  "Where else can you get a drink at this hour? Besides, you've got a gun, all I have is my raffish charm."

  "Then I'd say you're armed and dangerous,” Morales said dryly. But she followed him into his room. Which surprised him.

  It shouldn't have. Morales strolled casually around, checking the closets, giving the room a quick visual search.

  "I thought I'd be pulling out tonight so my bags are already packed. You're welcome to search them if you like."

  She glanced at him, straight on, startling him again with those ebony eyes, dark as jet and just as unreadable. “You wouldn't make the offer if there was anything to find, Murphy. Your answering machine's blinking. Would you like me to wait outside?"

  "I've got nothing to hide from you,” he said, switching on the box. “You're welcome to listen. Hell, take notes if you want."

  The first call was from a booking agent who needed a warm-up act for a concert in Moline. “No can do,” Murph muttered. “We've got back to back shows in Chicago that weekend."

  The second call was from Neil Diamond's road manager. Their drummer was down with flu, they needed a fill-in who could read charts.

  "Neil Diamond knows you?” Morales said, arching an eyebrow. “I'm impressed. But why would he ask you for help? Aren't you guys the competition?"

  "On the road we're more like an extended family,” Murph shrugged. “Rock'n'roll saloon society. I'll call Neil back tomorrow, pass along a couple of names. Maybe he'll return the favor down the line. Or not. Nobody really keeps score...” He broke off as the third message played.

  "Hey Murph, It's Eddie. Listen, I got something that'll blow your mind, man. I need your help to sort it all out, though. I can't trust anybody else. I'll explain when I catch you at the show, but here's a taste...” Some rattling as he fumbled with his phone ... then a crackle of background static.

  "Everybody know this one?” a man said, thumping out a boogie rhythm on an acoustic guitar. Other instruments joined in. Piano, bass, drums. A bit ragged at first, but quickly settling into a rock solid groove on “The House of Blue Lights,” an old forties blues jam. The guitarist cut loose, soloing over the riff...

  "Holy smoke!” Murph said, frowning. “That guy's incredible."

  "Who—?” He waved her to silence, still listening intently. Damn. The player sounded familiar—but before Murph could put a name to the style, Eddie broke in again.

  "Can you believe it, Murph?” he yelled. “It's like Christmas and New Years and the Fourth of freakin’ July all rolled into one! See you at the show."

  The machine clicked off. Morales was staring at him.

  "That was Eddie,” Murph said. “So whoever stole his briefcase probably scored a bootleg tape of ... whoever the hell that guitarist was."

  "You don't know? Eddie apparently thought you would."

  "My head's still humming from my own show, lady, but the guy did sound familiar. Not many people can play an acoustic with that kind of fire."

  "Some rising star?"

  "Not likely. Eddie was as stuck in the seventies as we are. Loved the old songs, remembered them from when they were new. And we were too."

  "Can I have a copy of the tape?"

  "Take the original,” Murph said, popping the cassette out of the machine. “How about that nightcap? Or maybe a late supper? Room service runs all night."
<
br />   "Thanks, but I'd better get back to the station.” She traded him a business card for the tape. “If you think of anything relevant, you can reach me at this number."

  "What if I just want to talk to you? About the weather or the news of the world?"

  "Anything you say can be used against you in a court of law."

  "That's cold, Morales. Am I still a suspect?"

  "Nope, but my mama warned me about guitar players, Murphy. Thanks for the tape. I've got to get back to work."

  "You're sure you don't want to frisk me or something?” he called after her. She waved over her shoulder without turning.

  Murph flopped on the bed, totally exhausted, but not a bit sleepy. Haunted by the excitement in Eddie's voice. He'd heard it before. The first time he'd met Eddie back in ... when? Seventy-one, maybe. They were both just kids, then, Eddie barely old enough to drink, Murph and the Kurves on the road promoting their first album. Vinyl LPs in those days.

  He closed his eyes, trying to remember what Eddie was raving about the first time they met ... oh hell yes. He was all pumped up about Woodstock, what else? The high point of his young life. A half million freaks camped out for three days in upstate New York in the rain and the mud, high on hope and a newfound sense of community, the haze of reefer smoke so potent you could cop a buzz just by breathing. And all that incredible music, fresh and free and soaring ... Murph let himself drift away into a reverie, back to earlier times, and old friends.

  To Eddie. Back when they were punk kids, wired up on music and life and, hell, just being young.

  Flash forward a few years, to another show, another club. Eddie morphing into a straight citizen now, with his hair cut short and a steady job working for the city of Detroit. Still a hippie at heart, though, loving the music to death.

  By the next show, Eddie'd put on a few pounds. Told Murph he'd gotten married, but hadn't brought his wife along. And he looked pained when Murph offered his congratulations.

  Murph found out why a few years later. Flash forward to—when? The mid eighties? Somewhere in there. A summer concert, outdoors, in a park. Murph couldn't remember the venue, but the Kurves weren't headliners anymore. They were opening for Bob Seger and the Silver Bullet Band, strictly a warm-up act. Eddie didn't seem to notice though, still treated them like rock'n'roll demigods.

  He brought his wife to that show. Marge? Something like that. She was younger and better looking than Murph expected, but a stone redneck, dumb as a box of rocks. And she definitely wasn't a Kurves fan. Made a big point of telling Murph how much she loved Garth Brooks and Achy Breaky Cyrus. Eddie was embarrassed.

  Murph noticed Eddie was going a little gray, his hair thinning out. How old was he then? Thirty-five? Maybe forty? Sadly, Murph realized he could almost mark the passages of his life in Eddie's face. Woodstock seemed like ancient history and—Sweet Jesus! Woodstock!

  Murph snapped awake, sitting bolt upright in bed. Jangled, shaken. He sensed Eddie's presence in the room so strongly that he checked the shadows in the corners to be sure he was really alone. Eddie. God, the dream had seemed so real...

  But he was wide awake now and desperately trying to focus. Trying to remember every magical note that guitarist played.

  * * * *

  The address on Morales's card was 1300 Beaubien, Detroit P.D. headquarters, a ten story concrete tenement in the dark heart of the city, eighty years old and showing every day of it. Just inside the front door, water was dripping from the stained ceiling tiles into a galvanized bucket. It hadn't rained in days.

  Murph gave a bored patrolman at the counter Morales's card. The patrolman made a call, and a few minutes later, she stepped out of a corridor and waved him down to the end of the counter away from the duty officer.

  Minus her jacket, she looked even more striking than before, he thought. A bit bleary, but otherwise unfazed by the all-night shift. Not conventionally pretty, but not a woman you'd forget, either.

  "What are you doing here, Murphy? It's six in the morning."

  "I know. Ordinarily I'd be tailing our tour bus into Ohio about now, scouting for a place to have breakfast. But you said to call if something came up. Something did. What did Eddie say to that nurse about our music?"

  "What? You came down here to ask me that?"

  "I wouldn't ask if it wasn't important. What did he say? Exactly?"

  "Uhh...” She pursed her lips, her eyes going vague as she scanned her memory. “The nurse said he was mumbling ... something about hating your music."

  "Did he hate music? Or hate tapes?"

  "C'mon, the poor bastard was bleeding out at the time, I doubt she got it verbatim. What difference does it make?"

  "Have you notified his wife yet?"

  "Of course. Right after I dropped you at your motel."

  "Was she all right?"

  "Seemed to be, under the circumstances. Why?"

  "We've got to get back there, right now. She could be in serious trouble."

  "What kind of trouble? What are you talking about?"

  "There's no time! I'll tell you on the way. Maybe I can even tell you why Eddie got killed."

  * * * *

  Six in the morning, the rush to beat the rush in downtown Motown was well underway, jamming the city streets with morning madness. Morales scarcely noticed, racing through traffic with lights and sirens, weaving between semis and minivans like a NASCAR pro stocker while Murph clung to the crash bar for dear life.

  "Talk fast, Murphy, and it better be good. What's the story?"

  "How much do you know about rock'n'roll? The history of it, I mean?"

  "History? I don't have time for—"

  "It's important! How much?"

  "Okay, okay! Elvis, the Beatles, the hippies, disco,” she recited, throwing the car into a power slide onto a freeway ramp, heading downriver to Ecorse. “How am I doing?"

  "You'd scare Bobby Unser to death. You've heard of Woodstock, right?"

  "Sure. Hippie kids, drugs, and mud."

  "And music. Jimi Hendrix played that festival, with Janis Joplin, Santana and twenty more dynamite acts. Singing to a half million kids in the rain. The music was new, cities and bras were burning, the country was torn up by Vietnam. Wild freakin’ times."

  "Before my time,” she said. “What about it?"

  "The summer of 1970, when Janis Joplin was at the peak of her fame, she owned a party house in Frisco's Haight-Ashbury district. A big, sprawling place, blowout parties every night. Every superstar passing through Frisco that summer came by to jam. Jimi Hendrix, Roy Orbison, The Dead, the Allman Brothers, Otis Redding. Everybody! Young geniuses playing for each other and the sheer joy of it. Clapton and Steve Stills swapping licks behind Joplin with the Mamas and Papas doo-wopping the background."

  "Party house, jam sessions, got it,” she nodded, whipping around a semi like it was posed for a painting. “So?"

  "At some point during that summer, one of Joplin's road crew miked up the playroom and began taping the sessions. Got a lot of stoner party chat and road stories. And some of the most incandescent music ever created. Pure gold. But that fall, Janis Joplin and Jimi Hendrix died within a few weeks of each other. Overdosed. Joplin's band broke up and her crew scattered. The roadie with the tapes went on a toot. Cocaine for the pain."

  "What happened to him?"

  "A few years later he showed up at Capitol Records in L.A., tried to peddle the tapes, but he was such a burnout their security bounced him. Word got out about the tapes, though, to people who knew about the parties and what the Haight tapes would be worth."

  "Haight tapes,” she nodded, “as in Haight-Ashbury tapes. So? Would they be valuable?"

  He risked a sidelong glance as she cut between a cattle truck and a Greyhound bus. “Are you serious? New music from Joplin or Jimi Hendrix, with an all-star backup band? Any three-minute tune could be a million seller, and that roadie taped three hundred hours' worth. It'd be the hottest bootleg ever made. Priceless."

  "Or jus
t an urban legend."

  "That's what I always thought. Until I heard Eddie's message tonight. That's Jimi Hendrix playing acoustic guitar on a song I know damned well he never recorded."

  "How can you be sure?"

  "The same way you know your mama on the phone as soon as she says hi. It's Jimi all right, but even if it's not, somebody apparently thought so. Ask Eddie."

  "How did your friend get the tapes?"

  "I don't know, probably turned them up in an old house. He was a master scrounger."

  "But if the tapes were cut in Frisco—?"

  "The roadie was from here. His road handle was Motown Mike. I think Eddie found Mike's stash, and somebody killed him for it."

  "Like who?"

  "That's your department, Morales. I'm more worried about the rest of those tapes. Eddie's briefcase could only hold four or five reels. The others are still out there somewhere. If Eddie kept them at his house, his wife might be in a serious jam."

  "Or not. How well do you know her?"

  "Only met her once. Her name's Marge, I think. A bottle blonde, built like a brick house and dim as a five-watt bulb. Why?"

  "Know what the worst part of my job is? Telling a victim's family that daddy's not coming home. But not this time. Eddie's wife seemed more edgy than heartbroken. No tears, no wailing. When I asked her about it, she said they were in the middle of a divorce, like that explained everything. Everybody reacts to bad news differently, so I didn't think much of it at the time, but now..."

  "You think she might be involved?” Murph asked.

  "I think I'm damn sure gonna ask."

  * * * *

  Ecorse is only a few miles downriver from metro Detroit, but much of the town feels like a thousand miles farther south, all the way to Alabama. Soot-stained houses, rental units, and mobile home parks. Backcountry folks who moved north seeking streets of gold ended up sweating like field hands at Ford Rouge or Great Lakes Steel. Even the locals call Ecorse hillbilly heaven.

  "You stay in the car,” Morales said, wheeling her unmarked prowlie across the narrow driveway. “I'll handle this.” She stalked up the narrow walk to the front door. Murph watched her go, enjoying the view. Wondering what she'd look like in a dress. Or out of one. Shook off the thought.