Chapter 39

The taxi back from Brooklyn is a bit of a squeeze. Big Sal and three of the girls are crammed into it with all my new suits, a charcoal stripe, a brown check searsucker, and a white tux. A dozen shirts, 3 pairs of shoes, cotton underwear and a new Derby hat. I still smell of fried fish, but we are all used to now. Once back in Sal’s room I open a bottle of bourbon and we all take a pull on it. Sal shoos the others away and runs me a bath. My fishy clothes she throws out of the window. Someone will be thankful for them. Once I am clean of fish, Sal washes herself, and then joins me on the bed. I have on my clean undergarments, socks and my new hat. Sal is naked. Without clothes the full voluptuousness of her is very evident. She is not really fat just bigger all around than the average flapper.  In my guise as Fats I am big too. We fill the bed with nothing to spare, and in my guise as Fats I like what I see. Through the open window the sound of the city in full throttle is as good as a lullaby and we are both asleep before any intercourse can take place.

I wake late, Sal has gone downstairs to work her shift, but has left me a note. It reads.

Call  CH 4001. CH stands for Chelsea, that’s a Manhattan number.

I put on my new charcoal brownstripe, a pink shirt and black brogues.  I look cool I must admit. I go out to the diner and dial the number from the pay booth.

‘Stork Club’

‘I got a message to call you’

‘You Fats?’

‘Yeah’

‘You free tonight’

‘For a fee’

‘Hows 5c’s grab you’

Sounds fine, where you at?’

‘Corner w22nd and 10^th be here at 10.30’

I check the clock on the wall. 9.10 time for a snack. I order steak and eggs. The waitress is the same one as this morning.

Maybe she does a split shift. I eat my steak and order apple pie and ice cream. I leave her a good tip and head off to w22nd St. Chelsea is a bit off the normal music beat, or maybe I’ve been away too long. The place is a one story dive at the end of a row of four story brownstones. The words Empire Diner have been badly painted over and a pink neon sign hangs over the doorway saying Stork Club. I should have a bad feeling about it but my instinct for trouble has deserted me. The fact that I am prossed up as Fats doesn’t mean that I can’t be hurt. Anyway a gig’s a gig. I push through the swing doors.

The interior is plush. Someone has gone to a lot of expense to make this joint look like the Ritz. The hat check girl asks for my Derby but I keep it on. It is a sort of trademark. A few punters are at the bar, but the tables by the dance floor are empty. Set for dinner with flutes and silverware, fancy folded napkins, but empty. The stage is small taken up with a drum kit a bass and a baby grand. I try out the top keys. Perfectly tuned. I run my right hand down the length of the key board. Not a bum note among them. This bodes well. May as well get a drink. I go over to the bar and order a bourbon on the rocks and reach for my wallet.

‘You have a tab Mr Waller, all on the house’

Well this makes a change an establishment that treats musicians like human beings. I down the contents in one and my glass is immediately filled. I like this joint.

Zutty Singleton  walks in. he must be booked to play drums.

‘Hi Zut, who’s on bass?’

‘I think it’s Slam’

‘Slam Stewart, wow that’s great man, I haven’t seen him for a while.’

‘He’s been playing with Slim Gaillard. As Slim and Slam.’

Now there is a big man, he holds the bass like it’s a guitar, and he don’t need no amplification neither. When he plucks them strings, they can be heard in Yonkers.

‘Have a drink man, I got me a tab.’

Zutty has a bourbon like me and I take another  hit.

The barman keeps em coming and me and Zutty keep downing em. I have a large capacity I can drink all night and just keep a gentle buzz. I hope this joint know that I can wrack up a bar tab faster than Jessie Owens can do the 100 dash.

Just as I’m getting into my stride. A big Smuck in a tux says I should start my act. There is still no one at the tables, but I’m paid to play so I seat myself at the piano. Zut tunes up the drums and in walks Slam. He picks up the bass as if it is a toy banjo and hits a walking intro. Zutty takes up the tempo and I hit the keys. We are in business. After a few numbers there is a lot of activity by the hat check. A group of wise guys with long legged blondes fill the tables. So that is the scene. The mob owns the joint. Out front, at the first table sits The Man. He has a 1000 dollar suit on and a tie pin with a diamond the size of an egg. His broad is the spit of Veronica. I do a double take and eyeball her. If she is Veronica she shows no sign of recognition. I do my best Uncle Joe impression and ham it up to great effect. My fingers are on automatic and Slam and Zutty are with me. All the tables are filled now with bosses at the front, lieutenants in the second row, and soldiers at the back. No one has taken to the dance floor, so I up the tempo and hope for a couple to start the ball rolling. From the wings come the floor show. This is great surprise to me.  But being a true pro I take it in my stride.

The Nicholas Brothers Fayard Antonio Nicholas  & Harold Lloyd Nicholas are a tap dancing legend.

They grew up in Philadelphia, the sons of musicians who played in their own band at the old Standard Theater, their mother at the piano and father on drums. At the age of three, Fayard was always seated in the front row while his parents worked, and by the time he was ten, he had seen most of the great African American Vaudeville acts, particularly the dancers, including such notables of the time as Alice Whitman, Willie Bryant and Bill Robinson. Neither Fayard nor Harold had any formal dance training.They became the featured act at Harlem's Cotton Club in 1932, when Harold was 11 and Fayard was 18. They were the only entertainers in the African American cast allowed to mingle with white patrons.

In that exhilarating hybrid of tap dance, ballet and acrobatics, sometimes called acrobatic dancing or "flash dancing," no individual or group surpassed the effect that the Nicholas Brothers had on audiences and on other dancers.

Yeh that is who just blew in. They weren’t the tallest people you ever met, but what they lacked in stature they made up for in talent and shear energy.

The curtains at the back of the stage opened to reveal a broad flight of stairs. The brothers danced up these and descended doing leapfrogs over one another landing in the splits on every step. Zutty giving a clash on the cymbal  on each landing. Then they jumped up on my piano and leaped from it also ending in the splits and rising from the floor by closing their legs, not using the hands. Incredible.

This got the crowd excited they were on their feet clapping and stamping, calling for more. The brothers asked me to play “Stormy Weather”  and they obliged with a tap routine that would have had Fred Astaire green with envy.

Follow that. We couldn’t and announced a break.

The big cheese asked me over and told me to sit down.

‘Fats, you know that cat house up on east 116 ?’

 He don’t give me time to answer. ‘Well I want a piece of it. Hear you’re friendly with the natives. So you can do me a big favour and tell ‘em I need to do business and set up a meet.’ He pokes me in the chest. ‘You can do that for me?’

This does not sound like a request. It’s a do it or else type of request. What can I do?

So I say yes.

He turns to Veronica who is not Veronica.

‘Tell Fats where and when, I’ve got some other business in the back.’

Veronica who is not Veronica who I shall call V2, until I find out her name, takes out a silver pencil and writes on a napkin and hands it to me. No smile no recognition, and I notice that her eyes are brown with no hint of pink. Her nose is a little longer and she is slightly plumper. Bigger breasts and a rounder ass.

‘Thanks’, I say. Then I add.

‘You have a look of Veronica lake about you, what do I call you?’

‘All out of a bottle honey, and a bit of the knife.’ She says this in a broad Bronx accent. ‘He’, she nods towards The John. ‘Likes Veronica Lake, goes to all her movies, tried to bribe her once into sleeping with him, but she is top drawer, gave him the big heave ho. So he had me remodeled.’

‘Looks good, you had me fooled.’

She smiles and then holds my arm. ‘Be careful he can be quite a prick. Oh and you can call me Babs’

About 3 am  I notice the  tall figure of Slim Gaillard  at the bar, he is a very handsome black guy with a pencil moustache, his hair is slicked back and he has a grin as wide as the Brooklyn bridge. He comes over and gives me a high five and greets Slam with a Vooty o Rooty.

He sits next to me on the stool and plays the into’ to “Dunkin’ Bagels.” Slam takes it up by bowing his bass, then me and Slim vocalize the lyrics, which are very simple.

Dunkin Bagels

Dunkin Bagels

Plop in the coffee.

It all goes down well with the late hangers on, so we play 

“Cement Mixer” (putty putty).

Eventually when the last drunk leaves we call it a night. Slim asks if I want to go onto a secret bar he knows up in the 90’s but I’m whacked and give him a rain check.

Slim leaves with Slam and Zut.  Babs  gives me my 5c fee and says to remember he can be a Prick.

                                                                        ****************

In some stories a chapter will tell what the other side is doing. Give you an angle from their point of view. The problem is this is real life man, I don’t know what Doil thinks nor do I have a channel into the thinking of the IGBI. They are a fucking mystery and no mistake. So you will have to wait it out with me, when I know it, you will know it. You might decide it’s not worth hanging around for. Don’t let me stop you. But if you want to know if the galaxy is saved from a super nova then keep reading.