In another room a deep, portentous voice was reeling off a potted history of country, sprinkling the saga with the occasional anecdote.
“Music for the heart, not for the head. For the soul of decent folks. It’s not smart music for bankers and lawyers, though some of the biggest fans have been professional men and women.” There was a screen showing a succession of faces and scenes that had somehow gotten out of sync with the commentary, so a picture of the great Willie Nelson was identified as someone called Cornpone Cawson, the Hayseed Hick.
“Many greats of the industry, like Johnny Cash, worked as sharecroppers and came from dirt-poor families. Others, riding the high wave, tried to make similar claims. It was often said that the only cotton some of them picked was out of the top of aspirin bottles.”
“I’ve had enough,” Mildred said when they were about halfway through the echoing vault.
Doc cleared his throat. “I must admit that I have seldom if ever seen such a tarnished collection of rubbish and outright quackery and poodle-fakery. How they have the damned nerve to try to charge for people to come and admire this rubbish is quite beyond me.”
“Because there’s nothing else, Doc,” Ryan said. “And when you got almost nothing, then even a real poor something’s better than that.”
“A philosophical truism, I suspect, my dear comrade,” Doc agreed.
“Exit’s over there,” Jak said.
They passed a large display, behind chipped sec glass, of rare records, most of them in ancient vinyl, nearly all showing an aged yellow label and the word Sun.
Mildred peered at them, shading her eyes against the reflected light from the strips of harsh overhead neon, exclaiming at the rarity of some of the disks, then noticing the prices handprinted underneath.
“It’s the album Waylon, Willie, Kris and Johnny cut together. I used to own this and nearly wore it out. Dates roughly from the 1990s. Title track’s one of the finest country songs I ever heard. Jesus! Look at what they’re asking for it.”
J.B. joined her, taking off his glasses to read it more clearly. “Dark night! You could buy a pair of matched dragoons in the original box for that kind of jack.”
Ryan laughed. “Least you buy blasters you can get to use them. Buy that record and what the triple-chill you going to play it on? Number of working players for that sort of disk that I’ve seen in Deathlands Reckon that I could probably count them on the fingers of both hands.”
“Yeah, but the really wealthy barons could probably afford one. Like this Countess Katya that Sullivan was talking about. Maybe we should buy her a record as a kind of peace offering for when we reach her ville.”
“Day I buy presents for barons, male or female, is the day I head for the rocking chair on the porch, so I can sit and rest alongside old Mose,” Ryan said.
“Who’s old Mose?” Jak asked.
“Just sort of a name.” Ryan scratched his head. “Don’t rightly know where it came from, either. Guess there must once have been a real Mose who wanted a rocking chair.”
NIGHT HAD FALLEN FULLY over Country Row as they stepped out of the exhibition, along a concrete corridor that smelted vaguely of piss, pushing open a swing-barred door into an alley off the main drag.
As the steel door swung shut behind them, it muffled the overbearing noise of the relentless music.
Mildred took a deep breath. “That was a serious disappointment,” she said. “Country’s such a great and positive force for good. Combine it with a little old-fashioned rock, and you’ve just about got my favorite music. But what they had in there” She made a gesture of contempt. “Just a cheap way of getting a fast buck. Peddled like it all fell off the back of a wag and nobody gives a shit. What I’d like right now is to find a quiet bar and wash some of that taste out of my mouth.”
“Sounds good,” Jak said, clapping his long white hands softly.
Ryan led them out into the street. It was fairly quiet, with the various bars and eateries lining the strip. Most of them were ornamented with colored lights, some of them spelling out the names. Music filtered out from behind a variety of swing doors.