“Many, many,” Linc answered with a chuckle. “About the time of the Civil War and twenty years after. He died in 1885 when he was about my age.”
“I think I’ve heard of him,” Charmaine said.
“Maybe you’re mixing him up with one of yer ex-husbands,” Tante Lulu quipped.
Charmaine elbowed her for teasing.
“I have a few old journals of his,” Linc went on. “Plus, I’ve checked out some historical society books on early blues musicians.” He began to sing, faintly at first.
“If you were a bayou, my friend,
And I were a fish, my friend,
I would swim you, my friend,
Because I love you so…”
“If you were mud, my friend,
And I were a pig, my friend,
I would wallow in you, my friend,
Because I love you so…”
“If you were the sky, my friend,
And I were the wind, my friend,
I would billow for you, my friend,
Because I love you so…”
“What kind of songs are those?” Jimmy complained. “Pigs, and mud and stuff!”
“Like rap music that praises big butts and gangs is any better?” Linc laughed. “Actually, these were lyrics that slaves in the cotton and sugar fields used to chant. It’s hard to tell which were passed on by oral tradition and which were original to A. B. In truth, I suspect that everyone added a new lyric as they went along, including A. B. It’s just that he was the one to write them down.”
He sang several other songs then, including some by Billy Bolton who was considered the father of the blues back in the nineteenth century. Then he played a poignantly melodic song, about peaches, of all things, which caused Charmaine and Rusty to look at each other and smile.
“You’re playin’ in my orchard,
Now don’t you see.
If you don’t like my peaches,
Stop shakin’ my tree.”
“And that goes for you, too, chère” Rusty told her with a wicked wink. “You better stop shakin’ my… tree.” He stared pointedly at her blouse as he spoke.
She tilted her head saucily, and asked, “Or?”
“Or else,” was all Rusty would say. But that was enough. She felt the promise of else in every erotic spot on her body, of which there were about a thousand.
“Have any of you ever heard the song ‘My Simone?'” Linc asked.
She, Rusty, and Clarence all said, “Yes.” Tante Lulu asked, “Didn’t Louis Armstrong sing that song?”
Linc nodded. “Bessie Smith’s version was probably the most famous. And lots of other artists did it, too.” Linc sang the beautiful song then with all the emotion his husky voice could drum up and all the pain of his genetic memory of A. B.’s love for a woman he could never truly have.
“Did your ancestor write that song?” Rusty asked in the heavy silence that followed the song.
“He did.” Linc raised his chin with pride, before adding, “Simone ran a sporting house in Nawleans after the Civil War. They loved each other but could never marry because she was white and he was black. He wrote this song about Simone… just before they both committed suicide.”
“Tsk-tsk-tsk!” Tante Lulu said at the sadness of such an act.
“Oh, Linc!” Charmaine got up and went over to lean down and give him a hug. When she straightened, she told him, “You should be writing all this down. Put it in a book. Or make a record.”
“That’s just what I was doing before I was… incarcerated,” Linc answered while he started to take off his guitar strap.
Charmaine was confused. Rusty had already told her that Linc had been convicted of embezzlement… money he’d stolen to support a cocaine habit. He’d been clean for five years now, but before hitting bottom he’d lost his job, his wife, and his home. Something was out of kilter in this picture, though. She just couldn’t reconcile a talented musician and author with a ranch hand.
“What did you do for a living before you went to prison, Linc?” Tante Lulu was obviously as confused as she was. It was none of their business, of course, but both of them stared at him expectantly, waiting for his answer.