Radiant Days by Elizabeth Hand

Author:Elizabeth Hand [Hand, Elizabeth]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781101567043
Publisher: Penguin Group
Published: 2012-04-12T06:00:00+00:00

11

Washington, D.C.

OCTOBER 9, 1978

THE ALLEY WOUND through a labyrinth of backyards and cobblestoned streets before dumping us back onto M Street, down where the road begins its long curve toward Key Bridge. There was hardly any traffic, just a few cars, and no people except for a handful of figures who stood huddled on the sidewalk a few blocks ahead of us. I was reluctant to pass them, but when I glanced back, the empty black expanse of M Street seemed even more forbidding. I heard the clock from Georgetown University chime once—midnight had passed and I’d missed it. I zipped my bomber jacket and tugged the fur collar around my ears, for good measure looped my arm through Arthur’s.

“Stay with me,” I said. “Don’t say anything. Just try to act normal.”

“What? Like you?”

I glared at him, and he shut up.

We hurried on, slowing as we approached the half dozen people gathered around a streetlamp. Beneath it, a man sat on a dirty white plastic bucket, flanked by a fishing rod and an open guitar case. He was hunched over an acoustic guitar, wearing the same grimy clothes as when I’d seen him that morning.

I halted. “That’s Ted.”

“That’s the man I saw last night.” Arthur stopped, frowning. “The tramp. The one who told me to look for the lockhouse.”

“That’s exactly what he said to me.”

We stared at each other, then walked over to the guitar case. A second plastic bucket stood beside it, three-quarters full of water. Two dark shapes moved slowly inside, like a living yin-yang symbol, their scales glittering dull gold.

“Sorry, kids,” Ted announced in his gravelly voice. “Technical difficulties, be another minute here.”

The body of the guitar had been repaired with duct tape. Ted tuned it, grimacing, reached for an open bottle of beer, and took a swig.

“That’s Ted Kampfert,” someone whispered. I looked up to see a guy with long hair and wire-rimmed glasses, his arm around a girl wearing a red peacoat. “Know who he is?”

“That guy from the Deadly Rays.”

Her boyfriend nodded. “I saw them at the Ontario a few years ago. They were incredible.”

“He looks bad,” said the girl.

The guy squinted, mimicking Ted’s expression. “The years have not been kind to him,” he said in a mock-serious tone, and they both laughed.

“Look at him.” Arthur nudged me. “He’s a troubadour.”

I didn’t think so. Ted looked like what he was, a homeless man too drunk to stand. Even sitting, he seemed to be having trouble staying upright. His head was bowed so you could see that fringe of gray hair, his badly sunburned scalp. He tapped the body of the guitar with scarred, blackened fingers, and started to play without a word. Everyone fell silent, and he began to sing.

His voice was as hoarse and raspy as his speaking voice, but he didn’t sound anything like a middle-aged white man. He sang like an old black man, like someone so ancient it was incredible he still had a voice to sing at all. I couldn’t make out the words: something about a man on a river.

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