Los Angeles Stories by Ry Cooder

cost five thousand dollars. I decided to keep the cost down to under four thousand dollars if possible. I’d have to sleep and feed enough boarders to make payments plus a profit. Eight boarders at sixteen to twenty-five dollars a week would pay the bills and fatten my bank account. Each boarder would need a bunk, a locker, and there’d have to be enough room so guys wouldn’t be falling over one another. Two washbasins. What had seemed like a simple job at first was becoming a matter of logistics.
    The slats in the bed upstairs went blamety­blam, crash! and Berta screamed. Then the floor got to squeaking in rhythm. A radio played boleros. Somebody was smoking outside. I followed the smoke, and it was a little man sitting in a metal chair in the backyard, in the moonlight. “Buenas noches,” I said.
    â€œFive to one, I know why you’re here,” the man answered in a soft voice.
    â€œMy partner and I just hit town. We’re musicians,” I said.
    â€œI lose. Smoke?” He put his tin can ashtray down and held out the pack. I took one, and he lit it and used the light to study me. I got a look at him — older and scrawny the way a hobo looks, but with the watchful eyes of a smart man.
    â€œThanks. I’m Al Maphis. Gambling man?”
    â€œJim McGee. I have been, off and on. Ended up here, somehow. I like Mexicans, they don’t push.”
    â€œYou were expecting somebody else?”
    â€œAlways, ever since my last bad hand. Up in Joplin, it was. I saw that Buick of yours out front. That’s an interesting vehicle. You could go straight across the country without ever stopping.”
    â€œWe have, on occasion.”
    â€œWhat’s in the big box over top, if I may ask?”
    â€œWater tank, and the instruments ride up there. String bass and drum set. I’m the drummer, Ray’s the bass. We’re appearing nightly here in town.” McGee seemed to relax a little. He leaned back in his chair and looked up at the black sky streaked with clouds.
    â€œI never saw a night sky like you get out here,” he said. “Ever been in Joplin?”
    â€œNever worked up there. This is a crap town. Arizona is a crap state and very non­swinging unless you like to sit and watch clouds.”
    â€œI can still get my kicks. All I need is a stake.”
    I let the line out a little. “Berta tells me you’re quite the mechanic.”
    â€œMaster machinist, first grade. I was head tool and dye maker at Martin-­Marietta in the war.”
    â€œThat a fact? I wonder if you could help me. I got a money­making idea, but I need expertise. See, Jim, music is a two-­bit racket. You can’t get ahead unless you make records and the mob controls that, so what’s a drummer supposed to do? But I been around out here in the West, and I found out one main thing. This road­ building and oil­ drilling and increased population since the war, it depends on housing. Housing is the key. You can’t have workers on the job if they can’t afford to live. Then they can spend the rest of their money on music and girls and booze.”
    â€œOn crooked cards and loaded dice and horses,” McGee said.
    â€œI’d sure like to show you my ideas. I bet a trained man like you could figure everything out to the nickel.”
    â€œTry me.”
    â€œSee you tomorrow.” I left him there in his chair with his smokes and his clouds.
    I woke up smelling lard and thought I was back in Tulsa. Ask any Mexican about his earliest memory and you will get the same answer: frying lard. My daddy was a white man and a peace officer, but he couldn’t control the situation at home and it broke him down. I saw it happen. Mamma was a Mexican firebrand. She was dark and different from Dad as day is from night. She lived for dancing. Cain’s Ballroom was her real home, and she could be found there any night of the week, dancing with every man