Free Neon Dragon by John Dobbyn

understandingly poured three fingers of Famous Grouse Scotch over four ice cubes. He had the maturity and gentility not to adulterate it with water or some twisted snip from a citrus object.
    That first sip of the Grouse awakened taste buds that went right down to my toes. The second sip a minute or two later soothed the wrinkles off the brow and put this wandering soul deep in the proper attitude to hear and appreciate what “Daddy” Hightower on bass and his trio were doing on the bandstand. Sips three, four, and five carried me through the last chorus of a tune written by the great jazz bassist, Charlie Mingus, that had not been done so tastefully since Charlie did it himself.
    When they finished, I moved across to one of the small, empty tables and settled into serious relaxation between sets. I was halfway to the Land of Nod when I felt a hand the size of a boxing glove on my shoulder.
    â€œWell, ain’t you the picture of piss and hot sauce?”
    Daddy slipped into, or rather consumed, the chair beside me.
    I nodded toward the bandstand. “That was nice.”
    He knew what I meant. He just smiled. Daddy was a piece of work. He stood six feet four in a crouch and weighed something less than the
QEII.
He actually dwarfed the stand-up acoustic bass. When he hovered over it, it became like an added appendage of his body.
    Daddy had been in the New York scene in Harlem in the late fifties, early sixties, when Thelonius Monk and Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker, and, of course, Charlie Mingus were showing people that there was more to music than Lawrence Welk. When Daddy got into it on the bass, he played with such power and imagination that he could drive another musician to play six levels above himself. Some of the big ones used Daddy as a sideman on recording sessions. He was truly in his element.
    Then the late sixties and seventies descended. Rock came along like a tidal wave and pushed some real talent into the backwashes. Jazz clubs withered and died, and the recording industry followed the rock thumpers after the money.
    Daddy actually became a bouncer in a club where a group of giftless whambangers packed in an equally tasteless audience of everything from college rowdies to bikers. One night, Daddy waded in to break up a broken-bottle brawl, and they turned on him. It took surgery and six years before he could move his fingers enough to grip a bass.
    Eventually it came back. Mostly. Some of the musicians from the old days backed him enough to open the cellar club on Beacon Street, and no serious jazz musician ever came to town without dropping by Daddy’s, usually with an instrument.
    I looked across the table at that big old smile and the beads of perspiration on that wide ebony forehead.
    â€œNo, I mean it was
really
nice.”
    The smile broadened, and he just nodded.
    â€œShe here tonight, Daddy?”
    He leaned back in the chair, which must have held together by sheer willpower.
    â€œI thought you might get around to that. Earlier. She asked about you.”
    â€œAnd?”
    â€œShe said she might be back. She has a gig over the Hilton. All gown and tux for the snappy set.”
    â€œUh-huh?”
    â€œUh-huh.”
    He nodded toward the piano on the bandstand. “So meantime, you comin’ up, Mickey?”
    Daddy is the only one who ever made “Mickey” sound like a suitable substitute for “Michael.”
    â€œI’d only slow you down tonight, Daddy.”
    His eyebrows rode halfway up to his bald crest. “You think you can slow Daddy down?”
    It was my turn to grin. “A herd of elephants couldn’t do that.”
    â€œC’mon. Let’s give that box a
mass
age.”
    Daddy waved Clyde Williams out of the audience. He’d been sitting ringside with his sax assembled, like a rookie hockey player choking his hockey stick waiting for a nod from the coach.
    We followed Daddy onto the stand. I settled into the piano and