Phoenix Noir

She made a face. “Sheee. Who knows with those two? But like I said, this is AZ and they don’t play around here. Sure, by then the Black Power thing was played out, but you gotta remember that the Sugar Kings had stepped out there after Hayzell heard Marvin Gaye’s “What’s Going On” and got his head bent. Not to mention being high and getting inspired listening to Funkadelic and Sly Stone. Him and Burris even got into a little acid like them white boys cause they heard Hendrix and George Clinton had dropped some. So toward the end of ’71 we started experimenting. Doing some protest songs, for lack of a better word, in our concert mix. Songs about getting over. Sheeee.” She gulped what was left of her vodka. “We almost got shot in Flagstaff.”

“Hayzell carried the gun for protection?” Monk asked.

“Partly for the peckerwoods,” she allowed, “but he also dealt with bad folk on the road since he was always on the hunt for nose candy. Whatever the reason, way Burris tells it, their argument got out of hand and Hayzell pulls his roscoe. They wrestle and the gun gets knocked to the floor. Burris dives for it as Hayzell picks up a mike stand to brain him. Even when he wasn’t loaded, Hayzell did have something of a temper. I certainly remember several times when he’d go off on us after a gig for messing up the beat or coming in too slow or too fast on the bridge. He couldn’t read music, but goddamn his eyes if he didn’t have the most natural sense of timing I’ve ever witnessed.”

Thaxton had been one of the few women in that era making a living playing guitar. She gathered herself and added, “Burris had the gun. One shot and Hayzell went down, a fatal wound to his chest. We come rushing in, and at that precise moment his mother arrived to surprise him and take him to lunch. It had been weeks since he’d been back in Phoenix, you see.”

She finished her drink and plopped the cup down noisily on the dressing table.

“Parchman is tried for second-degree voluntary manslaughter. He does five years and some change at Safford.” She slipped her shoes back on and straightened her stylish wig. “It almost killed him, but Hayzell’s daddy did a magnificent service for his only son.” A quaver went through her voice but she remained clear-eyed.

“You know where I could find Burris?”

A mirthless laugh rumbled in her chest. “You gotta un-derstand, when he got out he tried coming back on the scene. But it was strange, follow me?”

“Him being the killer of Hayzell Mumford, the south side’s own. Whatever the circumstances.”

“Exactly. He was off the blow but hit rock bottom with the booze. He’d get gigs but it didn’t take long for some fool or another to bring up the incident and he’d be getting more attention than he wanted.”

“Like a regulator in the Old West who could never outrun his rep,” Monk observed.

“Now, could be I heard he was up Oakland way last I no-tioned on it. But,” she sighed, “that’s been a long damn time too. At least ten years.” She held out her hand. “Help me up, baby. I need to get back out there and entertain.”

There was a knock on the door and a trim bespectacled man in his early forties leaned his head in. “Five minutes, Minnie,” he said, grinning at her and frowning at Monk. He wore a houndstooth sport coat.

“Okay, honey,” she replied, blowing him a kiss. He withdrew but left the door slightly ajar.

Thaxton stretched and said, “I’ll have my man go over these papers and we’ll be in touch with Ardmore.”

“Great, I appreciate your time.”

“Not a problem.”

Monk departed and was at the side exit door when the man with the glasses stopped him.

“What’d you want with Minnie?”

Monk told him, assessing him as a protective younger boyfriend.

“Hey, that sounds like a winner,” the guy enthused when Monk got to the part about the proposed agreement for Thax-ton’s songs. “Let me give you my card. I’m Minnie’s manager.”

Monk guessed there’d been a succession of “sturdy mens” in his age range as her managers. He glanced at Charles Es-tes’s card while handing the man one of his own. “Good to meet you.”

“You know, my uncle wrote a couple of songs when he was a Sugar King. But maybe you’re not going to include him because of what happened. Really, it’s messed up what they laid on him.”

“Your uncle is Burris Parchman?” Monk said.

“He’s not really blood, but our families have known each other a long time. My dad and him went to the same grade school.”

“Charles, get over here,” Minnie Thaxton called out, standing before her dressing room door.

Estes grinned sheepishly at Monk. “Her majesty needs me.”

“What about your uncle?”

“Holler at me tomorrow, man. My celly’s on the card.”

He rushed away and Monk returned to the Ramada Inn on First. After all these years chasing chuckleheads, from the common street thug to the truly flagitious, and getting socked in the head or worse for his trouble, he was still on a budget. It was hard being the People’s Detective, he lamented.