Ambient 06 - Going, Going, Gone

ignorance of the once well-known that made me break out with nervous tics, but the way her baby-voiced peeps counterpointed the sound of a dry branch underfoot. Definitely didn’t please me to see her suddenly giving the onceover to the black half-moons in her paws. She held them like a two-fisted pie eater.
    »Babycakes, you got to use silk when you’re shining up the master’s voice.« I relieved her of her burden, fearful to see what she’d sent to the hangman. My luck held, though. Bennie Moten’s Kansas City Orchestra, She’s Sweeter Than Sugar. One copy down, press-fresh at that, but I’d laid away three more in stock in event of April showers bringing tears in May. In this case it was still a heartbreak. Didn’t matter how many copies of the record there might be, Bennie wasn’t going to come up out of the ground with anything new.
    »Unintentioned,« said Big Girl. »Classify.«
    »Museumwear, Chlo. Populacra,« Little Mod said. »Records.«
    When she said records she might as well have been saying polly want a cracker. Strange to say but somehow I just knew in my bones that until she actually saw my prizes, wax platters had been nothing but some philosophical concept she’d needed to read about in college. Of course nobody pays attention to 78s anymore except for those in the know, and you know who you are.
    »Soundbites?« Big Girl asked. Before I could suggest that she shouldn’t, Eulie nabbed one from the shelf and slid it loose. She petted the disc like it was her favourite kitten. I turned on the deathray but didn’t blow, not until I saw the label. Then I lunged, and managed to wrestle it from her grip before she started playing pattycake.
    »Ladies, ladies,« I said. »Toss me around, but not these.«
    I let out one king-size sigh when I realized how terminal the damage might have been. Black Pattis are scarcer than dodos these days but this beauty was ne plus ultra. Matrix number 8045, Hightower’s Night Hawks, Boar Hog Blues backing Squeeze Me. Sounds like it was recorded underwater but nobody kissed a cornet like Willie Hightower, and this was all that was left of him. Snatching a shammy and a bottle of cleaner I started lifting Little Mod’s prints. The gals gaped in my direction, fixated, as if I were pulling diamond rings out of my sleeve.
    »Purpose?« Big Girl asked, almost broadsiding me with her veranda as she swooped down for the kill. Ordinarily, I wouldn’t have minded tumbling into that great divide but the task of maintenance required focus. I emerged from her shadow and checked the surface – clean as a bald head.
    »Hand oil clogs the grooves,« I said. »Eats into the wax. Dig, I’m not just a packrat but a preservationist. Just call this place Preservation Hall.«
    I never saw two grown women look so stupefied and so annoyed at the same time, but I was rolling, and kept up the spiel. »Libraries toss these babies out with the bathwater. Orphans in the storm till those with a heart take ’em in. History in the hand, only place it won’t get away. These aren’t like LPs, these bleed. Scratch ’em and you cut out their tongue. Break ’em and one more gets thrown over the side.«
    My audience seemed to get my drift, so I segued before the yawns started. »Well, seat yourself, my dears. Let me tender some perky libations.« They both stepped into the living room and unsherpaed, putting their black bags on the floor. Big Girl plumped down on a chair my grandmother left me and her big keister smashed right through the rattan. She started wiggling but it looked like a no go situation. I was wondering what to tell the rescue squad when the chair frame cracked open like a pecan, and she hit the floor with a powerful thump.
    »Hurt?« asked Little Mod. Big Girl hauled herself up, frowned and kicked the two halves of the chair straight through the apartment into the kitchen. Didn’t want anyone to trip over them, I supposed. I didn’t so much appreciate her thoughtfulness as I did the fact that she hadn’t aimed the pieces at me.
    »Accidents happen,« I said. »Let’s try the divan.«
    Both of them sat down on the sofa. It moaned but didn’t take the gas pipe. »Let’s make with the labels, why don’t we?« I asked. »How do yours read?« They gave me a stare as if I was a chinaman and they were the new white slaves. Downright unsettling to see molls like these two showing the whim-whams. »Call me Walter. Walter Bullitt. What do they call you?«
    »Eulalia. Call