"You locked me in."

She sat, stiff as a reed with her feet together on the
floor, in an easy chair directly across from the front
door.  An opened book, face down, was on the small
table beside the chair.  Obviously, she had been
reading.  Or trying to read.  That might indicate she
had calmed down.  When he'd left earlier, she had been
hysterical.  Screaming at him.  Fear in her eyes.  His
attempt to calm her had been futile; she would not let
him touch her.

"Locked up like an animal," she added.  Her statement
was a direct accusation.  And true.  Although no locks
had been used.  He had merely established a stasis
field around the house; no one could leave or enter
until he removed it.  Not even Muduud or Bdudd,
although it was a simple procedure and one day they
would know how.  If they ever grew up, which he
sometimes doubted.  Bdudd's UFO incident had created a
lot of press, all of it bad, as well as a gathering in
Oklahoma City of religious fanatics preaching doom.

He wondered what good it would do now to answer Starr.
 Decided that nothing could possibly be achieved, but
answered anyway.

"I needed time to think," he said simply.

He looked around.  She had not disturbed anything this
time.  However, she had turned on every light in the
house--the table lamps, the indirect lights in the
ceilings of the living room, the light in the hallway.
 An indication of anxiety?   Fear?  That would be
natural, under the circumstances.

Didn't matter about the lights.  There was no
electrical bill to worry about.  The locals thought he
had his own generator.  In effect, he did--a small
fusion pod that had been operating quite effectively
and efficiently on a glass of water for the past four
years and would operate another hundred years before
more water would be required.  It powered the lights,
the television, the music system, the stove in the
kitchen, the air conditioner, and the holographic
intersteller communication device she had accidentally
discovered.

Mentally, he kicked himself for not hiding the
communication projector away in the deep cellers
carved in the rock below the house.  Who'd have
thought that a mere earth girl could have figured out
the system.

Was she perhaps brighter than he realized?  He'd
suspected for a long time that the citizens of earth
were more intelligent than the universe gave them
credit for being.

Or had it been luck combined with curiosity?

He'd walked into his study four days ago just as
Xtarso Divhuud, giant balloon-sized eyes staring at
Starr in fright, asked her who and what she was.  She
had scared him more than he had scared her.  But, of
course, she hadn't known that.  Her screams had
frightened Xtarso Divhudd even more.

In his own confusion, Xtery hadn't switched the system
off kinetically, but ran over and pushed the pad down
with his palm.

Then came his fumbling attempts at explanation.

First, Xtery had tried to explain, even though any
decent explanation required various aspects of
fabrication and lying was terribly abhorent to him.

She had not, of course, believed his story that it was
a new projection system for television.  She had been
frightened by the sight of Xtarso Divhuud, grossly
overweight as were all denizens of the planet Cyrreen.
 To her, Divhuud had been, indeed, a bug-eyed monster
straight out of a pulp science fiction magazine of the
1950s and 60s or that old "Star Wars" movie series.

But she had believed Xtery's story--quite true--that
Divhuud was an alien from outer space.  He could not,
however, convince her that the Cyrreenan was totally
harmless.  Divhuud's screech, of course, would scare
just about anyone.  And the Cyrreenan had screeched in
terror the instant he saw her.

Then came three very confused, very troubled days.

She had tried to flee two days ago.

In his own confused state of mind, instead of chasing
after her on foot and dragging her back physically,
which the Mexicans might have appreciated because of
strong culturally male chauvenistic tendencies that
prevailed, he had popped her back.

She had been running down the dirt road almost half a
mile from the house, then suddenly she collided with
the couch in this same living room.  It had frightened
her almost out of her wits.  She had sat shaking in
fright on the couch until she began to cry.

The crying had hurt him.  It was very difficult to see
her in tears because of something that he had done.

One thing had led to another and she had grown
increasingly afraid.

And increasingly distant.

Yesterday, she'd flung herself around from room to
room smashing everything, including a very beautiful
photograph in color of them both sitting on a rock off
rim road along Franklin Mountains, with the city of El
Paso sprawled behind them and Cuidad Juarez in the
distance and the mountains of Mexico beyond.  She had
broken the frame and torn the photo into pieces.

He was very sad about it.  It was very obvious to him
that she didn't love him anymore.  The evenings of
walking hand in hand in the moonlight along the myriad
streets of Juarez and El Paso, by San Jacinto Plaza in
downtown El Paso...still called Alligator Park by many
natives although the alligators had been taken away
years ago, window shopping in the funny little store
windows, pausing to look at the plaque that marked the
site of the saloon where the legendary outlaw John
Wesley Hardin had been shot in the back--all gone.

Now, he stood before her, hands at his side, nervously
fingering the seams of his suit.

"You are scared of me," he said.  This was not news to
him, but it was the first time he'd been able to admit
it to himself.

Her chin dipped, her eyes flashed.

"Shouldn't I be?"

She looked extremely beautiful.  A black blouse with a
tiny rose embroided on the right breast accented her
lovely blonde hair.  She wore stone-washed Levis.  And
soft leather Indian moccasins.

She presently had her legs folded under her.  This
made her look very helpless, which he knew wasn't
exactly true.  Earth women were much more capable than
they appeared to be, he had noticed in the past.  They
feigned softness, but often were stronger than the
male of the species.  It depended, too, of course, on
how you measured strength.  But they were definitely
the stronger mentally of the species and often
physically as well.

He thought of his loss of her and his loss of whatever
bonding had been established.  He certainly had no
possession as valuable.

He admitted that, whatever love really was, this was
probably as close to it as he would ever get.  This
strange feeling that was in his chest and in his
thinking.

"I've tried to analyze this whole situation during the
past four hours," Xtery said. "I think I would be
scared if all this had happened to me."

"Yes, I'm very scared," she said.  "I suddenly
discover that my husband is not only from somewhere
out in space, but...."

"Tarrmell," he said.  "The planet I'm from is called
Tarrmell.  Though in my language, the spelling, even
the characters, is quite different than you would use
here on earth."

"...but he also talks to monsters."

"Not so," Xtery said.  "That is a very biased, and
quite inaccurate, description of a fairly nice being."

She held her head in her hands.

"Those eyes!"
He tried to explain.

"It's not very bright on Cyrreen.  Large eyes
developed--much as your Darwin would have
predicted--because of the environment."

"It was a monster!"

"No, he was not.  Although Controller Divhuud is no
doubt a bit overweight at the moment and certainly
should take off a few hundred pounds."

"Would you tell me something?" she asked.  It took her
a while to get the words out.  Her voice was low.  The
words were carefully accented, but forced.

"Yes," he said, grateful that she would talk to him at
all.

"Is the earth being invaded?  Or have we been invaded
for a long time?"

He rubbed at his forehead, thinking as he did so that
the gesture was characteristically that of an earth
being.

Finally, he said:

"Starr, I wish I could dramatically impress upon you:
No one wishes to invade earth.  Many people I know
think it has been a waste of time, energy, and
finances to even observe earth people.  Some even
claim you, as a race, are boring."

"Boring!"

"Yes."

"Then why are you here?"  She placed special emphasis
on the word are.

Again, he rubbed at his forehead.

"I don't really know, to be honest with you," he said.
 "I think we've being doing this sort of thing for a
long, long time here and there throughout this part of
the universe.  Probably a real reason doesn't exist
anymore.  But for the people on my planet, people like
me, it's like going into the military service here on
earth.  My family has been doing this sort of thing
for generations."

He noticed her strong reaction to his use of the word
military.

"I mean, it's more like civil service," he said
quickly.  "That is, the foreign service.  You receive
specialized training.  Then, once that is completed,
you receive an assignment to some planet and you go
there for three or four years, sometimes longer.  Then
you're generally assigned somewhere else."

"If we are boring, why bother?  Why don't you just
leave?"

"Because earth is not all that boring to me.  In fact,
I like earth.  Anyway, I've been assigned here and
that's all there is to that.  An assignment is an
assignment."

"You can not keep me locked up forever," she said.

"I'm aware of that," he replied.

"So, you'll eventually have to kill me."

"There has to be an alternative," he said.  "I'm
working on it."

"Then I will escape.  If not today, then tomorrow. 
Even if I have to kill you in your sleep."

Was this the same earth girl he'd married?  He stared
at her.  Even compensating for her overwrought
condition and the shock that had occurred to her these
past few days, was there not even a smattering of
affection for him?  Had she actually been in...he
could not say the word...had she really been fond of
an image in her own mind, not the person him at all?

"I've thought about all of that, too," he said after a
moment.  "I'm working on that problem, too."

"What if I promised not to tell?"

"Under the circumstances, I don't think that would
happen," he answered.

"No.  It probably wouldn't," she agreed.

"Would you like something to eat?" he asked.  "I'm
beginning to be hungry."

He walked into the kitchen.  It was an old-fashioned
kitchen with a fireplace that was more ornamental in
the climate that existed in west Texas--actually this
was north central Mexico--than useful.  When he burned
wood in the fireplace, he usually had to cool the fire
down...pop the heat out.  But he loved to cook.  It
was a hobby he'd acquired since coming to earth.  He
spent a lot of time in this room and loved the smell
of wood blazing and crackling in the open hearth.

Now and then, he cooked in a huge, blackened cast-iron
pot that hung from a hook over the open flame. 
Frijoles with a slab of bacon and hot red peppers. 
Later, he would fry the mashed beans on the stove to
make refrito frijoles and eat the delightful
concoction in warm corn tortillas held in his hand.

The cooking stove was an ancient cast-iron edifice
that burned short wood sticks for fuel.  It was very
difficult to cook on it.  The temperature rose and
fell.  But Xtery enjoyed the challenge the antique
stove involved.

He found himself growing hungrier.  But he stood
patiently by the red-brick fireplace.

Finally, she came into the kitchen.

He had hoped she would.  He could talk better here in
the warm, friendly atmosphere of this room with its
cool red and white tiles, its arched ceiling laced
with heavy wooden beams.

The entire house was designed in a bastardized Spanish
architecture, but larger, and, of course, with
personal touches.  No one but himself knew, for
example, that the entrance to the secret cellars below
the house lay through the fireplace and down a series
of winding steps.  A vast cavern opened off of a
closed door in the cellar.  Water for the house came
from an even deeper well far below.

Starr fell, and that was the correct description, into
one of the large hand-carved ornate chairs at the
table.  They had selected the chairs together.  As a
bachelor, he'd never bothered much about furniture. 
He had slept in those days on a pad stuffed with
feathers.  He had usually eaten standing up because he
cooked standing up.  There had been a canvas
director's chair on the veranda that swept around
three sides of the house.  He enjoyed sitting out
there and watching the sun set.  Now, there were two
canvas director chairs out there.  Soon, they would
probably gather dust.  One day, only pieces of rag
would flap in the wind.  Then they, too, would blow
away.

"Would you like some coffee?" he asked.

She nodded.

She perched on the edge of her chair.

"Do you look like that?"

"This?"  He spread his arms slightly from his body,
palms out in supplication.  "More or less.  Except my
skin is greenish in tone and I have ten fingers on
each hand."

She shuddered.

"I meant like that...that ugly thing in your study a
few days ago."

"Like the controller?  No.  Not as...as...," he found
it difficult to use the word she'd used, but could not
think of anything at the moment that would be more
appropriate, "...ugly as that.  And I don't have hair.
 Tarrmellians do not grow hair these days.  Although,
of course, many men on earth are bald and one day all
will be.  Women, too."

"God!" she moaned.  She sunk in her chair.

"It's true.  Back on my planet, men once had hair."

Her fingers raked through her hair as if to make sure
it was still there.

"I think your hair is beautiful," he said.  "I've
thought so since the moment I saw you."

He pulled up a chair and sat down in front of her.

She flinched.

He moved his chair back four feet.

"Show me," she said.

"Show you what?"

"What you really look like."

He sighed.

"Like it or not, I look like this.  I am not an
illusion.  You see me exactly as I am, fingers and
all."

He noticed her eyes focusing on his hands.

"I was joking about the ten fingers," he said.  "Look.
 Five on this one and five on the other.  Ten in all."

"And the skin?"

"No.  Not about the skin."  He rubbed one left finger
along his right arm, pushing back his shirt sleeve. 
"Skin tone is just a matter of pigmentation.  Here on
earth, there are wide variations of so-called white,
which is usually light brown and some even with spots
called freckles, brown, blacks so black they're almost
purple, yellow, red.  When I prepared to come here,
Tarrmell scientists changed my skin from a beautiful
greenish yellow to this, complete with freckles.  At
first, I didn't like this color at all.  I've grown to
tolerate it, except for the freckles.  And I still
abhor the necessity to wash my hair.  I've become even
hooked on Head and Shoulders.  If I don't shampoo with
Head and Shoulders every other day, I get dandruff."

"An alien with dandruff!"

He fingered the hair that had been surgically
implanted on his head.  It was brown.  He actually
liked the looks of it, he just didn't enjoy washing
it.

"Me?  Dandruff!" he scoffed.  "Would you like to hear
something funny?"

"Funny!  Oh, my god, yes."

Her voice was virtually at the hysterical level,
although she was trying to appear calm.  Now and then,
her eyes darted beyond him at the door, later at a
window, then at the kitchen door.

Xtery sensed her intense need to escape.  Like a
scared bird in a cage.

"We are here watching...."

"We?" she interrupted.

He was abject at his mistake.  He constantly made
things worse!

"There are three of us in this area," he finally
admitted after careful consideration of the
consequences of answering and the consequences of not
answering.  "A young couple and myself."

"Do they have green skin, too?"

"Now that you mention it, no.  They come from a planet
that is a sister planet to mine, but for some reason
they have skins yellow in tone.  No, I guess you'd
call it more like gold than yellow.  It is very pretty
on the females.  I find the males, however, a bit
gaudy."

She shifted in her chair.  He had the feeling that she
was about to get up at any moment and leave the room. 
But she stayed.

"You mentioned about something funny."

"Oh, yes," he said.  "I was about to tell you this
hilarious idea of mine."

He placed a huge iron pot on the wood-burning stove
and started some water heating, aware that he could
have radiated the water hot in an instant.  But he'd
given up most such "tricks" after his first year on
earth.  He preferred this old way of doing things.

"The idea is this," he said.  "We come here to watch
earth.  Meanwhile, another race sends watchers to my
own planet to watch us."

He thought the idea was extremely humorous.  He'd had
the idea for some months, but had no one to tell it
to.  Muduud and Bdudd would not have understood.

Unfortunately, he noticed, neither did Starr.  She sat
there, as silent and unappproachable as a cold stone.

"How long are you going to keep me locked up?" she
asked.

He spooned some instant Nescafe Classic coffee into
two cups and poured hot water into each.  She
preferred her coffee with cream.  He put in two
spoonfulls of Cremora and stirred her cup.

He handed the cup to her.  Two doves on the side of
the cup sat on the branch of a tree.  They had bought
the two cups in the open market one Saturday morning
in Juarez.

His cup pictured two doves in flight.

Xtery sat down at the old oak table across from her.

"I don't know," he said.

She sat glumly staring at her coffee.  Then she slowly
raised the cup and sipped.  She would sip until it was
gone.

He preferred his coffee just a bit cooler.  Then, at
the right temperature, he usually drank it in a gulp
or two.

"I swear to you," he said, "that we are just watchers.
 That is all we are."

"Swear?"  She laughed nervously.  "On a bible, I
guess?  Do they even have bibles where you're from?"

"No.  They do not have bibles.  We do have a god,
though.  Most cultures, for one reason or another,
found one or more gods.  Usually not as many as here
on earth, I must admit.  Every time I see a picture of
Budha, I think of the controller."

He tried to laugh to indicate the humor of the
thought.  But his laugh came out like sharp little
barks.

"Our wedding ceremony was probably a big laugh to you
as well," she said.

"No.  It was quite touching and meant a lot to me."

"To marry a mere earth girl?"
	
"Well, you may not be exactly the person you think you
are," he said, but instantly regretted the statement. 
He loved her and wasn't afraid to call it love now
that he'd given the matter considerable contemplation.
 But there were somethings he didn't think she should
know...he didn't know if she'd understand everything
under the present circumstances, so he quickly added: 
"I've changed.  Perhaps you've changed a little, too."

"They don't marry on...on your planet?"

"No.  Customs vary from world to world.  Marriage is
not known on my world.  And on Verdidium, male and
female children are paired at birth--it is like
marriage, I suppose--and the male baby is raised by
the girl's parents."

"And your world--Tarrmellian?"

"At mating time, men stand in line and draw a name of
a female from a huge lottery."

"Sounds very archaic and clumbersome to me.  And
gross."

"Actually, it's a much better system than my ancestors
practiced," he said.  "In olden days, males fought
males and females fought females to establish a kind
of sexual pecking order.  A lot of males and females
got killed in the battles."

She stared at him over the rim of her coffee cup. 

"Green!"  She said it as if it were a vulgar term. 
"That must be why someone wrote lizard on the wall by
the gate."

He was disturbed.

"Lizard?  I didn't see that.  I saw the word gringo,
which I thought was rather cute.  It did not bother
me.  I will take the graffiti off, since it offends
you."

She lapsed into a moody silence for what seemed like
eons to Xtery.  When she spoke again, it was a faint
groan that he did not comprehend.

"What?"

"Green!" she said.  "I hope I'm not pregnant."

(continued next week)

Sixth Street is different now.  It those days, it was
a sort of hell, but a hell that drew people like me
and Raul Cardenas, who suffered from a hunger that The
University of Texas in Austin--classroom, Daily Texan,
chemistry lab, nor football field--could provide.  We
were GIs.  Many just back from Korea.  Some back from
the Gast Hauses of places like Germany with it's
looming Bloody Red One up against the Russian front. 
There were about 700 of us on campus.  The campus
didn't know what to do with us and thus ignored us as
much as possible.

I met Raul, a Korean vet, in Papa Gallo on Sixth
Street.  To be precise, I met him in the john when he
asked, "What's a gringo like you doing in a place like
this?"  I've often wondered what Raul was also doing
in a place like that.  But the music was live and it
flowed like magic from a small Mexican band.  No one
can play a trumpet like a good Mexican.  Not Herb
Alpert.  Not anyone.  We were, of course, both there
for the utter excitement of being in a place like
that, a place where you had to be careful and always
say the right thing when you said anything at all
because everyone carried knives.  And fighting was
quite normal and the thing to do.  The police in those
days walked hand in hand and only the best cops and
they were followed by a paddy wagon up and down Sixth
Street.

I told Raul that I was there with a bullfighter and he
said I was lying because he knew all of the
bullfighters, which was a lie, and rather than fight
anyone, especially in a john on Sixth Street, I took
him out and introduced him to Fernando Corral, who was
known below the border as Corralito.  By this time,
although he made a couple of abortive attempts in the
rings, Fernando's bullfighting days were over.  Korea
had seen to that.  Once, the Koreans overran his
position and he was the only one left alive because
they'd shot him and left him for dead and when he came
to all around him was blood and bodies.  Everyone in
his company.  War is not a game for kids.  Not
American kids.  Not Mexican kids.  War would be much
better if the old men who wanted it met each other in
some distant plaza with slingshots and only
marshmellows as ammunition.  You've got to be crazy to
want war and to cause war.

The first short story I sold (I had shortly after
graduating from high school in Winters, TX, won a $75
plot contest by Other Worlds magazine published and
edited by the legendary Ray Palmer; I beat out Harlen
Ellison and Robert Silverberg, among others) was about
Sixth Street.  Frederick Whitaker, a pre-med student,
was dating a Mexican girl and he came back to his car
once from taking her home and found his tires slashed
and the seat of his car ripped to shreds.  I combined
his tale, fictionalized, with Sixth Street and wrote
it and sent it to Manhunt and they paid me $40 for it.
 Winning a contest is nice.  Selling your first
fiction is like dying and going to Heaven.  I still
have a faded color slide somewhere around here showing
a lean crewcut guy holding up a check on the steps of
a boarding house on San Antonio Street a couple of
blocks from The University of Texas campus.  Hey,
Mickey Spillane wrote for Manhunt!

Raul, to this day, claims I once started a fight in
the Papa Gallo.  I don't remember doing so.  Long neck
Lone Stars in those days only cost twenty-five cents. 
Maybe I'd had too many.  But I was lucky, I guess,
because if I'd started a fight or even got into a
fight in the Pot of Gold (something de Oro) across the
street I wouldn't be here now writing this.  That was
one very mean place and, in retrospect, probably had
the best live music of any of numerous places along
Sixth Street.  The "band" consisted of three pieces. 
A set of rachets a guy played with a thimble on his
right thumb, an accordian, an acoustic guitar.  They
played for guys right up out of Mexico in those
tapered suits and a lot of guys who weren't good
enough to steal themselves a suit.  The music later
became known as Tex-Mex and even later they found
names for various variations, but to me it was the
closest thing to reaching your heart and plucking it. 
I was alive when I was in the Pot of Gold.  Don't
think Raul ever went in there with me.  I had some
friends who wouldn't even go down to Sixth Street. 
Frederick Whitaker, probably not.  Fernando Corral,
yes, because he went with me once or twice.  Adrian
Roberts, who was majoring in medieval history of
Central Western Europe, once.  Some guy visiting from
Harvard, once.  Jim Russell, once, because the way I
found out about Sixth Street, now that I remember, is
that Jim and I went down there to do an article for
the Texas Ranger campus magazine.  I wrote the copy. 
Jim took the pictures.  A tearjerker piece.  Woman on
a sidewalk looking in the doorway of a bar.  A baby in
her arms.  Another little girl standing beside her. 
Hunting for daddy.  More people went down to Sixth
Street in those days for Lone Star than for the music.

Frederick Whitaker, incidentally, had a reel-to-reel
tape deck that played stereo.  First time I ever heard
stereo.  On headphones.  "Bolero."  Blew my gizard or
my mind or both.  This is one of the reasons that I
later bought a couple of Audio Fidelity albums in
Colony Records on Broadway in New York City when I was
still working for American Druggist magazine published
by Hearst.  I also bought a little Emerson stereo
player which was a piece of junk.  But I bought it
specifically so I could hear Louis Armstrong in stereo
and while the record was obviously better than the
player, I loved that album.  Billy Barcelona on drums.
 Three other guys.  And Louie.  Wish I had a CD right
now of that session.  I'll make this statement and you
can take it at face value: That was one of the best
albums ever produced.  And a late columnist--Joe
Delaney--who wrote for the Las Vegas Sun more than
likely produced it.  He produced a lot of stuff way
back then, including, as I recall, the Dukes of
Dixieland, a fabulous group that I haven't heard in
more than two decades.  Isn't it a pity that we don't
hear much of Louis Armstrong or the Dukes of Dixieland
these days?  Whatever happened to music?  Obviously,
someone started producing records for visitors from
Jupiter.

Any of you remember Bob Crewe?  Produced the Four
Seasons.  Barbara and I were driving up near the Strip
this morning to get some flu shots and there on a
billboard was the announcment that Frankie Valli and
the Four Seasons were performing at some casino.  Last
time I caught Frankie's show was at a theater in
Buffalo, NY.  That was more than a decade and a half
ago.   Bob Crewe produced records for humans.  So far
as I know.  And so did Jack Clement.  George Martin. 
Les Paul.  And a whole bevy of other record producers.
 I remember a record producer telling me that on one
regional hit single he had to put the drums in the
bathroom because they were too loud on the session. 
May have been Huey Meaux who told me that.  Before he
was convicted of a Mann violation and spent a year in
federal prison.  I've always thought Huey took the rap
for someone else.  I know the record man for whom I
think Huey took the rap.  So I never held that against
Huey.  When he got into child porn in Houston, though,
that was something I couldn't handle.  As a music man,
he was okay.  Quite colorful.  As a human being,
probably not.  But such distasteful situations never
dampened my love for music.

I was there in the New York studio when Felix
Pappalardi was producing one of the Cream albums.  By
that time, recording technology had changed and you no
longer had to put the drums in the bathroom.  Tracks. 
Great music.  Cherished by me to this day.

I was there in a Los Angeles studio when Neil Diamond
was producing a record.  As I recall, Hal Blaine was
on drums and, no, they were not in the bathroom.

It's funny, though, because although I cherish a lot
of the records that I have around the house and wish I
could put them all on CD, including some African
tribal dances on I think the old Folkways Records, I
still treasure my memories of Sixth Street, which, of
course, is now a yuppie/guppie street with cute little
boutiques where you can buy a hell of a lot of stuff
you don't need for a hell of a lot of money you don't
have.  I remember that crazy guy on fiddle up at the
other end of the street (one end was gringo land, the
other was wetback land).  I remember some guys trying
to play country music.  All up and down the street,
excitement.  I'm afraid that I can't get too excited
these days about a pair of shoes made in Paris.

Regardless, somewhere along Sixth Street I became
addicted to music and addicted to life.  So that by
the time I reached New York City I was eager to become
a victim of jazz at 8 St. Marks Place, a victim of
Greek music down in that strange little area--now
gone--around Eighth Street and 32nd Avenue.  It was
Jim Houtrides who introduced me to Greek music.  We
were both working on American Druggist, a Hearst
publication, at the time.  How do you talk to a gringo
about the music of a lifestyle?  He asked if I might
be interested in some bellydancing.

So one dark of night, I stood on a street corner and
waited and eventually he showed up and took me into a
magical little cafe called, I can't remember the
spelling now, something like Kephisia.  Yes, a couple
of women sat in stiff cane-seat chairs.  They were
somewhat plain.  Nothing much.  The band was five
pieces, the main instrument of which was the bouzouki,
a long-necked stringed weapon with a large gourd on
one end.  Under the deft fingers of a musician who had
been born with a bouzouki in his hands, it became
living fire.  Yes, there are those purists who might
think the oud plays an important role in Greek music. 
But I felt in love with the bouzouki.

I would buy pistachio nuts from a guy who traveled
from Port Said to the Britannia and even to the
Kephisia.  Jim Houtrides and Angelo and Spero and
Danny were friends with the owner of the Britannia and
we were often treated there or just charged slightly. 
But I hung out, especially when alone, in the
Kephisia.  I never cared much for ouzo; it's a
developed taste or maybe you have to be born in the
outskirts of Athens.  But I would order beer, eat
pistachios, and write short stories.  Some of these, I
later sold to the cheapie girly magazines.  Escapade,
Caper, Gentlemen.  Bill Helmer was associate editor of
all three magazines in those days.  These were mostly
horror stories or stories with an O. Henry twist.

I became so well-known in the Kephisia that the
bellydancers would come dance on my table.  I guess
they thought I was writing about them.  Oh, yes, those
plain girls sitting in those chairs became a lot more
beautiful and even exotic once they changed into those
lovely lace-flowing costumes and swirled in front of
you.  They would toss me their veils because they knew
I would give them back.  Greek sailors, just in from
the sea, would dance on the small floor then throw
dollar bills into the air when the bellydancers
performed and when the singer, often a woman who no
longer danced, sang those old Greek ballads, I swear
they would cry.  I've heard some of the greatest
performers in the world over the years with Billboard
(I didn't join Billboard until my second stint in New
York City), but I've never heard anyone create the
atmosphere you'd find in the Kephisia.  Raw guts. 
Heart.  Fire!  Dylan, Sinatra, Ronstadt.  No.  Not
even close.

Later, I would take Barbara down there to hear Greek
music.  And I also took her to the Mexican Gardens at
137 Waverly Place for a combination plate.  She loved
these places, too, or at least tolerated them.  She
was Park Avenue.  Me, I was never more than Sixth
Street in Austin, Texas, and she married me anyway. 
Just FYI, Raul and Jim tossed my so-called batchelor's
party in the Britannia, but my "gift" that evening was
an album by the Trio Los Lobos.  Everyone signed the
LP jacket.  I still have it.  Jim and Raul were both
my best men at the wedding.  Jim Houtrides went on to
gather seven or eight Emmys as a senior producer of
"Sunday Morning" on CBS.  Raul Cardenas, though
retired, still teaches at one of the New York
universities and is working on a water purification
system that may save the world.  Spero became a priest
on some Greek Island.

It's funny, though, about music.  Once you're hooked,
it's much worse than being hooked to a bottle of Lone
Star.  You can stop drinking Lone Star, though you may
never really get over it.  But you can't stop music. 
It lives on in your soul.  Even when you can't stand
current radio (except the Mexican station here in
town), even when new records don't have what you
desperately need.  Quality.

As I write this, I'm listening to Roy Orbison's "Blue
Bayou" and Johnny Cash's "Give My Love to Rose" and
Glen Campbell's "If Not for You."  Linda Ronstadt and
Willie Nelson and Jerry Garcia.  However, in case
you're wondering, would I trade all of these for one
more night on Sixth Street or in the Kephisia that
exists today only in memory?  Without question.

OTHER MATTERS
I sent Jim Houtrides a copy of the above so he could
tell me the correct spelling on a couple of things. 
But....

James Houtrides, jhoutrides@nyc.rr.com: "Sure, there
are typos, but so what. Some streets blend into one
another, who cares? Names from the past morph into one
another, why not? Time plays strange tricks on us,
what difference does that make?   What counts is the
truth of the memories. And your recollections of Greek
Town, New York, are true.  Never mind that Spiro never
became a priest. He is alive and well and teaching
Greek classics in Astoria, Queens, and is married with
a son and twin daughters. He had a beautiful voice and
sang Byzantine chants in the Greek Orthodox  church in
our old neighborhood on the Lower East Side.  Never
mind that the guy who did go back to Greece and did
become a priest was named Angelo. He, too, is alive
and well and married and living on the  island of
Ikaria in the Aegean Sea, where I was born.  Danny
became an actor, but, alas, I've lost track of him. 
The bouzouki music was living fire.  And we have lived
on the memory of that fire for 40 years."

Later, Jim wrote: "Hey Claude, speaking of typos, make
sure you correct the location where most of the Greek
bouzouki joints were located: it was 8th AVENUE (not
street) and the clubs ranged from about 27th STREET on
up to 31st STREET, in an area now called Chelsea, and
very upscale. One wonderful detail: the name of the
owner of the Britannia was 'Baccha', a variation of
Bacchus, of wine fame. No Greek I know thinks the oud
plays a more important role in Greek music than the
bouzouki; in fact, the oud--a marvelous unfretted
stringed instrument--came from the Middle East to the
west during the crusades, and got frets along the way
and morphed into the lute, so western ears didn't have
to worry about flatted quarter tones. But you are
right, there were oud players sometimes at the old
Greek joints, but they were usually Armenians and
Arabs.  By the way, I have never in my life ever been
called a 'gringo'. 'Green grow the rushes, oh!' to you
as well. A lovely touch, that memory of your of the
pistachio man. Also, do you remember the woman who
came in with flowers to sell every night, or the guy
with the camera to take pictures for a price? Also,
interestingly, most of the bellydancers were not Greek
or Arab, but Jewish girls from Chicago or Italian
girls from Queens. There were a couple of girls (I
guess we would have to say women, now) who were
Turkish or Egyptian. One other thing that stays with
me: in such places where music and booze and sex were
so on the surface, fights of any kind were rare.
Anyway, thanks for giving me a chance to look at the
piece. If you've a mind to, give me a call--or better
yet, come to New York. I can find us some Greek music
somewhere. It won't be the Kephisia, but nothing else
is either. My best to Barbara. Take care."

The word "gringo," Jim, refers only to me.  Used to be
a fighting word in my youth.  These days, I consider
it only my just tribution or whatever.  And just FYI,
the bellydancer who was the big name about the time I
left New York the first time was Puerto Rican, though
she said she was from Brazil.

Maureen F. Houtrides, mhoutrides@nyc.rr.com: "Just in
case you haven't seen this
site. http://www.thedukesofdixieland.com/."

Kent Burkhart, RADIOKENT@aol.com: "Claude, I think
'Cherry Pink' was not Cugat, but Perez Prado...on RCA
or X label."

I emailed Kent that he was absolutely right.  "I
guess."  After all, that was just about 50 years ago! 
And Kent would certainly know better than I.  You know
who also knew records?  Ted Adkins.  I watched Ted
Atkins and Mike Curb get into a contest on records one
night at Ted's place in the Hollywood Hills of LA and
I haven't recovered yet.

Patrick (Pat Martin) Lopeman, plopeman@wi.rr.com:
"Claude: I'll bet it's been 20 years.  I'm glad to see
that you're still around.  Today, I'm the owner of
WMOM in Ludington, Michigan.  You can see the station
and my picture if you log on to www.wmom.fm. My
daughter is program director.  She's listed as Jana
Rogers.   The station is based on WIFE in Indianapolis
where I was once a jock.  I don't think I've talked to
you since I was at WSPT in Stevens Point. I've been in
consulting and publishing since 1985.  WMOM is the
third station that I've owned and I'm looking to buy
or develop another facility.   Thanks for being so
supportive of me when I was starting my career.  I
hope all is well with you."

Good to hear from you, Pat.  Glad to see you doing
well.  Tell your daughter that I always thought you
were great.

All of us who are ancient of limb and mind remember
Don Whittemore (though we may, indeed, be ancient, who
could ever forget Don, once one of RCA's best?).  Don
today owns and operates Dandy Don HomeMade Ice Cream
with his wife Linda.  He just mailed me Tom Noonan's
newsletter so that I would see a picture of Jerry
Wexler taken years and years ago.  And he also sent me
a copy of a local tabloid with an article on the ice
cream and on Don.  There's a picture of Don in his
office with all of these Gold Records on the
wall...records he helped turn into hits long before he
learned to lick an ice cream spoon.  Would you believe
there's a plaque on the wall from Billboard.  
Probably signed by me.  Sort of odd how I keep bumping
into my past.

One of the things about Don for which I was grateful
was his honesty.  Don and Jan Basham and Howard Childs
always told me, as Howard Cosell used to say, "like it
is."  Come to think of it, so did Don Graham, Juggy
Gales, George Furness and some others.  Great people
during a great time in my life.

Dave Coopman, d.coopman@mchsi.com, Moline, IL:  "Okay,
I'll try for your munificent prize of three cents. I
believe the deejay that started the rumor that Paul
McCartney was dead was Roby Yonge at WABC in October
of 1969. Got him fired. But...for the life of me I
can't think of the song, so I guess I miss out on the
extra penny.  As somewhat of a local radio historian,
I was wondering if you ever wrote anything in your Vox
Jox column about any of a group of announcers that
once worked at KSTT in Davenport, IA. Guys like Ken
Draper, Mark Stevens, Pat Patterson, Ed Hider, Pat
Downey, or Lee Shannon. Am sure you've mentioned
Bobby Rich somewhere over the years, as KSTT was his
first program director gig. Enjoy your reminiscing
about radio and all the people that made it great."

Sorry, Dave, but you missed out on the three cents,
too.  A disc jockey named Lou in Philadelphia.  Then
WMCA in New York picked up on it.  Still have the news
release somewhere around the house.  It was written by
Marty Grove, then with MCA who you see now and then on
CNN as a movie reviewer.  Marty still writes a column
for the Hollywood Reporter, I think.  But, to be
honest, I had to write Joey Reynolds for the complete
info.  For some reason, I keep forgetting Lou's last
name.  I hereby sentence myself to 50 lashes with a
damp Chinese noodle.  As for the guys you mentioned,
yeah, I wrote about Ken, Pat, Bobby, Ed.  For sure. 
Can't remember about the others, but probably.

Joey Reynolds, G1boney@aol.com: "Lou Yager at 954 920
1514, he has 'The Right Connection' and represents the
ad clubs in Miami and Philly, Lou started the rumor
that 'Paul is dead' while at Hofstra in his less sane
years, he never did drugs or drank.  I needed the
excuse of chemical abuse to act crazy.  Dale Parsons
says aloha, he is the consultant for the stations
owned by John Detz who was my board op at WXYZ in the
60s, he is a mellow guy who sold all of his properties
in California after a strange viral attack (the same
one that got Jim Henson) and slowly built a new chain
in an easier place with Honoluli, Maui, and Kuai.  My
show is all over the state live at 8pm and he has been
a very accomodating host, last night I had David
Kaprelik in studio and Sid Bernstein and Ron
Alexenberg on the phone.  Les Paul who has never been
here has two Hawaiian albums and was a hoot also,
tonite Wayne Dyer, you might want to listen on the
internet at 8pm pacific at WOR710.com."

Jim Rose, rosekkkj@earthlink.net, Houston: "Your
mention of 'Deep Ellum Blues' brings back a
remembrance that I probably will never forget. Those
of us from Dallas know Deep Ellum as Elm Street, which
has quite a varied history. How many times have we
told ourselves something like I should've brought
that? Well, this memorable event happened
during Christmas of 1979 when I was still a deejay at
KULF-790 here in Houston.  Vargo's was one plush
restaurant with all the trimmings--as a matter of
fact, still is. A huge petroleum oil field supplier
had a giant catered social gathering for Houston's oil
companies. Since Houston is the petroleum center of
the world, this was quite a gala. Everybody who was
anybody was in attendance. This little soiree paid
me $750, plus $100 for each additional hour to do what
I love the most--play songs for folks. KULF's engineer
set up the equipment. All I had to do was bring along
a few LPs and 45s which I felt might fit in. To set
this up for you, let me mention that ROY HEAD is from
the Houston area. ROY had the gigantic hit 'Treat Her
Right' back in 1965. In the 70s, ROY migrated to ABC
Records with a modern country flair. Really great
stuff, too. Still had ROY's LP from 1977 when I was
Music Director at KXOL which contained ROY's version
of 'Deep Ellum Blues', plus, every cut was tremendous.
Wanted to bring it along so much, but figured I would
be the only one who appreciated it or even remembered
ROY HEAD. So, left it home. The music that I did bring
seemed to be just what the doctor ordered. Hundreds of
people were milling around.  After a couple of
hours, I spotted a dapper dude who was the only one
in attendance decked out in a tux. It was ROY HEAD!
The thought quickly raced through my mind--why did I
leave ROY's LP behind? Should have gone with my first
premonition. ROY was pretty far away from my deejay
spot. He was way on the other side of the ballroom.
Maybe ROY won't even notice where I was. Surely to
goodness the famous ROY HEAD could care less about
this little ole deejay from Texas. But what if ROY did
decide to stroll over to where I was? How in the world
could I tell ROY HEAD that I had not brought a single
one of his records? In my vast collection at home, I
had nearly all of ROY's records, including 'Treat Her
Right'.    Low and behold, spied ROY slowly headed
straight in my direction. He really looked sharp in
his jet black tux with lace cuffs and bib. When ROY
got within about five feet in front of me, he held
out his hand, said I'm ROY HEAD. So embarrassed, I
replied, 'ROY, I know who you are'. Tried to explain
my dilemma, that I started to bring his great ABC LP
with all those great tunes with me. How many times had
he heard deejays tell him this same thing, but were
insincere. I was serious. ROY was so gracious. ROY
said that's all right. We chatted a little. Absolutely
cannot remember a single word which was uttered. The
time, my mind had gone completely blank. This taught
me to always go with the first premonition. Maybe
avoid this kind of distress in the future."

First time I caught Roy Head was at a convention
somewhere.  Think it was in Atlanta.  This was before
he had the hit.  He did "Treat Her Right."  I
introduced myself off stage.  He asked what I thought
about the record.  I told him he could start counting
his money.  But I think Don Robey was head the label;
i.e., probably not a heck of a lot of money fell into
Roy's pocket.  Next time I saw Roy was in Houston.  My
sister took me to see him perform in some nightclub. 
I introduced myself later.  Got snubbed.  Oh, well, as
GO would say.

By the way, I just tapped into Rose's website "Jim
Rose Remembers."  Great!  Good on you, Jim! 
RadioDailyNews.com provides a link to Jim Rose if you
can locate him with a google.

Ian Wright, ianshome@iinet.net.au:  "Hello again,
Claude, from South Australia in summer.  I  see even
the brass monkeys are shaking in parts of the States
right now...the world is simultaneously an amazing
place! Thanks for your recent response re my  quest to
purchase a CD copy of your Ron Jacobs KGB  interview.
I'll wait patiently to see what comes to fruition  in
the coming weeks. In the meantime, I'm in need of a
good laugh particularly after today losing a stack of
work on my PC at  work...one of these days I'll learn
'how' to correctly use the damn thing and 'save' in
the accepted safe manner. After having consumed Ron
Jacobs' KHJ Boss Radio writings with glee, I'd be
delighted to now read a gut buster from Hawaii in
Ron's own words. By the way, Ron, my computer skills
may be average at best BUT 'the phones are fine'!
Thank you, Claude, for your offer AND amazing written
output. When God handed out the creative writing gene 
you must have scored an overdose."

The above was in regards to my promised to send a Ron
Jacobs diatribe to anyone who wanted it.  Then, Ian
came back with: "I've got today off...Australia 
Day...and many thanks for Ron's extremely perceptive
and  precise disection of American power politics via
George's swearing in. Speaking of swearing, heaven
knows if you take their bull shit too much to heart,
too often, in too greater a dose, you'd end up a
screaming basket case yourself!  Me?  I think I'll
stick to radio and a simpler life and TRY to work
around the politics. TALL order isn't it?  Thanks
again for your speedy response, Claude, and please let
Ron know it was 'spot on', BUT when he puts down the
radio version it's to be 30 seconds on the knocker and
not a tad more, followed of course by the ALOHA 
BULLET JINGLE back into 'ROCK IN THE USA' by John
Cougar  Mellencamp...unfortunate surname wasn't it
!?!"

John Hall, johnalexhall@gmail.com: "Your latest
commentary/vox box is now posted.  I did enjoy the
trip down music lane. I do not think A & M Books has a
separate website, but I do know that they do post
books for sale on places like ebay and the like. 
Regarding new music, there is plenty of new music that
is enjoyable out there. The problem is that you can no
longer depend on radio to find new music.  Have you
ever heard of Gov't Mule?  They get no airplay at all,
but the lead singer, Warren Hayes, has a killer
voice."