Looking for Chet Baker (11 page)

I look at the slip of paper. “No Ace,” it says. “Coop.”

“Oh, this is fine. Thank you,” I tell the clerk. I go up to my room and call Fletcher, tell him about my visit with Engels.

“Damn,” he says. “I wanted to go too.”

“I know, just wasn’t time to set it up. He’s going out of town tomorrow. Anything new?”

“Just had an e-mail from Margo, told her about you, that you were going to stay awhile. Everything is cool,” Fletcher says.

“Good. I’ve had enough of hotels for a while.”

“Well, Mister Nappy is knockin’ on my door,” Fletcher says. I can hear him yawning. “I’ll see you tonight. The guy with the duo gig is coming by, so we might talk after we play pretty for him.”

“All right, Fletch, see you then.”

I hang up, open the closet to get out the portfolio to take to the police. I stop and look again, moving things aside, but I come up empty.

The portfolio is gone.

I stand there for a few moments, thinking I’ve put it someplace but knowing I’m not going to find it. It’s not here.

I look around the room but don’t see that anything has been disturbed.

Now I do have to talk to Dekker.

***

“We go to my office, Mr. Horne, please.” He seems agitated, which I interpret to mean he’s already talked to Engels. I follow him down the hall, dreading this conversation. Dekker has been patient with me and tried to be helpful. Now I am going to have to confess I’ve been withholding information and lying to him. He isn’t going to like it.

We go into his office, and he motions me to sit down as he takes his seat behind his cluttered desk. “I’m glad you called. I was going to contact you,” he says. His expression is a grim frown, not angry but like he’s got bad news. I try to play it out.

“Oh? I’ve been gone most of the day, visiting with Detective Engels.”

“It’s not about that,” Dekker says curtly. “I’m afraid I have some bad news.” He’s no longer a patient policeman, humoring a tourist’s concerns about a missing friend. I know he’ll be studying my every reaction.

“What?”

He opens one of the large file drawers near his desk and reaches inside. And there it is—Ace’s leather portfolio. Dekker holds it out, drops it on his desk, and looks at me. I don’t have to feign surprise as it lands with a thud.

“This is your friend’s case, is it not? The one you described to me?” I nod and reach for it. I unzip it and look inside. None of the papers or files seem missing at first glance. I set it back down and risk a glance at Dekker.

“I don’t understand. Where—”

Dekker cuts me off. “It was found last night and delivered to me.”

“Not another coffee shop. Who found it?”

I lean back in the chair. He doesn’t have to tell me a thing. He can just say it’s not my concern, go back to my piano playing, he’ll take it from here, and no matter how much I argue the point, he would be adamant that it’s police business now. I sit back, waiting for his answer, but he surprises me.

Dekker studies me for a moment, rubbing his hand along his cheek, feeling the stubble that’s clearly visible. “I’ve worked the Old Quarter for many years, Mr. Horne. I know many of the red-light girls. Sometimes they provide information and favors. The girls are strictly regulated, and most don’t do anything to jeopardize their permits, so they cooperate with the police whenever they can.”

“It wasn’t my friend, I take it.”

“No,” Dekker says. “Unlike you, the women of the Quarter do not withhold information. The man she described who might have left it was not your friend. She was sure of that. It could have been one of several customers. She found it later, under the bed, so she can’t say for sure who it was.”

Dekker leans forward. “I’m afraid now this is more serious than we initially thought. Your friend checks out of his hotel without leaving word; we find his jacket, his business cards, and now his portfolio, which I take to be much more important than a jacket.”

“Yes, absolutely. I can’t imagine Ace letting it out of his sight.”

“Exactly,” Dekker says. “Do you understand what I’m saying? Is there anything else you can tell me? We have to treat this now officially as a missing person case, and consider the possibility that something has happened to your friend.”

I’m dying to light a cigarette, my mind racing. I promised Engels I’d tell Dekker I had the case, and now there’s no way out. “Yes, there is something you’re not going to like.”

Dekker leans back, waiting, as if he already expects something. I tell him about finding the portfolio in Ace’s room, keeping it, but assuring him I had come to tell him just that after my promise to Engels.

“That’s why I came over now,” I say.

Dekker is frowning at me. He looks up, shakes his head, and sighs. “I knew there was something the other day when I showed you the jacket. I asked you then, and you seemed to hesitate. My partner thought so too, but I didn’t persist. Perhaps I should have.…Now,” he spreads his hands, “you may have delayed finding out what has happened to your friend, and something certainly has.”

“Yes, I know, and I apologize for not telling you sooner. I just didn’t think it would come to this.”

“Yes, well, it has,” Dekker says. “I’m sure you’ve speculated considerably as to why the portfolio was in his room after he’d checked out. What about your room? Was anything else missing?”

“No. I didn’t realize it was gone until just before I came here. Whoever took it was obviously looking for the case and nothing else. They must have had a key. The room was locked when I got back.”

“Do you have any idea?”

I shake my head. “None. I just don’t understand what’s going on.”

“It would seem that whoever was in your room expected it to be there, no?” Dekker’s head snaps up. “Perhaps because it was not in the room where your friend stayed. Was that not also the room Mr. Baker fell from?”

“Yes, it was.” I lapse into silence, spinning out possibilities. Who else knew I was there?

“Mr. Horne, have you considered that this has something to do with Mr. Baker’s death? Your friend was here to do research. He’s missing; his portfolio is missing, then found. I’ve looked through it. There’s nothing in there but newspaper clippings, photos, and notes on Chet Baker.”

“Yes, I know, I read through most of it.”

Dekker looks like he wishes he’d never heard of me or Chet Baker or Ace. He leans forward again and clasps his hands in front of him on the desk. “I want to be very clear about this, Mr. Horne. If you think of anything else, I want to know. We’re going to have to work together to find out what happened to your friend.”

He shuffles through some papers and comes up with the photo of Ace taken in front of the hotel. “This was also in the portfolio, as you obviously know. This is your friend, correct?”

“Yes, that’s him. The owner of the hotel took it. I talked to him the other day.”

Dekker nods. “Remember what I said, Mr. Horne.”

“Understood.” I stand up to go. “And again, I’m sorry for not telling you about the case before.”

“Not nearly so sorry as I am,” Dekker says. “That’s what you need to think about, Mr. Horne. How and why it got there in the first place. When we know that, perhaps we will know where your friend is and what happened to him.”

***

The Bimhuis is overflowing for our last night. I can hear the bar chatter even as I mount the stairs. It’s three deep with people calling out drink orders, laughing, talking, and I have to push through a horde of people blocking the entrance to the main area of the club. Here too, the tiers of seats are full, and on the walkway around the top, people are talking in groups, occasionally glancing down at the stage, looking at their watches.

I find Fletcher at the piano bench on the unlit stage, his horn around his neck, playing some chords.

“A new arrangement?”

“Hey,” he says and flashes me a smile. “No, just working something out. How ya doin’?”

“Okay.”

“Uh-huh. Well, I’ll hear about that later. The guy I told you about, Eric Hagen, will be in tonight to check us out, so we’re going to play a couple of extra duo things, okay?”

“Sure. I’m getting to like it.” It’s been a new experience for me, playing without the net of bass and drums, but Fletcher has made it easy. His timing is so good. I’m not sure it would work with anyone else, but Fletcher and I have a connection I can’t quite explain, like we’re reading each other’s minds. I flash to the film again.

There was a brief segment of Chet and Stan Getz, on an otherwise empty stage, just the two of them playing, the drum kit and bass, lying on its side, clearly visible in the background, as if the other two musicians had been sent home early. Chet and Stan, playing, listening, responding, each commenting on the other’s lines. Matching phrases, repeating them, countering them. A musical conversation on Gerry Mulligan’s tune “Line for Lyons.” I understand it better now and realize that’s the level Fletcher and I are approaching.

“Cool,” he says. “Let’s open with the whole band for a couple, settle these restless natives down.” He stands up and adjusts the horn on the chain around his neck. “And don’t forget, you checking out of the ghost hotel tomorrow.”

I laugh. “No, I haven’t forgotten.”

I look around the club. The audience is settling in now, saving seats for friends, getting drinks, and the whole place is blue with smoke. Ah, the jazz clubs of old are alive and well in Europe.

Walter Offen appears out of the crowd as the houselights go down and the stage is suddenly bathed in a warm red glow. “It is time, yes?” he says.

“Hey, we’re just waiting for you. Let’s do it,” Fletcher says.

I want to say something to the bassist and drummer but decide to wait for now. Walter makes the introductory announcement, and we go to work on a medium blues. Fletcher eases into it teasingly, hinting at what’s to come. He leans back as the spot hits him, the horn, held a little to the side, gleaming in the light. I can picture him back with Count Basie, standing in front of that roaring band at Newport, taking chorus after chorus before nodding his head toward me, and slowly backing away.

My entire first chorus is lost in the shouts of the audience. I cruise through two more and think about Wynton Kelly with Miles, swaggering through “Freddie Freeloader,” or Victor Fieldman on “Basin Street Blues,” with Ron Carter and Frank Butler right behind him like a pair of bodyguards. Swing hard, and nobody gets hurt. I let it build gradually, feel the bass and drums catch my mood, comping with my left hand and stringing out single-note runs. On the last two, I start with two-handed block chords and feel Fletcher rocking beside me until I turn it over to the bassist.

Fletcher grins at the audience and points at me as if to say, Well? What about that? He leans in next to me and says, “You keep playin’ that good, I’m gonna quit letting you solo.” It’s better than any review I could ever get.

We come back and trade choruses several times around, let the drummer have his say for a couple of choruses, then finally take it out. We could stop right there for the night, and it would be fine with me. We’re a hard act to follow.

The audience breathes a collective sigh of satisfaction and quiets down. “My man is here,” Fletcher says. “How about ‘Sophisticated Lady’?”

I nod and play an intro, then listen to Fletcher breathe life into the verse. When he begins the melody, I stay out of his way and just feed him the richest, fattest chords I can find. He takes my breath away with his lines, and my only regret is I have to follow him. I give a nod to Duke Ellington and realize again how much I love playing ballads. We continue with a line Fletcher wrote, another blues we play almost entirely in counterpoint, and end the set with “My Foolish Heart,” which makes me wonder how Bill Evans and Chet Baker would have sounded together.

Fletcher calls my name, and I stand up for a quick bow, but the show is his. “We have one more set here at the Bimhuis,” he says on the microphone. “We hope you stay around.”

A tall, thin man about forty climbs up on the stage and comes toward Fletcher. He has a crew cut and lightly tinted glasses. Fletcher takes him by the elbow and brings him over to the piano. He smiles at me and extends his hand. “You two are wonderful together,” he says. “Just wonderful. I am Eric Hagen.”

We shake, and Fletcher beams behind him. “Hello,” I say. “Glad you enjoyed the music.”

“Oh, yes, very much. Please, we must talk.” We go into a small room behind the stage to avoid the crowds. It’s cluttered with instrument cases and several cartons of wine and beer stacked against the wall. Fletcher shuts the door, putting the din of the club behind us.

“So, Fletcher has told you of my proposition?”

“Yes,” I say. “It sounds very interesting.”

“My club is small, nothing like this, but I’m sure you’ll enjoy it. I have a very fine piano also.” He looks to Fletcher for confirmation.

“I stopped by the other afternoon,” Fletcher says. “Pretty cool.”

“So,” Hagen continues, “I would like to start next weekend, as a sort of trial, then we will talk more about a long-term arrangement.” He looks at us both.

“I’m for it,” Fletcher says.

“Me too.”

Hagen grins at us both. “Excellent. Fletcher, I will call you on Monday, then, and we will make the final arrangements. I’m sorry I cannot stay longer this evening. It was very nice to meet you, Evan. I look forward to next week, then.”

After he goes out, Fletcher and I look at each other for a moment, and then both of us laugh and slap hands. “I told you you’d like Amsterdam,” he says.

Yes, and now I have some time.

Chapter Ten

Sunday morning breaks quietly. After the excitement of closing night and the confirmation of the new gig, I don’t sleep as long as I thought I would, but it’s just as well. I want to get checked out of this hotel and over to my new digs with Fletcher. I shower and dress, pack my bag, then take one last look around the room, a ritual I’ve performed before in countless hotels on the road. Nothing left behind unless I want it left.

Ace, I remind myself once more, would have done the same if he’d departed the Prins Hendrik Hotel under normal circumstances. Ace wanted that portfolio left behind, and he wanted me to find it.

I take a final look out the window to the street below, the canal bridge at the end, bustling with people and traffic and inevitable bicycles. I won’t see this view again.

At the front desk, the clerk tallies the charges for me from the bar, and I pay for the extra phone calls. Everything else has been prepaid by Walter Offen. Nothing left to do but call Fletcher from the lobby phone.

“Hey, Fletch, you up and ready for your new boarder?”

“Yeah, if I have to be,” Fletcher says sleepily. “You coming over now?”

“Yeah, I’m going to grab some coffee and get a taxi.”

“Okay. At the hotel? I’ll pick you up.”

“Next to the hotel, a few doors down, is a coffee place. I’ll be in there or out front.”

“Gotcha. Be there in about an hour.”

“See you then,” I say and hang up the phone.

Outside, I study once again the sculpture of Chet and the list of donors. Something clicks in my mind as I read the donor list of names, individuals, record companies. I wonder how much it cost. Who commissioned it? Who was the artist? I get a pad and pen out of my bag and quickly jot down all the names, then wander down to the coffee shop.

I order coffee and a croissant while I try to decide what to do next, making a mental note to let Dekker know where I’m staying in case there’s some news. But I’m resigned to the idea that if anything develops, it will be of my own doing. Dekker may now officially make Ace a missing person and have the alert out, but the Old Quarter precinct is a busy one. A “possibly” missing tourist won’t be a high priority.

I sip the coffee and try to put myself in Ace’s mind. After viewing the film at the archives, I’m convinced, Ace would backtrack Chet’s final days, starting with the Thelonious in Rotterdam, then work back to Amsterdam and the afternoon of May 12. Even with the information in the film, there were some gaps in time, and those gaps are what Ace would be looking to fill.

Where was Chet, and what was he doing then? May 11 and 12, a couple of days and nights—why didn’t anyone know where he was? But what if somebody did know, and Ace found them, along with more than he could handle? If I could find that out, I might get closer to finding Ace. Dekker wasn’t going to do it, and he didn’t know anything about Chet Baker, musicians, or musicians’ friends, or what it was like for a junkie to be desperately looking for a fix. If Chet hadn’t come to Amsterdam until May 12, and he was last seen in Rotterdam, then he had to have had some contact there. That’s who I have to find.

I put out my cigarette, finish my coffee, and glance out the window for Fletcher’s car. For a minute it all sounds plausible. On the other hand, this could all be nothing but Ace’s forgetfulness—losing his jacket, leaving the portfolio in the hotel. It is possible, but I’m not convinced. The jacket maybe, but not the portfolio. And now that it’s been taken from my room, too many more questions are bothering me. My gut feeling is too strong.

Something has happened to Ace, or somebody is orchestrating his every move.

I look out the window again and see Fletcher’s car pull up. I grab my bag and go out to meet him. Fletcher is curiously quiet as we make the short drive to his place. He wedges his car into a space dangerously close to the canal, between a small truck and a Mercedes. The parking is diagonal on the canal, parallel along the curb on the opposite side. There’s just enough room for a car to get down the narrow one-way street.

“Good thing Margo has a permit,” Fletcher says, getting out of the car. We hear a tinkling bell, and both of us jump back between two cars. “Damn, all these years, and I still can’t get used to these bicycles.”

I grin at him as we walk back up the street to Margo’s flat and my temporary home for who knows how long. “You ought to get one,” I say. “Take a photo and send it to
Downbeat.
”

“Yeah, yeah,” Fletcher says. “You just play the piano.”

Inside, Fletcher hands me a key off the hall table. “That’s an extra,” he says.

I’m to be in Margo’s room, where I woke up the day after what Fletcher called my reefer madness night. I make a little space in the closet for the few clothes I have with me and leave the small items in my bag. Fletcher stands in the doorway, watching me. “You do travel light,” he says.

I shrug. “Yeah, well, I didn’t know if I was coming over for two weeks or two months. I can always pick up some things later if I need to—or I’ve got stuff in storage in L.A. I can send for if I stay longer.”

“Well, make yourself at home. I’m going to practice. I try to get in a couple of hours every day. If you feel like it later, you can try out the piano.”

I look at Fletcher. “Thanks for everything, man. I appreciate it.”

“No problem. I like the company, and you won’t see no ghosts here.” He wanders off to his room, and in a couple of minutes I hear his saxophone, running scales, playing exercises, while I check out the rest of the apartment.

I wonder about Fletcher and his self-imposed exile. Like so many musicians who have chosen to stay in Europe, Fletcher is more welcome here than in his own country, but ironically he’s still playing American music.

An apartment in Amsterdam is nothing like my old place in Venice Beach. I feel a twinge of nostalgia thinking about the beach, the long walks, the smell of the ocean. Here, it’s heavy wood furniture, large throw rugs on the wooden floors, and high ceilings. Sunlight streams in through the tall windows, their heavy drapes thrown open now. The kitchen must have been remodeled at one time. It’s decked out with fairly modern appliances and a well-stocked refrigerator. I’ll have to work something out with Fletcher on the food, especially if his cooking lives up to his promise.

In one corner of the living room is an upright piano. Some handwritten music sheets rest on the stand—probably tunes Fletcher’s working on. The upholstered wooden stool is the kind that’s raised and lowered by spinning the seat. I get it adjusted to my liking and sit down. The notes ring out loud and clear, surprisingly well in tune despite the dampness from the canal that must affect the piano. I run through some chords, play some scales, just warming up easily, and continue to marvel at my hand being so pain free.

I’m aware of Fletcher playing in the other room, but it’s not enough to distract me. Once I catch a few moments of silence; then he resumes, playing on the tune I’m trying. An hour later, I’m used to the action of the piano and getting to like it. Then I sense Fletcher standing behind me, listening.

“Not bad, huh?”

I stop and turn around. “No, not at all. You have it tuned?”

“Uh-huh, a couple of times. How about some lunch?”

“Sounds good to me.”

I follow Fletcher into the kitchen and watch him at work. “Got some chicken left over from yesterday and some of my dirty rice. Sound okay?”

“Whatever, I’m easy.”

Fletcher nods and gets the rice going. “There’s a bottle of white wine in the fridge. Why don’t you open that, and we’ll have us a little taste. You can tell me about your visit with the
po
-lice,” he says, emphasizing the first syllable. He opens a drawer and hands me a corkscrew.

I watch Fletcher bustle around the kitchen, as at home here as he is on the bandstand. He gets the chicken simmering in a big cast-iron skillet and the rice in a saucepan. The room fills with the aroma of garlic and something I can’t make out. He slices several pieces of bread off a large loaf, turns down the chicken, and checks the rice. Everything under control.

“Looks like you’ve done this a time or two before.”

He laughs. “Yeah, everybody cooked in my family, and on the road with Basie, sometimes we’d get a location gig and set up shop. Try to find motels with kitchens. Some of the guys brought their own pans with them.”

“Must have been some good times.”

He smiles, remembering. “Oh, yeah. I got on after he reformed the band. Late fifties, early sixties. Just missed Joe Williams. Lot of good music, good times, good food, and yes, plenty of women.” He claps his hands together and does a little dance. “Don’t get me started on that. One thing I don’t miss, though, is that bus. No, baby.” He checks everything again and turns the heat down. “Why don’t you pick out some music? Then we’ll eat. Margo has a lot of stuff, and some of mine is mixed in there.”

I take my wine and go into the living room. On shelves under the stereo is a large selection of compact discs and a sizable number of LPs. And yes, there is a turntable. I look through them and pick out an early Chet Baker, the band with Russ Freeman on piano, just as Fletcher comes through with two hot plates of chicken and rice.

“Now, how did I know you were going to play one of those?” he says, sitting the plates on the table. “Come and get it.”

We sit down and dig in. After a few bites I tell Fletcher if he ever quits playing he could always open a restaurant. “This is fantastic. What’s on the chicken?”

He nods, obviously pleased. “Don’t ask. That’s my grandmother’s recipe, and the secret stays with me, white boy.”

When we finish, Fletcher opens the window, and we each have a cigarette with the rest of the wine, and listen to Chet Baker. I tell Fletcher about Russ Freeman’s comments in the film, how Chet really didn’t know harmony. “He said all Chet wanted to know was the first note, and he just took it from there. He must have had a phenomenal ear.”

“Yeah,” Fletcher says. “You could put changes in front of him, and they didn’t mean nothing. I heard guys try to fool him and tell him wrong keys. Shit, it was them who got in trouble. Chet just played, man. I don’t think he even knew how he did it. Sang the same way. Let me show you something.”

He goes over to the stereo shelf and searches through some videotapes, finds what he’s looking for, slides the cassette into the machine, and turns on the television. “Margo got this. It was made at Ronnie Scott’s club in London about a year before he died.”

There’s an opening shot of Chet sitting on a stool, just staring at his trumpet, as if he’s gathering strength to play, or deciding whether to even pick it up. The camera stays with him for what seems like a long time before he turns to the piano player and they begin. No drums, just Chet, piano, and bass.

The song is “Just Friends,” an easy loping tempo, but Chet is clearly struggling, although the pianist feeds him one luscious chord after another. He manages a couple of choruses, then listens to the piano and bass, head down. Then he sings. It’s not that young boy voice anymore. It’s deepened, become rougher, but has more emotion. He strains here too, as if he’s not going to make it, but somehow he does, wrapping his voice around the familiar standard, making you pull for him in the process. He scats one chorus too, the phrasing sounding exactly like his trumpet playing, as if to say, I can’t do it with the horn anymore, but this is what it would sound like if I could. There’s no showy technique, no vibrato to his voice at all. He ends on a very hip little flurry of notes and smiles. But he looks so tired. He follows with a couple of ballads and a tricky little bop blues line of Kenny Dorham’s he plays in unison with the pianist.

Chet Baker playing and singing pure jazz. It’s not playing with soul—it is his soul.

We listen to a few more, then Fletcher gets up and stops the tape. “That’s the best stuff,” he says. “Couple of pop singers come on with him. Don’t know what they were doing there. Trying to sell records, I guess. That Kenny G character still selling a lot?”

“Oh, yeah. Millions.”

Fletcher says, “He’s the anti-Bird, but I guess he’s getting to some folks.”

“Chet’s playing really gets to you, doesn’t it? It does me, anyway.”

“Uh-huh, and his thing is as secret as my grandmother’s chicken recipe.”

I think for a moment, the film images and sound still in my mind. “He’d be what, about your age, if he’d lived, right?”

Fletcher nods. “Yeah, I guess so.”

“Wonder what he’d be doing now?”

“Same thing.” Fletcher shrugs. “Playing jazz and scoring dope. Somebody asked him once, ‘What’s the worst thing about drugs?’ Know what he said?”

“What?”

“The price.”

I shake my head. “I wonder if he just meant money. To play like that. What a waste.”

“Got a lot of folks. Got hold of Chet early and wouldn’t let go. Everybody else from those times either cleaned up or died.” Fletcher gets up and stretches. “Well, since you enjoyed my cooking so much, I know you won’t mind doing the dishes. I’ll make some coffee.”

We get the kitchen cleared up and go back to the living room. He picks the music this time: Miles at Lincoln Center in 1964 with George Coleman on tenor. They’re doing that band’s version of “All of You.” Near the end of Coleman’s solo, Fletcher puts up his hand. “Check this out.”

They’ve doubled the tempo from the original ballad start by then. Coleman plays a flurry of sixteenth notes, then slides into the vamp that started the whole thing and sets up Herbie Hancock’s solo.

“Damn,” Fletcher says. “That just kills me. Left Herbie Hancock something to think about.” After Herbie, Miles comes back, all forlorn and mournful, like a little kid wanting to be let into the room. “Okay, I’m done,” Fletcher says. He turns down the stereo. “Now tell me about the police.”

I recap my visit with Detective Engels, and my surprise that Dekker already had the portfolio before I could tell him I had it.

“Damn,” Fletcher says, “this is getting weird.”

“Yeah, they’re treating it officially as a missing person case now, but that doesn’t mean much. If Ace is going to be found, I think I’m going to have to do it.” Fletcher doesn’t say anything for a moment. I pause and look at him. “What?”