Leo played the exact same riff and when Ryder came in after the first fo-wah with a lower-pitched solo in a stripped down blues beat, Leo felt so right with the floor he was standing on and the air he was pulling through those tiny metal reeds that at first he didn’t notice Jim had come into the room, taken out his guitar, and was sitting on the stool. As Leo kept playing, he watched his father fasten a capo around the neck, nod his head, tap his feet a few times, then start picking a sister arrangement to Ryder’s lead. As soon as Leo finished his last “see you” note, he went back to fo wah and repeated the whole refrain. Then Ryder really took off on some wild hand-smacking combination that Jim matched with loud strumming chords. They kept on with it until Leo’s tempo was beginning to lag and that’s when Ryder slowed it down, then stopped altogether so Leo could take it out for the finish.

They went straight into two more songs together. This time Leo tried back up. The first song, a mournful one by Blind Boy Fuller, was easy in a way, once he found the right underbeat to stick in behind Ryder’s lead. But the second, a Big Bill Broonzy room-mover, he got instantly lost in and he settled on coming in every few counts like an echo to Jim’s singing. When the words ran out, Jim wound it down with a pick that Ryder went quiet for, then they pumped it back up and ended so suddenly it seemed the ringing silence in the air was the final note they’d all been aiming for.

“Hot damnit to hell, Jim, listen to that kid. He’s kickin’ our ass.”

Leo was breathing hard. If he’d ever felt this good outside of being with Allie Donovan, he didn’t know when or where or how.

“Quit the teaching,” Jim said. “You’re making yourself obsolete.” He straightened up and slipped the capo off. “Let’s do a Leadbelly number.”

“I can’t, pop, I gotta go meet Allie.”

“Who do you meet in alleys?” Jim was looking up at Leo and he didn’t seem drunk until he glanced at Ryder and missed him by about three feet.

“Young Buddy’s in love, Jimbo. Put that in your smipe and poke it.”

“Donovan’s daughter, is it?”

“So the kid says. Fine neck I hear.”