The Adventures of Slim & Howdy by Bill Fitzhugh, Kix Brooks, Ronnie Dunn Page B

just go around waving your giblets in public.” He shook his head in a judgmental fashion. “Ain’t proper.”
    “No, it ain’t,” Skeets agreed. “And you sure can’t do it on other people’s property. ’Cause then you also get charged with trespassing, which he did.”
    “Or shot.”
    “Which he didn’t. So he got lucky there, I guess.” Skeets sipped his coffee. “When they asked Mr. Kimble how he’d come to be in this unusual circumstance, he said he couldn’t remember. Said he may have had too much to drink last night.”
    “Did they believe him?”
    “No, they seemed to think he was lying,” Skeets said. “Like he might be afraid to start pointing fingers at anybody on the off chance that it might just mean more trouble for him. So they let him call his lawyer and post bail. Gave him a shirt and pair of county-issue pants, sent him on his way. Told him not to show his face or his bare ass in the county again except to be at the courthouse to answer for his crimes. Just goes to show justice is blind.”
    “Well, if she wasn’t before,” Howdy said, “she would’ve wished she was after seeing Dempsey Kimble in the altogether.”
    19
    SLIM GOT BACK TO THE PIGGIN’ STRING JUST AS HOWDY WAS set to go onstage that night. He slipped through the crowd, didn’t speak to anybody, except a waitress, then scooted into a back booth with his beer. He kicked back with the relaxed expression of a man who’d done a week’s worth of yard work and now had the night off. Sitting there in a smoke-filled club where he felt at home, he thought about that lyric Howdy had been playing with the other day, the one about having a honky-tonk for an office and a workday that started at night. Slim liked it, thought Howdy might be on to something.
    Across the club, Howdy ambled up onto the stage, sporting an impish grin like a cowboy trickster with something up his sleeve. He took the guitar from the stand, slung the strap over his shoulder, and gave the crowd the once-over. He offered a friendly nod here, a wink there. He pointed generally at the crowd and said, “Some awfully pretty girls here tonight.” His eyebrows popped up. “Thanks for coming.” He couldn’t wait to see them dance, and he knew they would.
    Howdy strung the crowd along for another minute, making them itch for it, as he tuned one string, then another. He’d act like he was about to play something, then he’d start the whole process all over again until finally some guy at the bar hollered, “Come on, Hank it up!”
    Howdy gave him an upward nod of the hat like that wasn’t a bad idea. But he just smiled and made them wait a few more seconds before he gently strummed the guitar, then picked a few familiar, sentimental notes that got everybody’s attention as they collectively thought,
You got to be kidding.
    Howdy leaned toward the mike, his eyes nearly closed, his head tilted just so. Then, with all the sensitivity of a seasoned Ramada Inn lounge singer, he crooned, “Feelings . . . nothing more than . . . feelings.” Then he stopped, as if to bask in the warm round of applause that signaled recognition. But there was nothing.
    The Piggin’ String had fallen into stone silence all the way back to the kitchen. A tomblike hush bordering on the explosive. The expressions on the faces in the crowd ranged from bewildered to betrayed to you-better-not-be-doing-“Feelings”-up-in-this-place.
    Slim almost spit a mouthful of beer, thinking,
What?
    Standing there in the awkward silence, Howdy’s mock-soulful expression dissolved into woeful anguish, like his feelings were genuinely hurt. Like he couldn’t believe they weren’t all singing along, swaying side to side, holding hands.
    The moment seemed to last forever.
    Finally, Howdy broke into a broad grin and said, “I’m just messin’ with you.” He chuckled a little. “Did you really think I’d do it?” He shook his head at the reaction he’d gotten. “C’mon now, y’all ready