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Hello7 Central, Give Me Doctor Jazz |
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is that Walter was the nearest thing jelly had to a friend. "When I came to visit Ferd in 1925," said his sister, "Melrose was the only friend he had in town. At least he was the only
person Ferd took me to see/"
Two years had gone by and still things had not panned out so that he could send for Anita. Morton had fallen ill. Unable to endure his loneliness, he sent for his younger sister to come and nurse him. Yet even this member of his family he kept at a distance.
"1 never did find out what was the matter with him," she recalled. "He put me up with some folks he knew and kept on living in an old flat at the Baldwin Apartments. He had written he needed a nurse, but he would never let me come to his room. Seems like he didn't want me to see and know anything. All I know is he went out to work at some night spot—1 don't know which one or what he did there because he never took me on the job—and come right back home and get in bed and sleep all day. He said his nerves were shot to pieces."
Somehow of all the stories about Morton, this anecdote of his sister's is the most shocking and melancholy. His pride would never allow him to admit to any woman, not even his sister, that he had not achieved the impossible goals he had set himself. He could not permit even his sister to come close and comfort him. Yet he trusted no woman out of his sight. His young sister still speaks of her Chicago trip with bitterness . . .
"I thought he was sending for me to show me a nice time in Chicago/' she said. "But I didn't get to see nothing much except what he wanted me to see. He demanded that I be home at eight or nine o'clock, told me I was too young to be out in Chicago at night. A whole lot of New Orleans musicians were in town, but Jelly never seemed to go around them. About ail he would do was take me riding in his old piece of a Marmon car that wasn't running half the time. And, once or twice he came by and played for me. Of course, I just love to hear him play. But I thought it was a mighty funny sort of |
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