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me who that is.”
    “Duane Allman,” Tyler says without hesitation.
    Your pa-paw laughs. “You know it.”
    “But this was before the Allman Brothers, right? Back when he was just a studio musician, right?”
    “ Just a studio musician?”
    “I mean—”
    “Yeah, Aretha Franklin came in the one week, and Duane just wrote her an R&B hit. Then the Osmonds came in the next week, and we just knocked out a bubblegum hit for them. Then Jimmy Hughes—”
    “How about I just keep my mouth shut from now on?” Tyler asks.
    Your pa-paw laughs again, handing him another picture. “You don’t know this one. You should, but you don’t.”
    “Uh … ”
    “Give you a hint. Bruce Springsteen and Pins and Needles both did covers of one of his songs.”
    I know he’ll go on forever about FAME Studios and who he wrote songs for and who he went on tour with. And Tyler will lap up every word.
    “Okay, I’ll give you another hint,” he says.
    I cough loudly. “Actually, Mr. Alton, we need to ask you some stuff. About Holly.”
    He smiles and sighs at the same time. “Should have known you didn’t come down just to keep an old fart company.”
    Was that a joke, or bitterness? Or one disguised as the other? I cringe, staring up at him, not sure if I should laugh or apologize.
    “What do you want to know, Little Bit?”
    “We wanted to know if any … strange stuff … has happened. Since the accident.”
    “Strange stuff?”
    I look at Tyler, still in the pilot’s chair. He gives me a tiny shrug, then tries to help. “Just, y’know, anything strange,” he says.
    “Okay, Mr. Alton, you know we’re not crazy, right? I mean, if we tell you something … ”
    Your pa-paw’s hands are shaking so bad he can’t hold the album. Setting it down, he presses them flat against the tabletop. “Her ghost is in the river, isn’t it?”
    For a moment, there’s only the water lapping against the hull. Me and Tyler stare at him, then turn to stare at each other. I say, “Show him the ring.”
    He presses your ring into your pa-paw’s hand. Tyler says, “It’s Holly’s ring. I gave it to her the day she died.”
    Turning it between his fingers, your pa-paw sees the word HELP . His eyes darken with pain. Tyler tells him about Rivercall and the catfish, about Pastor Wesley saying he wanted to help and Bo showing up at my house.
    Your pa-paw closes long, calloused fingers—musician’s fingers—around the promise ring. He looks stunned. I don’t think he hears half of Tyler’s story. Finally, he asks, “But what’s happening?”
    “We don’t know,” I say. “That’s why we came here. We thought maybe you’d know.”
    He just shakes his head, and hope evaporates.
    “Well, why did you ask if Holly was in the river?”
    He bends down and opens his guitar case. Tyler whispers, “The Dreadnought,” in a worshipful tone that makes your pa-paw grin weakly.
    “Yeah,” he mutters, slipping the guitar strap over his head. “Can’t go anywhere without her. Only family I’ve got left.”
    I cringe again, the joke inch-worming too close to the truth to be funny. But your pa-paw doesn’t notice. Carrying the guitar, he leads us up onto the deck.
    The old guitar is a C. F. Martin Dreadnought, its glossy black paint scuffed and scratched. It’s a veteran of a thousand days in sweltering studios, a thousand nights onstage. He told us he won it from Johnny Cash in a poker game. Of course, he also used to tell us he once had a pet saber-toothed tiger named Gut-Ripper Sam, so who knows.
    “Couple nights after I came here, I was playing, and … ” He plucks a few notes, stops and tunes one of the strings. “It might not happen this time. I don’t know.”
    “What might not happen?” I ask nervously.
    “Just keep your eye on the plants.”
    He starts playing. Long fingers jump like grease in a hot skillet. The guitar is plain, but it’s plain and true. Notes rise from its rosewood chest. A breeze off the river whirls