Eerie Ed Eddards

Of all the men with whom I worked during two decades as manager of my father’s Mississippi Delta farm, Ed Eddards was the strangest. Eerie describes him better. One day when my lifelong friend and mentor Jaybird and I were repairing a tractor’s flat tire, he appeared suddenly. “I need a job,” he said abruptly, causing us to whirl around. Growling, Guv’nuh, my Doberman Pinscher, scooted close against my leg, and Jaybird whispered, “Something ain’t right about that man.”

“You the boss?” “Yep. Ever done farm work?” “No. I learn quick.” I hired him. Ed was a wanderer who walked on life’s wild side. I learned that he was fired from his last job as a Greyhound bus driver after dropping off a football team at a New Orleans hotel, then taking a girl sightseeing in the bus, and setting off a galaxy of blue lights for driving down a one-way street the wrong way. One Friday night I witnessed firsthand Ed’s unpredictable nature. A July rain had stopped fieldwork, so we drove a farm truck with an I-beam steel rear bumper to town to shoot a few rounds of pool. The Delta’s pool halls aren’t salubrious, and Leon’s Lounge was the unhealthiest. Farm hands had been known to get paid on Friday, go there, and disappear. While chatting between games, five men strolled in, and when one asked if we cared to shoot a few rounds, Ed agreed. In typical pool shark fashion, he let the guy beat him several games, and after each loss, upped the ante and demanded another game. When his opponent’s friends joined in the betting, Ed chalked his stick and ran the table.

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“Boss, I sure fleeced them rednecks,” he said. “This here’s enough to pay down on a car.” Then one of the losers tapped him on the shoulder. “We’re from Arkansas. Folks on our side of the river don’t take kindly to Mississippi pool sharks. Return the money, or this time tomorrow you’ll be a one-day-old ghost.” Ed’s eyes gleamed the way a birddog’s do when his master shoulders a fowling piece. Pool hall brawls were prime entertainment for him. I intervened and convinced Ed to return the money. In the parking lot, Ed noticed only one car with an Arkansas tag. Before I could stop him, he reversed the truck and rammed it with the rear bumper. “That’ll teach them sore losers,” he guffawed. I was speechless. We made a big crop, and at year’s end Ed had earned enough to buy his dream car, a shiny Oldsmobile convertible. “Ain’t she a beauty, Boss?” I didn’t know whether he meant the car or the beautiful blonde beside him. “While we got some downtime here at the farm, I’m taking my lady friend to New Orleans.” Off he drove. Just as he appeared out of thin air, he disappeared into thin air. That was the last I ever saw of one of the strangest men I have ever known: Eerie Ed Eddards.