Savage Holiday

by Richard Wright

  He recalled that one Sunday morning he had gone down in the elevator and Mrs. Blake had been waiting on the first floor; she’d been so tipsy that he’d caught her arm to keep her from stumbling as she’d entered the elevator. At the time he’d been disgusted and amused, but now his memory of that incident made him seethe with moral rage. He should have complained about her then, should have protested the right of a morally depraved woman like her to live in the building.

  Suddenly his condemnation of Mrs. Blake was buttressed by still another and stronger memory. About a year ago he’d been awakened around five o’clock one morning by a strange noise—a dim, regular and rhythmic creaking—which had soon stopped. He’d lain in bed puzzled, wondering what could have been happening. A week later—it had been around four o’clock in the morning this time—he’d heard that same vague, rhythmic noise, and this time he’d known with a dismaying flash of intuition what was happening....He’d gotten up and changed rooms, converting his living room into his bedroom to escape overhearing Mrs. Blake’s carnal activities...Yes; that was the kind of woman she was, and he was more than ever certain that the true guilt for the death of Tony lay not on his, but her shoulders.

  He licked his lips and stared unseeingly through the yellow sunshine. There was trying to break into his mind yet another recollection, but he was fighting it off...Why? He bent forward and squinted at the green grass and his mind drifted. He recalled one evening last month when the summer sky was still light and he’d come home early from the office and had found little Tony alone upon the sidewalk. The child had smiled and run skippingly toward him, grabbing his hand.

  “Hi, Mr. Fowler!” Tony had greeted him.

  “Hello, Tony. How are you?” he’d asked him.

  “Fine.”

  “What are you doing?”

  “Playing.”

  “How’s your mother?”

  “Dunno. I ain’t seen her today yet. She’s sleeping.”

  “Oh.”

  “Are you tired, Mr. Fowler?”

  “No, Tony. Why?”

  “Are you very busy now?”

  “Not at all. Why?”

  “Talk to me some, hunh? A little,” Tony had begged.

  He had looked into those round, large, black eyes—helpless eyes, lonely eyes.

  “Why, sure, Tony. But haven’t you got anybody to talk to?”

  Tony’s lips had quivered and he had not answered.

  “Where are your little playmates? Don’t you talk to them?”

  “Naw. I never talk to nobody. No friends around here wanna play with me....”

  “Why?”

  Again Tony had refused to answer; he’d looked off and frowned.

  “All right, Tony. I’ll talk to you. Let’s go to the drugstore and get a malted milk, hunh? You don’t think that your mother would mind, do you?”

  “Naw. I won’t tell her.”

  “But you should tell her everything you do,” he told Tony. “Don’t you?”

  “Naw. Why should I?”

  “Good boys do, you know.”

  “I’m bad...”

  A stab of pity had gone through Erskine’s heart as he’d stared at the child.

  “Oh, no! Why do you say that?”

  “Mama says so.”

  “Don’t you tell your mother what you do during the day?”

  “She never asks me what I do.”

  “But suppose you lose your appetite from drinking a malted milk,” Erskine had posed a problem for him; “wouldn’t your mother want to know why you won’t eat?”

  “Naw. She just fixes the supper and leaves it for me to eat when I wanna.”

  “But don’t you talk to your mother at all?” he’d asked the child, leading him by the hand.

  “She tells me to wash my face and not to make so much noise,” Tony had said resentfully.

  “Look, sometimes you must try telling her what you do during the day,” Erskine had said. “Try it...”

  “She won’t listen—”

  “But, Tony, your mother must talk to you sometimes—”

  “But she won’t tell me what she does,” Tony had complained bitterly.

  “Don’t you love your mother?”

  Tony had not answered.

  “You should love your mother, you know, Tony.”

  “Maybe she doesn’t want me to love her—”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “I dunno.”

  “Does she beat you often?”

  “Naw. Sometimes...But I don’t care.”

  “Then, what does she do to you to make you say that she doesn’t want you to love her, Tony?”

  “She never does anything. Mama’s not like other ladies,” Tony had said in confusion.

  “Oh, Tony! You mustn’t say that—”

  “But that’s what Mike who lives down the street says.”

  Erskine had been shocked. He’d patted Tony’s head and had squeezed his hand in pity. There had been anger in his eyes as they’d entered the drugstore and seated themselves in a booth.

  “Tony, you must not listen to what this Mike says—”

  “But all the boys say that,” Tony had informed him.

  Erskine’s understanding had been a remembering...If only he could help this abandoned child! Somebody ought to report that Mrs. Blake to the authorities...They were silent until their malted milks came and they sat sipping them through long straws.

  “Why don’t you ever come to see my mama?” Tony had asked him suddenly.

  “She’s never invited me,” Erskine said, staring at the boy.

  “Then why don’t you call up and ask her to let you come over, like the others do?” Tony had demanded hopefully.

  “I guess I’m pretty busy, Tony,” Erskine had answered uneasily.

  “I like you better than I like the other men who come to see her,” Tony had said, looking Erskine full in the face. “They won’t talk to me. They take mama in the bedroom and lock the door.”

  “I like you, Tony. You’re a good boy,” Erskine had mumbled, avoiding Tony’s eyes.

  Offense nestled deep in Erskine’s heart. Tony had so upset him that he wanted to leave. He hadn’t known how to act or what to say. His pity for the child had made him remain.

  “When you were a boy, did you sleep in bed with your mother?” Tony had asked in a far-away voice.:

  “I guess so. I really don’t remember, Tony. Do you?”

  “Yes; when there isn’t a man in bed with her.”

  Erskine had wanted to tell Tony not to talk like that, but he felt that he hadn’t the right to. He’d felt more intimidated with Tony at that moment than with any adult he could have named.

  “Do you sleep with your mother often?” he’d found himself asking Tony.

  “I used to. But there are so many men coming to see her at night now...I go to sleep in her bed when she’s away at work at night, but when I wake up in the morning, I find that she’s taken me out of her bed and put me in my bed, and there’s a man in the bed with her,” Tony had said, staring off into space.

  “Tony, you must not talk like that!”

  “But it’s true,” Tony had said.

  “You really must love your mother, you know,” Erskine had said in confusion.

  “I do,” Tony had said, quietly, sincerely. “But she loves so many other people.”

  Erskine had blinked. He clenched his fist until it showed white.

  “Don’t talk like that about your mother,” Erskine begged.

  Tony seemed not to hear; he was staring off intently, then he looked at Erskine and blinked.

  “You know, you look a little like the man who slept with mama last night,” Tony had said at last. “I saw mama kissing him.”

  Erskine had pushed his empty glass away. He felt soiled. Somebody ought to wring that Mrs. Blake’s neck! She had no right to do that to a child! Tony emptied his glass and, in his effort to drink every drop, he made a loud noise by sucking air through the straws
. His little face was grave, sober; he seemed to be staring at some image that baffled and frightened him.

  “Mr. Fowler?” his voice had come with a soft hint of fear in it.

  “Yes, Tony.”

  “Will you tell me something?”

  “Sure. I’ll tell you anything. But why do you ask me like that?”

  “‘Cause other people won’t.”

  “What do you want to know, Tony?”

  “Where do we all come from?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “How are people made?”

  Erskine had smiled to reassure Tony.

  “God makes us, Tony.”

  “How?”

  “He creates us,” Erskine had explained, wishing that Tony’d not ask any more questions.

  Tony’s eyes had fluttered distrustfully across Erskine’s face.

  “Don’t you believe me, Tony?”

  The child’s eyes had filled with tears and he’d stared down into his empty glass.

  “You’re fooling me,” he whimpered.

  “No; I’m telling you the truth. Why don’t you believe me?”

  “Dunno.”

  Tony had mastered himself and was drying the tears.

  “Tony, God made all people in the world—”

  “Yes. But...” Tony had stammered diplomatically-

  “But what?”

  “Mama didn’t say that we are made like that.”

  “What did she say?”

  “She said that men and women make babies—“

  “Oh, sure; sure, Tony. They do. But God lets them make them—”

  “Why?”

  “For His glory. So little boys like you can have a chance to live,” Erskine had explained, forcing a smile as he talked; but he knew that he’d not answered Tony and he wondered if it was his duty to do so.

  “But why?” Tony had asked wailingly.

  “Don’t you think you ought to ask your mama about that, Tony? It’s better for her to tell you—”

  “But she won’t tell me everything...Now, you tell me why God makes the babies—”

  “It’s His will, God’s will—”

  “Will? What’s will, Mr. Fowler?”

  “Er—It’s desire, Tony. When you desire something, you want it, you will it. Understand?”

  “Then God wants them to be angry?” Tony had asked, frowning.

  Erskine had blinked. What was the child getting at?

  “Angry? Why, no, my boy. Why do you say ‘angry’?”

  “I mean the man and the woman—God wants ‘em to be angry?”

  “No. Tony, a husband loves his wife, and then there’s a baby—”

  “No!” Tony had exploded with sudden vehemence. “You’re not telling me the truth—”

  “But I am telling the truth, Tony!”

  “But they fight...I’ve seen ‘em fighting. Then there’s a baby—”

  “Fighting? What do you mean, Tony?” he had asked, but his words had slipped out of his mouth before he’d known it, and now he regretted his asking.

  “One night I saw a big man fight mama,” Tony had explained. “Mama didn’t have any clothes on, and the man didn’t have any clothes on either. And mama said that she was scared that she’d have a baby. Mr. Fowler—“ Tony had paused and looked hard at Erskine, “why do they have to fight like that to make babies?”

  Erskine’s mind had reeled. What hadn’t this five-year-old child seen? And yet Erskine had known that he had been reacting to more than what Tony had been telling him. Tony’s words had made him remember, and his head had swum, and he’d wanted to rise and run from this...But a nameless weight anchored him to his seat.

  “Tell me, why do they fight like that?” Tony had asked again, insistently, worriedly.

  “I don’t know, Tony,” Erskine had said under his breath. “Little boys mustn’t bother about such things...” What else could he say?

  “Then my mama knows more than you do,” Tony had declared in triumph.

  Erskine had known that he had to be careful. He could not give this child an explanation that would make him repeat his words to his mother, for his mother might well come to him and bawl him out for it.

  “Maybe she does,” Erskine had sighed in defeat.

  “But you are a man,” Tony had argued. “You can find out. People will tell you anything—”

  “I guess I don’t want to ask them, Tony,” he had said wearily.

  Tony had stared off again, then his lips quivered. “I don’t want to grow up,” he had said at last “I don’t wanna be a man—”

  “Why?”

  “‘Cause I don’t wanna fight,” he said. “I don’t wanna fight ladies like my mother...”

  Erskine had not answered that. He had been determined to stop the conversation. Yes; he’d take Tony to the toy shop down the street and buy him something to distract him. That was as good a way as any of getting out of this horrible atmosphere of panic and degradation that Tony evoked around him.

  “Say, Tony, wouldn’t you like some toys from the store down the street?”

  Tony’s eyes had grown round.

  “For real?”

  “Sure.”

  “I wanna long-range bomber,” Tony had said with excitement. “The kind that carries the atom bomb.”

  “All right But do you think they’ve got them there?”

  “Sure. I’ve seen ‘em in the windows.”

  Erskine had paid and had sauntered out, thoughtfully leading Tony by the hand. The child chatted about a film he’d seen in which fighter planes had been in a big battle in the sides. Erskine had brooded pityingly over the child, a frown creasing his forehead. Tony had felt Erskine’s silence and had stopped stiffly; he’d lifted his little face in fear toward Erskine.

  “Are you angry with me, Mr. Fowler?” Tony had asked anxiously.

  “God, no! No, Tony—”

  “I thought maybe you were thinking of fighting me—”

  “No; no...You mustn’t think of such things!” Erskine said in a frenzy.

  “But if somebody’s going to fight you, you must 1 always try to know it,” Tony had said, reasoning and frowning.

  “Why, Tony?”

  “So you can run and save yourself,” the child had told him.

  “But I m not going to fight you, Tony,” Erskine had pleaded with Tony. “I’m your friend,”

  “For real?” Tony had asked with rising inflections of voice.

  “For real, Tony,” Erskine had said in the tone of one swearing an oath.

  Erskine became aware of the strong, yellow sun, the green grass, the distant, tall apartment hotels looming across Central Park. Could it have been that that had frightened poor little Tony? Was it possible? He had the sensation that reality was dissolving before his eyes. Tony had been living in an unreal world, a dream, and, by accident, he had become a figment of Tony’s dream, a frightening figment which had scared Tony into falling...Erskine sighed, his eyes glistening, staring without seeing. Now that he was thinking of poor Tony, he recalled the rest of that strange summer evening when the sun had stayed so long in the skies.

  With Tony holding his hand, Erskine had walked in silence toward the toy store. When they reached the brightly colored, toy-arrayed windows, they paused.

  “Now, which plane do you want, Tony?” he had asked the child.

  Tony’s eyes had danced with interest. Carefully, he searched over every toy in the window before answering. Then he pointed directly to the four-engine bombing planes.

  “That bomber there, with the little baby fighter under the stomach,” Tony had said breathlessly. Then he’d whirled abruptly and stared pleadingly into Erskine’s face. “Could I have two of them, please?”

  “Two?” Erskine had asked. “But why two?”

  “I wanna mama bomber and a papa bomber, and the little baby bombers with ‘em,” Tony had explained.

  “Oh, all right,” Erskine had agreed uneasily; he was detecting a morbid drift in t
he child’s preoccupations and it disturbed him. But why not buy him two of them if he wanted them? The least thing he could do was to be kind to an emotionally deprived child, an emotionally violated child.

  He had followed Tony into the store and had stood beside him as he had selected a gray bomber and a blue bomber, both with little “baby” fighter planes tucked under their bellies. On the sidewalk once more, Tony had confided boastfully to him: “I like bombers.”

  “Really? Why?”

  “I make ‘em fight,” Tony had said with a trace of defiance and dread in his voice.

  “That’s good,” Erskine had said with feigned cheerfulness.

  What was happening to the child? His curiosity was leading him toward finding out, yet he was checked by a sense of shame. It wouldn’t be right to lead the child to tell him too much. In the fading light of a red, setting sun that spilled over the tops of tall apartment buildings, Erskine had paused when Tony had stopped, squatted, and placed his two bombers on the sidewalk. Passers-by glanced and smiled at the tall man and the little boy and the bombing planes. Then, puffing out his cheeks and making a sound that imitated the drone of planes in flight, Tony, holding the gray bomber in his left hand and the blue bomber in his right, made them veer and loop at imaginary speeds by circling his arms high above his head and then sweeping them low toward the pavement.

  “What are the planes doing, Tony?” he asked timidly, half afraid.

  “They’re looking for the enemy,” Tony had said, continuing his game.

  “Who’s the enemy?”

  “Anybody...”

  The motors of Tony’s planes had droned louder as he lifted them as high in the air as he could.

  “They’re climbing into the sky now!” Tony had panted. “They’re going out over the ocean...! Everybody’s scared...! Look! Here comes the enemy bombers! There’s gonna be a fight, a big fight...! Watch! The big bombers are letting the little baby bombers drop out of their stomachs! The sky’s full of little baby fighter planes now...Everybody’s fighting...!

  In spite of his shame, Erskine had watched little Tony’s face grow white with fear as he pursued his make-believe game of “fighting,” and Erskine felt ill.