The Brick Foxhole

by Richard Brooks

  CHAPTER XI

  The cabby was worried. He looked into the mirror and tried to diagnose what was wrong with his fare. It was too dark. Herman considered himself a supreme judge of human nature and he had come to the conclusion long ago that when a man in uniform rides in a cab all alone it means trouble.

  “Where did you say you wanted to go?” Herman was trying psychology. “I didn’t happen to hear you in all that noise back there.”

  Jeff pondered the question. In the one short block they had driven, his mind had almost been lulled to sleep. Now he would have to tell the driver where to go. Through his mind paraded a series of street signs on cast-iron poles. Pennsylvania Avenue, Fourteenth Street, N.W. He thought it cute the way everything in Washington was divided either N.W. or N.E. That was good, he thought. No South. Very good. Very good indeed.

  “Anywhere but the South,” Jeff declared aloud.

  Herman didn’t like this reply to his question. Not at all. He foresaw trouble of some kind. Herman always foresaw trouble. Herman was the kind of philosopher who left his apartment to go to work and said to his wife each day: “See you later, hon … if the luck holds out.” Herman was constantly being confronted by some sort of trouble. At every corner of life there lurked some mysterious power which did not want to see him reach his destination. So it was that when he gabbed with other cabbies, he would say: “Next year I’m getting me a brand new hack … God willing … and I’m going to go back to New Yawk. That is God’s country. New Yawk.”

  And here he had a soldier who was traveling alone. That in itself was unhealthy. Not only that but the fare asks him to go down a street. And to top things off, the soldier wants to get into an argument or something. What else could it mean when he says: “Anywhere but south.”

  “Me,” replied Herman, “I don’t meddle with politics.”

  “You know what I think?” drawled Jeff.

  “Maybe you thought where you want to go, hah, soldier?”

  “I know exactly where I want to go,” said Jeff.

  Herman felt better. With a world so disorderly, it was good to have direction and purpose in life. “Where to?” he said a bit smugly.

  “I shall tell you when the proper time comes, sir.” As Jeff said it, his answer suddenly struck him as very funny, and he giggled.

  So. It is starting again, worried Herman. This is a troublemaker from way back. What is the matter always I get the troublemakers? He looks like a nice young man, this soldier. Maybe he’s sick. Maybe he’s one of those shell shocks. Maybe he ain’t got the fare? That’s exactly what Bill Cooney would say. ‘All Herman thinks about is has the soldier got the fare.’ That Bill Cooney. He should only get stuck so many times as me. At least I don’t make that run between D.C. and that military post and charge the poor boys two and a half bucks. At least I don’t do that. So it’s hot anyway. So I’ll give this boy a ride. Maybe he’s sick. He needs a little American air. That Pacific. Ah, that’s a bad place. A boy spends so much time killing Japs and Nazis that he needs a little fresh air.

  “You killed many Japs?” he said to Jeff.

  “Why? Don’t I look it?”

  Always belligerent, thought Herman. But he had become accustomed to that. Those who killed most were the most morose.

  “Sure you look it,” said Herman.

  Jeff was pleased. He nodded his head to himself. He was beginning to believe it himself. Where was it he had killed his last Jap? Kwajalein? No. Saipan. Yes. Lots of Japs had been killed there.

  “You know what they ought to do with the South?” asked Jeff.

  There he goes again with the South, Herman worried. An absolute obsession, he’s got.

  “I think they ought to take the South and let it secede. Let ’em get out of the United States. Serve ’em right.”

  “You know, it’s a very funny thing,” said Herman. “I hear some people from the South, they hate the North and they say what the North did to them. And how they was cheated by the North. But I never hear anybody from the North say anything about the South. Everybody from the North, they like the South. Even in the moving pictures everybody likes the South.”

  “That’s the trouble. Don’t you see?”

  Herman didn’t see.

  “Trouble is,” went on Jeff, “not enough people from the North hate the South. Spoiled ’em all. Think they got royal blood or something. Always giving orders.”

  “Maybe you got something, soldier,” said Herman.

  “Sure I have,” said Jeff.

  “Take my wife,” said Herman. “All her life she talks natural. That’s because we lived in the Bronx. Suddenly she talks with a southern accent.”

  “You’re a goner,” said Jeff austerely. “A goner. That’s the first step.”

  “About a month ago she came home, Reba, and she was upset. What’s the matter? She says a colored man got on the bus before she did. So I said what’s the matter with that? They pay a fare like everybody else and if they stand in line first they got a right to get on first, no? So she says they don’t know their place any more. Reba, she is not a very deep thinker. She can’t grasp things. She knows only to go window-shopping in Garfinkle’s department store, and buying she does someplace else. That is all on her mind. Shopping. I told her: ‘Reba, you are in the same position as the colored people. What if somebody says: “Do you know some fat Jew got on the bus before I did?”’ Of course I lost the argument because I called Reba fat. But that’s the way it is. A woman will always confuse the issues.”

  Jeff felt depressed. Why did people always have to discuss the Negroes? Maybe Hank Ferguson was right? Maybe it was a bigger issue than people thought? A big issue, yes, thought Jeff. But it always had been a big issue. Only we never treated it as such. He didn’t want to think about it. What did the Negro question have to do with him? And yet he knew that somehow it had everything to do with him. If only Keeley were there to set him straight. Keeley knew the answer to things like this. He could connect things. Make sense out of them. But where was Keeley? He couldn’t remember.

  “Are you all right back there?” asked Herman.

  “Sure. Fine. Okay.”

  “Where to?” said Herman quickly. He thought that if he said it suddenly he might trick Jeff into an answer. Psychology was the trick.

  “What’s the name of that street with all the government buildings?” asked Jeff.

  “Constitution Avenue.”

  “That’s where to.”

  Herman felt a little better. He liked Constitution Avenue. It was broad and pretty, and the buildings reminded him that America was an important place. It was all well and good to talk about America and make speeches, thought Herman, but you got to have something to show for it. Buildings like these were proof. They were something substantial. Big buildings. Good-looking buildings. If you went into them they even smelled big.

  “I read in the papers that the war is going to be over soon,” said Herman.

  “How soon is soon?”

  “Maybe in the summer. Maybe in the winter.”

  “Tell me something, cabby.”

  “Sure, buddy. What would you like to know?”

  “What are you doing in this war? I mean, when the war is won and everything, what will you be able to say you’ve done?”

  Herman felt he should have been offended. He was constantly afraid people would ask him that question. But the tone of Jeff’s voice was simply questioning and not accusing.

  “I don’t know exactly,” said Herman. “Who knows who’s doing something? Of course, I don’t mean you boys in uniform. You’re doing everything you can do. At least you’re doing whatever they tell you. The rest of us … I don’t know. We buy bonds, sure. So what is buying bonds? I love to buy bonds. You know why? I lived in this country all my life. I’m a natural citizen. Never before in all my life I owned anything. Oh, I own my own cab, of course. But I don’t mean that. I mean something big. Some people they say they are real Americans because they own a farm or an
apartment house. Take a certain lady I know in the Bronx in New Yawk. She owns a big apartment house. She feels all the time she’s got a right to make complaints because she owns the apartment house, and pays on it taxes, and serves the people, and so forth and so on. If a policeman he does not walk by and look at her apartment house ten times a night, she makes a complaint. But now I got something, too. I own a piece of America. Even when things they are bad and customers they are not so many, I buy a bond. And if not a bond, then some stamps. I, Herman Gorsky, own a piece of America. I can hold it in my hands and look at it. Sometimes Reba, she’s my wife, she don’t understand why we need so many bonds. But she don’t understand a lot of things. But I understand. Listen, soldier, it’s not so easy to explain. To you, a man who is not killing Japs is not doing anything to win the war. But some people are not made for killing. I guess maybe I’m one of them. So, you have to kill twice as many to make up for men like me. After all, what am I good for anyhow? What do I do? I drive a cab. Hooray for Herman Gorsky. He drives a cab. A big contribution to civilization. I know I’m a nobody. A nothing. But I’m here. Like the ants and the little bugs in the air. Who knows why they are there? And what they do? A cow is important. It feeds people. A mosquito? What good is a mosquito? What good is a cockaroach? But they are there. I don’t know. Some things are hard to understand, even for me.”

  Herman stopped the cab at a corner near the art gallery. He motioned to a peanut vendor and bought two bags of peanuts. Then he started the cab. He handed one bag to Jeff and started to munch peanuts from the other bag himself.

  I’m crazy for peanuts,” said Herman. “You know who really discovered the peanut? George Washington Carver. A great inventor. He found out four million things to do with the peanut except eat it. Maybe he’s right. A peanut is terrific in the mouth and terrible in the stomach. Worst thing for constipation. It’s a funny thing. When a man is ten years old he dreams about leading an army. The whole world is his marble. When he’s twenty he thinks about girls. The whole world is full of girls’ arms and legs and things. When he’s thirty he thinks about making lots of money. The whole world is a mortgage or an automobile. When he’s forty he thinks about his constipation. The whole world is can he move his bowels regular? Even the radio knows it. Serutan spells Nature’s backwards. Carter’s Little Liver Pills. Headache tablets. Snap back with Stanback. Bayer’s aspirin. B.C. Once it used to mean ‘Before Christ.’ Now it means the second and third letter in the alphabet cures headaches at once or your money back. Yes. A man is a slave to his stomach.”

  Jeff thought that he was thirty and didn’t think about mortgages.

  “What about me?” he said. “I don’t think about money.”

  “You’re a soldier. You got a right not to think about anything. Only yourself. If I’m a soldier I’m just like you.”

  “I’m lonely.”

  “You ought to have a girl. Every soldier ought to have a girl.”

  “It’s not so easy.”

  “Why? Girls are lonely, too. Girls are looking for boys, just the same as boys are looking for girls. It’s only natural.”

  “Girls become complicated,” said Jeff.

  “It depends on the girl. Sometimes I think the only girls who know what the score is, is a prostitute. Sometimes I give them rides. They have to go out on business. They are regular ladies, those girls. They don’t yell and they don’t order you around and they always tip nice. They got good manners. Sometimes I think if a man marries a girl like that he can be very happy. Why? Because prostitutes have got a philosophy. Without a philosophy life is nothing.”

  “Okay. I’m sold. Where can I find one of these girls?”

  “Just a minute, soldier. You got the wrong idea. I’m not one of those fellas. Not me. I’m a legit cabby. You got me altogether wrong.”

  “Just drive me where I can get a girl.”

  “You tell me and I’ll drive you wherever you want to go.”

  “I don’t know any place.”

  “Come on, now. A soldier doesn’t know such a place?”

  “I’ve never been to a whorehouse in my life.”

  “Then my advice is not to go now.”

  “Why not?”

  “It might become a habit. It’s like smoking. A habit. Please, soldier, be nice. Eat peanuts and be happy. Please.”

  “I want a girl. Now. I’m lonely. I don’t want to be alone.”

  “Then you’ll have to find somebody else. You think you’re the first one? Lots of soldiers ask me this. But I don’t tell them. They think I get a cut from it. I don’t want anybody to think this about Herman Gorsky. Not me.”

  All at once Jeff wanted more than anything else to be with a girl. Someone who wouldn’t require a great deal of stupid preliminary chatter. Keeley was right. He wanted to be with a woman. The drinks were still strong in him. He needed company. Soft, sympathetic company.

  “Come on, cabby,” said Jeff. There was a new note of firmness in his voice. “Take me where I want to go.”

  “You say you never been to one of those places?” asked Herman.

  “No.”

  “Why?”

  “I don’t know. When a man is sure of himself he doesn’t have to go there. I’m not sure of myself any more.”

  “I feel sorry for you, soldier.”

  “Then you’ll take me?”

  “Well, why not?” said Herman philosophically. “A little happiness in the world is bad?”

  “I don’t think you’re getting a cut,” said Jeff.

  “That’s good. Because I’m not. It’s just that I pick them up sometimes when they call for a cab and so I know where they work.”

  The cab turned off Constitution Avenue and wove a path through the stream of automobiles. Neither man spoke for a long time. Then Herman said: “The war is a funny thing. Everybody says that war is natural. But it ain’t. Believe me, it ain’t. Because if war is natural, then the whole world is drunk.”

  Jeff didn’t reply. He was wondering what kind of girl he would find. A peculiar excitement seized him. It wasn’t so much the excitement of having a girl in bed, but the strangeness of going to the place. Finally the cab stopped on a quiet street lined with trees. An apartment building stood there.

  Herman looked at his wrist watch. It was almost eight-thirty.

  “Is this it?” asked Jeff.

  “This is it,” said Herman. “Maybe you want me to drive you back now? Maybe you changed your mind?”

  “No. How much do I owe you?”

  “Fifty cents.”

  Jeff gave Herman a dollar. Herman counted out fifty cents in change.

  “Keep it,” said Jeff, getting out of the cab.

  “Thanks,” said Herman.

  “So long,” said Jeff.

  “You’ll be okay?” asked Herman.

  “Sure. Fine.”

  “Don’t be lonely any more,” said Herman.

  Jeff walked away from the cab toward the apartment building. A man lounged near the entrance way. For a moment Jeff thought he might be a detective. The man was looking directly at him. Well, what of that? He looked back at the man. He couldn’t make out his features, but there was something sad and wistful about the man’s face, and Jeff thought he saw his lips twitch. As Jeff reached the door, he heard Herman’s motor race.

  Herman was still parked at the curb. He had turned on the radio in his cab. He drew a long white card from a niche and marked down his fare. His world was orderly again.

  CHAPTER XII

  Jeff walked into the foyer of the apartment house. The floor was tiled and the walls were faked to look like some kind of dirty marble. A small telephone switchboard stood to one side. A kid of about twenty sat at the switchboard looking at a picture magazine through one bad and angry sty and one dull brown eye. A little farther down the foyer the sliding door of the elevator stood open. Periodically the buzzer buzzed. Someone upstairs wanted to come down. The kid at the switchboard didn’t move. He heard Jeff and looked
up, his feet still propped on the edge of the switchboard. To the kid there were three kinds of people who came into the apartment house. One kind lived there. They went right to the elevator and waited impatiently. The second kind walked right up to him and asked if so-and-so was in. The third kind, Jeff’s kind, was indecisive. The kid always knew that the third kind had come to visit Mrs. Bell, the madam on the fourth floor.

  “Where is it?” asked Jeff. He was blunt because instinctively he didn’t like the kid.

  “Where’s what?” The feet came down off the switchboard.

  “You know what.”

  “Mrs. Bell’s?”

  “Is she the one who runs it?”

  “Yeah. She’s a resident here.”

  “Then that’s the one,” said Jeff.

  The kid held up the cord of a plug, “Who’ll I say is calling?”

  Jeff was getting discouraged. Why did everything have to become complicated. On matters like this, they should be easy and not at all difficult. Yet this business had a ritual all of its own. Everything was standardized. Even whorehouses.

  The kid was smiling, and that irked Jeff even more. The kid knew more about this than he did. He would have known how to handle the matter. The kid plugged in a number and pushed the tiny lever which rang a bell somewhere. “Mrs. Bell? A friend of Mr. Carter’s calling.” He listened for a second, and then pulled out the plug. “Okay, soldier,” said the kid to Jeff.

  Jeff followed him to the elevator. The buzzer was still buzzing, now angrily.

  “Just back from the Pacific?” the kid asked, as he started the elevator upward.

  Jeff grunted and it sounded like “yes.”

  “Get wounded?” the kid asked.

  Jeff grunted again.

  “Kill many Japs?”

  “Enough,” said Jeff.

  “I’d be in there pitchin’ myself only for my mother,” said the kid.