“Aw, Rutherford!” buzzed the little Viola-bee.
“I ain’ exaggeratin’, Amerigo, that gal came to school at n-o-o-n even! You’d hear that nine o’clock whistle blow, an’ ever’body’d take they seat all quiet an’ nice-like, waitin’ for school to start, an’ then you’d hear a rush a wind like a storm blowin’ up!”
“R-u-t-h-e-r-f-o-r-d J-o-n-e-s! How you expect to git to heaven lyin’ like that!” cried Viola.
“Amerigo, I hope the Lord strikes me down dead, right heah where I’m sittin’, if I’m lyin’. You know, you’d hear a … hear a … thunderin’ sound, like a herd a stampedin’ hosses! Haw! Haw! Tearin’ down Fifth Street. The whole buildin’d start to shakin’! That was your momma burnin’ a path to school. An’ don’ you git in ’er way! Better not git in ’er way! Git trampled to death! An’ then, Amerigo, she’d git right up to the door an’ stop an’ git all quiet an’ then come tiptoeing in, Jack! Just like nothin’ had happened!
“An’ ol’ lady Moore’d be sittin’ there, Jack, cool as a cucumber, ready for her. Ol’ Vi’d e-a-s-e the door open an’ come sneakin’ in, an’ Miss Moore’d say: ‘V-i-o-l-a!’ ‘Yes’m?’ she’d say, ’er eyes all wide an’ innocent-like, like she thought she was on time or somethin’.
“ ‘What happened this time?’ An’ the ol’ lady’d level those eyes on ’er. “Viola’d look at the ceilin’, set her mouth, an’ start lyin’ up a breeze! That gal could really go you hear me? She’d start to lyin’ an’ the little niggahs’d git to laughin’, ol’ T. C. louder’n all the rest! That joker was as big as he is now, Amerigo! He’d let out a horse-laugh. Miss Moore’d say, ‘Thomas!’ she called that niggah Thomas, ‘you may go out in the hall and finish laughing. When you’re through, you may remain after class.’ ”
“But wait! talkin’ about horses!”
“Aaaaaaaaw,” cried Viola, “don’ you start that lie again! You done told it at least a thousand times, and e-v-e-r-y time it’s different!”
“Aw, but wait Amerigo, T. C. played hooky from school more’n your momma! She was just late all the time, but T. C. played hooky ever’ day! An’ Pr’fessor Bowles, J. J. Bowles, the principal —”
“A wonderful man, Amerigo,” said Viola.
“She’s tellin’ the truth!”
“A race man!”
“I mean a real educator! Well Principal Bowles almost had to dynamite that niggah out a elementary school! Ha! ha! Ah-ha! ha! ha!”
“Amerigo!” said Viola, her voice trembling with laughter, “he was in the seventh grade, fixin’ to graduate, an’ didn’ even know his ABCs!”
“Pr’fessor Bowles shamed him before the whole class!” Rutherford said. “Look at Rutherford an’ Eddie an’ Viola, here, they’re at the head of the class. Your momma an’ me was the best! I was the president, Jack! An’ ol’ Vi was the class secretary!”
“Ol’ T. sure was dumb! Tee! hee!” Amerigo giggled.
“Naw he wasn’, Amerigo!” Rutherford replied. “Naw he wasn’, that niggah was smart! He knew all about fishin’ an’ huntin’, an’ hosses. An’ he knew e-v-e-r’-b-o-d-y’s first, middle, an’ last name, an’ they brothers’ and sisters’ names, an’ when was they birthday an’ when they was sick an’ what they had — an’ not only this year, but last year — an’ the year before that, too! He knew what you liked an’ what you didn’ like, an’ he would give it to you, too, if he could. If you could catch him in one place long enough. T. C. had a heart a gold! A-l-l the gals was crazy about that niggah! Nice girls, too! An’-an’ a-l-l the teachers, an’ even Pr’fessor Bowles. He never did nobody no harm, except maybe hisself, but then he had so much fun doin’ whatever he did that it didn’ make you feel bad, even if it was against hisself. Naw-naw, that joker wasn’ dumb, Amerigo, that cat was lazy!”
“I don’ even think he was lazy,” said Viola tenderly. A feeling of shame rose to Amerigo’s throat.
“Naw. That’s right, Babe,” said Rutherford thoughtfully. “He was just bigger than the rest of us, tall an’ powerfully built for his age. He just flunked out all the time ’cause he never came to school, ’cause he was ashamed to have to sit with all us little kids. So he’d just goof off.”
“An’ even then,” said Viola, “he couldn’ stay away from the playground. At recess he’d come ridin’ up on that big old white horse. Whose horse was that, Rutherford?”
“Ol’ man Benson’s, I think. Anyway, Amerigo, that horse was so ol’ that he didn’ have no teeth.”
“Aw, Rutherford!” exclaimed Viola.
“Well, he didn’ have many!”
“That’s true.”
“That old nag’s beard was so long he almost tripped over it every time he’d start to run! T. C.’d come ridin’ up on that old horse like Tom Mix a-grinnin’ and a-showin’ off, lettin’ ever’body ride. The bell rung for ’um to go back in but didn’ nobody hear it ’cause those little jokers was havin’ so much fun. When all of a sudden, before anybody knowed what was happenin’, there was Mister Bowles, standin’ in the midst of them little niggahs. E-v-e-r-y-body got as quiet as a mouse. T. C. tried to make that old horse stand still, but he got all nervous and started to rarin’ up!
“ ‘Thomas Corning Belcher!’ Mr. Bowles cried out, an’ all the little niggahs started howlin’. ‘Corning,’ they hollered. ‘Man! Where’d you git a name like that?’ Old T. C. looked down all shamed and ever’thin’.
“ ‘If you ever bring that beast on school property again, I’ll have you expelled from school. Now take that thing away and be in my office in the next thirty minutes. As for the rest of you, you have three minutes to be in your seats. Once more, the whole school will remain after the last bell for one hour!’ An’ I mean he laid it down in good English, Jack, just like I said it. M-a-n — you ought to a seen those jokers scramble!
“Yessir,” Rutherford continued dreamily, “ol’ T. C. was a lot a fun, Amerigo. An’ nobody better not bother me an’ Viola! He’d run them li’l niggahs wild! An’ they was some tough jokers, too, Amerigo, m-e-a-n li’l niggahs, with knives, an’ they’d use ’um, too!
“Me an’ a whole gang a niggahs usta go snake huntin’ ever’ Sad’dy on Clairmount Hill an’ all up in them woods ’roun’ Cliff Drive an’ down by the railroad tracks. An’ don’ let us come ’cross no cats! M-a-n, we was rough on cats! We’d throw ’um up in the air by the tail an’ chunk rocks at ’um!”
“Rutherford, you oughtta be ashamed of yourself, teachin’ that boy things like that!” said Viola. “Amerigo, don’ listen. That’s mean!”
“I usta just look at a cat an’ git m-a-d! They kin look at you so mean an’ evil-like. Besides, we was just havin’ fun, Babe. Anyhow, we never killed no cat more’n once or twice!”
“What foolishness you talkin’ now, Rutherford?”
“Well, they got nine lives, ain’ they? Ha! ha! ha! Anyhow, anyhow, no sooner’n ol’ T. C. got out a elementary school, he up an’ run off with a carnival. Some cat named Tex talked ’im into boxin’! One day the carnival came to town an’ there was ol’ T. C. prancin’ in the ring! An’ that cat looked keen, too, Amerigo: tall an’ heavy built, broad shoulders an’ all. Hey-hey! the jokers all cried. Look at ol’ T. C. We got our tickets an’ ever’thin’. Battlin’ T. C. B.! he called hisself. Ha! ha! You ought to a seen ’im, Amerigo. ‘Battlin’ T. C. B. takes on all challengers!’ that niggah Tex yelled out. An’ then a skinny wiry little joker, quiet, looked like he couldn’ whip a fly. What was that joker’s name, Babe?”
“I think it was Baby Li’l John, or somethin’ like that.”
“Yeah, that’s it. Baby Li’l John! Well, Baby Li’l John stepped in the ring an’ all the cats started agitatin’: Throw that worm back! No fight! No fight! T. C.’ll kill that joker! An’ all the time Baby Li’l John was quiet. Didn’ say nothin’. Didn’ even look at the niggahs! Then the bell rang an’ m-a-n! He liked to killed T. C. We had to goose ol’ T. back in the ring a couple a times! Hot damn! An’ that wrapped that box
in’ jive up.
“After that he got a job at the station, swingin’ one a them big sevenfoot mops! Naw, that ain’ right. First he was cleanin’ out the trains, the coaches, an’ after that he started janitorin’. An’ Amerigo, he knew e-v-e-r’-b-o-d-y in the whole Union Station! Every porter, brakeman, all the conductors. He coulda had a good job, an’ not just no janitor, ’cause the station master was crazy ’bout ’im! But he just-couldn’-do-right-to-save-his-name! No sooner’n he’d get paid Sad’dy he’d start drinkin’ with those low-lifers on Twelfth Street an’ that’d wrap it up! Four hours after he’d get paid he’d be broke. He’d turn up missin’ from work for days! An’ they’d always take ’im back. But they couldn’ give ’im no job with no responsibility. It’s a cryin’ shame! Why, why, with that niggah’s personality he coulda been president! I ain’ kiddin’! Amerigo, you ain’ seen ’im dressed up. But you git ’im dressed up in a blue serge suit with a white shirt an’ a tie, ain’ nobody, white or black, handsomer than that black man! Looks like a Philadelphia lawyer! An’ then he went an’ married old Fenny. Old enough to be his momma. That ol’ woman was so ugly an’ ol’ that he was ashamed to let people see ’im on the street with ’er!”
Rutherford’s voice droned on and the welter of familiar names and voices of half-remembered, invisible men and women, some dead, flitted in and out of the broadening rays of sunlight and flickered like mirrored reflections upon the windows of the autos whizzing in horizontal planes at the head and the foot of the alley. Singular images now and then darted within the range of a tangible perception: thus the tall handsome figure of Uncle T. C. stood out clearly and filled the brilliant air between the lot behind the empty house and the burning sky that rose beyond the crest of the rise at the top of the alley. His face was smiling and his perfect white teeth flashed a greeting!:
“Hiya, ’Mer’go! Looka there, Rutherford, look how that boy’s growed! He’s gonna be bigger’n me pretty soon! An’ strong as Jack Johnson! Let old T. feel yo’ muscle!” He flexed the muscle of his skinny little arm into a proud little knot and heard T. C. exclaim admiringly:
“Wow! Feel that li’l joker’s arm!” T. C. lifted him into his own powerful arms and pressed his face against his shaven face that nevertheless felt like the bark of a tree!
Then the images and voices gradually faded. He slowly discovered that school loomed large in his mind: the place where something was going to happen to him that had happened to his mother and father and T. C. Something big and long and strange that he could do nothing about. A stubborn resentment crept into his confused feelings and stirred him with an uneasiness that made him wish that twelve o’clock would come, and then five o’clock, night, and then sleep — very many times, and very quickly, until, at last, it would be time to go to school, and do all the things he had to do, and get it over with, so that he could get back up there (he scanned the sky for sign of a star) where it’s really real — really real!
But twelve o’clock did not come quickly. Seven-thirty came. And eight o’clock and five minutes after that: minute by minute, second by second, as though only things were moving and time were standing still, like the people on the radio, interspersed between the movements of cleaning up, from the front room to the kitchen.
He was just about to enter the house when he caught sight of Old Jake walking slowly up the alley.
“That ol’ man’s crazy!” said a voice.
“He ain’ crazy!” said Rutherford. “He’s deep. That man sees things that just any joker can’t see!”
What’s crazy? he wondered aloud, just as Old Jake turned into the shoot on the far side of the empty house and suddenly appeared in the lot. He peered into one of its paneless windows as though he were looking for something. He poked his staff into the rubble heap that rose from the caved-in floor.
And then he looked up into the child’s eyes. He tried to look away but he could not. Old Jake walked to the gate and stopped.
“Mornin’, Mister Jake,” he said nervously.
“Mornin’, ’Mer’go.” He let his sack slide carefully from his back and leaned his staff against the gate. Then he fumbled in the sack and finally brought out a bright object, which he held up in the air so that he could see it.
“What you got, Mister Jake?” He ran down into the yard.
“With them big eyes a yourn you oughtta be tellin’ me!”
“Looks like a star made out a glass!”
“By Gawd, that’s what it is! Found it down by the dump. I saved it for you!”
“Thanks, Mister Jake.” He took the star and held it up in the air as the old man had done so that the sunlight shone through it, reflecting brilliant points of red, green, yellow, and blue light from its beveled edges, just like the rainbow!
He turned to thank Old Jake again, but he was gone! He didn’t see him anywhere. Seized by a sense of mystery, he gazed warily at the empty house, as though it had swallowed Old Jake up. He had the sudden desire to look there himself, to look in ordinary places and find extraordinary things, like Old Jake. He ain’ crazy, he’s deep! That’s why he could find a star when nobody else could. It’s made out of glass. He put it in his pocket and kept his hand upon it. I wonder if it can shine in the pocket, like real stars shine in the sky. He returned to the porch, moving carefully so as not to break the star.
Again he started to enter the house, when he caught sight of a little knot of children cutting through the shoot: three big ones and three little ones. Tommy Johnson, Turner an’ Carl Grey — big. Willie Joe an’ Blanche an’ Cornelie — little. In patched pants and dresses, odd jackets and sweaters and can-scarred, rock-scarred, marble-scuffed shoes, with pigtails with and without ribbons, with big red Indian Chief tablets and pen-and-pencil boxes and lunches wrapped in brown paper sacks and newspaper. They kicked at cans and rocks and laughed and yelled, looked this way and that as they passed under the elm trees where they came to a halt, looked up on the porch, and discovered him.
“Look at that li’l niggah up there with that peanut head! Hee! hee! hee! Wow! What a head! An them eyes! With eyes like them, that niggah oughtta see the whole world with one look!”
“Aw come on, man. Let the boy alone. Hi, ’Mer’go.”
“Hi Tommy.”
The girls giggled and straggled behind the boys at the permitted distance. He followed their laughter through the shoot until the sound was gone, had mingled with the distant hum of traffic and with the farm news reporter’s final prediction of shifting southerly clouds and probable rain.
Just then Bra Mo came out of his cellar and put up the tailgate of his empty truck and climbed into the driver’s seat and released the hand brake and the truck creaked a short distance until the motor caught and then rattled down the alley in convulsive jerks, Bra Mo bobbling up and down on the springs of the driver’s seat like a cork on a choppy sea.
“Toodle-lum! Aw, Toodle-lum!” croaked the hoarse voice of an old woman.
Mrs. Shields. By straining over the banister he could just see her as she stuck her head out the window, a big yellow white-headed woman with a large wart on her cheek and big dark injured eyes underlined with deep purple rings.
“Her mouth looks like it’s always about to say somethin’ nasty,” he heard Viola say, seeing now his mother and father sitting with Aunt Lily on the front porch one evening when Mrs. Shields came out on her front porch and sat facing them.
“She is!” said Rutherford with a mischievous laugh.
“Now children,” said Aunt Lily in a discreet tone, “Margret Shields usta be young an’ pretty an’ as sweet a child as you’d ever wanna see. An’ then her momma died, an’ she had to take care of a mess a brothers an’ sisters. An’ then she had to git married, an’ had a mess a kids of ’er own. An’ you see how they turned out. An’ what with hard times an’ all, she suffered a lot. Poor child’s got the blues an’ can’t git rid of ’um. The blues makes some people able to laugh a little, an’ other folks they just git bitter an’ spiteful.
But she don’ mean no harm.”
“Sh-sh-shee’s jus’, jus’ mmm-mad ’c-c-c-cause she’s a-a-a-niggah!” stammered Unc Dewey. “Th-th-th-that darkie’s mad, mad at the whole world. Sh-sh-shee’d llllike to gggive it a kkick in — the ass!”
“They just ruinin’ poor Toodle-lum!” Rutherford said. “Toodle-lum! What a name to torture a child with!”
“Yes, hon,” said Aunt Lily sweetly, “but you’re forgettin’ somethin’. He’s all she’s got! You lucky. The Lord’s been good to you an’ Viola. Amerigo’s a good boy, an’ one day, just like Old Jake said, he’s gonna be a blessin’ to you. He is already. I ain’ heard from that young ’un a mine in ten years! If you was like her an’ you had a grandson you’d hope that at least he could turn out to be somethin’. Only thing is that she don’ know that you kin love somebody too much!”
“Toodle-lum! Aw, Toodle-lum!”
“Yes’m, Big Gran’ma, Big Gran’ma.” A thin frightened little voice, followed by a burst of laughter from a bunch of little kids whose voices he knew as well as his own: Annie, William and Lem, Victor and Helen-Francis and Sammy and Frank.
“You come in that yard where I kin see you or I’m gonna tan your hide!” shrieked Mrs. Shields.
“Oh, ho! ho! ho!”
“Hee! hee! hee!”
“Yoo — hoo!”
“C-o-m-e Toodie-woodie,” cried the children.
“Little devils!” cried Mrs. Shields. “If’n you was mine, I’d kick the holy shit out a the whole damned lot of you!”
“Sho’ glad I ain’ her’n!” giggled a muffled voice.
“What you say, li’l niggah?”
“Nothin’.”
“Toodle-lum, if you don’ stay ’way from them little dirty nappy-headed niggahs I’ll kill you!”
Charles! That’s his real name. Charles Baxter.
Such Sweet Thunder Page 4