Fairbairn, Ann

by Five Smooth Stones

  Li'l Joe sat in the big chair in front of the mock fireplace, feet propped on the hassock, and reached to turn on the radio beside him. He stopped, hand on knob, at the sound of a heavy thud-thud of feet on the porch. When he opened the door the Professor was standing before it, red-gray beard jutting over the top of the brown paper bag he held in his arms.

  "Ah! My friend—" The Professor pushed past Li'l Joe and went directly to the kitchen. "You are lonely. Do not lie to me and say you are not." He was opening the refrigerator. "Bjarne Knudsen is lonely with the boy away, and I know Li'l Joe must be also. So I come. With beer. Good Danish beer. The shot glasses, Li'l Joe! The shot glasses. What have you done with them?"

  "Lawd!" Li'l Joe, just behind him, was looking at the bottle the Professor had placed on the table. "You brought them schnapps. I dunno, Prof—"

  "There is no law that says you must drink schnapps with beer." The Professor was carrying a tray laden with bottles and glasses into the living room. "But there should be. Tonight you will have some, yes?"

  "No. I mean sure. Sure, Prof. Mebbe one or two."

  Later, sitting in a corner of the blue divan, the Professor shook a finger at him, a small shake, without menace. "Two grown men; two grown men and we sit consoling each other because one young boy has gone a short distance. Do not tell me your heart is not heavy. It is true that there is a feeling no? A feeling that he has gone a long way."

  "I done told the boy, long time ago, I done told him he' be leaving this place one of these days. Said he wa'n't, but knows better. Lawd, Prof! That boy's been lucky. I mean, he's been lucky! I looks around and I sees these other boys around here and the way they going, and I thinks about it al' the time. Not that I ain't had no problems with him; reckon just being a teen like he is, that's a problem all by itself. But still I wonders what I done the good Lord should make it so fine for David. I keep a-telling him there ain't nothing free; sooner or later a man pays for his luck."

  "You must not say that to him. He owes nothing. Excep to his people. And this he will know, or I am a stupid man."

  Li'l Joe grinned. "You ain't stupid, Prof." He sobered "Y'all think he'll make it? Y'all think he'll measure up?"

  "With—how do I say it?—with no sweat he will measure up. Without sweat he will make it. He is no prodigy, thank the good God, but he has what I call a wide intelligence."

  The Professor smiled at Joseph Champlin, and there was a sweetness in the smile Li'l Joe had never seen before, not in all the years he had known the Prof.

  "Something within you almost hopes he will not make it, no? It is natural."

  "My Gawd, Prof! I ain't all that selfish! I ain't like—"

  "You are human, Li'l Joe, and you love the boy. He is your life. He is—what is it your people say?—your 'heart.'" Knudsen picked up his glass of schnapps, downed it in one gulp, and followed it with beer. "He will go far, our David. But not from you, Li'l Joe. I know this. You do not understand? You will remain with him, Joseph Champlin, you and your wife and this house and the Timminses and the Jeffersons and the bureau drawer in which he was cradled. And, I hope, the Prof. Good God, yes! I hope the Prof! A man cannot cast aside his childhood, Li'l Joe, though he run from it as he would run from the devil. He may make of it a burden under which to stumble and fall, or a shield to hide behind, or he may make of it a tool." He sighed. "I do not make myself clear?"

  "Sure." Li'l Joe was looking into his glass. "Sure you makes yourself clear. You always does when you puts your mind to it."

  Knudsen found himself in the unfamiliar position of being without words. He knew Li'l Joe understood what he had said. He also knew that there was in Li'l Joe's mind a dark land as unknown to Bjarne Knudsen as the surface of a far planet, a land that his words would never reach, or if they reached would never lighten. Of that land he knew only that its prevailing wind was fear.

  He rose quietly and went to the kitchen, opened two more bottles of beer, and brought them back. He handed one to Li'l Joe, and said: "From your own life, you have given him courage. Do not worry about him. Where he goes, you go too." Picking up the bottle of schnapps, he said: "Akvavit, Li'l Joe? Three? Bah! It is nothing. Will you let a Viking out-drink you?"

  Li'l Joe was quiet for a moment, then he said, "Lawd! Ain't no—what you always calling it? Wiking?—what can't outdrink me. Reckon all of you was weaned on that stuff. Where y'all going with that bottle? You didn't hear me say I wouldn't."

  ***

  The outstanding feature of "Margie's" Coke and hamburger dispensary was noise. Its booths seemed made of elastic siding, capable of expanding to accommodate anywhere from one to eight young people. The day after David Champlin's arrival at Pengard, the woodwork of the back booth was creaking under the weights and against the pressures of Suds Sutherland, Tom Evans, Chuck Martin, and three girls, one of them Sara Kent. At the end of the booth's table Randolph Clevenger sat, chair pushed back, legs crossed, hands clasped around one knee. The other two girls were Carol Babcock, who had come with Chuck, and Lou Callender, Tom Evans's current companion in off moments. Randolph Clevenger had been drinking coffee at the counter when they entered, and had now attached himself to their table. They were talking about Goodhue, from whom Tom, earlier that day, had received a sternly tolerant lecture on curfew violations. Tom's mimicry of the dean was subtle but sure in touch.

  " 'Cozy,'" said Carol. "Whoever thought that up—"

  Sutherland protested. "He's too big. Man, he's got bones like a dinosaur."

  "I don't care. I think he's dreamy," Lou answered him. It was an adjective current at the time, and Lou used it as though she was afraid it would go out of style or vanish from the vocabulary before she had exhausted its possibilities.

  "Distinctive. That's the word for Cozy," said Sara. "You can take it two ways—"

  Clevenger lighted a cigarette, extinguished the lighter with a quick snap. "You're talking like adolescents," he said. "I'll agree that in some ways he's not all he cracks himself up to be. But at least he has standards you people don't seem to appreciate. Unfortunately, they're vanishing—"

  Sudsy made a rude noise, said, "Like the dinosaurs—"

  "And good riddance," said Tom. "They sure did mess up the campus."

  "I tried taking one home," said Chuck. "I wanted him for a pet. Never could housebreak him." He shook his head sadly. "My old man made me have him put to sleep."

  "No understanding of today's Young," said Sudsy. "That's the trouble with parents. We all, I'm telling you, we all have to have something to love. It says so in the books. But do they know it?" He threw an arm around Carol, nuzzled her hair with his nose.

  Clevenger stood, ground out the cigarette that was only a third smoked, said something about studying, and left.

  "What's about him?" asked Suds. "What's about him?"

  "Don't y'all know?" Chuck was drawling. "Cain't y'all see? He's a suth'n gentleman."

  "He's a fink," said Tom.

  "What's a fink?" asked Carol.

  "Something dirty?" Lou's tone was hopeful.

  "No! For gosh sake! A fink is really a low form of life known as the boss's man. Most prevalent among white-collar workers. Only nowadays everybody uses it and it means something different. When I was a kid—"

  "How does it happen you know so much, baby?" asked Carol.

  "Because my old man's Bull Evans, that's how. And I bet you never even heard of Bull Evans."

  "I have so heard of him. Only—gosh, it was a long time ago, wasn't it? I mean, isn't he, well, kind of old for a parent?"

  "Yup. Old as most people's grandparents."

  "There's more," broke in Sara. "My grandfather got Tom Evans's father out of prison. It must have been"—she frowned—"it must have been before any of us were born."

  "It was," said Tom.

  Lou said, "You mean poor Tom's father was in prison and all?"

  "You don't need to sound so damned sympathetic and patronizing all of a sudden," said Tom. "We're damned proud of it around
our house."

  "I didn't even know about all this," said Chuck. "I mean, I never even heard of Bull Evans, and I apologize. I really apologize, but I can't help being ignorant. I was born that way—"

  "Listen," interrupted Sara. "Bull Evans was a great labor leader. I've known him ever since I was a baby, and he's super. Isn't he, Tom? He was a labor leader when being a labor leader was something, really something, when it took —it took—"

  "Guts," supplied Tom.

  "Yes. And way back in the old days when a strike was really something and people got hurt and killed, Bull Evans got thrown in jail, and they dragged out some old law and dusted it off and were trying to send him to prison for life or anyhow a long time. Right, Tom? And then my grandfather heard about it and raised a terrible ruckus and took over his defense—"

  "Your grandfather being a lawyer?" asked Suds.

  "Of course, Stoopid. And my father, too. All three of them still get together at our house and talk and argue all night."

  "And he got out of prison? Tom's father?" Lou's eyes were wide.

  "I'm here, aren't I? Gosh, Lou, I wonder." Tom shook his head. "Sometimes I wonder. I really wonder."

  Chuck half rose. "If you all would stand up so I can slide out of this booth, I'll fetch Randy back. It's a downright shame not to have Clevenger here to learn all about your father being in prison—"

  "He'd die," said Sara. "He'd die utterly."

  "Sure would." Chuck was seated again. "And did you all know the new Quimby's finally arrived?"

  "The boy from New Orleans?" asked Lou.

  Suds answered her. "Yes, I met him and fed him. Knudsen asked me to meet him. The feeding was my own idea. Tom and Chuck helped."

  "What's he like, Sudsy?" asked Carol.

  "O.K. He's a real swell person—"

  Sara broke in. "He's a livin' doll—"

  "Sara!" Lou's shock was obvious. "What a thing to say!"

  Sara turned to her, face flushing. "Don't be like that. Why shouldn't he be?"

  "How'd you know, Sara?" asked Chuck.

  "Last spring. Remember? I'm the one with a courtesy aunt whose husband's faculty. I was here with them when he came up for interviews. He came to dinner. And if Lou will stop acting like a southern belle, I'll say it again. I will anyhow. He's a livin' doll."

  Carol asked, "Not another Simmons or Dunbar?"

  "No. Gosh, no," Sudsy answered. "He's a real guy. He was —well"—Sudsy hesitated—"sort of standoffish and shy at first—"

  "Poor thing," said Lou.

  "Stop being like that, Lou! Can't you educate your dames, Tom? Anyhow, you kept wanting to tell him to snap out of it. Gosh, no, he's not like Simmons or Dunbar. Those two guys bug me, I mean, really bug me, and if I say anything I'm talking against a Negro and I've got leprosy."

  "What about me?" asked Chuck plaintively. "You all think I haven't got leprosy every time I open my big mouth? I swear—" He ran big-knuckled hands through the tow-colored hair. "There's nobody in this whole cotton-picking, evil, li'l ol' world hates the way the South treats the Negro worse'n I do. And listen to me. Every time I open my mouth somebody calls out the N-double-ACP and the American Civil Liberties Union and ALEC. On the double."

  "Never you mind, Chuck," said Sara. "Never you mind. You don't say 'nigra.' That's one good thing."

  "First time I meet a colored person up here and just say 'Howdy' or something I feel like a one-man lynch party. What'm I supposed to do? Tell 'em I got kicked out of two southern colleges just for talking about civil rights and integration? Walk up and tell 'em my old man caught me in the basement of a church with a bunch of kids trying to start an interracial group and if the minister hadn't been there the old man would have horsewhipped me?"

  "Hush yo' mouth, Chuck," said Tom. "You're spitting on your grandfather's grave. You know that, don't you? Right on the green grass of his grave."

  "Oh, stop it!" cried Lou. "None of you know what you're talking about—"

  Tom Evans picked up Lou Callender's tightly clenched fist, began trying to pry the fingers open. "Quit sizzling, sweetie. Simmer down...."

  "Look," said Carol, who was large, phlegmatic, and who disliked arguments. "Look. Let's change the subject—"

  "No!" Lou pulled her hand away from Tom's. The thin, almost transparently pale skin of her face was flushed.

  "Lou—" said Sara, and Tom interrupted, "Let her go, Sara. She's got opinions, too."

  "I certainly have! I most certainly have! The way you-all talk people would think everyone in the South went around smelling magnolias and calling for a slave to—to peel a grape." Lou's chin was trembling. "You just don't understand, that's all. Chuck Martin, you know better than to talk the way you do. You know better. You're—you're nothing but a traitor!"

  There was an uncomfortable silence. Chuck's voice, when he spoke, was quieter and more serious than any of them had ever heard it. "To what?" he asked. "My country or the Confederate slave states?"

  "For gosh sakes!" Sudsy's voice was pleading, and Lou turned on him.

  "You just be quiet, Clifton Sutherland! You just hush! You come from New England, and everyone knows what they're like. Smug and—and know-it-all and trying to run everyone's business in the country, getting rich on the slave trade and being self-righteous about the South—"

  "Hey! Swear to God I never shipped a slave in my whole life! All my people were doctors, and that's what I want—"

  "It doesn't make any difference. I like Negroes. I was brought up to respect and be kind to them. Why, everyone knows, everyone knows Margaret Benjamin's my friend. Everyone knows I'd—I'd jump in the lake through the ice before I'd do anything to hurt her because she's a Negro. When I see the new Quimby—what's his name—"

  "David Champlin," said Sara.

  "When I see David I'll—I'll go out of my way to make him feel welcome. Just like I did Margaret The way you-all talk—"

  "He won't buy that," said Chuck. "Not if you marked it down to ninety-eight cents and threw in your lily-white body he wouldn't buy it. He'd rather you crossed over and walked on the other side of the street. Margaret doesn't buy it."

  "I don't know how you figure you know so much about it Chuck Martin. You're talking—"

  "Maybe it's because he thinks, honey chile," said Tom. "Try it some time." He curled a lock of her hair around his fingers, then slipped an arm through hers and pulled her to her feet. "Come on, sweetie. Let's go. Your head's going to start aching—"

  ***

  Sudsy parked his car in the garage he rented from a family living near the campus, and he and Sara walked together toward the college. "You always act like you're running somewhere," he complained. "Even when you're walking. You have to run? Can't you ever just sort of amble along? I bet you'd run to the dentist."

  She didn't answer, didn't speak until they were almost at the college gates. Then she said "Why?"

  "Why what?"

  "Why do people have to fly at each other's throats over other people" just because the other people's—other person's —well, anyhow, because their skin's a different color? We're all having a nice time together, then all of a sudden we're fighting the Civil War. It's stupid!"

  "I can't see that it's exactly stupid, Sara. If your dad's a lawyer and mixed up in labor cases, I'll bet when you were a kid you met Negro lawyers and, well, Negroes like that. The only ones Lou's ever known are the ones the whites have manufactured—"

  "You mean down there in what Tom's always calling the murder belt?"

  "Yes."

  "Well, it's all lousy. Chuck's right. Margaret Benjamin hates Lou. Honestly she does. I can see it. Sometimes she isn't even nice to her, and Lou tries so—so damned hard she makes you just plain sick."

  They were quiet for a few moments, walking along the center strip of the quadrangle; then Sara said, "If David Champlin had walked into Margie's while we were talking, we'd have all shut up and then we'd have started gushing all over the place and he'd have known, he'd have known, and it'
s awful."

  "We had a swell time together yesterday. Except when Randy was there."

  "I'm glad Chuck jumped him. Glad! And that's something else. Chuck's from as far south as Lou. So it can't all be just early environment and influences."

  "I dunno. I've wondered myself. I've got a sneaking hunch it's something that happened when he was a kid. Maybe he's got what my father talks about—a low threshold for pain, only with him it's for other people's pain."

  "And maybe he's got a low threshold for ideas, too." They had reached the upper third of the quadrangle, and as Sara turned to leave she said, "And it could be Tom's right. That Chuck thinks—"

  She headed for Rainsford Hall, really hurrying now in the gray light of late afternoon. She thought of the sketch of David Champlin she had tried to do last spring. It lay hidden now in the bottom of her suitcase because it wasn't good enough. She had made it after she returned home to Lakeside Heights, completed it after more than a score of false starts, and then almost destroyed it because she knew it was the best she could do then, and it wasn't good enough; it was so far from good enough that a jagged tear in an upper corner showed where she had started to tear up even that final copy.

  Still, she might show it to him even now, she thought; she would if he called her and let her know himself that he'd arrived. He ought to, she told herself; it would only be polite. After all, they'd had dinner together and washed dishes together and she'd been sort of junior hostess, and he must know, just couldn't help knowing, that they liked him and were interested in him. Actually, he should have called her yesterday, he really should; it would have been the right thing to do; and not having called yesterday, surely today, this evening he would.

  Then as she reached the sidewalk on the women's dormitory side of the quadrangle she knew with deadly certainty that he could never have called her yesterday, would never call her now, not if they boiled him in oil. She felt sickeningly helpless in the face of that knowledge, cornered by an enemy she could neither touch nor fight off.