Fairbairn, Ann

by Five Smooth Stones

  The dean replaced the pipe in his mouth, leaned back again, and said expansively: "So much for the details, David. You are doing well otherwise?"

  "I think so."

  "Do you have any problems?"

  Now he could feel a smile coining on, coming on so strong he had to fight to keep it from showing. It wasn't the kind of smile the dean would like at all; it was a smile he'd probably be lynched for in some places. It said, "Problems! Yes, you son of a bitch, you!"

  He drove his hands deep into his pockets and looked directly into Goodhue's shallow, slate-colored eyes, saw the wince and quick inner withdrawal he had seen in other whites when a Negro looked them directly in the eyes, measured them, hated them, knew them. Above all, knew them.

  "No problems." He kept his eyes on the dean's face. "Not right now," he added.

  Goodhue did not rise and go to the door with him, although David felt sure that this was one of his cozy customs following an interview. When David's hand was on the door handle, Goodhue said: "Don't hesitate to call me any time, David. My extension is one-two-three-four"—a throaty chuckle—"Ein-zwei-drei-vier—"

  Now David smiled without opening his lips, nodded, said, "Thank you. I hope I won't have to bother you."

  "My raison d'etre is to help, to advise. I try to keep in touch." A brief pause. "With everyone."

  There was no point in answering, thought David; no point in wasting energy on this man. Doc Knudsen, Andrus, even Benford, a fellow wanted them to like him. This ofay son of a bitch? Let him alone. Let him hate and stay happy. Do your business and get away. Don't mess with 'em more'n you has to. Tip your cap and get away.

  He pulled his knit cap over his ears, closed the door gently, and limped down the drive, shoulders straight, erect. The sound of his parting "Good evening, Dean" had been almost inaudible even to his own ears.

  ***

  Karl Knudsen stood beside the desk in his study listening to Goodhue's blandly deep voice on the telephone. The little professor was frowning fiercely, but his own end of the conversation was in quiet monosyllables. Goodhue said, "I will be frank with you, Knudsen. I've always found it best."

  "Of course."

  "I fear I cannot share your enthusiasm—and the enthusiasm of the others—for your protégé."

  "No?"

  "No. He is a type certain to create difficulties."

  "Why do you say that? We have not found him so."

  "Permit me, Knudsen, to say that I am better equipped to judge these people. They are, after all, our people in the South.... You said?"

  "Nothing, Dean. Nothing."

  "He appears uncooperative, and is uncommunicative to a point that borders on sullenness—"

  "Champlin?"

  "Yes."

  "He is shy—"

  "It is not shyness I am speaking of. No matter. There is no fault to be found with him from the scholastic standpoint, of course. Your brother did an excellent job. There is, of course, your own subject, in which he does not shine, but Benford appears confident this will be overcome, and I am not in a position to quarrel with his opinion."

  "I am seeing Benford this evening."

  "Good. Good. I called you, however, concerning the matter of the boy taking Greek. Really, Knudsen, it's out of the question. Quite out of the question. I explained this to him."

  "I see."

  "I hoped you would, old boy—"

  "I do. Quite clearly now—"

  "Good. Good. I only hope this boy won't let your side down. It's always a gamble—"

  "Ja. Thank you, Dean. I must go. Our doorbell is ringing. It was good of you to telephone so promptly."

  "Quite all right. We should always talk these problems out together. That has been my policy—"

  "Ja. My wife is calling. I will see you no doubt at the faculty breakfast tomorrow. Goodbye—"

  ***

  Eve Knudsen's greeting was warm and gracious. Man would be a fool, thought David, to doubt her sincerity; she just wasn't phony, not in any way that he could see. He was smarting with anger and resentment after his interview with Goodhue, and had tried to think of an excuse to stay away from the Knudsens' but could find none that would hold water. He didn't give a damn what that country son of a bitch with the fake English accent thought about him, not one damn. He knew. Nigger. He was a nigger again. It wasn't easy, he thought bitterly, being a human being on Thursday, a nigger on Friday, maybe a human being again on Saturday and a nigger again on Sunday. That was one of the darkest spots in the night of a colored person's life when he came away. A guy's guard was up all the time at home; up here he got conned into letting it down, and the knife was in him before he could see it.

  He wondered about Goodhue and Benford as he walked to the Knudsens'. It must kill that white bastard's soul, just kill his soul, to have to look at a face as black as Benford's at faculty lunches and breakfasts, to have to call him "Professor," to know—this must be real pain, real hurtin' pain—that inside that black skull was a brain that had racked up degrees all over, even from Cambridge, a brain that made his own look sickly and puny.

  Mrs. Knudsen led him into the living room and turned to him, laughing. "David! Would you be insulted if I said you've grown? Sometimes, after seventeen, young people resent being told that."

  "No, ma'am. My grandfather says I'm plumping out—"

  "Plumping out? Heavens, no! Filling in would be better. And"—she paused, became grave—"and, David, growing up. Definitely growing up."

  "Yes'm. Guess we all do, sooner or later—"

  "My husband will be here in a minute. He's on the telephone—" Before he could stop her she had gone into the hall, and he heard her call "Karl." He heard a telephone hung up, heard Knudsen say, not loudly but with an intensity obvious even to someone out of sight, "I am learning. Ja! I am learning now, Eve. You have been—"

  Mrs. Knudsen's voice interrupted quickly. "David's here. We're waiting for you so we can have coffee—"

  "Ah!" Knudsen hurried into the room, grasped David's arm with surprising strength. "Ah! Glad you came, David. I would not have blamed you had you stayed away."

  "Why?" Eve Knudsen was frowning. "Why do you say that, Karl?"

  "He has been with the Dean of Men. As I have just said, Eve, I am learning. Sit down, my boy, sit down; our coffee is not so strong and bitter as the Creole coffee—brr-rr!—but it is excellent. My wife has a certain touch with coffee—"

  David sat on the deep wide-armed sofa where he had sat with Sara the first night he came to Laurel. He realized now that ever since he entered the house it had seemed somehow empty, that he had been listening for the sounds that would mean Sara was there, quick steps, a tumble of words.

  The doctor sat down, then bounced up again, coffee cup in hand, and stood now before the fire. "I should not say it, not to a student, and tomorrow I will be sorry, but now I am ashamed and angry, so I say it. Damn the dean. I am sorry about the dean."

  "Don't worry about it, Doctor. I mean, well, there's lots like him, all over—"

  "The Greek—"

  "Shucks, that doesn't matter. Honest, Doctor, I mean, honestly, I wasn't all that disappointed. Gosh, I've got an awful lot on my hands right now. Next year's time enough."

  "Goodhue was nasty?" Eve Knudsen was looking at her husband, her voice low enough to hide any emotion that might lie behind it.

  Knudsen shrugged. "I do not know. Was he, David?"

  "Nasty? No, sir. He—he just said he wouldn't let me take Greek." How in hell could you explain to people like the Knudsens that characters like Goodhue were never nasty—in their sense of the word—to Negroes? That to be nasty or subtly unpleasant would be to put the Negro on a basis of equality. One was nasty and unpleasant to one's peers; to a Negro one was condescending and patronizing, dictatorial or violent, or even kind and gentle, but never, never nasty or sarcastic as one would be to a fellow white. David put his coffee cup down on the low table in front of the sofa and said, "Only, you see, I knew why. That was al
l."

  "All! All! It is too much!"

  "Karl." Eve Knudsen's voice was still low. "Karl, my dear, there is nothing to be done at this point. We will only make it harder on David if we—if you—press it."

  This woman sure has sense, thought David; sure has sense and understanding both.

  "It is hard," snapped Knudsen. "It is very difficult. One wants to fight—"

  "Fight what? A set, shallow, stupid mind that nothing will ever change, not even righteous Danish indignation?" She turned to David. "We're being rude, David, talking as though you weren't here, but you do seem like one of the family, you know."

  This time he didn't resent the "one of the family" remark as he had the earlier one about "almost a relative."

  The doctor was still fuming. "I suppose you are right, Eve. When I cool down it is possible I will know it." His voice was without conviction. He turned to David. "We wish we could have invited you to have dinner with us, but we are dining with the Benfords tonight."

  David, gratified that the subject had been changed, grinned. "I hope I live through it," he said.

  The doctor looked puzzled, but his wife laughed until a breeze of fresh air seemed to have swept through the room. The doctor, whose laughter had joined his wife's, said, "We will leave a few shreds of you, David." Then added, "But soon, David, you will dine with us. We will have our niece Sara and perhaps young Evans. My wife has known him also since he was a baby." He looked almost wistful. "They tell me you play piano. We could have music, real music, as well as records, if you did not mind—"

  "Me? Mind playing piano? Gee, no. I've been scared of getting rusty—"

  CHAPTER 23

  When David went home for summer vacation, he felt full of years and wisdom. It was his first trip home since Christmas. There had been too many unexpected expenses, books, warmer clothing, for him to go home in spring vacation. He felt himself bridling when Gramp, meeting him at the station, said, "My Gawd, boy! You've growed!" He felt that he was well past the growing stage, was in the full maturity of manhood, then lost the feeling abruptly when, looking for Stumpy, Gramp told him the tail-less cat was dead. He wouldn't let even Gramp see the tears in his eyes; instead he made a great to-do about unpacking, thinking, not only of Stumpy who had shared his bed every night, but of Gramp without Stumpy's company, Gramp who hadn't told him about Stumpy because he didn't want him upsetted up there at the college.

  Seeing Gramp again took some of the worry off his mind. Li'l Joe looked fine. He had never wholly believed Gramp's letters that always ended, "I am feeling O.K. Yrs. truly, your grandfather, Joseph Champlin," and had taken to calling home, collect, every couple of weeks, and Gramp had never objected to the expense.

  Li'l Joe's happiness at having him home was quiet, controlled, and warmly deep. The Prof's was outspoken and boisterous, his great hug rib-cracking. The hardest part of the return was the realization that he could not communicate to either man anything but the surface features of his life at Pengard. To David's near bewilderment the Prof did not ask immediately about his grades but, eyes fiercely twinkling under the bushy brows, said, "My brother writes me of jam sessions! He says he is becoming quite a drummer. Tell me about them—"

  It would have been better if the Prof had asked the question when Gramp wasn't around, instead of in the little house in Beauregard with Gramp's nose twitching like an inquisitive chipmunk's. Li'l Joe Champlin was pure murder when it came to knowing what was going on. David knew he wouldn't have to mention Sara Kent's name, any girl's name, but what Gramp would catch on and by some sort of psychic osmosis know damned well whether she was white or colored.

  Remembering that first session was like living it again, covertly watching Sara clap hands no bigger than the palms of his own while they listened to records; Sara feeding him song titles as he sat at the piano in the little room off the Knudsen living room; she and Tom both singing, then the Doc disappearing and coming back from somewhere in the depths of the house with an old set of drums, grinning like a kid. The Doc wasn't bad on drums, but Tom was terrible, and David coached him at this and other sessions until he became, as David told Gramp and the Prof, passable. Nehemiah had been invited, but said he was spending the weekend with relatives in Cincinnati, and David knew this to be a barefaced lie. David did not need to ask why Lou Callender, the girl Tom dated every now and then, wasn't there. Tom had introduced them one day, and she shook hands and gushed, and David wondered, as he did so often, what some whites saw in the women they picked. Maybe Tom was making out with her, but David doubted it. She looked like a teaser to him.

  Suds Sutherland and Chuck Martin came to some of the sessions after that first one, and a couple of girls whose faces David couldn't even remember very well the next day, although Sara could be in the room with him now, as close as she had been then, so clear was his memory of her face.

  When at last they broke up the first session to go back to the dormitories, Sara, walking from the little music room into the living room, went into a quick Charleston step, and a shoe flew across the room. She reached out and grabbed his arm, and instinctively David bent it at the elbow, stiffening the muscles of his forearm for her to grip. Even with her full weight on it while she put the shoe on, the grip had been as light as a bird's or a kitten's. Yet he was still feeling it when he reached the quadrangle and walked across it to his room.

  After that he didn't stay away from the recreation hall, although he kept in the forefront of his mind the knowledge that the dull red blocks that made up the floors were, for him, not tiles but eggs. Clevenger was there often, aloof and elegant, yet showing a patronizing friendliness that, thought David, was enough to make a guy puke. The youth from Virginia made a great point of tipping him off about the food at the snack bar, showed him the billiard room and library-study, and the room off the main lounge where there were a record player and records, as well as an old upright piano. David's eyes had gleamed at the sight of the grand piano in the main lounge, but he stayed away from it, partly from sheer awe at its magnificence, partly because he didn't want to call attention to himself.

  The Negro student, Margaret Benjamin, who lived in Sara's dormitory, was in his history class, but they didn't seem to be able to hit it off together. There wasn't any question about her being a dedicated scholar, but, damn it, so was he, and there sure as hell must be something a fellow and a girl could talk about besides the Federalist Papers.

  It was Margaret who switched the subject one morning in his second week and said: "What do you plan to do when you graduate? Or haven't you decided? I think making decisions is important."

  "Law," said David. "Never thought about anything different."

  She had chosen teaching, she told him; hoped for a Master's after Pengard. "Teaching and law," she said. "Those are the areas where we are most needed, don't you think?"

  "Well—I guess so—" No need to ask what she meant by "we." Educated Negroes, and somehow she managed to sound condescending about it.

  She said, "I haven't seen you at an ALEC meeting yet You know about them, don't you?"

  "Yeah. What they do besides talk?"

  "Well, goodness, talk and discussion bring understanding—"

  He shrugged. "I'll go along on law and teaching, but if there's one thing we don't need it's more talk. Jesus! Yak-yakity-yak! What's it going to get us?"

  "Oh, really now! Understanding—"

  "Understanding!" He almost said, "Understanding, shit!" when a shaft of watery sunlight struck her heavy-rimmed glasses and made them gleam with an even brighter earnestness than usual, and he smothered the epithet. All the talk in the world wasn't going to bring about "understanding" between a Clevenger and a Nehemiah, or between a Goodhue and, say, himself. Or a red-neck bus driver and a Negro passenger.

  His first real encounter with Simmons and Dunbar came in the recreation hall. There had been nods and greetings in class and on the campus, but they were distant and without warmth. On this day he was alone, playing piano sof
tly in the small music room off the main lounge, running over blues chords, noodling around, relaxed, half humming, half singing one of Li'l Joe Champlin's favorites, I'm the winin' boy— don't deny my name—Mamma, Mamma, won't you look at Sis—when he turned quickly, flustered and thrown off by the feeling that someone was watching him. They were standing together in the doorway, Simmons, light-skinned, whip-slender, cat-graceful, his impassivity an ineffectual covering for cool contempt; Dunbar, shorter, darker, also slender, eyelids too heavy for a small face half covering the eyes in a concealment more revealing than a wide-eyed stare. After what Nehemiah had told him of these two, David had decided there would be no speaking first on his part, but now he was at a disadvantage, embarrassed, half angry, and before he could stop himself he said, "Hi—"

  "Yeah." From Simmons it was half-greeting, half-contemptuous comment.

  "Having fun?" asked Dunbar, and added, "Don't let us spook you."

  "You're not spooking me," said David evenly. "Just fooling around, practicing."

  "What?" asked Simmons.

  "Nothing in particular. Music, blues—"

  "Oh," said Simmons.

  "Now we know," said Dunbar. They turned together, moving, it seemed, as one person, and crossed the main lounge. David saw them stop, with no apparent communication between them, at the grand piano by the big side window. He knew Simmons's laugh was coming before he heard it, then saw the tall youth slither onto the piano bench with the uncanny, jointless movement of a snake. There was the sound of the piano's fine tone, then one and then another slashing, dissonant chord, then the theme of "Tea for Two" was established, and from there on things happened musically that held him quiet and intent. The hands on the keyboard were skilled, subtly rhythmic, their owner passionately involved in what he was playing, and David thought: Bastard knows, that bastard really knows that piano. But he's never going to get out of that one; he's never going to make it home from way out there, serves him right, showboating—