While the Locust Slept

by Peter Razor

  “You drink too much,” Emma said. “Who knows when youse is comin’ home.”

  She slid a food dish across the table toward John.

  John shoved his chair back and stood. “You to keep mouth shut, woman!”

  As they glared at each other, I tried to move around John toward the door, but before I could escape, John punched my chest. I flew into Emma and we both stumbled. I straightened, pulled Emma erect and leapt around John toward the door. Near the washbasin, I grabbed my shoes, barn clothes, and jerked the door open. Moving through the doorway with my hand still on the knob, I heard a sickening thud. Without stopping, I glanced backward. That image remains crystal clear:

  Emma is frozen in the air, stiffened and falling backward, arms straight by her sides. Her glasses are suspended above her head and John’s fist still follows her face.

  John had shoved Emma in front of me, but I had not before seen him strike her with a closed fist. I wanted to stop and help her, but I wasn’t strong enough to fight a grown man, not John, not in one of his rages. I ran out to the barn.

  Half an hour passed. I milked my cows and my stomach ached. When John entered, he was still strutting with his head back, glaring down his nose. Violence seemed to intoxicate him as much as alcohol. I had no supper that night. Instead, I stayed in the barn and ate soybean meal and other animal feed.

  I did not see Emma for days after the beating. John fried eggs, made simple meals the first two days, and breakfast was on the table after milking the third morning. Emma prepared subsequent meals, but would not show herself. Four days passed before I saw her, and even then she was quiet, doing her work with a blank expression. I felt sorry for her. I knew what it was like to suffer such violent attacks.

  Though C-16 was much better than C-15, I had to work outside the cottage during my thirteenth summer for Mr. Beaty. On hot, sticky days, we still waited until Mr. Beaty decided it was time for water or shade. It didn’t matter how the sun burned, he stood with crossed arms daring certain ones to complain. No one dared.

  “He’s tough but fair,” Percy said.

  “He treats me okay,” Ted said.

  He knew gardening, but Mr. Beaty was like a guard supervising hard labor. He spent many years working for Superintendent Merril before I arrived at Owatonna. Under Merril, who had been an Army officer, non-cottage employees were called guards. Discipline was severe. A boy at the school during the nineteen twenties, whom I later met, was beaten—caned—on the back so severely, he bore scars for life. The boy was an Indian.

  Although conditions improved under Mr. Mendus Vevle, who took over about the time I arrived, it was slowed by a matronage accustomed to the penal philosophy of child rearing. I heard from Roy and others, how Mr. Beaty attacked George Lawson in the garden. It seemed to take weeks before George healed. George was black. Although Mr. Beaty was respected by many youths and staff of a mostly white institution, my strongest lessons from him were about the dark side of man.

  Boys went off to work one day to the Main Building, the barns, and gardens. Dale, Allen, and I were among those heading to the gardens. Mr. Beaty dispensed weeding scrapers and gave orders as boys straggled up to him. When speaking to Allen—”Over there, weed the strawberries”—he was firm but calm. His attitude changed when he spoke to Dale, and he only spoke to me through him. “Weed the beans. Make the lazy Injun do his share. Get some work out of that thing for a change.” And his eyes burned the words deeper. Fuming, I began weeding a row adjacent to Dale.

  Beaty treats you better than me,” I said.

  “Think so?” Dale asked. “Maybe he’s strict, or you could be right about him having it against coloreds, the way he nearly killed Portz that time. Lawson, too, I guess.”

  “Yeah,” I muttered. “Musta hit him hard enough to break his paddle. When he paddled me, I couldn’t sit decent for weeks.”

  We knelt between rows, propped on one hand, weeding with the other. Mr. Beaty came by, stood behind us with his hands clasped behind his back and legs spread. I was relieved when he moved to watch others.

  With Mr. Beaty out of sight, I could relax. Joking as we weeded, I laughed at something Dale said and accidentally cut a bean plant off. I looked to my right nervously. Seeing no one, I was about to look left when something struck me violently from behind. I sprawled on my stomach, ruining dozens of plants.

  “Dirty Injun bastard!”

  Mr. Beaty had kicked me in the lower back, violently wrenching my spine. I tried to lift myself from the dirt, but I was too numb from the waist down. He kicked me again, with his heavy boot, this time against my chest. Unable to catch my breath or feel my legs to stand, I could only claw at the ground. I braced myself for another kick.

  “Damn it!” Dale yelled, leaping between Mr. Beaty and me. “You can’t do that!”

  Mr. Beaty froze.

  He looked at Dale. “What?” he said. He had been off somewhere. Mr. Beaty left muttering to himself.

  I rolled onto my back, staring at a blue sky with scattered puffy clouds. In spite of intense heat, I felt numb, shivering oddly and turned my head to keep the sun from my eyes. My breathing, gasps at first, slowly became steady.

  “Cripes, Pete,” Dale said, “he’s raving mad.”

  “Always … was,” I gasped. I tried to draw deep breaths, but my ribs hurt. “Bastard.”

  “Can you move?” Dale asked. He knelt near me. “You don’t look good, like you’re pale through the brown.”

  “Hope nothing’s bleeding inside,” I said. “Can’t move my legs yet. It doesn’t hurt, but I feel sleepy.”

  “Better get help, get you to the cottage or anyplace but here,” Dale said. He stood glaring at Mr. Beaty’s back.

  “You better get to work,” I gasped.

  “Not on your life,” Dale said. “He’s crazy, if you ask me, but he knows it’s wrong. I’m going with you.”

  “You know when your leg goes to sleep, like when you lay or sit wrong?” I asked. “If that’s what’s wrong, I should feel things pretty soon.”

  “I don’t know.” Dale sounded doubtful. “Okay, just lie still.” A few minutes passed and deep aching throbs began in my upper legs, then pain seared where the first kick jammed my spine. Relieved when my face flushed, I no longer felt like sleeping, but it was fifteen minutes before I could stand.

  Dale helped me up, and I took a few steps. The pain was no worse walking, so I short-stepped out of the garden to the gym lawn where I lay flat to rest and moan. Making no effort to stop us, Mr. Beaty disappeared before we left the garden.

  Hunched, tilted to one side, my lower spine felt severely injured, my ribs bruised. I ached all over but managed to make my way to the Main Building where I again rested. It usually took me five minutes to walk from the garden to the cottage, but that day it took almost an hour. Arriving at the cottage, I lay across seat lockers, adjusted myself for the least pain in my back and immediately dozed off.

  “My goodness Peter,” Mrs. Cory said. She was bending over me as I opened my eyes. “Dale says Mr. Beaty kicked you quite hard. Is that right?”

  “Yeah. It hurts,” I said.

  “I know the men sometimes slap boys, but it’s hard to believe Mr. Beaty would almost cripple you.”

  “It hurts,” I repeated.

  “Are you sure you didn’t fall and make it worse?” Mrs. Cory pressed.

  “Whadaya mean?” I said. “I was already on the ground. How the heck could I fall?”

  “Pete was weeding on hands and knees and Beaty kicked him over ten feet,” Dale insisted. “Hard anyhow.”

  Mrs. Cory checked the rib bruise but seemed uncertain.

  “I could send you for a check up, but if you’re not bleeding, they might not do anything. You can stay near the cottage to see if it gets worse; meanwhile, I’ll see if other boys are being kicked.”

  “Mr. Beaty called Pete a dirty Injun Bastard,” Dale said.

  “Mind your tongue!” Mrs. Cory barked.

  “It’s all
right if Beaty says it, ain’t it?” Dale shouted.

  Mrs. Cory softened, “Mr. Beaty is well respected, and I’m sure he didn’t intentionally hurt you.”

  “Sure,” I mumbled. I lay flat, knees up, shifting to ease the pain in my back and covered my face with my forearm. “All I know is, it hurts like heck and Beaty done it.”

  “For now I’m putting you on sick restriction until further notice. I’ll have a pillow for you at meal time.” She turned to Dale, “Could you get a wet towel for Peter’s bruises?”

  “S’pose,” Dale said, smirking at me. “Who was his nurse maid last year?”

  My lower spine felt severely injured, and my ribs were bruised. I hurt all over. Mrs. Cory organized cottage medical restrictions with no further question. I sat on the edges of chairs for the first two weeks, then did light work away from the cottage. My ribs were sore for a week, but my back injury prevented normal bending and lifting for a month.

  Mrs. Cory had to have said something. Mr. Beaty never touched me again, but I was never told that, and his specter still hung over me like a teetering deadfall. More time would pass before I knew for sure that no staff would touch me.

  I almost enjoyed late fall of my thirteenth year and early winter of my fourteenth year. Although I worked amid strict discipline, it was not for the gardener, and life became a comfortable succession of days and months. However, a gnawing anxiety—perhaps suppressed at C-3 and C-15 by the treatment that caused it—prevented me from fully appreciating staff tolerance at C-16.

  During leisure, I read more. We went to Wednesday evening movies at the auditorium and, on weekends, to movies in town or open gym. When deemed worthy by staff, we could sign out and go elsewhere on campus.

  Though boys appreciated being on their own after work, that often exposed younger boys to bullies who constantly prowled for victims. Many boys were brought to the school late in childhood, though none after age fifteen. Of those brought after age ten, some were street wanderers who thought nothing of stealing or bullying. I feared no one my age, but I learned to be wary of certain older, bigger boys.

  When winter work was done, boys circulated about the cottage or outside in mild weather. Physical activities—boxing, tag, hide and seek—were in the basement, quiet games were in the living room. The basement was spacious enough so that a pair of boys could be ignored by others.

  As Roy and I sat talking on the basement seat lockers one evening, he yawned, then frowned, as two bigger boys sauntered in from the hall.

  “We got visitors,” Roy muttered to me. A scan of the room confirmed that we were alone with the bullies.

  My chest tightened. I stood and started toward the door with Roy behind me. “Hi, Len, John. We’re going upstairs,” I said with unsteady machismo. As we tried to sidle past them, the bullies grabbed us.

  “They’re goin’ to put us out,” Roy muttered.

  “They won’t hurt us, will they?” I managed, twisting in John’s grasp.

  “We wouldn’t think of hurtin’ ya,” John sneered. He was a soft sixteen-year-old of medium build. Lenard was thinner, taller than John—a follower who bullied little on his own. He helped capture victims while John decided the method of torture.

  “You don’t have to hold so tight,” Roy complained.

  “Yeah, you’re hurting,” I said.

  “Don’t move and it won’t hurt,” John said. “Off with the T-shirts.”

  “Bullshit! It’s cold down here,” I said, my voice quivering. Roy removed his T-shirt.

  “Hold Pete, I’ll get his shirt off,” John said.

  Forcing Roy deep into the corner, they turned on me, stripping my T-shirt from me.

  “Klein’s going to bitch about that,” I said, as the T-shirt tore.

  “That’s your problem,” John said. His voice was hoarse like Mr. Beaty’s. “Off with your pants. Or do we take them off?”

  Roy grumbled and dropped his pants, standing sullenly in shorts and bare feet.

  “What is this?” I asked. “Why the pants?”

  John punched me in the side of the head. I moaned.

  “Then shut yer trap,” he said. John held my shoulders from behind, as I removed my shoes and pants. Once my pants were off, I felt sudden pressure on my neck and chest, then everything went black.

  I awoke shaking from the cold. The bullies were gone. It wasn’t clear what they did to us. I remember thinking, At least, my shorts are on. Roy was quivering too. He awoke just as my hand touched his head.

  “You hurting anyplace?” I asked.

  “Don’t know,” he mumbled. He raised himself onto one knee then stood. “Did they let us fall?”

  “Maybe not,” I said. My fear turned to anger as we dressed. I started ranting on our way up to the living room. “They did that to you before, huh? How long would you say we slept? They do that to other guys? Does Cory know about this? Let’s get a bunch of guys and gang up on them.”

  “Bastards,” Roy muttered.

  “Dirty turds,” I said. We paused on the landing.

  I looked at Roy. “What’d they do to us, Roy?”

  “Who knows?” Roy whispered. “Cory says I’m gonna get big, like over six feet. Hope it’s before them S.O.B.S leave. I’ll beat the shit out of them.”

  We went to the dorm, undressed and climbed into our adjacent beds, talking to comfort each other until we slept.

  By the time the Schaulses moved to Caledonia, the State Public School was a closed orphanage, and social workers came out of St. Paul to check on state wards. Expecting a visit from a social worker, John allowed me to attend school until silo filling, then he kept me home from school a full week. Gene didn’t lose school for work, not even when we filled their silo.

  Back in school, English and social studies were easy to make up. Missing a week of chemistry, however, meant hard work in study hall. Other boys, Gene, and I were at a study hall table my first day back in school.

  I whispered to Gene across the table, “Did I miss anything in chemistry last week?” I opened my text. “While I filled your silo?”

  “Just the most important chapter, is all,” Gene replied, smirking. “It ain’t my fault you miss school for work. Anyway, we were supposed to sketch a Martian molecule.”

  “Which one?” I asked with a straight face. “Red sand or the green blood of little creatures?”

  “A Martian girl’s breath.” Gene smiled.

  I laughed then became serious. “Hey, Gene, know any farmers who need chore and Saturday help during winter?”

  “I’ll fill you in on last week’s work on the bus,” Gene said soberly. “Live there, too, right?”

  “Yeah,” I said, “I got to get away from Schauls. He’s driving me crazy.”

  “Yeah, my dad says the Schaulses are odd, but it’s mostly the old man, sounds like,” Gene said. “If he’s doing those things, you gotta get away. How’s Emma after John KO’d her?”

  “Doesn’t say much. She’s different though,” I said. “Musta had a bad concussion, I think it’s called.”

  “Yeah, that’s what my dad calls it,” Gene said. “I had one once, Mom says. Hit my head on a beam in the hay mow.”

  “Knock you out?” I asked, smirking, “Or crack the beam?”

  “Na, just kinda dizzy for a couple days, smart ass. Had a funny headache too. You ever have one?”

  “Wouldn’t call them funny, but yeah, sure did,” I said. I became nervous again. “Anyway, if I’m ever going to get through high school in one piece, I gotta leave. Lucky to pass tenth grade. Guess I’m old enough to be a hired hand.”

  8

  Not weekly or even monthly, but every couple of months, usually on a Sunday afternoon, married couples strolled through the cottage living room. During such visits we were encouraged to be on our best behavior with no boisterous activities. My naive thought was that they were hunting for kids, but before meeting children, couples were guided by office staff through files heavy with matron’s notes. A boy would
never see the assistant point him out from a distance or through a door. That’s him, there.

  A boy never knew when or how the decision was made. A formally dressed couple might simply stroll through the sitting room, smile for everyone and stop, almost too casually, near him. They would talk in low voices, and shortly the boy would stand, look at Mrs. Cory who nodded, and leave with the visiting couple. In less than two weeks that boy had a new family and a new name.

  …

  “You’re working far below your potential,” the principal said. I had been called into her office at Caledonia High to discuss my academic performance. “Your teachers think that if you work harder, you could go to college on a scholarship, especially in the sciences.”

  “It’d be all right,” I replied, “but I don’t have time for study at home, and I have only one study period.”

  “It’s a shame,” the principal said. “I understand you’re in a foster home. I just wanted to tell you that you could do it if you wanted to.”

  “Thanks,” I said. Returning to classes, I was briefly elated that someone thought I could be more than a farmhand. The euphoria faded as I wondered how I could break clean from John. When I was fourteen, I had tried to run away from the State School. The experience left me wary of being on my own until I knew exactly where I was going.

  During the spring when I was fourteen, I started growing restless at the State School. During recreation, I headed to a junkyard off campus, scouring the woods. Other times I would walk the tracks alone, wondering about trains, cities, and mountains, or would tromp out into the fields, watching insects, or birds building nests in the bushes. Curiosity drove my pastimes.

  In the classroom, with my head on the desk, I often stared sideways out the window where everything looked warm and cozy. Teachers seemed to admonish me less, leaving me daydreaming at the rear of the classroom until they could stand it no longer.

  The teacher whispered my name near my desk. She had been walking down the aisle, which I didn’t notice, handing papers back with usual comments.