Bill gulped down his rye and Darton lurched across the rug to refill his glass. Bill took a deep drink. His entrails began to burn. “Yes,” he muttered. “You’re right. Strength.”
“How about it?”
“How about what?”
“Her. There’s room for you.”
“No.”
“She won’t know. Your wife — ”
“Hell with Isabelle!”
“So that’s her name? A nice name. What’s she look like?”
“Why the hell do you want to know?”
“They all look the same anyway in their skins.”
“Damn you, you bastard.”
“No offense.”
“Damn you and damn her. She’s a bitch.”
“They’re all bitches.”
“You’re right. Can’t trust a woman.” Jagged memories of Isabelle, of the other women he had lived with in his life, Madge, Dixie, leaped into his heated brain; all the long-legged bouncing women.
“Come with me.”
“Too tired. Didn’t sleep last night.”
“Isabelle’s keeping you straight.”
Bill hawhawed. The rye had filled his veins as if with new blood. “Do what you want, Lester, huh? No damn shoeclerk! No laws. Not for us, Lester. Not for us. For the herd, huh. Not for us. She comes back, we lay her too.”
“Who?”
“The Hartman bitch.”
“No.”
“Why not? See what she’s got left.”
“She’s too old,” Darton laughed.
“That’s not the idea.”
“What’s not the idea?”
“See if her face can change.”
“Change?”
“Marcelled on like her wig. What’s below?”
Darton unlaced his shoes, kicked them off. “Bill, you’re a nut.”
“Force her. Rape her.”
“No, you wouldn’t have to rape her.”
Bill threw up his arm and hand in the fascist salute. He wallowed in thick bursting laughter.
“You nut!” Darton said.
“That’s all you’d need. Give her the high sign, the Nazi whore. Right on the good old signal button, the ersatz whore. Wow.”
“Suzy’ll fight,” Darton said. “She’s the cop’s girl.”
“The kike’s,” Bill exclaimed breathlessly. “Hayden made me ring the kike. I was a nigger. Hayden made me be a nigger. Is that right? I’m a white man. Talk like a nigger. He doesn’t care. Me, a nigger!”
“Oh, shut up.”
Bill stared at Darton’s stocking feet and he began to laugh. “Nigger feet. Nigger feet.”
“What’s so funny?”
“You. You’re a nigger in nigger feet.” He was enthralled by a new thought. He was a nigger and he was a white man. Both. Darton, too. Nigger and white man. Both. “We go up. Lay her. Two niggers in black faces,” he laughed. “Tomorrow, two white men reading it in paper.” The new thought glittered in him. There was a Bill, dark in the night, dark in the rooms of the night, a Negro in the night, darker than any Negro, black inside and out, black, so black. “That’s the way to be strong!” he cried. He watched Darton stand up; Darton was holding a key between his fingers. Bill staggered to his feet, smiling. Before him, he didn’t see a man with brown hair and hairy forearms. He saw force; it was like seeing the force that had dropped into the city like a bomb out of the sky, like a delayed-action bomb exploding day after day and that would explode again finally, terrifically on Monday. Darton was that force and he was that force. He was enjoying the living sensations the rye had given him; he was thinking of the pleasure to be torn out of the cop’s girl in the upstairs room.
“You don’t need your jacket,” Darton said. “Take it off.” Bill obeyed. “Nor your necktie. She might grab it.”
“You’ve done this before?”
“Come on.” Darton switched off the light in the living room and ascended the flight of stairs. The wooden stairs creaked. Bill listened to the stairs and he started to mutter to himself: “Creak, creak, creak.” Christ, it was dark. It was nigger dark, niggers … “Creak, creak.” Bill felt the last stair flattening out under his soles. It was the landing.
“Here we come!” Darton shouted. “Hey, white gal, git yourself ready!” Bill laughed at Darton’s ‘Negro’ voice. Derisively Bill called. “Creak, creak.” He saw a shape pounce on him out of the blackness. A hand seized his arm. Darton whispered, “I’m first. And shut up, you drunken bastard! Shut up!” Bill followed Darton along the wall and heard a clickety-click sound and guessed it was Darton’s key hitting at the lock. He heard the door creak open and slid his hand along the wall. Suddenly, his hand seemed to drop into a hole. He inched into the doorway, strained to see. And saw. A huge black block. And heard. “Where you, white gal? Commere.” That was Darton’s ‘Negro’ voice. Bill laughed and said, “Creak creak.” And heard the girl’s voice. “Let me alone.” And running feet — the girl’s? Darton’s? And out of the huge black block, a shape hit into him. Bill yelled, “Who’s that?” “Let me out.” It was the girl. Her fists thumped against his face and chest. He fumbled for her arms. “I got her!” he cried.
“Hold onto the bitch!” Darton yelled. Bill felt as if the girl had doubled in size in his grip as Darton bumped into them, ramming her against him. “Commere, gal. Just want a lil fun.” A scream — the girl’s. Bill felt her unseen hands clutch at his shirt. He pushed her away and felt a torment of resentment; it was as if he were waiting for the Governor at the establishment in Brooklyn; Christ, what was he, Darton’s pimp…. He heard them scuffling inside the room, heard another scream, heard heavy breathing, heard another scream. The blackness tore open in his brain and fitfully illuminated, Suzy Buckles’ black and white newspaper pictures glimmered behind his eyes, a face with wide cheekbones, and he saw Isabelle’s face, and her face was another black and white newspaper face and he thought that Darton would rape Isabelle, too, if he could. He heard a thump as if somebody’s fist had slugged into a pillow and Darton’s voice. “You bit me! I’ll beat hell out of you!” And a scream rising sharp and thin, and Darton. “Want me to knock you out! Quit fighting!” And another thump, and another scream, thinner than the one before. He stood in the doorway and he felt as if he had known the girl in the room a long time. He heard her panting. She was winded. It was a sound like the breathing of a horse galloped up a long hill, a horse beaten by a wild rider. Then distinctly, he heard her. “I’ll kill myself if you don’t — I’ll kill myself — let me alone!” And he heard. “She means it! Stop!” And slowly realized the voice was his own. His insides gushed up and he puked.
A shape blundered into him, a shape smelling of sweat, with a breath all hot and liquory. The door slammed. Darton bit out. “What you yelling for?”
“That girl’ll kill herself.”
“She won’t.”
“Want her to kill herself? Go on back.”
“She won’t.”
“Did you — ”
“Not yet. The bitch’s strong.”
“Go on back and screw her, she’ll kill herself.”
“No. You bastard.”
“I had to tell you. Screw her, she’ll kill herself. She won’t go to the cops.”
“Come on downstairs.”
They walked down the stairs. Bill was grinning. What a bastard Darton was, he thought; right in the middle of it, about to … and he’d broken right out of it like a trained seal, like the Hartmans, broken out of it. “You’re not human,” Bill growled inaudibly. “Hayden says she lives. You and Hayden. The plan. Human, you’d’ve screwed her, plan or no plan, even if she’d killed herself — ”
‘What are you saying?”
“You’re not human.”
“You’re crazy. Damn, where’s the light?”
Bill was blinded by the lightning shooting out of the bulbs. The table, the flowers in the green bowl flowed in the light, condensed, became fixed, solid. He looked at Darton. Darton’s shirt clu
ng to his body. Half of the shirt buttons had been ripped off. His hairy matted chest was as thick as a coal heaver’s. “She cut your face,” Bill said.
“Where?”
“Your chin, nose.”
“Get me a drink, you.” Darton dropped into a chair.
Bill poured rye into a glass and gave it to Darton. Darton drank. “She fought, the bitch!” Darton said frowning. “I thought — a man — in there.”
Bill sank down on the couch. He didn’t know why he had shouted at Darton to stop. Why? Christ, why? He wanted to explain to Darton. But what was there to explain?
“She’s soft. Soft and small,” Darton was saying.
“Why don’t you go back and lay her?”
“I would’ve if you hadn’t stopped me. Why did you?”
“I told you.” But he hadn’t told Darton. Was it hate at being Darton’s assistant, Darton’s God damn pimp and pratt boy? Was it Darton’s wisecracks about Isabelle? Isabelle, oh Christ! It was Isabelle, he felt; they’d take her away from him, Hayden and Darton; they’d take her away from him and he wouldn’t have her any more; he’d be in jail and they’d be on the outside. Oh, no! something said in the back of his brain. Creak! it said with infinite stealthiness as if a mouse were in the back of his brain and the mouse was watching everything and laughing at everything.
“If she kills herself where’s our story?” Darton was saying.
“She’s not raped so where’s your story?” And the mouse in the back of his brain said ‘Creak!’ and Bill almost laughed.
“I pulled her dress off, her slip. She took a damn good beating.”
“Not raped, not raped.”
“Why don’t you take a fling at her?”
“Me?”
“Sure.”
“I’m sick. I puked.”
“Die, damn you! Die! There’s a possibility — ”
“What possibility?”
“What the hell’s the matter with you, you moron, you bastard! There’s the possibility she kills herself. The way she fought. If I — The fanatic bitch. She might kill herself. It’s happened before. There’s an even chance she might. Do we want that?”
“You’re the boss.” Bill smiled a distorted smile. “You’re the fuehrer.”
“Die!”
“It’s your decision.”
“We want her to spiel how the niggers kidnapped her — ”
“And wanted to rape her,” Bill interrupted, “but got cold feet at the last minute. That’s not as good a story as she gets it. You can still give it to her. Maybe she won’t kill herself. Nobody likes to die. She might mean it now but afterwards she’d reconsider. Killing herself because she got screwed — stupid.” He realized Darton was staring at him and he laughed. “Would you kill yourself? No, you wouldn’t. That takes strength, real strength. Real guts to kill yourself. Puff. Wipe yourself out. What’ve you got so far? What’ve the papers got? Girl kidnapped by niggers. Fights the niggers on good old Saturday night. You know the kikes celebrate Saturday night? They say lechayem. Her dress comes off. Torn off by you, you lust maddened nigger. Darton in nigger feet, who gets cold feet.” He laughed wildly.
“You disgusting fool.”
Bill rolled to his feet, picked up the bowl of flowers from the table and flung it at Darton. Darton ducked. The bowl smashed against the wall. “Bill!” Darton bellowed. “You maniac!” Bill didn’t look at him, his eyes on the shattered pieces of the bowl.
“All that matters is strength,” he said clearly.
“You maniac!”
“Okay. Don’t call me a fool again.”
“Oh, go to hell.”
“You’ve got a good story,” Bill said as if nothing had happened. “The nigger got cold feet for a good reason. The whole city’s boiling up against the niggers. They’d catch him if he raped her and’d lynch him to the Empire State. But that still isn’t half as good as the other stories. Almost a lay’s no good. Not the real McCoy. That’ll let the public down. Was she layed or wasn’t she layed? That’s what gets the public.”
“Go lay her yourself. If she kills herself — You wouldn’t take the responsibility, would you?” Darton pressed his hand against his head. “She kills herself and there would be an investigation. It’s too dangerous — ”
“Live dangerously, you used to say in the old days.”
“Go to hell, you maniac! Her kidnapping’s a nation-wide story right now. If she kills herself, every law enforcement agency would be after us. Bill, listen to me! Bill, I’m your superior. Bill, I want you to sober up, you disgusting fool. Sober up or I will be compelled to report your actions to the organization.”
Bill looked at him and saw Darton as he was: Passionless and cold. Darton’s free talk over beer and whiskey was just that — talk. Darton was cold, cold as Hayden. Bill lowered his eyes, thinking of Hayden, the desk-sitter, the mathematician, the maker of blue prints. Darton was only another kind of Hayden. “Ersatz,” he mumbled. “Ersatz.” He raised his eyes to Darton. “Shall we lay her? What’ll work out best for the organization?” And he laughed uproariously. “I’m Hayden, too,” he said. He lifted his hands in front of him. They were ersatz, he thought.
CHAPTER 16
BEFORE the telephone rang, Sam had been dreaming. He recognized himself in the dream. He was barefooted and he was wearing his policeman’s trousers. His chest was naked except for the police badge that was somehow glued to his left nipple. In each hand he was holding two or three batons. From his belt, the butts of four or five .38’s stuck out. He was parading up and down One Hundred and Twenty-Fifth Street; the buildings were piles of rubble as if they had been bombed. There wasn’t a person on the street. A shining stone in the sky dazzled his eyes. He paraded up and down, searching for Marian Burrow. If only he wasn’t alone, if only he could remember. The telephone jangled and in his dream, the shining stone broke into sprays of light, and all the batons and .38’s began to shoot.
He woke up, listened to the ringing out in the foyer. On the dresser, the radio hands of his alarm clock glowed: 3.47. Who could be calling now? He knew his father and mother would never get out of bed to answer; they held the notion that no decent person called after midnight and if it wasn’t a decent person, why should anybody answer. Sam yawned and groped for his slippers. He couldn’t find them. He put on the reading lamp at the side of his bed. Already, the dream was unravelling. Who could be calling? They.
He hurried out into the foyer, to the telephone table. His mouth was clenched so tight that livid streaks, white as burn scars, zigzagged out of his lips. He picked up the receiver and a voice said, “Hello.” His lips sagged wide apart. The voice said, “Sam?”
A shocking joy roared out of the wire. He felt electrocuted by emotions that deafened and blinded and staggered. And then just as furiously, he thought: It’s a fake, it isn’t her.
“Sam, I’m on the corner of Fifty-Ninth Street — Madison Avenue — Sam — Please, darling — Sam, come — ”
“It’s you,” he babbled. “How did — When — I’ll be right over.” He ran back to his bedroom, tugged off his pyjamas. Shorts. Socks. Trousers. Shoes. He snatched his clothes, put them on, rushed down the corridor. Behind him his wakeful mother’s voice sounded; it was like an admonishing finger.
“Is that you, Sammy?”
He shut the door of the apartment, hurrying towards the elevator, and immediately as if he had been thinking about the elevator in secret, his eyes slid to the door. He shuddered. The elevator … He retreated a step and then clattered down the flights of tiled stairs to the lobby.
The street was as deserted as the street he had seen in his dream. The mighty presses of his emotions lifted up and he remembered the dream. In this black street, the windows all black, the pavements empty, he swelled with a fearful thought: Suppose they had made Suzy call him. For it was Suzy but they’d kidnapped her to get at him; they wanted him; hadn’t they threatened his life over the phone; Suzy was a come-on. “What am I thinking?” he c
ried aloud. He had reached Broadway and he was looking, the Sam that encased all the inner torments, was looking for a cab and there was no cab. Late stragglers drooped home shoulders bowed, the Sunday papers under their arms. Sam walked to the subway corner. Inside his head, behind the eyes searching for a cab and focusing on a cab on the corner near the news-stand, there were dozens of pairs of eyes and all the eyes were staring down their own lines of vision into: The basement. The living room with Mrs. Buckles bringing him tea. His own room with Detective Maddigan on the bed. The marihuana room.
Clair’s office. He got into the cab. “Fifty-Ninth Street and Madison. Step on it.” He hauled out his wallet, gave a dollar to the driver. “Step on it.”
“Thanks,” the driver said in an awed voice, looking from the dollar into Sam’s face. “The war must be treating you okay, mister. Thanks.”
The cab sped from the corner as if springing off a board into the avenue. Sam sat on the edge of the seat. “Faster!” he said.
“Doing forty, mister,” the driver answered as the cab went through a red traffic light between garages and automobile showrooms, down to the bottom of the hill and up again as if on a roller-coaster to the buildings of Columbia University.
“Faster!” Sam said. The apartment houses below Columbia lumped up before him like mountains; the lonely lights of all-night cafeterias and bars spotting their bases. “Cop’re all asleep.”
“Don’t gimme that,” the driver disagreed almost plaintively as if saying: I know you give a buck but don’t take advantage. “Cops got three shifts, mister, and that last night owl shift’s the meanest.”
Suzy walked to him on the corner of Fifty-Ninth Street and Madison. He wanted to say something. He couldn’t. His knees felt as if they would break under him. He rushed to her, squeezed her close. There were tears in his eyes. He held her tight and choked out, “Suzy, Suzy, baby.” Only now did time arrange itself, neat and orderly, in his consciousness; Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday; he couldn’t believe she had been gone so many days and that he had managed to exist without her, had eaten, slept, worked without her. His fingers tightened on her body.
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