Lonely Crusade

by Chester B Himes

  When Lee heard the door opening, he knew it would be Jackie. For now he realized that underneath all of his other thoughts had been the thought of her, not lustfully or even curiously—just there.

  “It’s in the mind, Jackie.”

  “No, Lee, it’s in the knees.”

  They laughed together.

  “I was waiting for you to come in and take me home.” In the rain her face was a blurred white pattern. But her voice was velvety.

  “I didn’t think about it.”

  “Didn’t you?”

  “Yes, I did. But I didn’t know I was thinking about it until you came out.”

  They were silent, sitting in the rain.

  “I believe in being honest with myself,” she finally said. “Are you married, Lee?”

  “Yes.”

  A cat came hurrying up the stairs, saw them, and scampered back.

  “Kitty-kitty-kitty,” she called. But the cat did not return.

  “Are you?” he asked.

  “No.”

  “I would like to ask you something. Will you answer it?”

  “I think so.”

  “Did they send you out?”

  “They?”

  “The party. Someone in the party?”

  “No, we don’t do that.”

  He let the silence run on.

  “Not now—not since the war. We’re not interested in recruiting colored people. It causes disunity—”

  After a time she added: “I never did.”

  “I don’t think I like Communists,” he said.

  “I don’t particularly like them either. But I believe in Communism. That comes from being honest with myself. If you were honest with yourself, you would believe in it too.”

  “Perhaps.” The silence between them was nice.

  “The lights look like stars, don’t they?” he asked.

  “The wild grass will be coming up soon and late afternoon in the sunshine the hills will look like emeralds. Have you been up there and looked over the Pacific?”

  “Where’s your home, Jackie?”

  “Everybody asks me that.”

  “Well—you look different.”

  She told him that she was from the state of Washington. In 1940 she had come to San Francisco to look for work and had become interested in the movement. From there she had come down to Los Angeles.

  “I work at Comstock, you know.”

  “You do? Well, well! In what department?”

  “In Foster’s office.”

  “Is that so? For Foster, eh? Say, what kind of a guy is he?”

  “Oh, as a man he’s swell. He’s so good-looking—really handsome—and considerate too. I don’t think he gets along well with his wife, though.”

  “Does he favor the union?”

  “Oh, no, he’s a capitalist, of course.”

  Suddenly he began to shudder. “Are you cold too?” he asked.

  “No.”

  “Well, I am. I’m getting a chill.”

  “Oh, we better go inside.”

  The lights were still turned on in the kitchen and living-room but the bedroom door was closed and the sound of laughter came from within.

  “I wonder what they do that Mollie finds so funny,” he said.

  Jackie giggled. “Probably tickle each other’s feet.”

  She found half a bottle of brandy and they drank all of it straight.

  “May I kiss you?”

  “I want you to.”

  He pulled her close to him and kissed her. When they looked up Mollie was standing in the bedroom doorway, a green crepe negligee draped carelessly about her, watching them. Then suddenly she began to laugh.

  “Let’s go,” Jackie said.

  They slipped on their wraps and went outside and down the stairs. The rain had thinned to a misty fog, which lay in the streets like a wet gray blanket. They walked with their arms about each other and once he stopped and pulled her to him and kissed her. Their lips clung, seeking, and then she broke away. Her eyes seemed large and bright and her blurred white face seemed fragile.

  “You’re cute,” he said.

  “You’re not so bad, yourself.”

  “Then kiss me again.”

  She smiled. “You’ll ruin my reputation.”

  “I like you when you smile. You’re cute.”

  She put her arms about him and they fused together in a long passionate kiss. When they had separated and were walking along again, she said: “I’ve never kissed a Negro before.”

  Everything went. A slow, crazy hurt ran all through him—tart, brackish, bitter. And though he did not move his arm from around her waist, he moved away, across the city, across the gulf. And where between them there had been a young and stolen sex attraction, now there was race.

  “Is there any difference?” There was belligerence in his voice.

  “I didn’t mean it like that. I just stated it as a fact.”

  “I don’t like the racial facts of life.”

  “I know, Lee, and neither do I.” Now the maternalism was back in her voice. “But they are here and you have to learn to face them.”

  “Do I?” He felt nothing but a cold, dispassionate resentment.

  She turned unexpectedly into the entrance of a Hollywood apartment house, and he experienced a moment of trepidation. She noticed it in the sudden movement of his arm from about her waist and took him by the hand and led him as one leads a little child. But at the appearance of the elevator operator she released his hand. It was as if she had left him standing there alone.

  “Step inside, please,” the elevator operator said.

  He gave a start and beneath Jackie’s searching glance felt inexpressibly stupid. “Oh, I didn’t notice it was an elevator,” he said as stupidly.

  She merely smiled at him, squeezing his arm encouragingly. But after they had alighted and passed beyond the hearing of the operator, she asked gently: “You didn’t think I would live any place you couldn’t come?”

  “Well—” Goddamn her soul to hell, he thought. Why couldn’t she let him alone? “No.”

  She unlocked the door marked “3-C” and ushered him into a cosy three-room apartment.

  “I live with another girl,” she informed him, lighting the gas logs in the fireplace.

  “Oh! Is she here now?” He had put his hat back on as if to prepare for flight.

  “No. She went down to San Diego last night. But she’ll be back any time now. You can’t stay but a minute.”

  “Oh, that’s all right. Do you have anything to drink?”

  “Only some wine. And take your things off to dry. I’ll bring you a robe.”

  “Oh, that’s not necessary.” In the sudden misgiving that seized him, he failed to notice the inconsistency of her words.

  “Don’t be silly, you’re wet.”

  She brought him a robe and retired to the bedroom. Finally he overcame his reluctance and undressed and put on the robe. It was much too small, too tight across his chest and shoulders, and his arms and legs stuck out like poles. She came back, looking girlish in a light-blue robe, and at sight of him began laughing.

  “Kathy would just love to see you in her robe.”

  But quickly she discerned that he did not like her laughing and stopped. “I’ll make some coffee,” she said and went into the kitchen.

  Alone, he began to worry; not only this crazy, senseless fear of being disrobed in a white woman’s house in a white neighborhood, one lost Negro in a white world—a fear he could not help; but the fear that Ruth might divine, by some strange intuition, that he had spent the night with some stray Communist woman. Suddenly as apprehension overwhelmed him, he began to tremble.

  “Coffee’s ready,” she called.

  He arose as if obeying a command and went to her. She stood with her face slightly lifted as if expecting him to kiss her. But he felt too uncomfortable and ill at ease to notice, and pulling out a chair, sat down as if to hide. Behind him she smiled to herself and r
ubbed her hand across his hair. Then silently she sat opposite to him and poured the coffee.

  She had prepared sandwiches of liver pate and saltine crackers. But he could not eat them—his throat was too tight. He could barely drink the coffee.

  And she knew this. She let her mouth become soiled and ate sensually, licking her lips with the darting red tip of her tongue. If there had not been this crazy restraint of race, he would have become so excited by the sensual way she ate that he would not have been able to restrain himself. But now he could only stare at her in rigid fascination.

  “I shouldn’t be eating so much,” she finally said, breaking the silence between them. “I’m getting awfully stout.”

  “Oh, I don’t think so,” he forced himself to say, swallowing.

  “Well, not so much here,” she gestured, forcing his gaze to her breasts. “But my hips are getting horrid.” And standing, she turned slowly before him, the tight blue robe revealing every line of her body.

  “Oh, well—” He could not think of another single word. His gaze clung to her body and the strength poured from his eyes until he became physically sick and could no longer support the weight of his body. He slumped down in his seat, staring at her.

  She sat down again, torn between shame and disappointment. “At least they sit comfortably,” she murmured, moving from side to side on them.

  “Oh, I think they’re very interesting,” he stammered as if mesmerized.

  Now cupping her chin in her palms, she drowned him in her eyes. She could not help her shame. She did not care, she told herself. While her inhibitions drew her back, her passion pushed her on.

  “They’re fat.”

  “Oh, no,” he contradicted with an effort at gallantry. They’re—”

  “Exciting?”

  “Oh, yes—exciting.”

  But he sounded more hypnotized than excited. Abruptly, she turned out the light and taking him by the hand led him into the living-room to sit by her side on the sofa. The flickering light from the gas logs in the fireplace bound them in breathless intimacy, making of her a picture of remote loveliness, something ethereal, not quite real, an oil by an old master seen at the first break of day. When she spoke, her voice was as startling as if the night had spoken: “I feel so lazy! So sleepy! Just like a little cuddly kitten!” And as human as a woman’s.

  It was the human quality in her voice that let him down again. “Oh, you do?” His own voice came out raspy and tense.

  He could smell her, a soft perfume like tiny fingers in the nose, and the strong musk scent of sex—a woman scent, more telling than a voice could ever be. His gaze touched her face, the marvel of her eyes and the glisten of her moistened lips.

  So now it came, she thought, resting her head back on the sofa and closing her eyes to the world. Now she could recite to him because culture was only sex-deep after all:

  Send me some token, that my hope may live,

  Or that my easeless thoughts may sleep and rest;

  Send me some honey to make sweet my hive.

  That in my passion I may hope the best.

  I lie noe ribbond wrought with thine owne hands,

  To knit out loves in the fantastick straine

  Of new-toucht youth; nor Ring to shew the stands

  Of our affection; that as that’s round and plaine,

  So should our loves meet in simplicity,

  No, nor the Coralls which thy wrist infold,

  Lac’d up together in congruity,

  To shew our thoughts should rest in the same hold;

  No, nor thy picture, though most gracious,

  And most desir’d, because best like the best;

  Nor witty lines, which are most copious,

  Within the Writing which thou has addrest.

  Send me nor this, nor that, t’ increase my store,

  But swear thou thinkst I love thee, and no more.

  For a long time after she had finished she let the words linger in the mind, then murmured, “Isn’t that beautiful?”

  “Yes, it is. You make it sound more so.” Now, slowly, the strain was leaving him. “I like to hear you recite poetry,” he added.

  “I love John Donne.”

  “I love you.” Though he could say the words, he could not get the feeling. The vaunted burning lust Negroes are supposed to have for white women would not assert itself. He felt impotent and a fool and took his hand from her thigh.

  With the abruptness of a curse she snapped on the light.

  But he kept trying, because he thought it was expected of him, and sooner or later it would have to come. For after all, he was a male.

  “Kiss me,” he demanded, putting his arm about her shoulders.

  She looked at him in the glare of light and sighed. “No, let’s be sensible,” she said. But for the ragged edges, her voice was level now. “Tell me about the union. How is it coming? Are the Negro workers joining up?”

  “I don’t want to talk about the union. I want to kiss you.”

  “No you don’t.”

  So she knew, he thought. Well, let her know. He had felt nothing for her since the remark that he was the first Negro she had kissed, as if it was some kind of special honor she bestowed.

  But he could not leave it. “I can make you kiss me,” he said. Deep within him was the faint desire to hurt her.

  “Don’t, darling. Some other time when we both feel more like it.”

  “You know I want—”

  “No, Lee!” She stood quickly up and went across the room. “I want to read you something.”

  “I don’t want to hear it.”

  She returned with a copy of the Crisis magazine and turned to the editorial page. “This is the farewell speech of Lieutenant Colonel Noel F. Parrish, a white Southern officer, to the men of the 99th Pursuit Squadron,” she related as if he had not spoken. “Listen, darling, these are some excerpts:

  You have a double responsibility. As a squadron of the Air Corps, you are responsible to the army of your comrades and to the nation which shelters those you love. As the first flying Negro fighting unit in history, you are responsible to all the darker people of America who look upon you with pride…Whatever you do badly will encourage those who hate you, and that includes the Germans and the Japanese who hate you most of all because your mere existence is some proof of the sincerity of this nation in trying to provide opportunity for all people. Whatever you do well will encourage those who have fought for a square deal for you, who have insisted, sometimes against great odds, that the chance you are given should be a fair chance…

  I must face you with the fact that you, as Negroes, have not been particularly encouraged to be heroic in the past. You have been more often taught to be patient and to endure misfortune. Those are excellent abilities and I hope you can continue to cultivate them and keep them. But there is a time to keep quiet and a time to fight, and the time for you to fight may come soon. Not to fight for me, for the Air Corps, for Negroes, or even for yourselves. I hope you will think of yourselves as fighting, first of all, for this nation, not because it is a perfect nation, from your standpoint, but it is our nation, an improving nation, and the best nation of all.

  I hope you will think of yourselves as fighting for more, even, than a nation. I hope you will remember that you are fighting for all mankind….It is your privilege, for the first time as Negroes, to play a part that is by no means a low or subservient part. You now have a top role. And you must win in that role just as any other group of men must win, by unselfish, vigorous effort and determination…

  You can not expect to be one hundred per cent successful. Air Corps squadrons have run into serious trouble before and will do so again. For this squadron to fail in any mission would be doubly unfortunate, but it could happen through no particular fault of your own…

  I can only remind you in the midst of these problems of race that seem so serious now…that we must not forget the human race, to which we all belong and which is the major p
roblem after all. The fate of all of us is bound up with the fate of humanity, and the most important of all—men. No one can ask more than that you acquit yourselves like men. Each of you, and all of us, must prove first of all that we are capable of the dignity and nobility of manhood; that we can, when the occasion calls for it, fight and die for a cause that is greater than any one life, or any one man, or any one group of men.

  At the end of her voice there came a profound silence. She reached up and snapped off the reading light. Outside it was dawn.

  One line above all remained etched on Lee Gordon’s mind. Not the line about the nation: “…fighting…for this nation…an improving nation…” Nor the line about the top role: “…a part that is by no means a low or subservient part.” Nor even the reference to the price of failure. The first thing that Lee Gordon learned about failure was that when he failed, it was not the failure of a person, but the failure of a race.

  The line that etched itself on Lee Gordon’s mind and crucified him to his seat was: “…that you, as Negroes, have not been particularly encouraged to be heroic in the past.” In this nation rooted in heroism, built on heroism; where this one virtue runs through the pages of its history like a living flame, where its people worship heroism before they do their God! It was a hurting thing to hear a white man’s admission that this exalting and redeeming virtue had been denied a people because of race; that instead, they “…have been more often taught to be patient and to endure misfortune.” In a nation where patience and fortitude are viewed with subtle contempt!

  Finally Jackie said: “Don’t you think that is an inspiring speech? And from a Southerner.”

  “No.”

  “Well, encouraging?”

  “No. It is depressing. To fight and die for one’s country in time of war is the privilege of any citizen. Why should it become such a great honor when a Negro does it?”

  “Because you’ve never before been allowed to play such a part.”

  “Should I be grateful now? For what? Do you feel grateful when you vote? Or when—”

  “Yes, I do.”

  “When a Communist begins agreeing with a Southerner it’s time for me to leave.”

  “You are not being fair—and perhaps you had better go.”

  “I don’t think I will. I think I will stay here and argue with you since you invited me.”