Of Love and Dust

Charlie made a pot of coffee and came back to his chair again. Charlie had to walk on the heel of his right foot because he had stuck the nail right smack in the center. He said he didn’t know what possessed children to stick nails up in the road when people went barefooted all the time.

  Charlie Jordan drank coffee and watched Marcus. Even when Marcus wasn’t on the gallery, Charlie still looked over there. Then Marcus would show up again. Charlie said he must have come out there and went back in a dozen times that evening. He was like a lion—back and forth, back and forth, Charlie said.

  Around four o’clock, Charlie said, the pain in his foot really hit him. The sweat started pouring off him like rain water. He made it to the bed and laid down. Now he started shaking. He was shaking like he had the chills. But it wasn’t chills, he said later. It was just plain fear. It wasn’t until then that he realized what could happen to Marcus. He said once his teeth started rattling in his mouth, and he had to bite down on the sheet to keep them still.

  Aunt Margaret said by the time Marcus came back from the trial, she and Louise had packed everything. And she was scared every second of this time. Once she got so weak she couldn’t tie the string on the food box, and Louise had to help her. After they had packed everything and pushed everything under the bed, Louise powdered her face again. She even looked more colored than she did last Saturday morning. She was getting the feel of it now and she knew exactly how much she needed to put on. And with her hat and veil on, nobody could possibly take her for a white person. She powdered up Tite again, too. With the polka dot kerchief on Tite’s head, Tite could have passed for one of Jobbo’s little girls, Aunt Margaret said.

  When Tite, Bonbon and Louise were sitting at the table at twelve o’clock, Tite said:

  “J’n neg, Papa?”

  “Kess-koo-sey?” Bonbon said.

  “Playing with that mud out there and smeared mud on her face,” Louise said. “Now she thinks she’s a nigger.”

  “No neg,” Bonbon said to Tite. “No neg.”

  “No neg?” Tite said, shaking her head.

  “No neg,” Bonbon said, shaking his head. “No neg.”

  After Bonbon left the house, Aunt Margaret and Tite sat out on the gallery. Louise was checking the place to see if she had forgot anything. She was taking just food and clothes. And that’s why Bonbon hadn’t missed anything. He had to look inside the dresser or the armoire to miss her clothes, and he didn’t have any reason at all to go in either one.

  Around three o’clock, Tite fell asleep in Aunt Margaret’s arms, and Aunt Margaret laid her down on a little pallet on the gallery. Then she sat back in her chair and looked down at Tite. The tears started running down her face. She didn’t know how hard she was crying until Louise came to the door and put her hand on her shoulder.

  At five o’clock, she got ready to leave the house. Tite was up again. Aunt Margaret, Tite and Louise were standing on the gallery. Aunt Margaret picked up Tite and held her close, then she put her back down. She looked at Louise.

  “Anything in there you want?” Louise asked.

  Aunt Margaret said she wanted to say, “You ain’t going nowhere, Miss Louise. I can tell from the weather y’all ain’t leaving this place.” But she only shook her head.

  “Good-bye, Margaret,” Louise said.

  Aunt Margaret went down the steps. At the gate, she looked back at them again. They still watched her from the gallery. She turned from the gate and went out in the road. The dust was so white and hot it made her eyes burn, she said.

  About five thirty, Bonbon went up to the big house. Bishop said Pauline was still there. She could have been gone since three thirty, but she stayed because she knew Bonbon was coming back. When he came in, she asked him if he wanted to eat. He sat down at the table and she fixed him up a big plate of food. Bishop and Bonbon looked at each other once or twice, but they didn’t say anything. Neither one of them liked the other one, and both of them knew it. But right now, Bishop didn’t feel hate for Bonbon. He felt just plain fear—and he already knew he couldn’t do a thing about it. He couldn’t run because he didn’t know where to go. There wasn’t any place for him to go. This house and this yard was the only place he had.

  While Bonbon ate his food, Pauline sat across from him drinking coffee. They were quiet most of the time, with Pauline looking across the table at Bonbon. Bishop said she knew what was going to happen and she hoped Bonbon did too, but she knew she couldn’t tell him. Bishop was in the dining room most of the time—shining wine glasses that didn’t need shining—but a couple times he went back in the kitchen where Pauline and Bonbon were. Pauline was still looking across the table at Bonbon. Bonbon went on eating without paying her any mind.

  “I keep thinking ’bout Baton Rouge,” she was saying. “It was good there—us in that room—wind blowing the curtain. You remember?”

  He ate and didn’t say anything.

  “I liked it there,” she said. “I didn’t want ever leave. You don’t know how you look, sleeping like that—the wind blowing the curtain. Remember when you woke up and I told you?”

  He didn’t say anything.

  “I want it to be like that again,” she said. “I want it to stay like that. Get in a place where we don’t ever have to leave. You think it’ll ever be like that again?”

  He didn’t answer her. He wasn’t even looking at her. He went on eating.

  “Promise me it’ll be like that again,” she said. “I’ll do anything you say, you promise me that.”

  Bishop didn’t know if Bonbon looked at her or not. Bishop went back in the dining room. A minute later, Marshall went by the dining room with a paper bag. Bishop could hear Marshall saying to Bonbon, “Meet you downstairs in a minute. Going in my car.” Then Bishop heard the screen door shut. He went to the window—shining a wine glass that didn’t need shining—and looked at Marshall walking ’cross the yard toward the field car. Marshall opened the door and got inside. But when he got back out, he didn’t have the paper bag with him any more. Bishop shook his head. That was too big for money, he thought.

  In the kitchen, Pauline was saying, “Promise me, promise me.”

  “What’s the matter with you?” Bonbon asked her.

  “Promise me we spend another day together like that,” she said.

  “I see you tonight,” Bonbon said.

  “You promise that?” Pauline said. “You promise that? Promise me.”

  Bonbon went out. Bishop heard the door slam behind him. After the car had driven across the yard, Bishop left the dining room. He was going to his own room and lay down, but he stopped to look at Pauline. She stood at the screen door, gazing out in the yard. When she realized Bishop was in the kitchen, she turned to look at him. Her face showed so much hatred for him, Bishop had to walk away. He went to his room and laid down on the bed. A few minutes later, he heard Pauline leaving the house.

  It was quiet in the house now. Bishop had shut his door and window to make the room dark. Now, he laid on his bed listening and waiting. He didn’t know what he was going to hear, but he knew he was going to hear something.

  53

  I should have got back to the quarter no later than six o’clock, but just as we knocked off, the tractor went dead on me. My heart jumped in my throat because I didn’t know how long it was going to take me to get the tractor fixed. Freddie and them didn’t know either, and since they had already heard about what Marcus was supposed to do, they didn’t want to hang around the fields too late and they started out for home. I started to leave with them and come back to fix the tractor later, but I told myself that fixing the tractor was my work just like driving it.

  It took me an hour to get the tractor running again. The sun was already down when I finally hit the road. I didn’t have any lights on the tractor, but still I drove her fast as she could go. I knew it was getting close to seven o’clock, and I knew Marcus was getting ready to leave. I wanted to be there to say good-bye to him. No matter what a person does, there oug
ht to be somebody on his side at the last moment. And what had Marcus done that was so wrong? Yes, he had killed—yes, yes—but didn’t they give him the right to kill? I had been thinking about this in the field all evening and I had said to myself, “Yes, yes; it’s not Marcus, it’s them. Marcus was just the tool. Like Hotwater was the tool—put there for Marcus to kill. Like Bonbon was the tool—put there to work Marcus. Like Pauline was a tool, like Louise was a tool.…” So I didn’t blame Marcus any more. Yes, in a way I did, because I still didn’t think it was right to kill. And I didn’t think it was right to go free after killing. But what could I do against this big thing that said Yes. I couldn’t do a thing. Bonbon had said, “We is nothing but little people. They make us do what they want us to do and they don’t tell us nothing.” So why blame Marcus? Why blame him? No, I didn’t blame Marcus any more. I admired Marcus. I admired his great courage. And that’s why I wanted to hurry up and get to the front. That’s why my heart had jumped in my throat when the tractor went dead on me—I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to tell him how much I admired what he was doing. I wanted to tell him how brave I thought he was. He was the bravest man I knew, the bravest man I had ever met. Yes, yes, I wanted to tell him that. And I wanted to tell Louise how I admired her bravery. I wanted to tell them that they were starting something—yes, that’s what I would tell them; they were starting something that others would hear about, and understand, and would follow. “You are both very brave and I worship you,” I was going to say. And I was going to shake Marcus’s hand, and I was going to kiss Louise on the jaw—that’s if she let me. And I was going to ask them to let me buy candy for Tite. Yes, I would buy a big bag of candy so she would always remember that there was somebody on her side when she went away.

  I didn’t slow up at all from the time I left the field until I came in the quarter. Soon as I crossed the railroad tracks, I could see how dark and quiet the quarter was. There wasn’t a light on in any house. There wasn’t a child playing anywhere. Nobody sat out on the gallery waiting for supper to be done. Not even a speck of smoke came from any of the kitchen chimleys. The whole place was so dark and quiet, it looked like everybody had moved away. But they hadn’t moved away, they had locked themselves inside the houses. All of them had heard what Marcus was supposed to do and all of them were afraid. It was the same fear that made me hate Marcus at first. It was fear for myself and all the rest. The fear was still in me, but I didn’t blame Marcus for it any more. Because it wasn’t Marcus who was doing this; it was the big people.

  I drove through the quarter just as fast as I had driven from the field. There wasn’t any need to go slow now, because everybody was inside. When I came up to my house, I saw Marcus’s door wide open. I stopped the tractor and ran in to see if he was there. His suitcases were gone, so I knew he had left already. I ran back out and got on the tractor. Maybe I would catch him at the other house. I thought I saw the small red light of a car way up the quarter, and I drove the tractor fast as it could go. Then I saw the red light turn out of the quarter, and I thought I had missed Marcus for sure now. I felt a big lump in my throat because I wanted to see him before he got away. Seeing how all the people had locked themselves inside, I felt more proud of Marcus now than I ever did. I wanted to tell Louise how proud I was of her, too.

  Then I saw somebody running toward me. It was getting very dark now and I couldn’t tell who it was until he was right on the tractor. Then I recognized Sun Brown. He acted like he didn’t see the tractor. If I hadn’t ducked out of his way, he might have run right into me.

  “Sun?” I hollered at him. “Sun? What’s the matter? Sun? Sun?”

  He kept running. He was running like a man who was very tired. He could hardly move his legs, and still he was running.

  I was coming up to Bonbon’s house now. I saw a car parked before the gate. As I came closer, I saw it was the ’41 Ford Marcus was supposed to leave in. The front door on the driver’s side was opened. The rear door on the other side was opened, too. I stopped the tractor and jumped down. I looked in the back of the car and I saw a pasteboard box on the seat. I looked toward the house. The house was dark. But I thought I saw somebody sitting on the steps. I went up to the gate to get a closer look. Yes, somebody was sitting on the steps. I pulled the gate open and went in the big yard. I thought the dog was going to start barking at me, but he never did. Later, I learned that Louise had locked the dog in the kitchen when Marcus came there to get her and Tite. I went up to the small gate, and I saw it was Bonbon sitting on the steps with Tite in his arms. Laying on the ground to the left of the steps was Marcus. I pulled the gate open and went in the yard. The front of Marcus’s clothes was black with blood. I knelt down beside him to brush some dirt from his face, and that’s when I noticed Louise crawling from under the house. Louise wore a light-color dress, and her face was black. The little girl’s face was black, too, who laid in Bonbon’s arms. Louise’s right hand was up to her mouth—no, not the hand, the tip of her fingers. She didn’t see anybody but Marcus. I’m not sure she saw him either—she just knew where he was. She knelt down ’side me, without seeing me, gazing down at Marcus all the time. Then she brought her right hand slowly from her mouth and touched his face. She touched it lightly, almost not touching it at all. She touched his hair and his ear just as lightly. Then she touched his face like that again.

  “You hurt, Marky-poo?” she said softly. “You hurt?”

  I started to pull her away from him, but I changed my mind. It wasn’t because Bonbon was sitting there—I didn’t care about Bonbon. I didn’t care if he killed me just like he had killed Marcus. I didn’t pull her away from him because this was going to be their last time together.

  “You hurt, Marky-poo?” she said again. “You hurt?”

  She laid her face against his. She didn’t say another word long as I was there; she didn’t even cry.

  The reason why Sun had been running in the road was because he had seen it all. This is what he saw.

  54

  Sun Brown had gone to Frank Morris’s plantation earlier that day. His sister had sent word that her oldest girl was in trouble, and Sun had gone there to see what he could do. He and his sister and the girl sat out on the gallery talking all evening. The girl was in trouble, all right; she had got caught and the boy didn’t want to marry her. Around five o’clock, when Sun got ready to leave, they still didn’t know what they were going to do about the girl. Sun promised to send a few dollars whenever he could spare it; then he left for home. Hebert’s plantation was six or seven miles from Morris’s plantation, and Sun had to walk all the way. Around six thirty, he came up to Jacques Guerin’s place and he saw Bonbon and Marshall and Jacques and two or three other Cajuns standing along the fence, looking at a Brahma bull in the yard. Sun stopped in the road to look at the bull. He didn’t care about the bull, but he didn’t feel good passing his boss and his overseer without speaking. They hadn’t seen him because all of them had their backs turned toward the road. Marshall pulled out his watch and checked the time and put the watch back in his pocket. Bonbon looked over his shoulder and saw Sun standing out there. Sun raised his hand and waved. Bonbon didn’t wave back; he just looked at Sun, wondering why he was out there. Sun wanted to tell Bonbon he had got permission from Mr. Marshall to go visit his sister, but Bonbon was too far away. Sun didn’t know what to do, so he grinned and waved again. Marshall and the other Cajuns looked at him, and he waved at Marshall. Like Bonbon, Marshall didn’t wave back, either. He pulled out his watch to check the time again. When the bull went across the yard, everybody turned to look at the bull.

  Sun started walking. He wasn’t thinking about the men who hadn’t waved at him, he wasn’t thinking about his pregnant niece, he was just thinking about the hardship man had to live with. Sun thought he had as much hardship as any other man—and maybe a little more. When he came up to the plantation store, he remembered that Sarah had told him to buy some rice and a piece of salt meat. He went inside and he
noticed that there weren’t any Negroes at the store. Old Godeau asked him where everybody was, and he said he didn’t know. After paying for the rice and meat, he started for home. As he came in the quarter, he noticed how quiet everything was. He couldn’t understand why it was like this and why he felt scared all of a sudden. He started looking for people in the road, but there wasn’t a person anywhere. When he came up to Mrs. Laura Mae’s house, he hollered in at her. Mrs. Laura Mae didn’t answer him. That was strange, because usually Mrs. Laura Mae was sitting on the gallery this time of evening and she loved talking to people. Sun felt more scared now and walked faster. Then he saw a car coming toward him—no, he saw the dust. The dust was flying all over the quarter. In front of the dust was a car, coming up the quarter with no lights on. The car stopped in front of Bonbon’s house, and somebody got out and ran in the yard. Sun had come up to the car by the time the other person came back with a package in his arms, and now he saw that the other person was Marcus. Marcus threw the package on the back seat of the car and ran back in the yard. Sun was so dumbfounded he couldn’t move. He couldn’t understand what was going on, either. Marcus and Louise running away together was the last thing to come in his mind.

  Then he looked over his shoulder. He had not heard the other car, he had not seen any lights—because there weren’t any lights; he had felt the other car coming toward him. He wanted to run, but he couldn’t run. So he fell in the ditch and crawled in a bunch of weeds where they wouldn’t see him.

  The car stopped and Bonbon got out. He looked at the car and looked toward the house before he went in the yard. Sun could tell that Bonbon didn’t know what was going on, either. After Bonbon had gone in the yard, Marshall got out of his car and went to the field car. Sun could see him searching in the dashdrawer. Then he got out of the car with a paper bag. He took the bag to his own car and drove away. Sun was watching Bonbon now. Bonbon still had not gotten to the gallery—he still didn’t know what was going on. He had even stopped on the walk and looked back toward the road so Marshall could tell him what was happening. He didn’t start toward the gallery again until Marshall had driven away. Sun looked toward the gallery. Marcus, Louise and Tite were standing there. Marcus was in front with a package in his arms, and Louise was behind him, holding Tite by the hand. Bonbon still didn’t know what was going on—Sun could tell by the slow, careful, thinking way he went toward the house. Then as he came in the small yard, Marcus threw the package to the side and jumped on the ground to fight him. Sun said Marcus had all the chance in the world to get away from there, and he couldn’t understand why Marcus didn’t run. Sun was screaming inside—“Run, boy; run, run, run.” But instead, Marcus jumped on the ground to fight. Bonbon moved toward the house quickly now. When he came to the end of the gallery, he stooped over and picked up something by the steps. Sun could tell that it was a scythe-blade, and not a hoe or a shovel, from the way Bonbon swung it at Marcus. Marcus ran to the fence and jerked loose a picket that was used there for a prop. He and Bonbon started fighting. Marcus was blocking the scythe-blade more than he was trying to hit with the picket. Sun could hear the noise that steel made against wood and that wood made against wood. He wanted to run, but he couldn’t run. He couldn’t even shut his eyes or plug up his ears.