The guard opened the cell door and let me in, then he locked it back. I looked at him through the bars.
“When will y’all ever learn?” he said, shaking his head.
He said it like he meant it, like he was sorry for me. He kept reminding me of that boy I had played baseball with. They called that other boy Lloyd, and he used to show up just about every Sunday to play baseball with us. He used to play the outfield so he could do a lot of running. He used to buy Cokes for everybody after the game. He was the only white boy out there.
“Here’s a pack of cigarettes and some matches,” Paul said. “Might not be your brand, but I doubt if you’ll mind it too much in there.”
I took the cigarettes from him.
“You can say ‘Thanks,’ ” he said.
“Thanks,” I said.
“And you can say ‘sir’ sometimes,” he said.
“Sir,” I said.
He looked at me like he felt sorry for me, like he felt sorry for everybody. He didn’t look like a policeman at all.
“Let me give you a word of warning,” he said. “Don’t push T. J. Don’t push him, now.”
“I won’t.”
“It doesn’t take much to get him started—don’t push him.”
I nodded.
“Y’all go’n turn out them goddamn lights?” the woman hollered from the other end of the block.
“Take it easy,” Paul said to me and left.
After the lights went out, I stood at the cell door till my eyes got used to the dark. Then I climbed up on my bunk. Two other people was in the cell. Somebody on the bunk under mine, somebody on the lower bunk ’cross from me. The upper bunk ’cross from me was empty.
“Cigarette?” the person below me said.
He said it very low, but I could tell he was talking to me and not to the man ’cross from us. I shook a cigarette out the pack and dropped it on the bunk. I could hear the man scratching the match to light the cigarette. He cupped his hands close to his face, because I didn’t see too much light. I could tell from the way he let that smoke out he had wanted a cigarette very bad.
“What you in for?” he said, real quiet.
“A fight,” I said.
“First time?”
“No, I been in before.”
He didn’t say any more and I didn’t, either. I didn’t feel like talking, anyhow. I looked up at the window on my left, and I could see a few stars. I felt lonely and I felt like crying. But I couldn’t cry. Once you started that in here you was done for. Everybody and his brother would run over you.
The man on the other bunk got up to take a leak. The toilet was up by the head of my bunk. After the man had zipped up his pants, he just stood there looking at me. I tightened my fist to swing at him if he tried any funny stuff.
“Well, hello there,” he said.
“Get your ass back over there, Hattie,” the man below me said. He spoke in that quiet voice again. “Hattie is a woman,” he said to me. “Don’t see how come they didn’t put him with the rest of them whores.”
“Don’t let it worry your mind,” Hattie said.
“Caught him playing with this man dick,” the man below me said. “At this old flea-bitten show back of town there. Up front—front row—there he is playing with this man dick. Bitch.”
“Is that any worse than choking somebody half to death?” Hattie said.
The man below me was quiet. Hattie went back to his bunk.
“Oh, these old crampy, stuffy, old ill-smelling beds,” he said, slapping the mattress level with the palm of his hand. “How do they expect you to sleep.” He laid down. “What are you in for, honey?” he asked me. “You look awful young.”
“Fighting,” I said.
“You poor, poor thing,” Hattie said. “If I can help you in any way, don’t hesitate to ask.”
“Shit,” the man below me said. I heard him turning over so he could go to sleep.
“The world has given up on the likes of you,” Hattie said. “You jungle beast.”
“Bitch, why don’t you just shut up,” the man said.
“Why don’t both of y’all shut up,” somebody said from another cell.
It was quiet after that.
I looked up at the window and I could see the stars going out in the sky. My eyes felt tired and my head started spinning, and I wasn’t here any more, I was at the Seven Spots. And she was there in red, and she had two big dimples in her jaws. Then she got up and danced with him, and every time she turned my way she looked over his shoulder at me and smiled. And when she turned her back to me, she rolled her big ass real slow and easy—just for me, just for me. Grinning Boy was sitting at the table with me, saying: “Poison, poison—nothing but poison. Look at that; just look at that.” I was looking, but I wasn’t thinking about what he was saying. When she went back to that table to sit down, I went there and asked her to dance. That nigger sitting there just looked at me, rolling his big white eyes like I was supposed to break out of the joint. I didn’t pay him no mind, I was looking at that woman. And I was looking down at them two big pretty brown things poking that dress way out. They looked so soft and warm and waiting, I wanted to touch them right there in front of that ugly nigger. She shook her head, because he was sitting there, but little bit later when she went back in the kitchen, I went back there, too. Grinning Boy tried to stop me, saying, “Poison, poison, poison,” but I didn’t pay him no mind. When I came back in the kitchen, she was standing at the counter ordering a chicken sandwich. The lady back of the counter had to fry the chicken, so she had to wait a while. When she saw me, she started smiling. Them two big dimples came in her jaws. I smiled back at her.
“She go’n take a while,” I said. “Let’s step out in the cool till she get done.”
She looked over her shoulder and didn’t see the nigger peeping, and we went outside. There was people talking out there, but I didn’t care, I had to touch her.
“What’s your name?” I said.
“Clara.”
“Let’s go somewhere, Clara.”
“I can’t. I’m with somebody,” she said.
“That nigger?” I said. “You call him somebody?”
She just looked at me with that little smile on her face—them two big dimples in her jaws. I looked little farther down, and I could see how them two warm, brown things was waiting for somebody to tear that dress open so they could get free.
“You must be the prettiest woman in the world,” I said.
“You like me?”
“Lord, yes.”
“I want you to like me,” she said.
“Then what’s keeping us from going?” I said. “Hell away with that nigger.”
“My name is Clara Johnson,” she said. “It’s in the book. Call me tomorrow after four.”
She turned to go back inside, but just then that big sweaty nigger bust out the door. He passed by her like she wasn’t even there.
“No, Bayou,” she said. “No.”
But he wasn’t listening to a thing. Before I knowed it, he had cracked me on the chin and I was down on my back. He raised his foot to kick me in the stomach, and I rolled and rolled till I was out of the way. Then I jumped back up.
“I don’t want fight you, Bayou,” I said. “I don’t want fight you, now.”
“You fight or you fly, nigger,” somebody else said. “If you run, we go’n catch you.”
Bayou didn’t say nothing. He just came in swinging. I backed away from him.
“I wasn’t doing nothing but talking to her,” I said.
He rushed in and knocked me on a bunch of people. They picked me clear off the ground and throwed me back on him. He hit me again, this time a glancing blow on the shoulder. I moved back from him, holding the shoulder with the other hand.
“I don’t want fight you,” I told him. “I was just talking to her.”
But trying to talk to Bayou was like trying to talk to a mule. He came in swinging wild and high, and I went under
his arm and rammed my fist in his stomach. But it felt like ramming your fist into a hundred-pound sack of flour. He stopped about a half a second, then he was right back on me again. I hit him in the face this time, and I saw the blood splash out of his mouth. I was still backing away from him, hoping he would quit, but the nigger kept coming on me. He had to, because all his friends and that woman was there. But he didn’t know how to fight, and every time he moved in I hit him in the face. Then I saw him going for his knife.
“Watch it, now, Bayou,” I said. “I don’t have a knife. Let’s keep this fair.”
But he didn’t hear a thing I was saying; he was listening to the others who was sicking him on. He kept moving in on me. He had both of his arms ’way out—that blade in his right hand. From the way he was holding it, he didn’t have nothing but killing on his mind.
I kept moving back, moving back. Then my foot touched a bottle and I stooped down and picked it up. I broke it against the corner of the building, but I never took my eyes off Bayou. He started circling me with the knife, and I moved round him with the bottle. He made a slash at me, and I jumped back. He was all opened and I could’ve gotten him then, but I was still hoping for him to change his mind.
“Let’s stop it, Bayou,” I kept saying to him. “Let’s stop it, now.”
But he kept on circling me with the knife, and I kept on going round him with the bottle. I didn’t look at his face any more, I kept my eyes on that knife. It was a Texas jack with a pearl handle, and that blade must’ve been five inches long.
“Stop it, Bayou,” I said. “Stop it, stop it.”
He slashed at me, and I jumped back. He slashed at me again, and I jumped back again. Then he acted like a fool and ran on me, and all I did was stick the bottle out. I felt it go in his clothes and in his stomach and I felt the hot, sticky blood on my hand and I saw his face all twisted and sweaty. I felt his hands brush against mine when he throwed both of his hands up to his stomach. I started running. I was running toward the car, and Grinning Boy was running there, too. He got there before me and jumped in on the driving side, but I pushed him out the way and got under that ste’r’n’ wheel. I could hear that gang coming after me, and I shot that Ford out of there a hundred miles an hour. Some of them ran up the road to cut me off, but when they saw I wasn’t stopping they jumped out of the way. Now, it was nobody but me, that Ford and that gravel road. Grinning Boy was sitting over there crying, but I wasn’t paying him no mind. I wanted to get much road between me and Seven Spots as I could.
After I had gone a good piece, I slammed on the brakes and told Grinning Boy to get out. He wouldn’t get out. I opened the door and pushed on him, but he held the ste’r’n’ wheel. He was crying and holding the wheel with both hands. I hit him and pushed on him and hit him and pushed on him, but he wouldn’t turn it loose. If they was go’n kill me, I didn’t want them to kill him, too, but he couldn’t see that. I shot away from there with the door still opened, and after we had gone a little piece, Grinning Boy reached out and got it and slammed it again.
I came out on the pave road and drove three or four miles ’long the river. Then I turned down a dirt road and parked the car under a big pecan tree. It was one of these old plantation quarter and the place was quiet as a graveyard. It was pretty bright, though, because the moon and the stars was out. The dust in that long, old road was white as snow. I lit a cigarette and tried to think. Grinning Boy was sitting over there crying. He was crying real quiet with his head hanging down on his chest. Every now and then I could hear him sniffing.
“I’m turning myself in,” I said.
I had been thinking and thinking and I couldn’t think of nothing else to do. I knowed Bayou was dead or hurt pretty bad, and I knowed either that gang or the law was go’n get me, anyhow. I backed the car out on the pave road and drove to Bayonne. I told Grinning Boy to let my uncle know I was in trouble. My uncle would go to Roger Medlow—and I was hoping Roger Medlow would get me off like he had done once before. He owned the plantation where I lived.
“Hey,” somebody was calling and shaking me. “Hey, there, now; wake up.”
I opened my eyes and looked at this old man standing by the head of my bunk. I’m sure if I had woke up anywhere else and found him that close to me I would’ve jumped back screaming. He must’ve been sixty; he had reddish-brown eyes, and a stubby gray beard. ’Cross his right jaw, from his cheekbone to his mouth, was a big shiny scar where somebody had gotten him with a razor. He was wearing a derby hat, and he had it cocked a little to the back of his head.
“They coming,” he said.
“Who?”
“Breakfast.”
“I’m not hungry.”
“You better eat. Never can tell when you go’n eat again in this joint.”
His breath didn’t smell too good either, and he was standing so close to me, I could smell his breath every time he breathed in and out. I figured he was the one they called Munford. Just before they brought me down here last night, I heard T. J. tell Paul to put me in there with Munford. Since he had called the other one Hattie, I figured he was Munford.
“Been having yourself a nice little nightmare,” he said. “Twisting and turning there like you wanted to fall off. You can have this bunk of mine tonight if you want.”
I looked at the freak laying on the other bunk. He looked back at me with a sad little smile on his face.
“I’ll stay here,” I said.
The freak stopped smiling, but he still looked sad—like a sad woman. He knowed why I didn’t want get down there. I didn’t want no part of him.
Out on the cell block, the nigger trustee was singing. He went from one cell to the other one singing, “Come and get it, it’s hot. What a lovely, lovely day, isn’t it? Yes, indeed,” he answered himself. “Yes, indeed … Come and get it, my children, come and get it. Unc’ Toby won’t feel right if y’all don’t eat his lovely food.”
He stopped before the cell with his little shiny pushcart. A white guard was with him. The guard opened the cell door and Unc’ Toby gived each one of us a cup of coffee and two baloney sandwiches. Then the guard shut the cell again and him and Unc’ Toby went on up the block. Unc’ Toby was singing again.
“Toby used to have a little stand,” Munford said to me. “He think he still got it. He kinda loose up here,” he said, tapping his head with the hand that held the sandwiches.
“They ought to send him to Jackson if he’s crazy.”
“They like keeping him here,” Munford said. “Part of the scheme of things.”
“You want this?” I asked.
“No, eat it,” he said.
I got back on my bunk. I ate one of the sandwiches and drank some of the coffee. The coffee was nothing but brown water. It didn’t have any kind of taste—not even bitter taste. I drank about half and poured the rest in the toilet.
The freak, Hattie, sat on his bunk, nibbling at his food. He wrapped one slice of bread round the slice of baloney and ate that, then he did the same thing with the other sandwich. The two extra slices of bread, he dipped down in his coffee and ate it like that. All the time he was eating, he was looking at me like a sad woman looks at you.
Munford stood between the two rows of bunks, eating and drinking his coffee. He pressed both of the sandwiches together and ate them like they was just one. Nobody said anything all the time we was eating. Even when I poured out the coffee, nobody said anything. The freak just looked at me like a sad woman. But Munford didn’t look at me at all—he was looking up at the window all the time. When he got through eating, he wiped his mouth and throwed his cup on his bunk.
“Another one of them smokes,” he said to me.
The way he said it, it sounded like he would’ve took it if I didn’t give it to him. I got out the pack of cigarettes and gived him one. He lit it and took a big draw. I was laying back against the wall, looking up at the window; but I could tell that Munford was looking at me.
“Killed somebody, huh?” Munfo
rd said, in his quiet, calm voice.
“I cut him pretty bad,” I said, still looking up at the window.
“He’s dead,” Munford said.
I wouldn’t take my eyes off the window. My throat got tight, and my heart started beating so loud, I’m sure both Munford and that freak could hear it.
“That’s bad,” Munford said.
“And so young,” Hattie said. I didn’t have to look at the freak to know he was crying. “And so much of his life still before him—my Lord.”
“You got people?” Munford asked.
“Uncle,” I said.
“You notified him?”
“I think he knows.”
“You got a lawyer?”
“No.”
“No money?”
“No.”
“That’s bad,” he said.
“Maybe his uncle can do something,” Hattie said. “Poor thing.” Then I heard him blowing his nose.
I looked at the bars in the window. I wanted them to leave me alone so I could think.
“So young, too,” Hattie said. “My Lord, my Lord.”
“Oh shut up,” Munford said. “I don’t know why they didn’t lock you up with the rest of them whores.”
“Is it too much to have some feeling of sympathy?” Hattie said, and blowed his nose again.
“Morris David is a good lawyer,” Munford said. “Get him if you can. Best for colored round here.”
I nodded, but I didn’t look at Munford. I felt bad and I wanted them to leave me alone.
“Was he a local boy?” Munford asked.
“I don’t know,” I said.
“Where was it?”
I didn’t answer him.
“Best to talk ’bout it,” Munford said. “Keeping it in just make it worse.”