“Little Boy, you and Joby, Mr. Frank want y’all,” I said, after I had spoke to everybody.
“Who-us-for what?” Little Boy said. “What we done?”
“Come on,” I said.
“Lord, have mercy,” Little Boy said. “Now, what? People can’t even rest round here on Saturday.”
They followed me round the store back to the house.
Little Boy was grumbling all the way; Joby was keeping quiet. When we came in the kitchen, I saw Stateman ducking down the hall. I supposed he had been trying to feel up that yellow gal again.
“What’s this?” she said, when she saw Little Boy and Joby.
“How I’m supposed to know,” Little Boy said. “They don’t tell nobody nothing.”
Dee-Dee started laughing, and we left her back there laughing. I knocked on the library door, and when ’Malia told us to come in, I nodded for Little Boy and Joby to go in first. Little Boy and Joby, both of them with their hats in their hands, stood before Frank Laurent like two little children. ’Malia, in her corner, went on sewing like nothing was happening. Poor ’Malia was so tired, and she had seen so much foolishness, things like this didn’t bother her much any more.
“You two niggers stay on my place?” Frank asked.
“Course we do, Mr. Frank,” Little Boy said. “You know us.”
“Do I?” Frank said. “The only thing I know is that somebody’s running round this place telling me where I can put that back door, and I—”
“No sir, no sir,” Little Boy said. “I didn’t say that—I didn’t. But Joby, he could ’a’. ’Cause just like you see him standing there, Joby got a big mouth. I done told Joby, I done told Joby—I said, ‘Joby, mind your mouth; mind your mouth, boy, or one of these good days it go’n get you in a lot of trouble.’ I told him that no later than, I think, last Sunday.” He turned to Joby. “Didn’t I tell you that?”
“I don’t ’member you telling me nothing,” Joby said.
“I did tell you that, Joby.”
“You didn’t,” Joby said. “ ’Cause I didn’t see you Sunday. I seen you Saturday.”
“Then I told you Saturday,” Little Boy said. “I knowed it was one of them days.”
“Where you told me that at?” Joby said. “Where? At the fair? At the road? In Bayonne? Where? The store?”
“In one of them places,” Little Boy said. “I can’t ’member everything.”
“You ain’t told me nothing,” Joby said. He turned toward Frank, and I could see he wanted to cry. “Mr. Frank, I swear by my mama Little Boy ain’t told me nothing.”
Frank had been squinting up at them all the time they stood there squabbling. Even after they quit, he still looked at them a long time before he said anything.
“You two mind if I go on now?” he said.
Little Boy looked at Frank, but Joby lowered his head. He was waiting to hear the punishment Frank was going to give him.
“Either of you know Copper?” Frank asked.
“Miss Amalia’s nephew?” Little Boy said, pointing toward ’Malia in the corner. “Yes sir, I know him. He’s down the quarters right now.”
“Go down there and bring him back up here,” Frank said. “I don’t want any scars on him, I don’t want any broken bones, but I want him up here.”
“Yes sir,” Little Boy said. Then he turned to ’Malia. “Hope that’s all right with you, Miss Amalia?”
“What did you ask her?” Frank said.
“I was just telling Miss Amalia over there I hope it’s all right with her if—” Little Boy stopped.
“You’re asking her if it’s all right when I told you to do something?” Frank asked him.
“I wouldn’t want do nothing she might not—” Little Boy stopped again before he finished.
“Do like Mr. Frank say,” ’Malia said, with her head down.
“Just a minute,” Frank said. “Who the hell’s running this place, me or Amalia?”
“I guess you, Mr. Frank,” Little Boy said.
“You guess, nigger?” Frank said. “You guess?”
Little Boy lowered his head, but Frank kept on looking at him. Then all of a sudden his face changed. Like only now he re’lized, maybe he wasn’t running the place. Maybe somebody else was running it after all. Or, maybe nobody was running it. Maybe it was just running down.
“Get out of here,” he said.
“Yes sir,” Little Boy said. “Joby, come on.”
They went out. I started to follow them, but Frank stopped me. I turned toward him with my cap in my hand.
“This whole place gone mad?” he said.
I didn’t answer him.
“You hear me talking to you, Felix, goddamn it,” he said.
“It ain’t mad, Mr. Frank,” I said. “It ain’t no more like it used to be, that’s all.”
“What you’re trying to say is that I’m not running this place any more? You and Amalia are?”
“Nobody’s running the place, Mr. Frank,” I said. “The Cajuns sharecropping it, and the overseer seeing that—”
“I’m running it, damn you,” he said. “I’m running it.”
I nodded. “Yes sir.”
Then that look came on his face again. “I’m not running nothing,” it said. “They know I’m not running nothing; I know I’m not running nothing.”
“Why did they have to leave me here?” he said out loud. “Why did I have to be the one to stay?”
“Now, stop that,” ’Malia said.
“Why?” he said again. “Why? I wanted no part of it. Why did they have to dump it on my lap?”
“You have relatives there,” ’Malia said. “She’d be glad to take it off your hands.”
“Is that what you all want, for her to take it over?” he asked ’Malia. He looked at ’Malia a while, but she went on sewing. “Is that what you want?” he said. “And do you know what’ll happen then? She would kick you off the place before I was cold in my grave. She would let the Cajuns plow up the ground where your houses are now. And that cemetery back there, what do you think’ll happen to it? Do you think she would hesitate a moment before she plowed that under too? Do you have another plot of land picked out for the bones, Amalia? Now, do you know why I go on?”
“Vexing yourself like that won’t let you go on much longer,” ’Malia said.
“I was all right until that nigger got here,” Frank said. “Until your nephew got here, Amalia.”
“Us nephew,” ’Malia said softly, with her head down.
“What did you say?” Frank asked her. “What did you say, Amalia?”
She kept her head down; she didn’t answer him.
“I heard you,” Frank said. “You joining Felix and that nigger, too, huh?”
‘Malia raised her head and looked at him. “Ain’t that’s why you want Copper here, Mr. Frank?” she said.
“That nigger is on my place,” Frank said. “Any nigger on my place comes to my house when I say come.”
“Look like Mr. Walter got plenty more round here nobody ain’t been sending for,” ’Malia said.
Frank got whiter. ’Malia had never talked to him like that before. If she wasn’t so tired, and if Copper hadn’t had her so mixed up, I’m sure she wouldn’t ’a’ talked like that now. Frank raised his hand real slowly, then he pushed it inside the robe quickly and rubbed his chest. He was breathing fast and hard, like he was trying to catch his breath. ’Malia jumped up from the chair and ran to him.
“You all right?” she asked him. “You all right? You want your pills? You want the doctor? Mr. Frank? Mr. Frank, you hear me?”
He didn’t answer her. His head was bowed. He rubbed his chest hard as he could.
“Mr. Frank?” ’Malia said. She turned to me. “Felix?”
“Sit down,” Frank said, out of breath. He never raised his head. “Sit down.”
’Malia moved back to her chair, but she didn’t sit down. I just stood there watching. I didn’t know what to do. After a while,
Frank raised his head and looked at ’Malia.
“Did I frighten you?” he asked her. “What’s the matter, Amalia? Did you hear the tractors knocking over the house?”
’Malia sat back down, but she kept on watching him. Frank rubbed his chest inside the robe. The room was absolutely quiet all this time.
“What does that nigger look like?” Frank asked me.
“Who, Copper?” I said. Because I was still thinking about what had just happened. And I could hear the tractors knocking over the houses and plowing up the graves.
“Who do you think I’m talking about, Felix?”
“He’s a tall, slim boy,” I said.
“ ‘He’s a tall, slim boy,’ ” Frank said, mocking me. “ ‘He’s a tall, slim boy.’ Does he have hands? Is he green? Does he speak Russian?”
“He’s brown,” I said. “Gray eyes. A long face. He writes with his left hand.”
“And because he writes with his left hand, he can’t come through that back door?”
I didn’t answer him.
“Well?” he said.
“That’s why he won’t come through that back door, Mr. Frank,” I said.
“He’ll come through that back door, and he’ll be glad to come through that back door,” Frank said. “You can go back to your hammering now.”
“Thank you,” I said, and turned to leave.
“That one piece of iron ought to be thin as a razor blade by now,” Frank said.
I faced him again. “It’s not the same piece,” I said. “I got all that old stuff there.”
“You’ve never told me why you stay in there so much,” he said, squinting up at me.
“Maybe some day somebody’ll use it again,” I said.
“And who may that somebody be?” he said. “Copper?”
“I don’t know, Mr. Frank,” I said. “Maybe it will be Copper.”
“Yes, maybe it will be Copper, Felix,” Frank said. “But I’ll be in my grave before that day comes.”
6: I went to the store to get me a pack of tobacco, then I went back to the shop. I had done no more than picked up my file when I heard that yellow gal calling me out there again. When I got to the door, I saw her standing out there with a basket of clothes in her arms. She was on her way from the clothesline.
“Now, what?” I said.
“Samson been calling you,” she said.
“Samson?” I said. “What—”
“Yonder,” she said, pointing with the basket. “Look like he got Joby and Little Boy tied together.”
Joby and Little Boy faced the gate like a pair of mules or a pair of oxen that had been working the fields all day. Samson was holding something behind them, but I didn’t know what it was till I got closer. Then I saw it was the end of a trace chain, with the other end wrapped around both Joby and Little Boy. The first thing to come to my mind was a bad dog or a bull. “Yes, a bull,” I thought; “a bull. Ben’s bull. He got out the pasture and took after them. When they saw him coming, they tried to get under Samson’s wire fence, but the fence was too low. But, wait,” I thought. “Wait, now. I can see a bull running you under a wire fence and making you rip half your clothes off, but where would that bull get a chain from?”
Then Samson told me: Copper.
“Sure, sure,” I thought. “Copper.” Only it hadn’t darted my mind that one human being would do that to two more of his own kind.
Samson told me what happened, then he gived me the end of the trace chain he was holding. Copper had tied their hands behind their back with their own belts.
“Maybe this’ll convince him he don’t want come up here,” I said to Samson.
“I don’t know ’bout him, but I’m sure you couldn’t pay these here to go mess with him again,” Samson said. “I done seen some fighting in my days, but I ain’t never seen none like that young man can put up. Biff, boff; ooof, offf. You got to be possessed to fight like that.”
“Let’s go,” I said to Joby and Little Boy. “Thanks, Samson.”
“My pleasure,” Samson said. “He paid me a quarter to bring them up here. Yes, you got to be possessed to fight like that. Boff, biff. Doggonest thing I ever seen in my life.”
We started toward the house. That yellow gal was still out in the yard with that basket of clothes. When we came closer to her, she started laughing. She laughed so hard, she dumped half of the clothes out of the basket on the grass.
Stateman met us at the door; he said he didn’t know if he could allow us to come in there, seeing the way we was looking. I pushed him to the side and nodded for Joby and Little Boy to go on up the hall. I knocked on the door, and when ’Malia told us to come in, I let them go in first.
’Malia made a loud groan and throwed her hand up to her mouth when she saw Little Boy and Joby. But Frank’s expression didn’t change. You would ’a’ thought Stateman had just brought him a cold glass of water and that was all. After he had looked at Joby and Little Boy, he looked at the trace chain that tied them together. He looked at it the way you look at something, but you not really seeing it. The way you look at something, but at the same time you thinking about something else. Then he looked at ’Malia. ’Malia a while, then Joby and Little Boy again, then me. I’m sure he thought we was doing all this to either run him crazy or kill him. Then he probably thought maybe he ought to let us kill him. If we killed him, then he wouldn’t have to go through the torment of keeping up this place day in and day out. He would be free of this place, free of us (who, he said, he never wanted), and he would be free of all his pains.
He covered his mouth to cough. Then he said pardon.
“Sir?” Little Boy asked, raising his head.
“ ‘Pardon,’ ” Frank said.
“Yes sir,” Little Boy said, lowering his head again and jingling the chains.
Now, it got quiet again. All this time, Frank was waiting for me to start talking. He had been waiting for me to explain since we came in there. But I was waiting for him to ask me what had happened. He knowed what had happened, but he thought it was my place to start off first. Well, I wasn’t going to say a word till he opened his mouth.
Then he couldn’t hold back any more. He looked at me like I was the cause for all of this. He knowed I wasn’t. He knowed it was Copper and just Copper. But since he couldn’t reach Copper, he had to accuse me. Like a man who beat his mule because his wife beat him; or the man who go home and beat his child because the overseer cussed him out in the field.
“Well, Felix?” he said.
“All right, Little Boy,” I said.
Little Boy started off, but Frank wasn’t looking at Little Boy, he was still looking at me—still accusing me. Sure, he knowed I didn’t have nothing to do with it, but since he couldn’t touch Copper, he had to touch somebody else. It would ’a’ been ’Malia if I wasn’t there, but since I was, and since it was me who had brought the note from Copper, and since it was me who had brought Little Boy and Joby in there, then I had to be the one to blame.
“… down there with that little brown tablet and that pencil, looking at Mr. Rufus old house,” Little Boy was saying.
I looked at Little Boy again. His blue denim shirt looked like a line of ribbons. I’m sure if Samson hadn’t told me what had happened, I would ’a’ thought somebody had put Little Boy in a pit with a bobcat. Only, the person had tied Little Boy’s hands behind his back and had told that bobcat to go to work on him.
“… I went there and told him you wanted to see him,” Little Boy was saying, “but he didn’t pay me no mind. After he got through writing up the house, he jumped the ditch and sighted ’long the fence, then he jumped back and writ some more on that little tablet. He looked down at the ditch a little while and even writ something ’bout it, too.”
“After he had pulled up piece of that jimpson weed and chewed it,” Joby told Little Boy.
Joby lowered his head again. Little Boy nodded. The chain jingled when either one of them moved.
“Yeah,”
Little Boy said. “After he had pulled up piece of that jimpson weed and tasted it, he writ something ’bout it in that little tablet. Bitter or sweet, I don’t know. Then after he got through there, he went down to Compaa house …”
Frank was looking at Little Boy, but you could see he was thinking about something else. Maybe he was thinking he was dreaming. Maybe he was thinking he was in a crazy house, or maybe he was dead and this was hell.
“I told him again you wanted to see him, but he just went right on writing,” Little Boy said. “Acting more like he was white—like he was Mr. Walter—”
He stopped again. That was something he wasn’t ever supposed to say. Anybody in the world who had ever seen Walter Laurent and saw Copper could see that Walter Laurent was Copper’s paw. But you wasn’t supposed to ever say it.
When Frank heard his brother’s name, his eyes shifted a little. He had been looking at Little Boy all this time, but he hadn’t been listening to him. But hearing Walter’s name woke him up. He started looking at Joby and Little Boy like it was just that moment he re’lized they was in the room.
“Where did you meet the bears?” he said.
“B’ars, sir?” Little Boy said.
Frank nodded. “B’ars.”
“Me and Joby ain’t met no b’ars nowhere, sir,” Little Boy said.
“Sure, you did,” Frank said.
Little Boy and Joby looked at each other like two small children. They didn’t know if to agree with Frank or not. To say yes, they met bears would ’a’ been a lie, and they could be punished. To say no, they didn’t meet any bears would ’a’ been calling Frank a lie, and they could be punished for that, too. So they looked at each other, not saying a thing. For my part, all I wanted to do was laugh.
“I sent you and Joby down the quarters to find Copper,” Frank said. “But Copper told both of you to go to hell. You didn’t go to hell—no, you came back up here to tell me what Copper had said, and that’s when you met the two bears. One grabbed you and threw you down, the other one grabbed Joby and did him the same. They took off your belts, wore out your butts, and tied your hands behind your backs. But that wasn’t all. One of the bears happened to have a chain ’cross his shoulder. Where he got the chain from, we won’t question.