The Oxford Book of American Short Stories

  The rattling ceased for a moment as he stood paralyzed. He waited. It seemed that the snake waited also.

  "Oh, fuh de light! Ah thought he'd be too sick"—Sykes was muttering to himself when the whirr began again, closer, right underfoot this time. Long before this, Sykes' ability to think had been flattened down to primitive instinct and he leaped—onto the bed.

  Outside Delia heard a cry that might have come from a maddened chimpanzee, a stricken gorilla. All the terror, all the horror, all the rage that man possibly could express, without a recognizable human sound.

  A tremendous stir inside there, another series of animal screams, the intermittent whirr of the reptile. The shade torn violently down from the window, letting in the red dawn, a huge brown hand seizing the window stick, great dull blows upon the wooden floor punctuating the gibberish of sound long after the rattle of the snake had abruptly subsided. All this Delia could see and hear from her place beneath the window, and it made her ill. She crept over to the four-o'clocks and stretched herself on the cool earth to recover.

  She lay there. "Delia, Delia!" She could hear Sykes calling in a most despairing tone as one who expected no answer. The sun crept on up, and he called. Delia could not move—her legs had gone flabby. She never moved, he called, and the sun kept rising.

  "Mah Gawd!" She heard him moan, "Mah Gawd fum Heben!"

  She heard him stumbling about and got up from her flower-bed. The sun was growing warm. As she approached the door she heard him call out hopefully, "Delia, is dat you Ah heah?"

  She saw him on his hands and knees as soon as she reached the door. He crept an inch or two toward her—all that he was able, and she saw his horribly swollen neck and his one open eye shining with hope. A surge of pity too strong to support bore her away from that eye that must, could not, fail to see the tubs. He would see the lamp. Orlando with its doctors was too far. She could scarcely reach the chinaberry tree, where she waited in the growing heat while inside she knew the cold river was creeping up and up to extinguish that eye which must know by now that she knew.

  LANGSTON HUGHES (1902-1967)

  Brilliant in narration, powerful in impact, this story from The Ways of White Folks (1934) cannot suggest the remarkable virtuosity of that volume of short fiction, which portrays, with sympathy, rage, horror, and satiric humor, the manifold relations between American blacks and whites. Any number of stories from the book might have been chosen to represent it, including its most ambitious concluding work, the near-novella "Father and Son. "

  Langston Hughes is most celebrated as a poet, but his genius cut across a number of genres including short fiction, novels, and plays; during the 1930's, as the most popular writer connected with the Harlem Renaissance, he became something of a public figure, working as a journalist, lecturing, founding black theatres, and bringing out anthologies of black writing. Born in Joplin, Missouri, Hughes lived variously in Detroit, Cleveland, New York, and Chicago; his identification was "the bard of Harlem. " Among African-American writers of our time, no one has been more honored than Hughes.

  His output was considerable: more than thirty-five books. Of these, in addition to The Ways of White Folks, the most significant are the poetry collections The Weary Blues (1926), The Dream Keeper (1932), Montage of a Dream Deferred (1951), and The Panther and the Lash (1967); the novel Not Without Laughter (1930); the humorous sketches Simple Speaks His Mind (1950); and the autobiographical The Big Sea (1940) and I Wonder as I Wander (1956).

  Red-Headed Baby

  "DEAD, dead as hell, these little burgs on the Florida coast. Lot of half-built skeleton houses left over from the boom. Never finished. Never will be finished. Mosquitoes, sand, niggers. Christ, I ought to break away from it. Stuck five years on same boat and still nothin' but a third mate puttin' in at dumps like this on a damned coastwise tramp. Not even a good time to be had. Norfolk, Savannah, Jacksonville, ain't bad. Ain't bad. But what the hell kind of port's this? What the hell is there to do except get drunk and go out and sleep with niggers? Hell!"

  Feet in the sand. Head under palms, magnolias, stars. Lights and the kid-cries of a sleepy town. Mosquitoes to slap at with hairy freckled hands and a dead hot breeze, when there is any breeze.

  "What the hell am I walkin' way out here for? She wasn't nothin' to get excited over—last time I saw her. And that must a been a full three years ago. She acted like she was a virgin then. Name was Betsy. Sure ain't a virgin now, I know that. Not after we'd been anchored here damn near a month, the old man mixed up in some kind of law suit over some rich guy's yacht we rammed in a midnight squall off the bar. Damn good thing I wasn't on the bridge then. And this damn yellow gal, said she never had nothing to do with a seaman before. Lyin' I guess. Three years ago. She's probably on the crib-line now. Hell, how far was that house?"

  Crossing the railroad track at the edge of town. Green lights. Sand in the road, seeping into oxfords and the cuffs of dungarees. Surf sounds, mosquito sounds, nigger-cries in the night. No street lights out here. There never is where niggers live. Bickety rundown huts, under palm trees. Flowers and vines all over. Always growing, always climbing. Never finished. Never will be finished climbing, growing. Hell of a lot of stars these Florida nights.

  "Say, this ought to be the house. No light in it. Well, I remember this half-fallin'-down gate. Still fallin' down. Hell, why don't it go on and fall? Two or three years, and ain't fell yet. Guess she's fell a hell of a lot, though. It don't take them yellow janes long to get old and ugly. Said she was seventeen then. A wonder her old woman let me come in the house that night. They acted like it was the first time a white man had ever come in the house. They acted scared. But she was worth the money that time all right. She played like a kid. Said she liked my red hair. Said she'd never had a white man before. . . . Holy Jesus, the yellow wenches I've had, though. . . . Well, it's the same old gate. Be funny if she had another mule in my stall, now wouldn't it? . . . Say, anybody home there?"

  "Yes, suh! Yes, suh! Come right in!"

  "Hell, I know they can't recognize my voice. . . . It's the old woman, sure as a yard arm's long. . . . Hello! Where's Betsy?"

  "Yes, suh, right here, suh. In de kitchen. Wait till I lights de light. Come in. Come in, young gentleman."

  "Hell, I can't see to come in."

  Little flare of oil light.

  "Howdy! Howdy do, suh! Howdy, if 'tain't Mister Clarence, now, 'pon my word! Howdy, Mister Clarence, howdy! Howdy! After sich a long time."

  "You must-a knowed my voice."

  "No, suh, ain't recollected, suh. No, suh, but I knowed you was some white man comin' up de walk. Yes, indeedy! Set down, set down. Betsy be here directly. Set right down. Lemme call her. She's in de kitchen. . . . You Betsy!"

  "Same old woman, wrinkled as hell, and still don't care where the money comes from. Still talkin' loud. . . . She knew it was some white man comin' up the walk, heh? There must be plenty of 'em, then, comin' here now. She knew it was some white man, heh! . . . What yuh sayin', Betsy, old gal? Damn if yuh ain't just as plump as ever. Them same damn moles on your cheek! Com'ere, lemme feel 'em."

  Young yellow girl in a white house dress. Oiled hair. Skin like an autumn moon. Gold-ripe young yellow girl with a white house dress to her knees. Soft plump bare legs, color of the moon. Barefooted.

  "Say, Betsy, here is Mister Clarence come back."

  "Sure is! Claren—Mister Clarence! Ma, give him a drink."

  "Keepin' licker in the house, now, heh? Yes? I thought you was church members last time I saw yuh? You always had to send out and get licker then."

  "Well, we's expectin' company some of the times these days," smiling teeth like bright-white rays of moon, Betsy, nearly twenty, and still pretty.

  "You usin' rouge, too, ain't yuh?"

  "Sweet rouge."

  "Yal?"

  "Yeah, man, sweet and red like your hair."

  "Yal?"

  No such wise cracking three years ago. Too young and dumb for flirtation then:
Betsy. Never like the old woman, talkative, "This here rum come right off de boats from Bermudy. Taste it, Mister Clarence. Strong enough to knock a mule down. Have a glass."

  "Here's to you, Mister Clarence."

  "Drinkin' licker, too, heh? Hell of a baby, ain't yuh? Yuh wouldn't even do that last time I saw yuh."

  "Sure wouldn't, Mister Clarence, but three years a long time."

  "Don't Mister Clarence me so much. Yuh know I christened yuh. . . . Auntie, yuh right about this bein' good licker."

  "Yes, suh, I knowed you'd like it. It's strong."

  "Sit on my lap, kid."

  "Sure. ..."

  Soft heavy hips. Hot and browner than the moon—good licker. Drinking it down in little nigger house Florida coast palm fronds scratching roof hum mosquitoes night bugs flies ain't loud enough to keep a man named Clarence girl named Betsy old woman named Auntie from talking and drinking in a little nigger house on Florida coast dead warm night with the licker browner and more fiery than the moon. Yeah, man! A blanket of stars in the Florida sky—outside. In oil-lamp house you don't see no stars. Only a white man with red hair—third mate on a lousy tramp, a nigger girl, and Auntie wrinkled as an alligator bringing the fourth bottle of licker and everybody drinking—when the door . . . slowly . . . opens.

  "Say, what the hell? Who's openin' that room door, peepin' in here? It can't be openin' itself?"

  The white man stares intently, looking across the table, past the lamp, the licker bottles, the glasses and the old woman, way past the girl. Standing in the door from the kitchen—Look! a damn redheaded baby. Standing not saying a damn word, a damn runt of a red-headed baby.

  "What the hell?"

  "You Clar— . . . Mister Clarence, 'cuse me! . . . You hatian, you, get back to you' bed this minute—fo' I tan you in a inch o' yo' life!"

  "Ma, let him stay."

  Betsy's red-headed child stands in the door looking like one of those goggly-eyed dolls you hit with a ball at the County Fair. The child's face got no change in it. Never changes. Looks like never will change. Just staring—blue-eyed. Hell! God damn! A red-headed blue-eyed yellow-skinned baby!

  "You Clarence! . . . 'Cuse me, Mister Clarence. I ain't talkin' to you suh. . . . You, Clarence, go to bed. . . . That chile near 'bout worries de soul-case out o' me. Betsy spiles him, that's why. De po' little thing can't hear, nohow. Just deaf as a post. And over two years old and can't even say, 'Da!' No, suh, can't say, 'Da!' "

  "Anyhow, Ma, my child ain't blind."

  "Might just as well be blind fo' all de good his eyesight do him. I show him a switch and he don't pay it no mind—less'n I hit him."

  "He's mighty damn white for a nigger child. "

  "Yes, suh, Mister Clarence, he really ain't got much colored blood in him, a-tall. Betsy's papa, Mister Clarence, now he were a white man, too. . . . Here, lemme pour you some licker. Drink, Mister Clarence, drink."

  Damn little red-headed stupid-faced runt of a child, named Clarence. Bow-legged as hell, too. Three shots for a quarter like a loaded doll in a County Fair. Anybody take a chance. For Christ's sake, stop him from walking across the floor! Will yuh?

  "Hey! Take your hands off my legs, you lousy little bastard!"

  "He can't hear you, Mister Clarence."

  "Tell him to stop crawlin' around then under the table before I knock his block off."

  "You varmint. ..."

  "Hey! Take him up from there, will you?"

  "Yes, suh, Mister Clarence."

  "Hey!"

  "You little ..."

  "Hurry! Go on! Get him out then! What's he doin' crawlin' round dumb as hell lookin' at me up at me. I said, me. Get him the hell out of here! Hey, Betsy, get him out!"

  A red-headed baby. Moonlight-gone baby. No kind of yellow-white bow-legged goggled-eyed County Fair baseball baby. Get him the hell out of here pulling at my legs looking like me at me like me at myself like me red-headed as me.

  "Christ!"

  "Christ!"

  Knocking over glasses by the oil lamp on the table where the night flies flutter Florida where skeleton houses left over from boom sand in the road and no lights in the nigger section across the railroad's knocking over glasses at edge of town where a moon-colored girl's got a red-headed baby deaf as a post like the dolls you wham at three shots for a quarter in the County Fair half full of licker and can't hit nothing.

  "Lemme pay for those drinks, will yuh? How much is it?"

  "Ain't you gonna stay, Mister Clarence?"

  "Lemme pay for my licker, I said."

  "Ain't you gonna stay all night?"

  "Lemme pay for that licker."

  "Why, Mister Clarence? You stayed before."

  "How much is the licker?"

  "Two dollars, Mister Clarence."

  "Here."

  "Thank you, Mister Clarence."

  "Go'bye!"

  "Go'bye."

  RICHARD WRIGHT (1908-1960)

  "The Man Who Was Almost a Man" contrasts with, and in an oblique way amplifies, Langston Hughes's "Red-Headed Baby": for here we see a further development of certain thematic tensions, the logical, if unarticulated, next step. Its setting would seem to bear a close resemblance to the rural area near Natchez, Mississippi, where Wright was born to extreme poverty, familial disruption, and the violent bigotry of whites.

  Like Zora Neale Hurston and Langston Hughes, Richard Wright left the South permanently. He too worked for the Writers' Project and did various freelance journalism; by 1935, he had started to write fiction, strongly influenced by the literary Naturalism of the era. The publication of the original and disturbing Native Son in 1940 was a turning point in black American literary history, for the novel was unaccommodating in its portrayal of a vengeful black youth named Bigger Thomas, yet it became a bestseller, bought and read by a large audience of white readers. Bigger Thomas as character and symbol entered the American consciousness permanently, as a daemonic counterpart, it might be said, to Samuel Clemens' long-suffering Nigger Jim and Harriet Beecher Stowe's Christly Uncle Tom.

  Long associated with Marxist ideology, Richard Wright is nonetheless an artist of complexity and subtlety, as the story included here demonstrates. Apart from Native Son, Wright's important titles are the stories Uncle Tom's Children (1938), the autobiographical Black Boy (1945), and the novel The Outsider (1953). An early novel, Lawd Today, was published posthumously; and a gathering of stories, Eight Men, from which "The Man Who Was Almost a Man" is taken, appeared in 1961.

  The Man Who Was Almost a Man

  DAVE struck out across the fields, looking homeward through paling light. Whut's the use talkin wid em niggers in the field? Anyhow, his mother was putting supper on the table. Them niggers can't understan nothing. One of these days he was going to get a gun and practice shooting, then they couldn't talk to him as though he were a little boy. He slowed, looking at the ground. Shucks, Ah ain scareda them even ef they are biggern me! Aw, Ah know whut Ahma do. Ahm going by ol Joe's sto n git that Sears Roebuck catlog n look at them guns. Mebbe Ma will lemme buy one when she gits mah pay from ol man Hawkins. Ahma beg her t gimme some money. Ahm ol ernough to hava gun. Ahm seventeen. Almost a man. He strode, feeling his long loose-jointed limbs. Shucks, a man oughta hava little gun aftah he done worked hard all day.

  He came in sight of Joe's store. A yellow lantern glowed on the front porch. He mounted steps and went through the screen door, hearing it bang behind him. There was a strong smell of coal oil and mackerel fish. He felt very confident until he saw fat Joe walk in through the rear door, then his courage began to ooze.

  "Howdy, Dave! Whutcha want?"

  "How yuh, Mistah Joe? Aw, Ah don wanna buy nothing. Ah jus wanted t see ef yuhd lemme look at tha catlog erwhile."

  "Sure! You wanna see it here?"

  "Nawsuh. Ah wants t take it home wid me. Ah'll bring it back termorrow when Ah come in from the fiels."

  "You plannin on buying something?"

  "Yessuh."

  "Your m
a lettin you have your own money now?"

  "Shucks. Mistah Joe, Ahm gittin t be a man like anybody else!"

  Joe laughed and wiped his greasy white face with a red bandanna.

  "What you plannin on buyin?"

  Dave looked at the floor, scratched his head, scratched his thigh, and smiled. Then he looked up shyly.

  "Ah'll tell yuh, Mistah Joe, ef yuh promise yuh won't tell."

  "I promise."

  "Waal, Ahma buy a gun."

  "A gun? What you want with a gun?"

  "Ah wanna keep it."

  "You ain't nothing but a boy. You don't need a gun."

  "Aw, lemme have the catlog, Mistah Joe. Ah'll bring it back."

  Joe walked through the rear door. Dave was elated. He looked around at barrels of sugar and flour. He heard Joe coming back. He craned his neck to see if he were bringing the book. Yeah, he's got it. Gawddog, he's got it!

  "Here, but be sure you bring it back. It's the only one I got."

  "Sho, Mistah Joe."

  "Say, if you wanna buy a gun, why don't you buy one from me? I gotta gun to sell."

  "Will it shoot?"

  "Sure it'll shoot."

  "Whut kind is it?"

  "Oh, it's kinda old ... a left-hand Wheeler. A pistol. A big one."

  "Is it got bullets in it?"

  "It's loaded."

  "Kin Ah see it?"

  "Where's your money?"

  "What yuh wan fer it?"

  "I'll let you have it for two dollars."

  "Just two dollahs? Shucks, Ah could buy tha when Ah git mah

  pay."

  "I'll have it here when you want it."

  "Awright, suh. Ah be in fer it."

  He went through the door, hearing it slam again behind him. Ahma git some money from Ma n buy me a gun! Only two dollahs! He tucked the thick catalogue under his arm and hurried.

  "Where yuh been, boy?" His mother held a steaming dish of black-eyed peas.

  "Aw, Ma, Ah just stopped down the road t talk wid the boys."

  "Yuh know bettah t keep suppah waiting."

  He sat down, resting the catalogue on the edge of the table.