If He Hollers Let Him Go (16 page)

‘Now how that remind you of a man going to the river?’ Arkansas wanted to know.

‘Anyway,’ Smitty went on, ‘this coloured fellow was sitting down by the bank of the river when an alligator came up out of the water. The coloured fellow watched the alligator for a while, then he started laughing. “Look at that old funny alligator,” he said. The alligator rolled his eyes at the coloured fellow and ast, “What so funny ‘bout me? I’se just an alligator.” The coloured fellow jumped up and looked all about, looked in the bushes and up and down the bank, then he look back at the alligator. “Did you say somp’n?” he ast. “I say what’s so funny ‘bout me?” the alligator said. The coloured fellow’s eyes popped near most out his head. “Kin you talk, or is I just hearing things?” he ast the alligator; and the alligator rolled his eyes and said, “Sure, I kin talk. All us alligators kin talk. The difference between us and you coloured folks, you coloured folks talk too much.”

‘Well, the coloured fellow lit out running and didn’t stop till he come to the field where a white man was ploughing, and he said, “Mistah Jones, Mistah Jones, I just hear an alligator talk.” Mistah Jones said, “Go on, boy, you know can’t no alligator talk.” The coloured fellow said, “I swear I heard him talk. Just lak a natural man. Come on down to the river, Mistah Jones, I’ll show you.” Mistah Jones say, “I ain’t got no time for no foolishness; I got to git dis corn ploughed.” But the coloured fellow said, “I swear I heard him talk. I laughed at him and say, ‘Look at dat old funny alligator,’ and he say, ‘What’s so funny ‘bout me?’ ” So Mistah Jones say, “All right, boy, I’ll come ‘long and see. But I swear if that alligator don’t talk I’se gonna beat the stuffings outa you.” The coloured fellow said, “Oh, he gonna talk.”

‘Well, they come down to the river bank and the old alligator was laying out in the sun; and the coldured fellow said, “Hey, alligator, show this man you kin talk.” The old alligator just rolled his eyes at the coloured fellow. The white man looked at the coloured fellow and the coloured fellow said, “Now come on, Mistah Alligator, and talk. You was talking up a breeze a while ago.” But the alligator don’t say nothing. Ain’t nothing the coloured fellow can do to make him say nothing. So the white fellow got tired of standing there and jumped on the coloured fellow like he said and beat the stuffings out of him. Well, the coloured fellow sat down beside the alligator, his head knotty as fat pine; man, his head knottier than the alligator’s. “Why didn’t you talk?” he ast the alligator. “I told that man you could talk and you made him beat the stuffings outa me.” The alligator rolled his eyes at the coloured fellow and said, “That just what I says, you coloured folks talk too much.”

Willie and Arkansas rolled on the floor. ‘Dat was some alligator,’ Arkansas said.

I caught Ben’s eye and grinned at him. Ben made twirling motions with his index finger at the side of his head, and I laughed.

Nobody could top that one, and they were silent for a moment. Tebbel took advantage of the pause to tell his. ‘Old Aunty was out in the back yard washing.’ All of us gave him a startled look. ‘And she said—’

‘You mean old Aunty Loo?’ Pigmeat cut him off.

‘It don’t make any difference what her name was,’ Tebbel tried again; but Pigmeat cut him off again, ‘Or do you mean old Aunty Coo?’

Tebbel began getting red. ‘Just old Aunty,’ he snarled. ‘Old Aunty was out in the back yard—’

Conway picked up a duct and banged it on the deck. ‘We done told enough jokes, now let’s get to work,’ he said.

I had to laugh. I felt better than I’d felt all morning.

‘We all know that one about old Aunty,’ Johnson said.

‘You know that one, don’t you, Johnson?’ I winked.

‘Everybody knows that one, boy,’ Pigmeat said to Tebbel. ‘You go think up another one and then come back.’

‘What I wanna know now is whether to make a butt joint here or a lap joint,’ Conway said, turning over the duct.

‘Tebbel will tell you all about it,’ I said. ‘Tebbel’s gonna be your boss next week.’

Tebbel looked dubious. ‘What does the print say?’

‘If I had the print I wouldn’t be asking you,’ Conway said.

‘Better get the print to be sure,’ Tebbel said, and walked out.

‘I done run him,’ Conway grinned.

‘It’s a lap joint,’ I said.

‘I know,’ he said. ‘I was just trying to stop him from telling that dirty joke to keep from having to knock out his teeth.’

The three girls came in and Peaches asked, ‘Are you all through telling dirty jokes?’

I laughed. ‘Tebbel broke it up.’

‘What did he tell?’ Bessie wanted to know. ‘Something dirty about some coloured people, I know.’

‘They ganged up on him and wouldn’t let him tell it, so he left,’ I told her.

‘That’s good,’ Peaches said. ‘Don’t let him get started on that stuff.’

I winked at Peaches. ‘Think I’ll go out and give my white woman a break,’ I said.

‘You ain’t no trouble,’ she said slyly. ‘You done found that out.’

But it didn’t even ruffle me. ‘Wanna bet?’ I teased.

‘Who gonna be the judge?’

‘I’ll let you judge. If you holler more than once—’

‘What I’ve got will kill a little boy like you dead,’ she cut me off, and then if she had been light enough she would have turned fiery red:

‘All right, let our helpers alone,’ George said. ‘We’ll take care of everything that needs taking care of. You go on and give your white woman a break.’

Kelly had popped his head in just in time to hear the last of it. He gave a startled look and beat it without saying a word.

Pigmeat laughed. ‘Did you chalk the walker?’

I glanced at my watch. It was nine-fifteen. We had clowned up more than an hour. But they had got it off their chests; almost all of them had started back to work. I felt better about it too. Now I could go up and talk to the union steward without blowing my top.

Then all of a sudden Conway snapped his fingers. ‘We done plumb forgot all about Bob—’ he began, but I cut him off, ‘No, no, we’re not gonna do that any more. You guys go on and do your work. I’ll take care of everything.’

‘Well, we behind you, chief,’ Smitty said.

‘Way behind you,’ Pigmeat said.

I gave them the okay sign, hitched up my pants and started out. Ben stopped me. ‘Some folks, ain’t they?’ he said, shaking his head.

‘Remember what the monkey said when young Mose ran over him and cut off his tail?’ I asked.

‘My people, my people,’ we chorused, grinning at each other.

I found the union steward, Herbie Frieberger, on the weather deck, enjoying his privileges. He was a tall, lean, stoop-shouldered guy in his early thirties, with frizzly gopher-coloured hair, a flapping loose-lipped mouth, and a big hooked nose. His face was narrow and his brownish eyes were set close together; he had a shiny tin hat tipped to the back of his head and a union button big as a saucer pinned to the front of his shirt. I didn’t exactly hate the guy, but I despised him from the word ‘go.’ It was strictly personal.

There were five guys standing around him, four white and a coloured fellow who was something or other in the union, probably the proof that it wasn’t discriminatory. Herbie was beating up his chops about Lend-Lease to Russia when I walked up.

‘Comrades,’ I greeted.

They all looked around. One of the white guys winked; the other three didn’t speak.

‘Comrade,’ the coloured fellow saluted. A black Russian, I thought.

Herbie looked salty. ‘ ‘Lo, Bob,’ he growled.

‘May I have a word in private with you, Commissar?’ I said. Herbie didn’t like that either. ‘Come on, can the corny jive,’ he grated. ‘Next thing you’ll be asking me to get you out of a jam.’

I kept my face under control. ‘Okay, you know the story,’ I said. ‘I want to talk to you about it.’

He got important again. ‘Say look, Bob, can’t you see me in about a half-hour? Maybe I can do something for you, old man.’

‘Whatever you can do in a half-hour, you can do right now.’

‘Jesus Christ, all you guys do is gripe,’ he complained. ‘You don’t want a union, you want a court of human relations. Write a letter to Mr. Anthony.’

If he knew what I thought about both him and the union he wouldn’t be so cute, I thought. I kept my voice level. ‘Come on, Jew boy, don’t be so loud,’ I said, dragging him in front of the white boys.

He jerked a look of solid malevolence at me, then gave the others a you-see-how-it-is look, spread his hands in a despairing gesture, and walked with me to the starboard rail.

‘The thing for you to do is to write out a grievance and give it to me tomorrow,’ he began blabbing before I’d said a word. ‘I’ll present it before the executive board when we meet next week.’

‘You’re jumping the gun, sonny boy,’ I told him flatly. ‘What I want you to do is straighten out this cracker dame. I’ll handle the rest of it. I want you to tell her she has to work with Negroes here or lose her job.’

I knew that’d put him on the spot; he didn’t want to butt heads with those crackers any more than I did.

‘Jesus Christ, Bob, you know the union can’t do that,’ he began, tracking back. ‘The union can’t force anybody to quit—’

‘You can if they don’t pay their dues,’ I said.

‘But this is different,’ he contended. ‘This is dynamite. If we tried that, half the workers in the yard would walk out. I hate to even think what might happen.’

‘Don’t try,’ I said. ‘Think of what’s already happened. If a third-grade tacker can get a leaderman bumped every cracker dame here is going to figure she can make a beef and get any Negro bumped—’

‘Well, Christ, I’ll talk to her,’ he said. ‘That’s the best I can do. I’ve been intending to talk to her.’ He wiped mock sweat from his brow. ‘Damn, old man, take in some of your muscle, you’ll get us all shot. Just take it easy and you’ll live longer. Listen, if you take it easy for a month or two, I promise you—’

‘If you can’t talk to her now, and with me there to hear what you say, then to hell with you and this lousy Jim Crow union too!’ I said.

‘That’s no way to talk about the union,’ he began ducking and dodging again. ‘You know we have always fought for the coloured people. Christ, learn something about your union, man. Most of the nationals have Negroes on their executive boards—’

‘That don’t mean anything to me,’ I cut him off. ‘When I came to this lousy city in ‘41 all I did was bump my head against Jim Crow shops that were organized by your union. They organize me
in
—that’s fine—when I get
in
…’

‘Hell, the union isn’t an employment agency. If it hadn’t been for the union you wouldn’t be working here now—’

‘That’s a goddamned lie!’ I said. ‘The only reason this company started hiring Negroes is because they couldn’t get enough white workers who wanted to work in this dirty yard. This lousy local never fought for Negroes to be hired—probably fought against it—’

‘Okay, okay,’ he cut in. ‘This local is a stinker. Christ, don’t you know I know it? But don’t judge the whole movement by—’

‘The whole movement ain’t little Jesus Christ to me,’ I said. ‘Either you’re all the way for me, or you’re all the way against me. I don’t play the middle.’

‘That’s the trouble with you coloured people,’ he shouted, getting agitated. ‘You forget we’re in a war. This isn’t any time for private gripes. We’re fighting fascism—we’re not fighting the companies and we’re not fighting each other—we’re all fighting fascism together and in order to beat fascism we got to have unity. We got to have unity in the union and unity on the job—’

‘That’s fine, Comrade Marx, that’s wonderful,’ I cut him off. ‘Let’s you and me unite and start right here fighting fascism. Let’s go down and give this cracker dame some lessons in unity and if she doesn’t want to unite let’s tell her about the war—’

‘Aw, goddamnit, you want to agitate!’ he shouted. ‘I’m no Communist and you know it. Mrs. Baker had an editorial in her paper about Negro people like you. She said—’

‘Whatever she said, I don’t want to hear it,’ I said. ‘Mrs. Baker’s not my mama.’ Mrs. Baker was a Negro woman who published a weekly paper in Los Angeles. ‘And as for all that gibberish about unity! Get these crackers to unite with me. I’m willing. I’ll work with ‘em, fight with ‘em, die with ‘em, goddamnit. But I ain’t gonna even try to do any uniting without anybody to unite with. Do you understand that?’ I put my finger on his chest. ‘What the hell do I care about unity, or the war either, for that matter, as long as I’m kicked around by every white person who comes along? Let the white people get some goddamned unity.’

He gave me a funny look, ‘I’m white,’ he said. ‘I’m not kicking you around.’

That made me blind mad for him to put me on a spot like that. I blew up. ‘Dammit to hell, don’t look at me!’ I said. ‘I believe you. Tell it to some of these crackers around here who don’t. They’d refuse to work with you as quick as they would me.’

Now he got a hurt enduring look. ‘Jesus Christ,’ he said. ‘I never saw a guy so confused.’

‘Okay, I’m confused,’ I said. ‘I knew that was coming.’ I took a breath and pinned him down. ‘All I want to know are you coming with me to talk to this dame?’

‘Bob, you know damned well I can’t do that. I’d start—’

‘Well, go to hell!’ I said, and walked off.

I rubbed my face with the flat of my hand, dug my finger tips into my scalp. That guy could really get on my nerves. He could give more phoney arguments in five minutes than the average chump could think up in a day. And the hell of it was he could make a weak-minded chump fall for ‘em. All I’d wanted was for him to straighten out the dame, and he’d damn near shown me where she was right and I was wrong.

Now I didn’t know what to do. I hadn’t turned in the timecards because I didn’t want any stuff out of Kelly. I stood there on the deck for a time, looking out across the harbour. A cruiser was silhouetted against the skyline. The white folks are still going strong, I thought; then I thought about the black sailors aboard waiting on the white. In the good old American tradition, I thought; the good old American way.

My face felt drawn in, thin, skin-tight on the bone. I wondered what would happen if all the Negroes in America would refuse to serve in the armed forces, refuse to work in war production until the Jim Crow pattern was abolished. The white folks would no doubt go right on fighting the war without us, I thought—and no doubt win it. They’d kill us maybe; but they couldn’t kill us all. And if they did they’d have one hell of a job of burying us.