Of Love and Dust (29 page)

“Pretty good, huh?” he said.

“Yeah,” I said.

“Used to do little that for a living,” he said.

“Did you?”

“Yeah, long time ago.”

After he finished with the oxblood shoes, he got the brown ones.

“This time tomorrow, guess that trial be over,” he said, thoughtfully. “This time Tuesday I’ll be somewhere in Texas.”

“California, huh?”

“Yeah, I figure that’s the best place for us to go,” he said. “They say they got a lot of them army and navy plants out there. Should be able to get some kind of work.”

I looked at him, but I didn’t say anything. I could feel that tightness in me again. It had been coming and going ever since Marshall first showed up in the field. It was in me Friday evening when Marcus went to that house. I waited for him in the road and asked him what had happened. He told me everything was set. But when I came up to the yard the next day, Bishop came up to me shaking his head. He looked sadder and sicker than I had ever seen him, and he just stood there shaking his head. He didn’t say a word, he didn’t even try to open his mouth, he just shook his head like doomsday had finally got here. When I saw Marcus again that evening I told him about it, but I could have saved my breath for all the good it did.

Now, Marcus looked up from the shoe he was working on and grinned at me. It was a little knowing grin, like he knew what I had been thinking about all the time.

“Still don’t think it’s go’n work, huh?” he said.

“Aunt Margaret and Bishop don’t think so,” I said.

“I don’t pay too much ’tention to old people talk,” Marcus said.

“That’s not a good thing to say, Marcus; not at a time like this.”

“Jim, stop being old-fashion,” he said. “Where would people
be if they didn’t take a chance? You know where? Right here. Right here in this quarter the rest of they life.”

The little boy came back with the food and the beer.

“Go in my kitchen and get that opener off the table,” I told him.

He ran in and ran back out. After handing me the opener, he ran out of the yard. He was the running-est little boy I had ever seen.

We sat there eating. I was hungry because I hadn’t ate a thing since last night. I had done some gambling at Josie’s place until about four this morning, and I had left there, half broke, without eating anything. I hadn’t ate anything when I got up, so right now I was half starved. Marcus was pretty hungry, too. He was tearing into that chicken like he hadn’t seen food in days.

The second bell rang for church. I saw people going by the gate. It was hot, and all the women and girls had on light-color dresses. Most of them had straw or pasteboard fans. The men used their pocket handkerchiefs to fan with. The smaller children didn’t have anything, and they didn’t mind the heat half as much as the older people did. Most of them waved or spoke to me as they went by. They didn’t say anything to Marcus; they just looked at his clothes hanging on the line.

“I used to belong to church,” Marcus said.

“Yes?” I said.

He could see I wanted him to talk, so he wouldn’t say anything else for a while.

“I was baptised when I was about twelve,” he said. “Was a good little Christian, too. Used to go to church all the time—me and my mama. People used to say I was go’n be a preacher. I used to read the Bible in the church sometime.
Then my mama died. My daddy put me with my nan-nan and he took off somewhere. After he left, I had to get a job to help support myself. I got a job on a parking lot. They had another nigger working there they called Big Red. I wasn’t no more than fifteen then, so Big Red showed me the ropes. He charged me a dollar a day for showing me the ropes. I didn’t think that was fair and I went to the boss and told him. He told me not to give Big Red a damn thing. I told Big Red what he said. I didn’t say the word damn, because I was a Christian and damn was a bad word. I just told Big Red the boss said I didn’t have to give him anything.

“ ‘So you went to the white man, huh?’ Big Red said. ‘For that you go’n give me two dollars a day. Now, go tell the white man that.’

“I went and told the white man Big Red said I had to give him two dollars a day. He said I didn’t have to give Big Red a damn thing. I asked him to tell Big Red that because Big Red wouldn’t believe me. He told me he was a little busy then, but for me to go out there and tell Big Red what he said. I didn’t tell Big Red anything because now I saw what was going on. Big Red was his number one nigger, and he didn’t care what Big Red did.

“So I went to Jesus on my knees. Every night before I went to bed I asked Jesus to go with Big Red. I figured if He blessed Big Red, Big Red would leave me ’lone. Big Red might even take pity on me, seeing I was a little boy, and even give me some money. But that was the farthest thing from Big Red’s mind. Every day just ’fore I knocked off, he came to me and asked me for his two dollars. If I told him I hadn’t made that much tip, he jugged his hand in my pocket and took everything. I wanted to quit the job, but my nan-nan told me not to. She said the white man would
put a bad mark behind my name and it would be hard for me to get another job anywhere else in Baton Rouge. So I stayed there. I stayed there, and every night I prayed. I prayed so much, I even mentioned Big Red’s name in church. But instead of me saying, ‘Jesus, go with Big Red,’ I said, ‘Jesus, please make Big Red stop taking my money.’ When I said that, the church cracked up. Everybody started laughing. Even the preacher on the pulpit. Everybody laughing and coughing and wiping they eyes. Because, you see, Jesus didn’t do things like that. Jesus healed the sick and raised the dead, but He didn’t stop people from taking your money. That wasn’t a miracle—not even a little miracle.

“The next day when I went to work, Big Red said, ‘I hear you been talking ’bout me to a Jew now. That go’n cost you another dollar.’

“That night he came to collect his three dollars. I had just bought a big bottle of pop.

“ ‘All right, pay off,’ he said. ‘Don’t try to hold back, I’ll just go in your pocket.’

“I paid him off, all right. I splintered that bottle on his head.

“But ’fore I could move, the law was there hauling me off to jail. They put me in a cell with about six other niggers. They called one of them Cadillac. Soon as I got in there, Cadillac said, ‘You brought my cigarettes?’

“ ‘No,’ I said.

“ ‘You shouldn’t come to a man house and don’t bring his cigarettes,’ he said, and rammed his fist in my stomach. I went down. He picked me up and hit me again. He beat me so bad I couldn’t even go to my bunk. Two other niggers had to take me there. The next morning the jailer looked at me all bruised, but he didn’t say a thing. He even gived
Cadillac more food than he gived the rest of us. Cadillac was his nigger just like Big Red was the other white man’s nigger.

“When my nan-nan came to see me, I told her to bring me some cigarettes next time. She bought the cigarettes ’fore she left the jail, and I gived them to Cadillac. That went on every time she came. She gived me the cigarettes and I gived them to Cadillac. When Cadillac got out, somebody else came in. They called him Horse Trader and he said he was Cadillac cousin. He told me Cadillac told him to collect the cigarettes I owed him. So when my nan-nan came now, I gived the cigarettes to Horse Trader. I wasn’t the only one Cadillac and Horse Trader did this to; they did it to everybody they could. Horse Trader even made people suck him off. Not me, some other cats. If he had ever tried that on me, I woulda killed him while he slept. But he tried that on other people. If the jailer caught anybody sucking anybody off, he took the person who was doing the sucking to another room and beat the hell out of him and brought him right back. And Horse Trader would make him suck him off again. Horse Trader had a favorite one, a little yellow cat called Chinaman. Horse Trader used to make Chinaman hit it every night. Every time Chinaman got through, he puked and prayed to Jesus. Every night he had to eat, then he puked and prayed. I could have told him praying wasn’t going to do any good, but I thought I better keep out of this shit. One day they took Chinaman off to Jackson to the crazy house.

“When Horse Trader got out of jail, another one came in. I forgot his name—Boxcar, or something—and he said he was Horse Trader half-brother. So I gived the cigarettes to Boxcar. Then one day I told myself I ain’t giving these fuckers nothing no more even if they killed me. If I had to go
through life like that, life wasn’t worth it. So I told my nan-nan to stop bringing cigarettes. She wouldn’t stop. So everytime she brought them, I ripped open the pack and dumped them in the toilet. Boxcar beat me every time I did that, but I didn’t care no more.

“When they let me out of jail, I promised myself I was go’n look out only for myself; and I wasn’t go’n expect no more from life than what I could do for myself. And nobody in this world need to expect no more from me than that.”

“You can’t make it like that, Marcus,” I said. “They got the world fixed where you have to work with other people.”

“Not me,” he said.

“Yes, you, Marcus,” I said. “Yes, you. You, me and everybody else.”

“Not me,” he said. “ ’cause I already know ’em. No matter what they say, it don’t add up to nothing but a big pile of shit. You do what you can do for yourself, and that’s all.”

Up the quarter, the people were singing and praying in the church. I looked at Marcus, and I felt empty inside. I felt empty because he could not believe in God or friendship; I felt empty because I doubted if I believed in anything, either.

50
 

The next morning, when I came to the yard, Bonbon was there already. He told me Marcus wasn’t going in the field with me that morning, he had to go for his trial. He said Marcus would be out there that evening, though, so it wasn’t any need for me to get anybody in his place. At ten o’clock, he took Marcus to Bayonne in the truck. Marcus wore his black suit, his white shirt and his black and white shoes. The trial was at ten thirty. At eleven thirty the trial was over, and at ten minutes to twelve Bonbon had Marcus in the quarter again. When he stopped before the gate, he told Marcus to go in and change clothes because the honeymoon was over.

Charlie Jordan lived right across the road from us. Charlie was sitting out on his gallery with his right foot in a pan of Epsom salt water. Charlie said he could see how Bonbon and Marcus were talking to each other, then glaring at each other, but he didn’t know what it was all about. Marcus walked away from the truck. Bonbon watched him a few seconds, then he swung the truck around and went speeding back up the quarter. Charlie said the dust in the road was flying so much you couldn’t see the house next to yours. Bonbon went up to the big house and knocked on the screen door, but he jerked the door open before anybody could answer.

“Where is the old man?” he said to Bishop.

Bishop went to get Marshall. When they came back in the kitchen, Pauline was there, too. She stood by the stove, pretending to be busy.

“Yes?” Marshall said.

“What’s with that boy down there?” Bonbon said.

“What boy?” Marshall said.

“The one I take to Bayonne.”

“Did he say anything to you?”

“He say something to me, all right,” Bonbon said. “He’s innocent and don’t have to go back in that field.”

“He is innocent,” Marshall said. “I just got a call from Bayonne.”

“Innocent?” Bonbon said.

“Yes,” Marshall said. “Didn’t you go to the trial?”

“I got other things to do,” Bonbon said. “When they start deciding these things at trial?”

“I thought they always did,” Marshall said.

“Yes?” Bonbon said.

“Yes,” Marshall said. “But maybe I’ve been wrong all these years.”

Now they just looked at each other. Bonbon knew Marshall was lying. He knew Marshall had it fixed from the start. Marshall knew Bonbon knew this. Bonbon turned to leave, and Marshall stopped him again. Bonbon didn’t turn around this time, he looked over his shoulder at Marshall.

“I want you to take me somewhere this evening,” Marshall said. “To see that bull there of Jacques. Be here at six o’clock.”

Bonbon went out. Marshall went back up the hall. Bishop and Pauline stood in the kitchen looking at each other. Pauline said, “Innocent? Innocent? Did he say he was innocent?” Bishop didn’t answer her. Bishop didn’t like Pauline at all, but this was not the reason he didn’t answer her now. He didn’t answer her because he felt too weak to answer her. He felt too weak to be standing there, too. He should have been laying down with a cold towel on his forehead.

Pauline heard the tractor coming up the quarter and she
came out in the yard to meet me. She was at the crib when I drove up there. That was the first time since I had been on that plantation when I wasn’t glad to see Pauline. I parked the tractor in front of the crib and jumped down to see what she wanted.

“What’s going on, Jim,” she asked me.

“What’s the matter?” I said.

“Marcus innocent.”

“He is?” I said.

“You mean he don’t pay for killing that boy?” she asked.

“I guess not—if he’s innocent,” I said.

“What’s going on, Jim?” she said, looking straight at me. “What’s going on round here?”