If he hollers let him go

CHAPTER IV

I bumped into Red Williams in the companionway and he said he'd been looking all over for me.

'Will you get me a tacker, Bob?' he said. 'I'm tired of fooling with these people. I've had enough.'

He was a tall, rawboned, merriney-looking Negro with kinky reddish hair and brown freckles.

Me too, I wanted to tell him, but the fellows in my gang looked up to me; whenever they had trouble with the white workers they looked to me to straighten it out. So all I said was I'd see Hank.

Hank was the tacker leaderman, a heavy-set, blond Georgia boy about my age and a graduate of Georgia Tech. White mechanics could go to him and get any tacker they wanted, but he made the coloured mechanics wait until he could find a coloured tacker that was free. Most of the white tackers didn't like to work for coloured mechanics, and Hank wouldn't assign them to. He wasn't offensive about it, he'd just make the coloured mechanics wait, and if they got mad about it he gave them a line of his soft Southern jive. I found him on the quarter-deck talking to a couple of white women tackers in their welders' suits.

'How 'bout a tacker for a half hour or so?' I said.

He hadn't seen me coming toward him and when I spoke he jumped. Then he put on his special smile for coloured. 'Why, if it isn't the shot,' he said. 'Whataya say, big shot, long time no see. What's cooking?'

'All I want's a tacker,' I said. I knew it wasn't the way to go about it but I wasn't in the mood for jive.

'Say, fellow, you're getting fat-a regular capitalist.' He kept on as if he thought he was going to thaw me out. Then he turned to the two women. 'Here's a boy who's come out to California and made good in a big way; he's a leaderman in the sheet-metal department-one of Kelly's boys.'

I saw I couldn't rush him so I decided to dish out some too. 'You're doing fine yourself,' I said. 'The folks back in Georgia wouldn't know you.'

He kept his smile, but he began getting dirty. 'You said it, bo.' Then to the women, 'This boy's really a killer, got all the little brown gals in a dither about him.' To me again, 'How does you do it, bo?'

I got all set to curse him out; then right in the middle of it I realized that I was jumping the gun; he hadn't really said enough to start a rumpus about. I had to laugh. The three of them started to laugh with me. I said, 'Don't sell me too hard, buddy, you just might find a buyer.'

Hank caught it first; the creases stayed in his face but his smile went. The two women dug it from the change in his expression; neither blushed; they just got that sudden brutal look.

'You don't want a tacker, sho 'nuff?' Hank said, trying to get back his advantage.

But he had lost it. 'Sho 'nuff,' I drawled. 'An' ri' now.'

We looked at each other, measuring. His eyes were hard blue, hostile but not quite angry. I don't know how mine looked but I tried to make them as hard as his.

He decided to play it straight, where he always had the advantage. 'To tell you the truth, Bob, all of my tackers are busy, will be busy all day.'

I tried to get it back again. 'How about one of these ladies?' I'd started to say 'Southern' ladies, but decided not to press him that far.

'They're busy too,' he said. Now he got some of his smile back.

I started to turn away, saw a couple of tackers lounging over at the port rail by the generators, gabbing; turned back. 'How about one of them?' I nodded in their direction.

He glanced over at them, looked back at me. Now he had all of his smile back. 'They're busy too,' he said. 'You're just out of luck, Bob. Why don't you try Tommy?' Tommy was another cracker bastard.

I couldn't call him a liar; that's where he had me. I couldn't go down to Kelly and say, 'Hank said he ain't got any tackers'-even if I would have, which I wouldn't. He'd look at me as if I was nuts and say, 'Why, goddamn, why tell me?' I turned away, thinking. The white folks win again, trying to laugh it off. But it stuck in my craw. If I couldn't get the work done I'd have to take Kelly's riding; and in order to get it done I had to eat everybody else's. I had my usual once-a-day urge to tell them to take their leaderman job and shove it.

But half-way down the ladder I thought, What the hell, and turned around and went back to the tackers who were gabbing by the rail. I saw they were Southerners, but I asked anyway.

'Look, can I get one of you fellows to tack a couple of stays for me?'

They looked at each other. For a moment I thought neither one was going to answer, then one said, 'We's waitin' fuh Hank.'

'You're not working on a job, though, are you?'

'No, we's jes waitin'.'

I couldn't tell whether they were making fun of me or just talked like that. I decided to try again. 'If Hank says it's all right, can I get one of you then?'

They looked at each other again. The other one spoke this time. He said, 'Sho.'

All of a sudden I had to laugh. They knew that Hank wasn't going to assign them to me. 'Okay, boys,' I said. 'Get your rest.'

I walked off but I didn't know where I was going. I couldn't go down and tell Red that Hank wouldn't give me a tacker, either; they'd get down on me too. Then I thought of Don. I found him at the forward end supervising the installation of a cowl vent.

'Wanna do me a favour?' I said.

He turned that bright speculative stare on me. 'Shoot Kelly?' He didn't crack a smile, but I laughed once anyway to show him it was funny.

Then I said, 'Let me borrow one of your tackers for about a half-hour.'

He thought for a moment. 'There's a girl down aft-Madge. They're doing these things.' He kicked at the cowl. 'You can have her till dinner-time, anyway.'

'Fine,' I said, hurrying off. I noticed the white mechanics give him a dirty look, but I didn't think anything about it at the time.

She had her back to me and her hood up so it covered her hair, so I didn't recognize her right off. I was about twenty feet away, hurrying toward her, when one of the white mechanics looked up, and that caused her to turn. I saw that she was the big, peroxide blonde I'd run into on the third deck earlier; and I knew the instant I recognized her that she was going to perform then-we both would perform.

As soon as she saw me she went into her frightened act and began shrinking away. I started off giving her a sneer so she'd know I knew it was phoney. She knew it anyway; but she kept putting it on me. I didn't know how far she'd go and I got apprehensive. Before I got too close to her I began talking to her, like you do to a vicious dog to gentle it.

'Look, Madge, Don said you could work with me for a while.'

A wild excited look came into her eyes and her mouth went tight-lipped and brutal; she looked as if she was priming herself to scream. This bitch is crazy, I thought, but I walked on up to her and picked up her line as if nothing was happening. 'It's just a short job,' I said. 'I'll carry your line for you.'

She came out of her phoney act and jerked her line out of my hand, 'I ain't gonna work with no nigger!' she said in a harsh, flat voice.

I didn't even think about it. I just said it right out of my stomach. 'Screw you then, you cracker bitch!'

I stood there for a moment swapping looks with her. She didn't even bat her eyes; she just gave me a long hard brazen look and turned to the two mechanics squatting open-mouthed and said, 'You gonna let a nigger talk tuh me like that?'

One started up tentatively, a bar in his hand. 'Well now, by God-'

I gave them a glance. They were both elderly men, small, scrawny, nothing to worry about. I turned and walked away, went down to the head and told Red that I couldn't find him a tacker, he'd have to take the job over to the sheet-metal shop and get it welded.

'These white folks just refuse to work with us niggers this morning,' I laughed. I felt better now I'd cursed somebody out.

At eleven-thirty MacDougal, the department superintendent, sent for me. I walked across the yard to the sheet-metal shop where he had his office.

'Hello, Bob, the boss'll see you in a minute,' Marguerite said, looking up from her desk by the door. She was a small, compact, black-haired woman with sharp brown eyes and skin that was constantly greasy. She wasn't pretty but she wore expensive clothes. She looked thirty and she was hard as nails.

'How's it going, Marguerite?' I said, but she had turned away to answer the phone and didn't hear me.

I stood there for a time then Marguerite noticed me again and said, 'Sit down, Bob. Mr. MacDougal's busy now, he'll see you in a minute.'

I went over and sat in one of the chairs along the wall and looked at Mac. His desk was out from the wall across the room. He was talking to one of the white shop leadermen and didn't look at me. The shop super and two other shop leadermen came in and he talked to them in turn. Then he made a phone call. Another fellow came in and took the chair at the end of the desk with his back to me and Mac talked to him for a time; then he looked up at me and beckoned.

I went over to his desk. 'Hello, Mac,' I said.

He didn't like for the coloured fellows to call him Mac, but he wouldn't tell them outright; he'd tell Marguerite to tell them to address him as Mr. MacDougal. She had told me twice; she didn't tell me any more.

He was a fat man in shirt sleeves, weighing three hundred or more. He had a jolly red face and twinkling eyes and when he laughed he shook all over. Now he sat there overflowing in his huge desk chair, beaming at me.

'Hello, Bob, I'm glad you dropped in,' he said.

'You sent for me,' I said.

He quit beaming and his face got vicious. 'You cursed a woman worker this morning,' he charged.

I was suddenly conscious that everyone in the office had stopped to listen. 'She called me a nigger,' I said.

He carefully crossed his hands over his fat belly and leaned back in his chair. Then he began beaming again. 'You expect all kind of things when you work with people,' he began in a careful voice. 'But one of the first things people in authority gotta learn is they can't lose their temper. I can't lose my temper. My superior can't lose his temper. You didn't have no right to lose your temper about it either. Things happen every day that make me mad enough to curse somebody-but I don't do it. I couldn't keep the respect of my workers. Some of them would get mad and curse me back. I'd lose my discipline over them, I'd lose their respect, I wouldn't be able to keep my job. You can understand that, Bob, you're an intelligent boy.'

I didn't say anything.

'You know as well as I do that part of your job was to help me keep down trouble between the white and coloured workers,' he went on. 'That was one of the reasons I put you on that job. I figured you'd have sense enough to get along with the people you had to work with instead of running around with a chip on your shoulder like most coloured boys.'

I let him talk.

'You know I put you on that job against Mr. Kelly's wishes. Kelly-Mr. Kelly said I wasn't doing nothing but borrowing trouble but I told him you were the most intelligent coloured boy I knew and you'd be able to help us.' He took an aggrieved attitude. 'I'm surprised at you, Bob. I figured you were too intelligent to lose your head about something like that. I figured you had better manners, more respect for women than that. You know how Southern people talk, how they feel about working with you coloured boys. They have to get used to it, you gotta give them time. What makes me so mad with you is, goddamnit, you know this. I don't have to tell you what could have happened by your cursing a white woman, you know as well as I do.' He paused and jerked his head back. 'Don't you?' He pressed.

'Sure, I know,' I said.

His face got a swollen look and his eyes filled up. 'I'm not going to have you or any other coloured boy in this department who can't maintain a courteous and respectful manner toward the white men and women you have to work with,' he said. His voice shook with anger. He unhooked his hands and shook his fist at me. 'I'm not going to have it, goddamnit, that's all!'

'I'm not going to have nobody call me a nigger either," I said. I wasn't angry; I was just telling him.

He was through with it. 'You stay on through Saturday. Monday you start in as a mechanic.' He jerked his head toward the fellow sitting at the end of the desk. 'This is Dan Tebbel. Danny's going to work with you this week and beginning Monday he takes your place.'

I'd known Mac was going to give me hell; but I didn't think he'd downgrade me and put a white boy in my place. I thought he'd be afraid of the coloured workers making trouble. It shocked me to find out he didn't give a goddamn about the coloured workers, one way or the other. I looked at Tebbel sort of vacantly. He was a thin, undernourished man with a beaked nose, pale blue eyes, and reddish hair.

But I didn't really begin to feel it until Mac said, 'You'll lose your job deferment too. You're a single boy and they'll put you in 1A.'

All of a sudden I got that crazy, scared feeling I'd waked up with that morning. It had happened in a second; my job was gone and I was facing the draft; like the Japanese getting pulled up by the roots. But I couldn't find a thing to say in my defence. I had to say something, so I said, 'What's Tebbel going to do? My gang's a Jim Crow gang. Maybe they won't work for Tebbel.'

Mac reddened. 'That's all, Bob,' he said, dismissing me.

'What about Ben for my job?' I kept on; I couldn't let it go like that. 'He's a college graduate-U.C.L.A. Just as smart as — '

The phone rang. Mac picked it up. He wasn't listening to me. I stood there for a moment, listening to him talk over the phone, not knowing what to do. When I should have challenged him was when he said, 'Monday you start in as a mechanic.' But I had let it pass. Now with the bastard not even listening it was too late to quit. I turned and walked off.

Outside, I stood for a time, feeling cheated, trapped. I couldn't decide whether I'd been a coward or a fool. I debated whether to go back and split him. I'd get a fine and some days, perhaps. Probably a sapping at police headquarters. I'd lose my car. I think that was what made me decide that my pride wasn't worth it. My car was proof of something to me, a symbol. But at the time I didn't analyse the feeling; I just knew I couldn't lose my car even if I lost my job.

The whistle blew for lunch but I couldn't eat. The taste of bile was in my mouth, tart, brackish, bitter as gall. I wanted something to do with my hands, action. I began looking for a crap game. Finally I found one over between the plate racks. A dozen or so white fellows and two coloured were ringed on the concrete. There was money in the centre and two big green white-eyed dice were rolling.

I took out six ones and a ten and two of the white fellows made room for me. A big, seamed-faced, bald-headed welder with gnarled hands was shooting eight bucks. I tossed in a ten to fade him and a thin, sallow-faced man gave me a cursing look.

'He done hit me twice,' he snarled in an Okie voice. 'Think I'm gonna let you have him now?'

I took down my ten. He took his time, counted out eight ones, tossed them in the pot. He kept grumbling under his breath. 'Comin' in here tryna bull de game.' He gave me another hard, hostile look. 'One of these slick guys, think you gonna grab the gravy. Goddamn smart-' He was working himself up to call me a nigger and I figured I'd better stop him.

'If you say another word I'll knock your eyes out,' I grated in a low voice.

He popped to his feet like a jumping jack, a stooped, undernourished, middle-aged man with the damnedest expression of baffled indignation on his face. I didn't even look up at him. He puffed and he blew. The shooter had come out on a five and he kept working at it until he made it-four, one.

'Shoot it all,' the welder said.

I looked up at my Okie friend. He had turned beet-red. 'He's all yours,' I said.

He muttered some words in his mouth, dribbling saliva. I began feeling better.

'Take down some,' somebody said to the shooter. 'You're holding up the game.'

'I got it,' I said, and tossed my sixteen bucks in the centre.

The shooter nursed the dice, blew on them, said, 'Now do your stuff, babies. Come out on seven.' He cocked his arm, turned them loose. They stopped trey. one.

'Liddle Joe from Kokomo,' one of the coloured fellows murmured, looking at me.

The big bald-headed welder picked them up and rubbed them on his leather pants leg. I looked at him.

'Come on,' a Texas drawl said impatiently. 'You're holding up the game.'

The shooter was getting ready to unlock 'em but now he rubbed them up some more. He gave the speaker a defiant look. Then he threw a beautiful seven.

'A lick too late,' I crowed. I picked up my thirty-two bucks, feeling good for the first time that day.

Then a little waspish, rat-mouthed cracker snatched the dice and tossed six bits in the centre. 'I shoot a nigger lick,' he said.

I didn't move. I squatted there with my eyes on the ground and couldn't look up. When I looked up it was toward one of the coloured fellows. He was looking down too, unmoving; and when he looked up it was toward me. A ripple went through the ring for just an instant; nobody moved. Then the third coloured fellow tossed six bits in the centre and the game went on. I caught several white fellows giving me furtive looks; but I kept looking at the shooter.

When the dice got to me I blew the air out of my lungs, got another lungful, and said, 'I'm gonna shoot my hand.' I tossed the bills in the centre.

'How much is it?' somebody asked.

The little rat-mouthed cracker started to count it. I leaned forward and pushed his hand away. 'It's thirty-two bucks,' I said.

He gave me a hard look and said, 'I got six bits of it.'

I squatted back and waited. I knew they wanted to tell me to take some down and let the game go on. If I'd been white they'd have cursed me. But because I was coloured they didn't say anything; they kept it bottled up and began getting mean.

Finally one of the coloured fellows said, 'Let's gang him.'

Every player in the game took a piece, each pulling his bet in front of him. I picked up the dice with my right hand, passed them to my left, rolled them softly on the concrete. One came to a stop six up; the other dropped in a deep crevice and cocked with the five facing me, the six facing away.

'Throw in, good losers,' I said. 'I ain't going no farther.'

'Throw in what for?' the rat-mouthed fellow challenged.

'Cocked dice,' somebody said.

I began to choking up. 'Listen, I ain't giving away a goddamned thing. I made my goddamned eleven and now I'm gonna take my goddamned money.'

'You'll take hell, you nigger bastard,' the rat-mouthed guy said, feeling covered by the other twelve white guys.

Blood rushed to my head, stung me blind. I jack-knifed up and kicked at him with one motion. He rolled to one side and my boot heel went over his shoulder, throwing me off balance. I wheeled to my left, falling half forward, my right arm stuck out to catch my fall and my right foot flattened in a pigeon-toed stance.

'I'll cool the nigger!' I heard a voice grate, and I raised my chin, looking for the guy.

I just had time to see him: a tall young blond guy about my age and size. His mouth was twisted down in one corner so that the tips of his dogteeth showed like a gopher's mouth and his blue eyes were blistered with hate. I'll never forget that bastard's eyes. Then that sick, gone feeling came in the pit of my stomach-just a flash. And a blinding explosion went off just back of my eyes as if the nerve centres had been dynamited. I had the crazy sensation of my eyes popping out of my head and catching a telescopic photo of ringed figures, some half up, others squatting in a circle. Then I didn't know a thing.

When I came to the whistle was blowing. I lay flat on my back in the shade of a rack of plates. Two white fellows and a coloured fellow were bent over me, waiting for me to come to. When I opened my eyes they helped me to get to thy feet.

One of the white fellows gave me a sympathetic grin. 'You stuck your chin right straight into his fist.'

The other one said, 'I got some of your money for you- twenty-five dollars and some change.' He stuck it in my hand.

The coloured fellow's eyes were muddy, opaque. His flat brown face was unsmiling. He didn't say anything.

I was still dazed. I braced myself against the plates, shook my head to clear it.

One of the white fellows said, 'Take it easy, son.' They both waited a moment longer and when I didn't say anything they moved off together, grinning. They were elderly, kindly men. I wasn't angry at them; I just hadn't given them a thought. I leaned there for a while, half in the noonday sun, feeling a little faint. I put my hand up tentatively and stroked my chin. When I looked up I saw a couple of other white fellows who had been in the game standing at a distance, watching me.

Then I remembered the blond boy's eyes. I recalled his words, 'I'll cool the nigger!' I felt that sick, gone feeling again. I began trembling; I felt weak, scared. I knew I couldn't take it; but I was scared of what I might do. Scared of what might happen to me afterward. If I could just stop thinking; every time I thought of trouble I thought of death. Then I looked at the coloured fellow again. His face was impassive.

'You see which way he went?' I asked.

He studied me for a moment. 'Ah know whar he work,' he said. His expression didn't change.

I licked my lips, tried to keep the sick, scared feeling out of my eyes. 'Where?' I asked.

He stood there looking at me as if time meant nothing. A curious animal change came over his face. I noticed him take his hand out of his pocket. It struck me funny. But now we seemed closer, as if we'd struck an understanding or come to an agreement about something.

'He in de copper shop,' he said. 'He work on a 'chine down in de back end. You doan need tuh go through de shop, you ken cum in de back do'.'

I started off. My first step was wobbly, more from the sick, gone feeling in my stomach then from any effects of the blow. The coloured fellow stepped in beside me; his eyes slid from side to side.

'You got a chiv?' he asked.

I knew I didn't have one but I fanned myself. 'Musta left it in my box,' I said.

He looked around again, then slipped me his. I didn't look at it, but by its feel it must have been eight inches long. I slipped it in my pocket.

'Ah'da cut de bastard's throat mahself,' he said. 'But Ah thought you'd wanna do it yuhself.'

He split off and I kept on toward the copper shop. My hand rested on the knife in my pocket. I began thinking of how I ought to cut him. Whether I ought to slip up and begin stabbing him in the back, trying to get his heart; or wheel him about to face me and begin slashing him across the face, cutting out his eyes and slashing up his mouth. Maybe he'd be on the lookout for me, I thought, and would have a knife himself. Then we'd dodge about and keep cutting at each other until one dropped.

Bile rolled up in my stomach and spread out in my mouth. I started retching and caught myself. The sun beat down on my bared head like showers of rain. My skin was tight and burning hot, but it wouldn't sweat. Only in the palm of my hand holding the knife did I sweat. I had lost my hat; I didn't know where.

I could see the blond boy's bloody body lying half across his machine, blood all over the floor, all over the shapes; blood on my hands; his face all cut to pieces, one eye hanging out and wrinkled like an empty grape skin. I came to the copper shop, kept on around to the back. For a moment at the back door I stopped and steadied myself. I took the knife out and opened it and got it in a stabbing grip. Then I saw a piece of wood on the ground. I picked it up and held it in my left hand, the knife in my right.

I stepped through the door and stopped. The blond boy looked up at that instant and our gazes locked. He stuck his right hand out slowly and gripped a ball-peen hammer on his work-bench.

It was then I decided to murder him cold-bloodedly, without giving him a chance. What the hell was the matter with me, running in there to fight him? I thought. What the hell did I want to fight him for? I wanted to kill the son of a bitch and keep on living myself. I wanted to kill him so he'd know I was killing him and in such a way that he'd know he didn't have a chance. I wanted him to feel as scared and powerless and unprotected as I felt every goddamned morning I woke up. I wanted him to know how it felt to die without a chance; how it felt to look death in the face and know it was coming and know there wasn't anything he could do but sit there and take it like I had to take it from Kelly and Hank and Mac and the cracker bitch because nobody was going to help him or stop it or do anything about it at all.

The sick, scared, gone feeling left my stomach. I kept looking at him, thinking. There's one goddamned thing, you can't take your colour with you, until I felt only a cold disdain. I turned around and went out.