The Children (18 page)

T
HE WORLD GOES ON, AROUND, THE RIVER FLOWS AND THE
sun shines. If Blackbelly is dead, Ishky is alive, and others are alive, too. They must go on.

My story is almost over—almost, but not quite. Blackbelly died, hanging from the tree; and from him came death, the strange master. Death comes like night comes, and if you understand, neither are terrible.

But I was afraid—God, how filled with fear I was! Blackbelly's legs, kicking and kicking. It made a picture for me, fastening itself over my eyes. I turned around, plunged down the bluff.

Now, what difference does it make if I plunge to my death? Death, the strange master, has taken me. Blackbelly is dying back there—

I go all the way down the bluff, as quickly as I can, and then I run frantically toward the river. My heart pounds, and all the time I am looking behind me. Somewhere up there, Blackbelly is dead—swinging. Like a branch in the breeze.

The river stops me. What now? I stand upon the edge, swaying, looking down. Sewage and dirt—but water to take me in, and payment there to the strange master.

Do you see? I
killed Blackbelly!

All over me, inside of me, the words are written. I killed him, right from the beginning, with my heart full of hate. The gang was mine—not Ollie's. I had thought of it; I led Ollie on—

(Turn around, Ishky, and look at the bluff, where Blackbelly swings. Blood is all over you.)

I begin to scream, hard frantic screams that come from far down in my belly, and I throw myself on the wet, brown earth, burying my face in it. Then I roll over, and I see that a man is watching me. What does he think? Does he know? Does he know? But, of course, he knows—

(You killed him.)

“What'll he say—what'll he say?”

I spring to my feet, and run from him. I must run forever, from everyone; and now I keep looking back at the man. No, he isn't following me. But he knows; he knows. They all know. Sooner or later—

I have to walk, I am so tired; I can run no longer. So I walk, and I find that I am saying to myself, “You don't hate him, you don't hate him, you don't hate him.”

That is so. In death, hate is gone.

All things have gone now, all my dreams. But the sun still shines; the wind still blows.…

“Where duh hell duh yuh tink yer goin'?” the cop says.

(Not to me. Traffic is passing. I stand and look at him, and then I begin to run.)

Run, run—run, run—

(All the music of Shomake's fiddle. I destroyed the fiddle. I destroyed Blackbelly. Death, the strange master, and I have become one—one and together.)

Run, run—run, run—

(That will never stop. Time passes, but time means nothing to me anymore. I must keep on, and on—or they will find me. And when they find me, they will hang me by the neck until I am dead. I will have to tell them.)

“
I killed Blackbelly!
”

“Yer lost, sonny?”

“I
killed Blackbelly!
”

“Run along now, sonny.”

(That's my torture, standing large and terrible in his dark uniform. Will he follow me? I run again, looking behind me. God help me, what will I do when I can run no longer, when my feet break beneath me?)

Run, run—run, run—

(Shomake is playing his fiddle. What did he ever do to me, that I should take his fiddle from him? I am sorry. I am sorry. Shomake, I swear to God that I am sorry.)

The king sits in the jungle, broad and black,

And under jungle trails I pass, seeking,

Where are you, Blackbelly, noble king?

Three of us then, me and the master death,

And Blackbelly. I killed Blackbelly, Laughing and laughing and laughing—

(I stop, panting, crying, laughing. Good God, I have to rest. I can't run forever.)

No, run, run—run, run—

Send the drums from the jungle, men are children.

There. Blackbelly is king of all the jungle land.

Beat the drums—play the children's game,

While death, the strange master, comes.

(Where am I? The sun is setting, and all the streets are in shadow, streets I have never seen before. How did I get here?)

Run, run, run—Ishky.

(No, I can't run anymore. But I will be caught out here in the dark—with Blackbelly. Go on!)

Only tell me why, Ishky? Why, Ishky? Tell me why?…

I begin to walk home. What a long way I have come—afraid, always afraid! It's no use, because I know what the end will be, when they have me and Ollie and Kipleg—all of us.

I go on walking. The sun is setting, throwing light on the clouds. But there is no promise for me. Only terror—

(Try to think of the magic garden, of Marie, of all the beautiful things—)

No, all gone now.…

Why is my mother so glad to see me? Does she know? Does everybody know?

“Eat,” she says, “eat, my heart of all hearts. How worried I was! Where were you this lunchtime?”

“Playin'.”

“Yes, yes, and fighting—and eating out your mother's heart. Why are you trembling so?”

“Runnin'.”

Then she tells me about Thomas Edison, and I know why. Oh, I know well enough. The strange master and I. I can't eat any more. I push the food away.

“You are sick, my child?” she asks in her Yiddish.

“Naw. I don' wanna eat.”

I hide in the bedroom, but it all follows me in there. Thomas Edison is dead; Blackbelly is dead. And I did it. I have done it all.

I creep out into the hall, and fear follows me. The strange master is with me. He will always be with me. Slowly, I go down the stairs to the street, praying all the time. If God is good, he will understand.

There is a small, wan figure sitting on my stoop. I sit down next to him. In the deepening darkness, we sit there, together. Our hands creep out, find each other.

“Shomake,” I say, “I took duh fiddle.”

“Yeah—I know.”

“It's all smashed.”

“Yeah.”

“Yuh ain' saw?”

“Naw—”

Night comes, and a strange peace. The block is still. Does the strange master go with night?

“Shomake?”

“Yeah?”

We look at each other. Our world is gone, but we have found something. We both sigh. Shomake moves closer to me. Across the street, Kipleg is coming home. Very slowly, we begin to grin.…

BIOGRAPHY

Howard Fast (1914-2003), one of the most prolific American writers of the twentieth century, was a bestselling author of more than eighty works of fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and screenplays. Fast's commitment to championing social justice in his writing was rivaled only by his deftness as a storyteller and his lively cinematic style.

Born on November 11, 1914, in New York City, Fast was the son of two immigrants. His mother, Ida, came from a Jewish family in Britain, while his father, Barney, emigrated from the Ukraine, changing his last name to Fast on arrival at Ellis Island. Fast's mother passed away when he was only eight, and when his father lost steady work in the garment industry, Fast began to take odd jobs to help support the family. One such job was at the New York Public Library, where Fast, surrounded by books, was able to read widely. Among the books that made a mark on him was Jack London's
The Iron Heel
, containing prescient warnings against fascism that set his course both as a writer and as an advocate for human rights.

Fast began his writing career early, leaving high school to finish his first novel,
Two Valleys
(1933). His next novels, including
Conceived in Liberty
(1939) and
Citizen Tom Paine
(1943), explored the American Revolution and the progressive values that Fast saw as essential to the American experiment. In 1943 Fast joined the American Communist Party, an alliance that came to define—and often encumber—much of his career. His novels during this period advocated freedom against tyranny, bigotry, and oppression by exploring essential moments in American history, as in
The American
(1946). During this time Fast also started a family of his own. He married Bette Cohen in 1937 and the couple had two children.

Congressional action against the Communist Party began in 1948, and in 1950, Fast, an outspoken opponent of McCarthyism, was called before the House Un-American Activities Committee. Because he refused to provide the names of other members of the Joint Anti-Fascist Refugee Committee, Fast was issued a three-month prison sentence for contempt of Congress. While in prison, he was inspired to write
Spartacus
(1951), his iconic retelling of a slave revolt during the Roman Empire, and did much of his research for the book during his incarceration. Fast's appearance before Congress also earned him a blacklisting by all major publishers, so he started his own press, Blue Heron, in order to release Spartacus. Other novels published by Blue Heron, including
Silas Timberman
(1954), directly addressed the persecution of Communists and others during the ongoing Red Scare. Fast continued to associate with the Communist Party until the horrors of Stalin's purges of dissidents and political enemies came to light in the mid-1950s. He left the Party in 1956.

Fast's career changed course in 1960, when he began publishing suspense-mysteries under the pseudonym E. V. Cunningham. He published nineteen books as Cunningham, including the seven-book Masao Masuto mystery series. Also, Spartacus was made into a major film in 1960, breaking the Hollywood blacklist once and for all. The success of
Spartacus
inspired large publishers to pay renewed attention to Fast's books, and in 1961 he published
April Morning
, a novel about the battle of Lexington and Concord during the American Revolution. The book became a national bestseller and remains a staple of many literature classes. From 1960 onward Fast produced books at an astonishing pace—almost one book per year—while also contributing to screen adaptations of many of his books. His later works included the autobiography
Being Red
(1990) and the
New York Times
bestseller
The Immigrants
(1977).

Fast died in 2003 at his home in Greenwich, Connecticut.

Fast on a farm in upstate New York during the summer of 1917. Growing up, Fast often spent the summers in the Catskill Mountains with his aunt and uncle from Hunter, New York. These vacations provided a much-needed escape from the poverty and squalor of the Lower East Side's Jewish ghetto, as well as the bigotry his family encountered after they eventually relocated to an Irish and Italian neighborhood in upper Manhattan. However, the beauty and tranquility Fast encountered upstate were often marred by the hostility shown toward him by his aunt and uncle. "They treated us the way Oliver Twist was treated in the orphanage," Fast later recalled. Nevertheless, he "fell in love with the area" and continued to go there until he was in his twenties.

Fast (left) with his older brother, Jerome, in 1935. In his memoir
Being Red
, Fast wrote that he and his brother "had no childhood." As a result of their mother's death in 1923 and their father's absenteeism, both boys had to fend for themselves early on. At age eleven, alongside his thirteen-year-old brother, Fast began selling copies of a local newspaper called the
Bronx Home News
. Other odd jobs would follow to make ends meet in violent, Depression-era New York City. Although he resented the hardscrabble nature of his upbringing, Fast acknowledged that the experience helped form a lifelong attachment to his brother. "My brother was like a rock," he wrote, "and without him I surely would have perished."