Three Days Before the Shooting ... (117 page)

“‘Cap’n, suh,’ says Uncle Ned, ‘d’you ever see a couple of hongery hound dogs a-fightin’ over a bone?’

“‘Course Ah have,’ the white man said, ‘so what about it?’

“‘It ain’t you, Cap’n,’ said Uncle Ned, ‘it’s
me
. ‘Cause just this morning I seen a couple of ‘em fightin’ over one but for the life of me I
still
can’t figger just which side that damn
bone
was on.’ ”

Suddenly Wilhite paused and shook his head with a mournful expression.

“Come on, Deacon,” a brother said. “You can’t just leave Uncle Ned suspended in the air like that—what happened?”

“Now, brother,” Wilhite said, “you
know
what happened: That white man cursed a blue streak and charged Uncle Ned with being a no-good, nappy-headed, ignorant nigra. And before they dragged his cow away they told Uncle
Ned, ‘Nigger, this will teach you what to say the next time a white man asks you whose side you on!’ ”

“Poor Uncle Ned Wilhite,” Brother Roscoe said with a note of mock sadness. “He’d been thinking he was neutral, but now he was caught between a rock and a hard place, and in looking both ways he was forced to realize that neither side, North
or
South, was letting him get away as easy as that.”

“That’s right,” Wilhite said, “And Abe Lincoln wasn’t there to back him. So no matter what either side really thought about him, Uncle Ned was still a bone of contention.”

“Yeah,” Brother Roscoe said with a frown, “and even today they’re still gnawing on him—which means that we’re
all
Uncle Neds!”

But now, knowing the old story and hearing another voice take up the theme, Hickman ceased listening.

Looking back through the rear window he could see traffic creeping forward bumper to bumper. Up front the sisters were quietly talking, the young white girl reading a book, and from the look of his reflection in the rearview mirror the bus driver was cursing the traffic under his breath.

So now
, he thought,
the brothers are protecting themselves from the endless complexity of our situation by laughing at stones. But while Wilhite was discussing Abraham Lincoln as a creature of politics—which he truly was, thank God, and no doubt about it—I was speaking of the man who changed history by executing God’s will under disheartening conditions. Wilhite would like for him to have been a perfect hero and probably thinks of Robert E. Lee as a perfect villain—ay! But since perfection is reserved for God the Father, I’ll take the man who did the best he could for us and came out the winner
.

Nevertheless, seeing the memorial in the presence of old friends and companions in Christ had affected him in ways that he hadn’t foreseen. And now, back in his room at the Longview, he prepared to shower before dinner still brooding and troubled in mind.

But it wasn’t for myself that I led them there
, he thought,
and I certainly didn’t intend to preach them a sermon. But then the spirit of the place took over and I lost control. And it wasn’t as when you’re playing your horn and get grabbed by a riff that sends you flying—or when you’re in the pulpit working a familiar text and suddenly find yourself inspired by the Spirit and giving voice to a stream of eloquence that strikes fire in the hearts of your listeners. This was something else, and there was also that strange sense of insolation about it, as though I was struggling to purge myself of any conflict of ideas and emotions I held regarding the man’s story. And doing it not so much for the brothers and sisters as for my own relief. But they were on the receiving end, and the effect of my outburst is yet to be seen—unless what Wilhite was saying on the bus is an indication. If so, getting their spirits back to where they’ll be willing to face up to more disappointment is going to be a strain
.

Control, Hickman! Yes, and most of all
, self-control
! Because without it you try to make music and end up blowing wind! You try to lead the people by preaching the Word and you end up whooping and hollering and beating your gums. And then all you do is lead them into more trouble and disappointment! What kind of church did I think I was in—out there
blowing my heart out without a lick of supporting rhythm or a single heartfelt echo of “Amen” to affirm my rambling? So without it they just listened, they just cried…. Well, I was never one for preaching “Take the World, Just Give me Jesus”—oh, no! This is His, our Father’s world, and in our searching we have to find Him in it and through it. So maybe I made a mistake out there, but then again I’ll have to wait and see. Maybe I blew better than I thought, and if I didn ‘t, one thing is sure: I can depend on Wilhite to tell me…
.

Adjusting the shower, he allowed the water to flow over the back of his hand, testing the temperature before stepping into the tub. And now with water sprinkling down upon his head he grinned, thinking,
Hickman, you’ve already wasted enough water to baptize a whole church full of Methodists, where for a Baptist like you it’s only the beginning of a shower bath. So I guess folks like us are much more steeped in sin
.

Then, grinning at his moldy fig of a joke, he stood soaping himself beneath the swift drumming of the shower and gave himself over to the ritual of cleansing.

At first he hummed inaudibly, his mind flashing with faces and scenes from his earlier years: St. Louis Square in New Orleans in springtime, Ma Rainey and Georgia Tom Dorsey crossing a street with a royal air in Memphis; Jelly Roll Morton seated at the piano flashing a thin-lipped, diamond-toothed smile; the dim faces of audiences seen from behind the footlights of the old State Theater in Chicago; Piney Brown and George E. Lee standing on the corner of Eighteenth and Vine in Kansas City; Jimmy Rushing in his less heavy days dancing a forgotten step called Falling Off the Log with his amazing, floating, fat-man’s grace … John Bubbles of Buck & Bubbles singing “Make Me a Pallet on the Floor” to the pounding of Buck’s piano; and a sad, broken King Oliver leaning wearily across the green felt of a pool table racking balls for a couple of hustlers because too ill to earn a living with his once famous horn…. Then beneath the random rhythm of the water’s splash his mind flowed from half-formed thoughts to the mute lyrics of a song:

Well I was standing
On the corner
When I heard my bulldog bark
Stackalee and Billy were gambling—
Oh, yes!—In the dark
.

And suddenly aware of what was happening he paused, staring down at the soap-bubbling washcloth in his watery hands.

Hickman
, he thought,
you must be nigh exhausted to let something like that slip out of you! Oh, how the sins of a man will find him out! That’s one out of those wild, thoughtless, shimmy-she-wobbling times long gone…. Still, it was a good ole swinging tune. And amusing too, even though based on a terrible incident…. A ballad? No. More a blues-ballad or ballad-blues—but in those days who needed such fancy names? It sure wasn’t an anthem or a hymning tune—Hey, now, Mister Preacher! Oh, yes, I’m guilty! Even made up my own
version—added all those blams and slams. What was it called? Didn’t know then, but learned much later and still cant remember—something like “onomatopo” something or other. Japanese-sounding Greek word…. We invent it, then the college boys come along and give it a name. Anyway, had the drummer taking rim shots on his drum to a fare-thee-well—“rim shooting”? No, fool, “rim shots,” like I said—though probably then not in the dictionary. But the audience knew what was going on. Rim shots, as in the sound of pistols and sudden death; the agony of dying, farewell to life and death’s confusion, the bang that ends the clamoring world…. Yes, and the knock of conscience and the roar of John Law the Tax Collector backed by Uncle Sam, the Regulator…. How did I have it? Well, a-rooty-toot-toot, I heard Stackalee shoot! And the drummer going Blam-blam-blam! Blam-blam-blam! Folks doing sixty in shoe and boot (Blam-blam-blam!) They call for the Sheriff / and his Black Maria / (Blam-blam-blam!) Stackalee starts running for that Dixie-flyer! / (Blam-blam-blam!) Billy’s lying dead / Bleeding from his head / (Blam-blam-blam! Blam-blam-blam!) / After pleading for his life / for his chillen and wife / (Blam-blam-blam! Blam-blam-blam!) / Billy’s poor lil wife / she’s sick in bed / (Blam-blam-blam! Blam-blam-blam!)— that’s right, and by now the drummer’s hitting rim shots and kicking his drums like he’s imitating cannons and civil war. And one night out there in K.C. the customers joining in and starting to knock on the tables with everything from knives to water glasses and pitchers of illegal corn…. Did so much damage that the boss docked me three days’ pay—Blam-blam-BLAM! … Where was I? Oh, yes: When Billy’s little wife hears all that shooting (Blam-blam-blam!) she screams and she cries, It’s got to be (Blam!) murder / (Blam-blam!) / Or suicide! (Blam-blam-blam!) / Then up rolls the Sheriff / All puffed with pride / (Blam-blam-blam! Blam-blam-blam! / Then he sees all that blood / And believe you me / He’s so shook up / That he has to pee! / (Blam! Blam! Blam! A-blammity-blam-blam!) / Sheriff yells, Suicide, hell / Y’all can’t fool me / This here’s cold-blooded murder / In the first degree / (Blam! Blam! Blam!) / And it’s gonna cost that Stack his / Liberty! (Slam-blam-slam!) / Gonna throw his butt in jail / Throw away the key / (Slam-slam-bam A-bam-bam-BAM! / Keep his black butt jailed ‘til he’s as white / as me! / Slama-bam / A-bam-A-BAM!) Till black as he is he’s white as me-hee-hee! … Then the whole band yelling choruses of:

Oh, you better run, Stackalee!
Run, Stackalee
Run! Run! Run!
Stackalee, Stackalee!
Just listen to the running and the jumping of
To the hopping and a-skipping and the
Digging and the gripping of
That BAD
MAN
Stack-Ah-LEE!

Yes
, he thought,
and you let some of the brothers and sisters hear you singing that stuff and it’ll be Hickman who’s doing the running…. But this boy, why is
he
still running from us? He must realize by now that we mean him no harm, so how long does he think we’re going to keep being thrown out of places trying to see him before some newspaper reporter hears about it and gets the idea that there’s more to our trying to see him than meets the eye?… What a terrible thing is power! Especially when it lets you forget how other people—poor people, weak people—can react to bad treatment. To being ignored and forgotten with promises unkept, to mean acts and casual insults…. But Hickman, you’re forgetting that men of power don’t have to know about such matters. In place of knowing and the feeling that goes with it they have a heap of unknowing, unfeeling folks on the payroll to force an unknowing, unfeeling wall around them. That’s how it works. A high wall, like those around some of the

buildings in this town…. That young secretary, now, she’s a wall. Yes, and her being from

way down home in her attitudes—another wall. A private untouchable wall in a public place that’s been set up to make any black face a fool…. Thinks it’s hidden, but a wall just the … Run, Stackalee! … Lord, it’s so hard to tackle … and inside herself a stubborn wall…. Better turn on the cold, get braced for action—no, not yet. Relax. Cleanliness ain’t godliness, but it helps…. Ho, a wall around a wall within a wall of white-walled womanhood—that’s some kind of riddle, no? Holes for eyes a cotton sack and a gal now and a maiden then and a babe awash in the water, but no bulrushes there in Georgia! So where was Moses when the lights went out? But still the sparrow watches the watching of his watchers. Oh, he’s somewhere out there, somewhere behind the walls within walls though no wall willing nor withering…. No seams, no runners, just bold defiance, narrow-nosed with folded arms trying to stare us down. Looking straight at us with eyes like pistol barrels but with no hint of savvy or sympathy…. Oh, speak the truth…. Crying, Please don’t take my life…. Oh, I tried, I truly tried! Talked to her all that time, riffed about him and the shadow on the wall and kept back only what I couldn’t say. So maybe that’s why on the Mall I spoke the unspoken tongue but still split out with a busted lip and flubbed the notes…. Spoke to her earnestly, pleadingly and all but calling “O sinner come home,” but she never heard a word! Oh, watchful dove—But no, it ain’t gonna be like that! He stole the hat and the money, so she probably calls him honey…. Under the clock still deaf but not dumb with dumbness, eyes in the head but they see not. Just Caldonia-headed hard. Walled up in thick walls of attitude! It’s in the grain, under the bark—and that’s the bite! Yes, Lord! Words within walls within walled words and no word able to breach the wall…. And now the needles—cold! Brrr! God’s gonna trouble the water, Yes! But this I must still confirm:

Seek
Find
Knock
Open
Ask
And ye shall
Receive

Though no wall withering
Without resistance….
But somehow, Lord, somehow….

Soon, soon! But no wall can wall out or wall in the Word. For wherever the tree liveth the kernel sprouteth and leaves come forth to tremble in the winds of life, and now trembling is truly in order…. Yes, but Hickman, but do you realize that you have got the Word up against a wall? How so? Oh, boxed, boxed, boxed! But I didn’t do it, or did I? Hidden within boxes without topses, that’s our boy! Walled within a walnut wall and yet stirring, God willing, even though no one has yet heeded our cry…. Now that’s it … cold … cold, needling cold…
.

[CONTRAST]

A
FTER SUPPER HE SAT
in the quiet of the Longview’s lounge fingering a copy of
LIFE
while Wilhite returned to his room for a long-distance talk with his wife. And as he waited for news of developments back home he thought of Janey, and how their presence in Washington had begun with her letter.