Edge of Eternity (52 page)

‘I’ve seen his name in the papers.’

‘The nickname tells you all you need to know about him. As if that were not enough, Birmingham also has the most violent chapter of the Ku Klux Klan.’

‘Any idea why?’

‘This is a steel town, and the industry is in decline. Skilled, high-wage jobs have always been reserved for white men, while blacks do low-paid work such as cleaning. Now the whites are desperately trying to maintain their prosperity and privileges – just at the moment when blacks are asking for their fair share.’

It was a crisp analysis, and George’s respect for Verena went up a notch. ‘How does that show itself ?’

‘Klan members throw home-made bombs at the homes of prosperous Negroes in mixed neighbourhoods. Some people call this town Bombingham. Needless to say, the police never arrest anyone for the bombings, and the FBI somehow just can’t seem to figure out who might be doing it.’

‘No surprise there. J. Edgar Hoover can’t find the Mafia, either. But he knows the name of every Communist in America.’

‘However, white rule is weakening here. Some people are beginning to realize it does the town no good. Bull Connor just lost an election for mayor.’

‘I know. The White House view is that Birmingham’s Negroes will get what they want in due course, if they’re patient.’

‘Dr King’s view is that now is the time to pile on the pressure.’

‘And how is that working out?’

‘To be frank, we’re disappointed. When we sit in at a lunch counter, the waitresses turn out the lights and say sorry, they’re closing.’

‘A clever move. Some towns did something similar to the Freedom Riders. Instead of making a fuss, they just ignored what was happening. But that level of restraint is too much for most segregationists, and they soon reverted to beating people up.’

‘Bull Connor won’t give us a permit to demonstrate, so our marches are illegal, and the protestors are usually jailed; but they’re too few to make the national news.’

‘So maybe it’s time for another change of tactics.’

A young black woman came into the café and approached their table. ‘The Reverend Dr King is free to see you now, Mr Jakes.’

George and Verena left their lunches half-eaten. As with the President, you did not ask Dr King to wait while you finished what you were doing.

They returned to the Gaston and went upstairs to King’s suite. As always, he was dressed in a dark business suit: the heat seemed to make little difference to him. George was struck again by how small he was, and how handsome. This time King was less wary, more welcoming. ‘Sit down, please,’ he said, waving to a couch. His voice was mild, even when his words were barbed: ‘What has the Attorney General got to tell me that he can’t say over the phone?’

‘He wants you to consider delaying your campaign here in Alabama.’

‘Somehow I’m not surprised.’

‘He supports what you’re trying to achieve, but he feels the protest may be ill-timed.’

‘Tell me why.’

‘Bull Connor has just lost the election for mayor to Albert Boutwell. There’s a new city government. Boutwell is a reformer.’

‘Some people feel Boutwell is just a more dignified version of Bull Connor.’

‘Reverend, that may be so; but Bobby would like you to give Boutwell the chance to prove himself – one way or the other.’

‘I see. So that message is: Wait.’

‘Yes, sir.’

King looked at Verena, as if inviting her to comment, but she said nothing.

After a moment King said: ‘Last September, Birmingham businessmen promised to remove humiliating “Whites Only” signs from their stores and, in return, Fred Shuttlesworth agreed to a moratorium on demonstrations. We kept our promise, but the businessmen broke theirs. As has happened so many times, our hopes were blasted.’

‘I’m sorry to hear that,’ said George. ‘But—’

King ignored the interruption. ‘Non-violent direct action seeks to create so much tension, and sense of crisis, that a community is forced to confront the issue and open the door to sincere negotiation. You ask me to give Boutwell time to show his true colours. Boutwell may be less of a brute than Connor, but he is a segregationist, dedicated to keeping the status quo. He needs to be prodded to act.’

This was so reasonable that George could not even pretend to disagree, though the likelihood of his changing King’s mind seemed to be fading rapidly.

‘We have never made a gain, in civil rights, without pressure,’ King went on. ‘Frankly, George, I have yet to engage in a campaign that was “well-timed” in the eyes of men such as Bobby Kennedy. For years now I have heard the word: “Wait”. It rings in my ears with piercing familiarity. This “Wait” always means “Never”. We have waited three hundred and forty years for our rights. African nations are moving with jet-like speed towards independence, but we still creep at horse-and-buggy pace toward gaining a cup of coffee at a lunch counter.’

George realized now that he was hearing a sermon being rehearsed, but he was no less mesmerized. He had abandoned all hope of fulfilling his mission for Bobby.

‘Our great stumbling block, in our stride toward freedom, is not the White Citizens’ Councilor or the Ku Klux Klanner. It’s the white moderate who is more devoted to order than to justice; who constantly says, like Bobby Kennedy: “I agree with the goal you seek, but I cannot condone your methods.” He paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man’s freedom.’

Now George felt ashamed, for he was Bobby’s messenger.

‘We will have to repent, in this generation, not merely for the hateful words and actions of bad people, but for the appalling silence of the good,’ King said, and George had to struggle against tears. ‘The time is always ripe to do right. “Let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream,” said the prophet Amos. You tell Bobby Kennedy that, George.’

‘Yes, sir, I will,’ said George.

*  *  *

When George got back to Washington he called Cindy Bell, the girl his mother had tried to fix him up with, and asked her for a date. She said: ‘Why not?’

It would be his first date since he had dumped Norine Latimer in the doomed hope of romancing Maria Summers.

He took a taxi to Cindy’s place the following Saturday evening. She was still living at her parents’ home, a small working-class house. Her father opened the door. He had a bushy beard: George guessed a chef did not need to look neat. ‘I’m glad to meet you, George,’ he said. ‘Your mother is one of the finest people I’ve ever known. I hope you don’t mind me saying something so personal.’

‘Thank you, Mr Bell,’ said George. ‘I agree with you.’

‘Come in, Cindy’s almost ready.’

George noticed a small crucifix on the wall in the hallway, and remembered that the Bells were Catholic. He recalled being told, as a teenager, that convent schoolgirls were the hottest.

Cindy appeared in a tight sweater and a short skirt that made her father frown a little, though he said nothing. George had to smother a smile. She was curvy and did not want to hide it. A small silver cross on a chain hung between her generous breasts – for protection, perhaps?

George handed her a small box of chocolates tied up with a blue ribbon.

Outside, she raised her eyebrows at the taxi.

‘I’m going to buy a car,’ George said. ‘I just haven’t had time.’

As they drove downtown, Cindy said: ‘My father admires your mother for raising you on her own, and making such a good job of it.’

‘And they lend each other books,’ said George. ‘Is your mom okay with all that?’

Cindy giggled. The idea of sexual jealousy in the parental generation was naturally comical. ‘You’re sharp. Mom knows nothing else is going on – but, all the same, she’s on her guard.’

George felt glad he had asked her out. She was intelligent and warm, and he was beginning to think how pleasant it would be to kiss her. The thought of Maria became dim in his mind.

They went to an Italian restaurant. Cindy confessed that she loved all kinds of pasta. They had tagliatelle with mushrooms followed by veal escalopes in a sherry sauce.

She had a degree from Georgetown University, but she told him she was working as a secretary for a black insurance broker. ‘Girls get hired as secretaries, even after college,’ she said. ‘I’d like to do government work. I know people think it’s dull, but Washington runs this whole country. Unfortunately, the government hires mostly white people for the important jobs.’

‘That’s true.’

‘How did you break in?’

‘Bobby Kennedy wanted a black face on his team, to make him look sincere about civil rights.’

‘So you’re a symbol.’

‘I was, at the start. It’s better now.’

After dinner they went to see Tippi Hedren and Rod Taylor in Alfred Hitchcock’s latest film,
The Birds
. During the scary scenes, Cindy clung to George in a way he found delightful.

On the way out, they disagreed amiably about the ending of the movie. Cindy hated it. ‘I was so disappointed!’ she said. ‘I was looking forward to the explanation.’

George shrugged. ‘Not everything in life has an explanation.’

‘Yes, it does, but sometimes we just don’t know it.’

They went to the bar of the Fairfax Hotel for a nightcap. He ordered Scotch and she had a daiquiri. Her silver cross caught his eye. ‘Is that just jewellery, or something more?’ he said.

‘Something more,’ she replied. ‘It makes me feel safe.’

‘Safe from . . . anything in particular?’

‘No. It just guards me, generally.’

George was sceptical. ‘You don’t believe that.’

‘Why not?’

‘Uh . . . I don’t want to offend you, if you’re sincere, but it seems superstitious to me.’

‘I thought you were religious. You go to church, don’t you?’

‘I go with my mother because it’s important to her, and I love her. To make her happy, I’ll sing hymns and listen to prayers and hear a sermon, all of which seem to me to be just . . . mumbo-jumbo.’

‘Don’t you believe in God?’

‘I think there’s probably a controlling intelligence in the universe, a being that decided the rules, such as E = mc
²
, and the value of pi. But that being isn’t likely to care whether we sing its praise or not, I doubt whether its decisions can be manipulated by praying to a statue of the Virgin Mary, and I don’t believe it will organize special treatment for you on account of what you have around your neck.’

‘Oh.’

He saw that he had shocked her. He realized he had been arguing as if he was at a White House meeting, where the issues were too important for anyone to care about other people’s feelings. ‘I probably shouldn’t be so direct,’ he said. ‘Are you offended?’

‘No,’ she said. ‘I’m glad you told me.’ She finished her drink.

George put some money down on the bar and slid off his stool. ‘I’ve enjoyed talking to you,’ he said.

‘Nice movie, disappointing ending,’ she said.

That summed up the evening. She was likeable and attractive, but he could not see himself falling for a woman whose beliefs about the universe were so much at odds with his own.

They went outside and got a cab.

On the ride back, George realized that in his heart of hearts he was not sorry the date had not worked out. He still had not fully got over Maria. He wondered how much longer it was going to take.

When they reached Cindy’s house she said: ‘Thank you for a lovely evening.’ She kissed his cheek and got out of the car.

Next day Bobby sent George back to Alabama.

*  *  *

George and Verena stood in Kelly Ingram Park, in the heart of black Birmingham, at twelve noon on Friday, 3 May 1963. Across the road was the famous Sixteenth Street Baptist Church, a magnificent red-brick Byzantine building designed by a black architect. The park was crowded with civil rights campaigners, bystanders, and anxious parents.

They could hear singing from inside the church: ‘Ain’t Gonna Let Nobody Turn Me Round’. A thousand black high school students were getting ready to march.

To the east of the park, the avenues leading downtown were blocked by hundreds of police. Bull Connor had commandeered school buses to take the marchers to jail, and he had attack dogs in case anyone refused to go. The police were backed up by firemen with hoses.

There were no coloured men in the police force or the fire brigade.

The civil rights campaigners always applied, in the correct way, for permission to march. Every time, they were refused. When they marched nevertheless, they were arrested and sent to jail.

In consequence, most of Birmingham’s Negroes were reluctant to join the demonstrations – permitting the all-white city government to claim that Martin Luther King’s movement had little support.

King himself had gone to jail here exactly three weeks ago, on Good Friday. George had marvelled at how crass the segregationists were: did they not know who else had been arrested on Good Friday? King had been put in solitary confinement, for no reason other than sheer malice.

But King’s jailing had hardly made the papers. A Negro being mistreated for demanding his rights as an American was not news. King had been criticized by white clergymen in a letter that got big publicity. From the jail he had written a reply that smouldered with righteousness. No newspapers had printed it, though perhaps they yet would. Overall, the campaign had got little publicity.

Birmingham’s black teenagers clamoured to join the demonstrations, and at last King agreed to permit schoolchildren to march, but nothing changed: Bull Connor just jailed the children, and no one cared.

The sound of the hymns from inside the church was thrilling, but that was not enough. Martin Luther King’s campaign in Birmingham was going nowhere, just like George’s love life.

George was studying the firemen on the streets to the east of the park. They had a new type of weapon. The device appeared to take water from two inlet hoses and force it out through a single nozzle. Presumably that gave the jet supercharged force. It was mounted on a tripod, suggesting that it was too powerful for a man to hold. George was glad he was strictly an observer, and would not be taking part in the march. He suspected that the jet would do more than soak you.