Five Smooth Stones (108 page)

Now David could see Sweeton clearly: a small man, very dark, not much bigger than Gramp had been, with a long face, thin and deeply lined; large eyes, set deep, the sockets almost black from fatigue. He looked like a man who slept little. He looked, too, like a solitary man, a man who would make few close friends. His smile, when he said goodbye and God bless, had been of such gentle sweetness, so free of the usual easy, ingratiating pretenses, that David, watching him move toward the door—stopped every few steps by well-wishers—had felt a familiar ache for Gramp awaken. "And God bless you, too," he murmured as he watched the small figure leave the building.

When Brad came back, David said: "I remember Hummer well now. There's a sort of otherworldly quality about him."

"He's sort of a kook." Luke swung his foot to the floor and tossed Brad a pillow so the older man could lean back.

"All right," said David. "He's sort of a kook. When you come right down to it, so was Jesus Christ."

Luke ran a finger over the rim of his glass, not looking up. "He laid me out once," he said. "I mean he
laid
me out. He brought me down so far I swear to God I went around all day feeling like I didn't have a stitch of clothes on." He sighed. "And he never even raised his voice. Swear he didn't speak as loud's I'm speaking now. And he didn't say more'n twenty-five words. That man can sure bring a guy down, somehow."

"And lift a crowd up," said Brad. "I don't know what it is. One meets it now and then. Hummer Sweeton is a man whose hatred of violence is as intense and deep-seated as his hatred of oppression. He's not so starry-eyed he doesn't realize its inevitability in certain situations; no one is. He lacks formal education. Grade school and the Bible, that was it. He differs radically from the general run of Negro preachers. He can sway a crowd, hold it, fire it up, and he can kneel beside a sick baby's bed all night and in the morning put his take from the previous night's prayer meeting on the table."

"You've got to be kidding," said David. "There ain't no such animal. Not even Hummer."

"No, David, I'm not kidding. Three months ago I made him—it wasn't easy—take a week's rest with us in Boston. We got to know him damned well. As you said, he lacks that touch with reality needed in a good leader, but he has other qualities just as important. One of them is the ability to inspire trust in a people who don't trust anyone, even each other. Another quality is the Goddamndest faith I ever ran across, a faith that quite literally passeth understanding. My understanding, anyhow."

"No cross, no crown?" said David. "Gramp—"

"No. Not the 'no cross, no crown' faith that's been the ruination of prior generations. No, not that. His is a fiery, Old Testament kind of faith, the faith of the Hebrews, made gentler and more acceptable by the teachings of Jesus. Damned if I can find exact words for it, and damned if an agnostic like me has any business trying to. I can explain the psychological motivations of a murderer. The faith of a Humboldt Sweeton is something else again."

"It's not unusual," said David. "It's—hell. Brad, you'd have had to be brought up in the South, lived with it, to know its strength. And when you leave the South, and look back on it, remember it, it—well, as you say, it passeth understanding."

"My grandmother," said Luke. "She was like that."

"Let's get to Cainsville," said David.

"Apparently Sweeton has had a dream for many years of a drastic nonviolent program, contradiction in terms though that may be. The elimination of the working Negro from the Southern way of life."

"My God, Brad, that's not new. We've all had that particular daydream."

"It's a lot more than a daydream to Hummer. He's been working on it, biding his time." Brad smiled. "I was one of the few he confided in. I'd run into him, here and there when he was moseying around the South, looking the territory over, preaching, and I'd say, 'How you doing, Reverend?' and he'd smile and say, 'So-so, Mr. Willis, so-so. Biding my time, tha's all, jes biding my time.' "

"And now his time has come? Or he thinks it has? In Cainsville?" David tried to keep the skepticism out of his voice.

"Actually, I think it has. Cainsville has more Negroes employed than many other places. Its whole economy is dependent on them in more ways than one. There is poverty, but not the abject poverty of so many southern Negro communities."

"Brad. Listen, man. Money. M-O-N-E-Y, money."

"It seems to be materializing."

"It can't be. At least, all that money. All the civil rights groups put together couldn't raise enough money to support a whole damned Negro community on a gone-fishing boycott of everything, including their own jobs. And even if they could, you must know what would happen. Pressure. Pressure by the whites on wholesalers, on banks, on loan companies. Good God, Brad, you of all people!"

"I've thought of them all, David. The first of the week, in Boston, I spent most of an afternoon dictating to Lucy a memo on possible retaliatory measures. I prepared it as carefully as I would an outline of the prosecution's probable case. After a while Lucy asked me please could she go home early, as soon as I'd finished, so she could throw up in private."

"Funny," broke in Luke. "Damned funny how hard it is for some of these so-called sympathetic whites to dig the Southerners. I've heard 'em say, 'Well, now the Supreme Court's decided so-and-so, there won't be so much trouble.' Bunch of starry-eyed assholes, if you ask me."

"I like that," said David judiciously. "Man, I like that. May I use it if I give you a credit line?"

"At least a name like that will give the whites something new to think about," said Brad.

Luke interrupted with a loud "Yah!" Then, anger mounting, was on his feet, eyes hot. "Who the hell cares what the whites think! For Christ's sake, who cares! There's fifty-eleven different kinds of colored in this damned country. There's Harlem colored who don't stop cutting throats— white
or
black—long enough to put the knife in their pocket, and who blames 'em! And there's Brad's kind of colored, who've had it pretty easy and still have a bone in their craw; and there's David's, brought up a hell of a lot better than most whites; and there's mine, all snarled up on a toboggan, going downhill; and there's colored like they got in Cainsville, good, decent colored, some of 'em scared shitless, and what the hell! We're all niggers to the whites. Man, you know it! We're all niggers. So what the hell difference does it make what the whites think!"

"Luke," said Brad gently. "I could drive an Army tank through that argument."

"Sure you could. You're fixin' to say there's just as many kinds of whites. You're fixin' to point to Chuck Martin and some of the others, like the students coming down here."

"Brad's just going at it from a pragmatic angle, Luke." Three years ago that "pragmatic" would have thrown Luke. Now it didn't.

"Sure. Sure. I'm not so damned dumb I don't know it hurts our cause when some little black kid pees on the wall inside a grocery story during a demonstration. But what you going to do? Train a hound dawg to kill cats, then shoot it when it kills your grandmaw's pet tabby? You think the whites are going to see anything but a nigger peeing on a wall?"

"Can't say I appreciate it myself," said Brad.

"Man, I'm not saying it's good. I'm just saying it don't make a damned bit of difference what the whites think, because they going to think the same thing no matter what we do. If we stand around singing hymns and talking love talk, they going to say, 'Ain't the nigras wonderful?' but they still ain't going to want us moving in next door, living near 'em, living in a house as good as theirs, sitting at the next table in a restaurant—"

"Marrying their sisters—" goaded David.

Luke whirled on him. "Who the hell wants to marry their Goddamned sisters! I don't even want to lay 'em. A few times is plenty, I mean
plenty.
Talk-talk-talk. Talk-talk-talk. They ain't all that good. My God, Luke Willis has got something better to do when he's in bed with a chick besides talk about race relations!"

David choked on his drink, didn't try to check the laugh. It had its usual effect, stopping argument, stopping discussion, filling the little house, spilling over through the open windows and the screen door. When it was spent and the sounds in the living room had come back to normal, he said, "Sorry, Luke. I guess I've got what they call a photographic mind."

Luke was still steaming, cooled off only slightly by the interruption. He pointed a finger at David and said: "You know what I'd like to see? You want to know, man? I'd like to see about ten big—and I mean
big
—black—and I mean
black
—bastards with nothing on but maybe a goatskin and maybe not even that, prancing up and down the aisles of Congress, steppin' high, peeing on every mush-mouthed southern congressman they got there, every damned one of them. And the whites wouldn't think any the worse of us than they do when we march down the street singing hymns. It don't make any difference
what
we do. We're still niggers."

It was Brad whose control snapped now, and he laughed, if not with the same overwhelming power of David, at least with as much spontaneity, his head against the back of the divan, eyes green slits, finally wiping away tears, shaking his head. "Same like David," he said. "Photographic mind. Certain fine, mealymouthed, old s'uthe'n gentlemen—"

"We're with you, Luke," said David. "We're ahead of you. But look, what happened to Cainsville? Sit down and cool it for a while, huh?"

"O.K., O.K." Luke sat, still fuming, but, David knew, feeling better, his mind clearer.

"You mentioned money, David," said Brad. "And economic retaliation. Remember, Hummer has rounded up an unbelievable amount of support. And Les Forsyte, who has a genius for organization and detail, is getting up a file consisting of a statement from everyone who will need help of just what their minimum requirements are for a two-week holdout. You'd be surprised at how little they've asked. A lot of these people could live off their land and stock indefinitely."

"Yes," said David thoughtfully. "I know. And there are a lot of us in the South, in business and in the professions, who are loaded, and willing to give. And a few whites who won't want to be identified—"

"Right. Forsyte has a projected figure of donations that, once the thing breaks into the open, would surprise you. The Negro storekeeper on the colored side of Main Street is the community leader. Fellow named Haskin. He's been quietly increasing his orders to the wholesalers for months. Dr. Anderson has stocked up on extra drugs and supplies, although he needed some help from ALEC. God knows, he may need 'em, because Hummer plans two demonstrations first. They'll be red herrings in a sense. If they work, and you know damned well they won't, we might have to change our plans."

"How closely is this Garnett guy working with you?"

"He's glommed on to Hummer, who's an exception to the rule and trusts everyone. Behind his back we call Garnett our gopher. You know, he 'goes fer' this and he 'goes fer' that; anything from a drink of water to a phone call. He's not in a position to hurt us."

"I doubt if he talks," said David. "So. What's the population ratio?"

"Sixty-forty, about. Sixty white, forty Negro. And vicious white, believe me. The first Negro has yet to be registered to vote."

"How's employment? Negro, I mean."

"High, such as it is. Which is one reason Hummer picked Cainsville. Pay is substandard, even for the South. There's a cigar factory, a paper box factory. Both finally had to employ Negroes. Of course, there are fieldworkers and tenant farmers."

David began ticking off work categories on his fingers, taking Brad's nods as answers: "Waiters? Dishwashers? Housemaids? House cooks? Day-work cleaning women? Gardeners? Cleaning women in the hospital? Store janitors? Hotel chambermaids? Hotel porters? Office building janitors? Ditch-digging-type laborers?"

Brad elaborated on his nod at the last category. "Definitely. The place is growing. There's a subdivision being laid out, roads. Ground has just been broken for another hospital."

"O.K. Elevator operators? If the town has buildings large enough."

"Hell, yes, three of them."

"Garbage collectors?"

"All of them."

"Any in what might be called public service? Besides garbage collectors. Policemen, firemen—"

"You out of your mind?" growled Luke.

"I'm just trying to find out what makes you guys think this would work. Brad, the supposedly cool legal mind; you, Luke, hotheaded, vindictive, and mean; man, really mean when you want to be—I swear I can't get it—"

Luke was on his feet again, anger rekindled. "Now wait! Wait a minute, dad! I'm just as mean and vindictive as I ever was. The only reason I'm for it is because it's going to hurt those lily-white sons of bitches on the other side of Main Street a hell of a lot worse than marching up and down a few streets, making muscles, singing hymns, or even, by God, busting windows, or shooting guns. If it works, it's going to get 'em right by the balls. That's the reason; that's all, dad. It's going to hurt 'em worse. I'm no Mahatma Gandhi. Not li'l Luke Willis. No, man! I'm for stringing 'em up by the balls over a slow fire. But I've grown a little sense these last couple of years, and that's
your
fault, dad."

"All right, kid, you're as mean as ever. But will you just sit down and stay sat? You're giving me fits."

After Luke had subsided David said to Brad, "What about Aunt Mattie?"

Brad frowned. "Aunt Mattie?"

"Lawd, you-all know Aunt Mattie! Deah ol' Aunt Mattie; she's the sweetest li'l ol' thing. Been working for us ever since my grandma was a little girl; she gave my mother her first spanking and ouah little Cynthia, too. We jus' love Aunt Mattie, and she loves us."

"Oh," said Brad. "We've got her too. But not too many of her. She's dying out."

"What about her husband, Uncle Mose; he must be around, too. Dying out maybe, but still there. I know. I've been running head on into Uncle Mose everywhere I've been these last years."