Five Smooth Stones (132 page)

The young prisoners in the stockade were screaming, massed at the fence where fingers were interlaced so thickly in its meshes they looked like clusters of brown grapes. One boy, shoes off, agile as any monkey, already had climbed close to the top, and was going to brave the barbed wire. Eddie stretched body and arm to their utmost, rapped sharply but not viciously on the knuckles of the clinging hand. "Get down from there, Jerry, y'hear! Y'all goin' to get hurt—" The boy stopped his climb, looked down at Eddie's upturned face, and spat.

The first contingent of horses came then, sweeping the people down from the City Hall area, then on their heels the second contingent, single-filing down the eastern sidewalk, a horse wheeling across from each intersection to charge into the crowd. There were people lying on the pavement now, some of them struggling to their feet again, others crawling toward the opposite side of the street. A young Negro in a striped shirt was running toward the Greyhound station, and when he saw that it was Willy Haskin, David gave a hoarse, involuntary shout of warning as he saw the horse that was following him. Willy was driven over the sidewalk, fell, and crawled into a corner by the station steps, and David saw the hoofs of the rearing horse plunge downward, saw the swinging whip in the rider's hand. A surging movement of the crowd obscured the scene for a moment, and when the steps were visible again horse and rider were charging back into the milling group in the center of the street. He saw Willy's hand reach up gropingly and grasp the edge of a step, saw him pull himself painfully half upright; then two men came from inside the building and lifted and supported him until they reached the inside of the station. The blood was clearly visible on face and body. He's alive, thought David. He's alive. And now he'll always fight like a cornered animal, always, wherever he is. More power to him, more power to him—

Main Street was comparatively quiet in the wake of the horses, all the pandemonium concentrated in the area below Calhoun, in front of the stockade and the police station and below. David could see that horses had followed Negroes who fled from them down the side streets, did not need to see to know that the horses would overtake many, some in their own yards, on their own porches.

The haunch of a wheeling horse just in front of them threw him against the stockade fence, knocking his breath from his lungs, and he needed Chuck's support for a moment as they edged along the fence, working their way back to the area in front of the City Hall.

"Where's Eddie?" asked Chuck. "Where is he?"

David leaned against the wall of the building, still fighting for breath. "Damned if I—" then pointed in the direction from which they had come. "There. Bleeding like a stuck Pig."

By the time he reached them, Eddie had succeeded in slowing the flow of blood from a deep forehead gash. It had been made by a sharp-edged rock. David recognized the type of wound. Eddie said, "Stay where you are." David watched him mount the steps of City Hall, saw three men in khaki come forward. "Who's in charge here?" snapped one. A fourth stood quietly at the railing of the porch just above them.

"I am. Scoggins is down at the jail directing action."

"Want us to take care of those niggers you got there? Both of 'em? White and black?"

"Who sent for you?"

"No one. We're just li'l ol' taxpayers, keeping niggers off city property. There's more of us inside. We just took five niggers across the street. Them committee niggers. Elmore told us to. Son of a bitch if I ever thought I'd see the day I'd be giving safe conduct to a bunch of trouble-making niggers. We're sure getting soft."

David considered making a break for the other side of the street, but knew he'd be worse off than a sitting duck. Eddie was doing the best he could, keeping at his job because it suited his purpose at this time, following orders in his own way. David was sure Eddie had been on his way to the jail to deliver the release orders for the children when the riot had broken out and had realized it was out of the question for the time being.

Eddie was speaking again. "Never mind how you feel. Just don't forget, you're guarding property; you ain't here to start something new."

Looking up, David saw Eddie limp to the man standing at the railing just above them, heard him say, "How you like it, Underwood? How you-all like it now?"

The man called Underwood spoke so low it was difficult for David to catch the words. "I don't, son. I don't. Ruby Brown damned near raised our kids after my wife took sick. Get going, Eddie. I'll take over here."

Eddie turned, walked to the top step, and said quietly, "Underwood's in charge till I get back."

Hours later, sitting in the Haskin dining room, David remembered these things with reasonable clarity, the edges of the events blurred and made hazy by the sounds of the fighting and violence that were their background. But what had followed Eddie's quiet order was sharp and shatteringly clear in his mind, without merciful blurring or forgetfulness, and the sound of Ruby Brown's steady, monotonous sobbing had been the acid that etched the details into his brain. It came from behind him, and he turned and saw Hummer Sweeton and Dr. Anderson, Hummer supporting Ruby, who walked stumblingly between them. They were making their way along the sidewalk outside the stockade fence. Chuck said, "Couldn't they have sent her home by car, the back way—" and David growled, "When're you going to quit talking about these people as though they were human. She's lucky not to be in jail—" Beside the three an impassive trooper walked as escort. Before they reached David, they started across the road, and David saw Abraham Towers start down the steps of Haskin's store with Haskin, Mrs. Haskin, and Gracie just behind him. David walked quickly to Hummer, and the little preacher's sunken, tragedy-darkened eyes lighted. "David."

"What can I do to help, Hummer?"

Hummer shook his head, tightened his arm around Ruby. "Nothing, son. There's nothing anyone can do about it now. Doc's getting her over to the hospital." Ruby's sobs increased and, as her screams had done earlier, blocked from hearing the sounds below them.

"Come on," said the trooper. "It's dangerous here."

Hummer nodded and gently urged Ruby forward. Anderson's eyes met David's. They were bleak and cold, the devils behind them no longer subdued. "If you can, come over to the hospital later, David. Bring your boy, Luke." David nodded. There would be pictures for Luke in that hospital tonight, pretty pictures all in color.

Mrs. Haskin and Gracie ran past Abraham Towers, who, with Haskin, stood waiting at the edge of the pavement. "Let me," said Mrs. Haskin, and took Ruby into her arms, Gracie shielding them both as they made their way across. Anderson hurried after them. David turned and looked back at City Hall, trying to catch Eddie's eye, saw the young sergeant standing in the doorway with his back to them, talking to someone inside. When he turned back, Hummer was alone, the trooper dog-trotting toward a running group of Negroes, to herd them toward the west side of the street.

"We'll be over in a minute, Hummer," he said. "They were going to release the kids when this broke loose. We want to make sure there hasn't been any mind-changing." He wanted desperately to offer some word, some gesture of comfort to Hummer, but could only shake his head futilely. Hummer's smile was distilled sorrow as David and Chuck started away, and at the steps of City Hall David looked back and saw that the little preacher's walk had slowed. As though feeling David's eyes on his back, Hummer turned his face toward them, and lifted his hand in the familiar, gentle gesture that was half salute, half blessing.

Hummer's body did not crumple slowly to the ground, but struck the pavement as though he had fallen from a great height, and the crack of the gun that felled him came at the same instant.

***

It was all as clear now as an image seen in a flawless mirror, as sounds heard on stereophonic tape: Chuck's hoarse, half-crazed whisper at his side, "No, God; no, God; no, God; no, God—" and the way Hummer's blood had flowed slowly, not spurting, down and over one side of the dark forehead, filling the deep eye socket, the hollow of the cheek, flowing richly, redly, to the pavement. The gaping exit hole from which it spilled showed more than blood, showed splintered bone and the yellow-gray mucoid patches that had been Hummer's brains, and these things had splattered the pavement around his head in the brief instant of his fall.

David ran forward, but Abraham Towers was quicker, and when David reached the body Abraham was on his knees beside it, both hands on the pavement, Hummer's blood flowing, more slowly now, over black knuckles and fingers. David said "Abra'm—" but Abraham did not hear—or, if he heard, did not heed. The big man gathered Hummer's body into his arms, stood tall and straight and alone with his burden for a moment, his face a dark mask of pain and horror; then he moved toward those who waited, and Hummer's head rolled gently against his shoulder, the ruin of it hidden against the blue denim of his shirt. The exposed profile under the small red entrance hole in the temple was as peaceful and quiet and content as a tired child's, eyelid half open, waiting sleep.

His thoughts then were remembered now, in Haskin's dining room, in the same bitter sequence. The barn, the old barn turned warehouse, and the story of the World War I snipers. Where Hummer had been standing was in direct line with the doors of the former hayloft, and just after the shot David had looked up, backing away as he did so, and saw that they had been swung half open, saw the glint of the sun on a rifle barrel, and saw behind it, indistinct but unmistakable, the bright green of a man's shirt.

There was a second blast of gunfire, closer than the first, three shots this time, and a poster beside the hayloft doors advertising "Pep-U-Up" showed three holes in almost exact alignment. The angle of the rifle barrel behind the hayloft door changed, lost the glint of the sun as it was withdrawn slowly, eerily, by the unseen hand on its stock. On the porch of City Hall the man Eddie had called Underwood was holstering his gun. The three other men had moved away from him, and he stood alone in the center of the porch.

Chuck, gray and sick with shock, was waiting. Eddie had held him back with an expert grip, but now he released him, running up the steps, his voice rasping and harsh as he said, "You see, Underwood? You see now? You see what I mean—?"

"I see. Leave the trigger-happy son of a bitch to me, Eddie. I gave him notice to get the hell down. I'll talk to him when he—"

"Talk!
Talk
to him?"

David did not wait for any more, said to Chuck, "Let's go. We can't accomplish anything here now—"

They walked slowly, and David kept his eyes straight ahead, not looking at what he knew was on the pavement at his feet. As they drew near Calhoun he saw Haskin and Gracie half carrying Ruby Brown to Anderson's car. He could hear again the keening of her sobs, and said to Chuck through stiff hps, "Were you there, Chuck, were you there—"

"Yes, Lord, I'm here—"

***

He had heard someone, probably Gracie, place coffee on the table while he sat there, and he raised his head now and drew the cup toward him. When it came to a certain kind of chips-down guts, he thought, women have us all whipped. It had been Mrs. Haskin and Gracie who had stripped the sodden shirt and undershirt off Abraham Towers, washed Hummer's blood from the massive black chest, forced a powerful slug of whiskey on him, known best what to do when he broke and the shuddering cries had come from deep within him.

The call to Washington was made by Brad within minutes after his return from Heliopolis. "Two dead," he had said. "One of them Humboldt Sweeton. Numerous critical injuries and no adequate hospitalization... Snipers... Mounted posses... Uncontrollable rioting..." His voice had gone on, while David, leaning against the wall beside the

telephone, had said, "Save your breath, Chief. Save your breath—"

But the jeeps had come, and the trucks, and the mobile hospital unit, but not before two Negro boys had been dragged from hiding and beaten to a bloody pulp on the City Hall porch while a young police sergeant named Eddie who had tried to interfere lay unconscious nearby; and not before David Champlin had crouched on the floor of a pickup truck beside the frighteningly quiet form of Luke Willis, calling to the driver, "Mind the bumps, Les; for God's sake take it slow and mind the bumps!"

Brad came into the room, a glass in each hand. He handed one to David, saying, "I can't get through to Anderson on the phone—"

"I know. It's a madhouse."

"I saw Hummer's body—"

"Well?"

Brad did not answer, and David said again, "Well? Aren't you going to say they can't get away with it?"

"No. They can."

"Effie. Hummer. Maybe Willy Haskin. And Fred. And another guy. Maybe our kid Luke—"

"What happened to Luke, David? I've only had a sketchy account."

"Ever watch a polo match where a man's head was the ball?"

"For God's sake, no!"

"The crazy bastard, the crazy, damfool bastard. He ran into the center of the street and focused on the horses, two of them, coming toward him hell-bent. He was running backward. He sidestepped the first horse, but not in time, and you could hear the crack of the club on his head clear over here. God knows why it didn't knock him cold, but it sent him staggering, and the guy on the second horse, coming up from behind, finished the job. He shouldn't have been moved, but we had to."

"Who's 'we'?"

"Haskin and someone else—I don't know who it was—and L And a guy from the police department named Eddie. That was just before they knocked him out. Eddie, that is."

"Anyone see that happen?"

"Haskin says he did. Happened while we were getting Luke to Anderson's."

"Luke's camera?"

David gave a short bark of laughter. "Stupid. As I said before, they're stupid. It was still slung around his neck. It's in Anderson's safe. The film's intact, I'm sure. I'll get it and unload it and send it north in the morning. When Luke comes out of it, he'll give me hell for not getting it there tonight. On foot if necessary."