The Complete Stories (69 page)

He got up and threw the cereal box in the garbage. Before he left the house, he looked into Norton's room to be sure he was not still sick. The child was sitting cross-legged on his bed. He had emptied the quart jars of change into one large pile in front of him, and was sorting it out by nickels and dimes and quarters.

*   *   *

That afternoon Norton was alone in the house, squatting on the floor of his room arranging packages of flower seeds in rows around himself. Rain slashed against the window panes and rattled in the gutters. The room had grown dark but every few minutes it was lit by silent lightning and the seed packages showed up gaily on the floor. He squatted motionless like a large pale frog in the midst of this potential garden. All at once his eyes became alert. Without warning the rain had stopped. The silence was heavy as if the downpour had been hushed by violence. He remained motionless, only his eyes turning.

Into the silence came the distinct click of a key turning in the front door lock. The sound was a very deliberate one. It drew attention to itself and held it as if it were controlled more by a mind than by a hand. The child leapt up and got into the closet.

The footsteps began to move in the hall. They were deliberate and irregular, a light and then a heavy one, then a silence as if the visitor had paused to listen himself or to examine something. In a minute the kitchen door screeked. The footsteps crossed the kitchen to the refrigerator. The closet wall and the kitchen wall were the same. Norton stood with his ear pressed against it. The refrigerator door opened. There was a prolonged silence.

He took off his shoes and then tiptoed out of the closet and stepped over the seed packages. In the middle of the room, he stopped and remained where he was, rigid. A thin bony-face boy in a wet black suit stood in his door, blocking his escape. His hair was flattened to his skull by the rain. He stood there like an irate drenched crow. His look went through the child like a pin and paralyzed him. Then his eyes began to move over everything in the room—the unmade bed, the dirty curtains on the one large window, a photograph of a wide-faced young woman that stood up in the clutter on top of the dresser.

The child's tongue suddenly went wild. “He's been expecting you, he's going to give you a new shoe because you have to eat out of garbage cans!” he said in a kind of mouse-like shriek.

“I eat out of garbage cans,” the boy said slowly with a beady stare, “because I like to eat out of garbage cans. See?”

The child nodded.

“And I got ways of getting my own shoe. See?”

The child nodded, mesmerized.

The boy limped in and sat down on the bed. He arranged a pillow behind him and stretched his short leg out so that the big black shoe rested conspicuously on a fold of the sheet.

Norton's gaze settled on it and remained immobile. The sole was as thick as a brick.

Johnson wiggled it slightly and smiled. “If I kick somebody
once
with this,” he said, “it learns them not to mess with me.”

The child nodded.

“Go in the kitchen,” Johnson said, “and make me a sandwich with some of that rye bread and ham and bring me a glass of milk.”

Norton went off like a mechanical toy, pushed in the right direction. He made a large greasy sandwich with ham hanging out the sides of it and poured out a glass of milk. Then he returned to the room with the glass of milk in one hand and the sandwich in the other.

Johnson was leaning back regally against the pillow. “Thanks, waiter,” he said and took the sandwich.

Norton stood by the side of the bed, holding the glass.

The boy tore into the sandwich and ate steadily until he finished it. Then he took the glass of milk. He held it with both hands like a child and when he lowered it for breath, there was a rim of milk around his mouth. He handed Norton the empty glass. “Go get me one of them oranges in there, waiter,” he said hoarsely.

Norton went to the kitchen and returned with the orange. Johnson peeled it with his fingers and let the peeling drop in the bed. He ate it slowly, spitting the seeds out in front of him. When he finished, he wiped his hands on the sheet and gave Norton a long appraising stare. He appeared to have been softened by the service. “You're his kid all right,” he said. “You got the same stupid face.”

The child stood there stolidly as if he had not heard.

“He don't know his left hand from his right,” Johnson said with a hoarse pleasure in his voice.

The child cast his eyes a little to the side of the boy's face and looked fixedly at the wall.

“Yaketty yaketty yak,” Johnson said, “and never says a thing.”

The child's upper lip lifted slightly but he didn't say anything.

“Gas,” Johnson said. “Gas.”

The child's face began to have a wary look of belligerence. He backed away slightly as if he were prepared to retreat instantly. “He's good,” he mumbled. “He helps people.”

“Good!” Johnson said savagely. He thrust his head forward. “Listen here,” he hissed, “I don't care if he's good or not. He ain't
right!
”

Norton looked stunned.

The screen door in the kitchen banged and someone entered. Johnson sat forward instantly. “Is that him?” he said.

“It's the cook,” Norton said. “She comes in the afternoon.”

Johnson got up and limped into the hall and stood in the kitchen door and Norton followed him.

The colored girl was at the closet taking off a bright red raincoat. She was a tall light-yellow girl with a mouth like a large rose that had darkened and wilted. Her hair was dressed in tiers on top of her head and leaned to the side like the Tower of Pisa.

Johnson made a noise through his teeth. “Well look at Aunt Jemima,” he said.

The girl paused and trained an insolent gaze on them. They might have been dust on the floor.

“Come on,” Johnson said, “let's see what all you got besides a nigger.” He opened the first door to his right in the hall and looked into a pink-tiled bathroom. “A pink can!” he murmured.

He turned a comical face to the child. “Does he sit on that?”

“It's for company,” Norton said, “but he sits on it sometimes.”

“He ought to empty his head in it,” Johnson said.

The door was open to the next room. It was the room Sheppard had slept in since his wife died. An ascetic-looking iron bed stood on the bare floor. A heap of Little League baseball uniforms was piled in one corner. Papers were scattered over a large roll-top desk and held down in various places by his pipes. Johnson stood looking into the room silently. He wrinkled his nose. “Guess who?” he said.

The door to the next room was closed but Johnson opened it and thrust his head into the semi-darkness within. The shades were down and the air was close with a faint scent of perfume in it. There was a wide antique bed and a mammoth dresser whose mirror glinted in the half light. Johnson snapped the light switch by the door and crossed the room to the mirror and peered into it. A silver comb and brush lay on the linen runner. He picked up the comb and began to run it through his hair. He combed it straight down on his forehead. Then he swept it to the side, Hitler fashion.

“Leave her comb alone!” the child said. He stood in the door, pale and breathing heavily as if he were watching sacrilege in a holy place.

Johnson put the comb down and picked up the brush and gave his hair a swipe with it.

“She's dead,” the child said.

“I ain't afraid of dead people's things,” Johnson said. He opened the top drawer and slid his hand in.

“Take your big fat dirty hands off my mother's clothes!” the child said in a high suffocated voice.

“Keep your shirt on, sweetheart,” Johnson murmured. He pulled up a wrinkled red polka dot blouse and dropped it back. Then he pulled out a green silk kerchief and whirled it over his head and let it float to the floor. His hand continued to plow deep into the drawer. After a moment it came up gripping a faded corset with four dangling metal supporters. “Thisyer must be her saddle,” he observed.

He lifted it gingerly and shook it. Then he fastened it around his waist and jumped up and down, making the metal supporters dance. He began to snap his fingers and turn his hips from side to side. “Gonter rock, rattle and roll,” he sang. “Gonter rock, rattle and roll. Can't please that woman, to save my doggone soul.” He began to move around, stamping the good foot down and slinging the heavy one to the side. He danced out the door, past the stricken child and down the hall toward the kitchen.

*   *   *

A half hour later Sheppard came home. He dropped his raincoat on a chair in the hall and came as far as the parlor door and stopped. His face was suddenly transformed. It shone with pleasure. Johnson sat, a dark figure, in a high-backed pink upholstered chair. The wall behind him was lined with books from floor to ceiling. He was reading one. Sheppard's eyes narrowed. It was a volume of the Encyclopedia Britannica. He was so engrossed in it that he did not look up. Sheppard held his breath. This was the perfect setting for the boy. He had to keep him here. He had to manage it somehow.

“Rufus!” he said, “it's good to see you boy!” and he bounded forward with his arm oustretched.

Johnson looked up, his face blank. “Oh hello,” he said. He ignored the hand as long as he was able but when Sheppard did not withdraw it, he grudgingly shook it.

Sheppard was prepared for this kind of reaction. It was part of Johnson's make-up never to show enthusiasm.

“How are things?” he said. “How's your grandfather treating you?” He sat down on the edge of the sofa.

“He dropped dead,” the boy said indifferently.

“You don't mean it!” Sheppard cried. He got up and sat down on the coffee table nearer the boy.

“Naw,” Johnson said, “he ain't dropped dead. I wisht he had.”

“Well where is he?” Sheppard muttered.

“He's gone with a remnant to the hills,” Johnson said. “Him and some others. They're going to bury some Bibles in a cave and take two of different kinds of animals and all like that. Like Noah. Only this time it's going to be fire, not flood.”

Sheppard's mouth stretched wryly. “I see,” he said. Then he said, “In other words the old fool has abandoned you?”

“He ain't no fool,” the boy said in an indignant tone.

“Has he abandoned you or not?” Sheppard asked impatiently.

The boy shrugged.

“Where's your probation officer?”

“I ain't supposed to keep up with him,” Johnson said. “He's supposed to keep up with me.”

Sheppard laughed. “Wait a minute,” he said. He got up and went into the hall and got his raincoat off the chair and took it to the hall closet to hang it up. He had to give himself time to think, to decide how he could ask the boy so that he would stay. He couldn't force him to stay. It would have to be voluntary. Johnson pretended not to like him. That was only to uphold his pride, but he would have to ask him in such a way that his pride could still be upheld. He opened the closet door and took out a hanger. An old gray winter coat of his wife's still hung there. He pushed it aside but it didn't move. He pulled it open roughly and winced as if he had seen the larva inside a cocoon. Norton stood in it, his face swollen and pale, with a drugged look of misery on it. Sheppard stared at him. Suddenly he was confronted with a possibility. “Get out of there,” he said. He caught him by the shoulder and propelled him firmly into the parlor and over to the pink chair where Johnson was sitting with the encyclopedia in his lap. He was going to risk everything in one blow.

“Rufus,” he said, “I've got a problem. I need your help.”

Johnson looked up suspiciously.

“Listen,” Sheppard said, “we need another boy in the house.” There was a genuine desperation in his voice. “Norton here has never had to divide anything in his life. He doesn't know what it means to share. And I need somebody to teach him. How about helping me out? Stay here for a while with us, Rufus. I need your help.” The excitement in his voice made it thin.

The child suddenly came to life. His face swelled with fury. “He went in her room and used her comb!” he screamed, yanking Sheppard's arm. “He put on her corset and danced with Leola, he…”

“Stop this!” Sheppard said sharply. “Is tattling all you're capable of? I'm not asking you for a report on Rufus's conduct. I'm asking you to make him welcome here. Do you understand?

“You see how it is?” he asked, turning to Johnson.

Norton kicked the leg of the pink chair viciously, just missing Johnson's swollen foot. Sheppard yanked him back.

“He said you weren't nothing but gas!” the child shrieked.

A sly look of pleasure crossed Johnson's face.

Sheppard was not put back. These insults were part of the boy's defensive mechanism. “What about it, Rufus?” he said. “Will you stay with us for a while?”

Johnson looked straight in front of him and said nothing. He smiled slightly and appeared to gaze upon some vision of the future that pleased him.

“I don't care,” he said and turned a page of the encyclopedia. “I can stand anywhere.”

“Wonderful.” Sheppard said. “Wonderful.”

“He said,” the child said in a throaty whisper, “you didn't know your left hand from your right.”

There was a silence.

Johnson wet his finger and turned another page of the encyclopedia.

“I have something to say to both of you,” Sheppard said in a voice without inflection. His eyes moved from one to the other of them and he spoke slowly as if what he was saying he would say only once and it behooved them to listen. “If it made any difference to me what Rufus thinks of me,” he said, “then I wouldn't be asking him here. Rufus is going to help me out and I'm going to help him out and we're both going to help you out. I'd simply be selfish if I let what Rufus thinks of me interfere with what I can do for Rufus. If I can help a person, all I want is to do it. I'm above and beyond simple pettiness.”