The Essential Ellison Part 88

And she took him upstairs to bathe away his blood and his pain.

John Kinzer and I stood in our separate places in the dim living room of their home, and we stared at each other. He had nothing to say to me.

I shoved past him and fell into a chair. I was shaking.

I heard the bath water running upstairs.

After what seemed a very long time Leona came downstairs, wiping her hands on her ap.r.o.n. She sat down on the sofa and after a moment John sat down beside her. I heard the sound of rock music from upstairs.

"Would you like a piece of nice pound cake?" Leona said.

I didn't answer. I was listening to the sound of the music. Rock music. On the radio. There was a table lamp on the end table beside the sofa. It cast a dim and futile light in the shadowed living room. Rock music from the present, on a radio upstairs? I started to say something, and then knew... Oh, G.o.d... no!

I jumped up just as the sound of hideous crackling blotted out the music, and the table lamp dimmed and dimmed and flickered. I screamed something, I don't know what it was, and ran for the stairs.

Jeffty's parents did not move. They sat there with their hands folded, in that place they had been for so many years.

I fell twice rus.h.i.+ng up the stairs.

There isn't much on television that can hold my interest. I bought an old cathedral-shaped Philco radio in a second-hand store, and I replaced all the burnt-out parts with the original tubes from old radios I could cannibalize that still worked. I don't use transistors or printed circuits. They wouldn't work. I've sat in front of that set for hours sometimes, running the dial back and forth as slowly as you can imagine, so slowly it doesn't look as if it's moving at all sometimes.

But I can't find Captain Midnight or The Land of the Lost or The Shadow or Quiet, Please.

So she did love him, still, a little bit, even after all those years. I can't hate them: they only wanted to live in the present world again. That isn't such a terrible thing.

It's a good world, all things considered. It's much better than it used to be, in a lot of ways. People don't die from the old diseases any more. They die from new ones, but that's Progress, isn't it?

Isn't it?

Tell me.

Somebody please tell me.

XIICONTRACTSON THE SOUL.

"My soul says, tomorrow cannot be trusted to naked apes. [...] I cannot argue with my soul, it will hear no counter-suggestion. And what can I do? I'm trapped in here with the lunatic."

"Stealing Tomorrow," Trumpet #11, 1974 Some call it the soul, some call it the totality of each human intelligence, and some disregard it. The presence is there, nonetheless, the inner matrix of every human body: the nature of the being.

If Harlan were a painter instead of a writer, imagine the wonders he would give us-the grist and grue of Dali and Bosch, the blinding colors of van Gogh, the subtle flesh tones of Rembrandt. But he paints in words, and like an artist with a brush his goal is the stimulation of the soul-the soul in its moments of pa.s.sion, and in its touchy moments of negotiation with itself.

These stories present some of those memorable moments, and we can all learn from them.

Since "Daniel White for the Greater Good" (1961) confronts a specific moral decision in a time that is now past, it would be easy to regard it with a disclaiming distance. After all, we have our own current problems, and Daniel White is only a fictional black man in an historical context. Yet the paradox of Daniel White remains: how can we make "moral" judgments when a human life is weighed against the importance of our personal value system? What is the price of a human soul? Daniel White's, U. J. Peregrin's, Henry Roblee's, even Marion Gore's-not to mention mine and yours. The price was once measured in pieces of silver, but the true measurement has always been and remains much higher.

"Neither Your Jenny Nor Mine" (1964) ill.u.s.trates the complex maze in which souls go about their business of life. We seem to wander through the maze alone-and in the Southern California of Harlan's story, the details scrupulously emphasize commercial manipulation of this loneliness-but when our solitary paths cross, there comes the burning question of responsibility. Who will carry an extra load, who will become the monkey-on-the-back? Even more critical is the challenge to the soul's strength, and Jenny is a weight that each of us should measure before we break our backs in the test.

The epigram to "Alive and Well and on a Friendless Voyage" (1977) translates as "What pains us trains us." (I bother to tell you this because, as Harlan has stated publicly, it extends beyond the story, which was created in an exorcism of personal pain.) What especially matters to us, as readers, is that we must see ourselves equally as tragic as Moth, bearing guilt as a responsibility too large for one soul. It is to be hoped that from this tragedy we can draw insight, to meet the less stringent demands most of us carry through the years. If we believe the soul is eternal, we must not forget that it can develop the character and strength to meet its challenges along the way.

"I think that's the obligation of the strong, to a.s.sist the weak. Not leaners, you understand; not people [...] who aren't willing to fight down to the last breath. But for those people who have determination and courage, and simply need a little more hand [...]"

"An Interview with Harlan Ellison" by James Van Rise, RBCC #151, August 1980 Daniel White For The Greater Good Begin with absolute blackness. The sort of absolute blackness that does not exist in reality. A black as deep and profound as the s.p.a.ce directly under a h.e.l.l pressed to the ground; a black as all-encompa.s.sing as blindness from birth; a black that black. The black of a hallway devoid of light, and a black-advancing down that hallway-going away from you. At the end of a hallway as black as this, a square of light painfully white. A doorway through which can be seen a window, pouring dawn sunlight in a torrent into the room, through the doorway, and causing a sunspot of light at the end of the pitch-black hallway.

If this were a motion picture, it would be starkly impressive, the black so deep, and the body moving away from the camera, down the hall toward the square of superhuman white. The body clinging to the right-hand wall, moving down the tunnel of ebony, slowly, painstakingly, almost drunkenly. The body is a form, merely a form, not quite as black as the hallway mouth that contains it, but still without sufficient contrast to break what would be superlative camera work, were this a motion picture. But it is not a motion picture. It is a story of some truth.

It is a story, and for that reason, the effect of superlative cinematography must be shattered as the body pulls itself to the door, lurches through, and stumbles to grasp at the edge of a chest-high wooden counter. The camera angles (were this a motion picture) would suddenly s.h.i.+ft and tilt, bringing into immediate focus the soft yet hard face of a police desk sergeant, his collar open and sweat beading his neck and upper lip. We might study the raised bushy eyebrows and the quickly horrified expression just before the lips go rigid. Then the camera would pan rapidly around the squad room; we would see the Georgia sunrise outside that streaming window, and finally our gaze would settle on the face of a girl.

A white girl.

With a smear of blood at the edge of her mouth, with one eye swollen shut and blue-black, with her hair disarrayed and matted with blood, leaves and dirt ... and an expression of pain that says one thing: "Help ... me ..."

The camera would follow that face as it sinks slowly to the floor.

Then, if this were a movie, and not reality, in a town without a name in central Georgia, the camera would cut to black. Sharp cut, and wait for the next scene.

It might have been simpler, had he been a good man. At least underneath; but he wasn't. He was, very simply, a dirty n.i.g.g.e.r. When he could not cadge a free meal by intimidation, he stole. He smelled bad, he had the morals of a swamp pig, and as if that were not enough to exclude him from practically every stratum of society, he had bad teeth, worse breath and a foul mouth. Fittingly, his name was Daniel White.

They had no difficulty arresting him, and even less difficulty proving he was the man who had raped and beaten Marion Gore. He was found sleeping exhausted in a corner of the hobo jungle at the side of the railroad tracks on the edge of the town. There was blood on his hands and hair under his fingernails. Police lab a.n.a.lysis confirmed that the blood type and follicles of hair matched those of Marion Gore.

Far from circ.u.mstantial, these facts merely verified the confession Daniel White made when arrested. He was not even granted the saving grace of having been drunk. He was surly, obscene and thoroughly pleased with what he had done. The fact that Marion Gore had been sixteen, a virgin, and had gone into a coma after making her way from the field where she had been attacked to the police station, seemed to make no impression on Daniel White.

The local papers tagged him-and they were conservative at best-a conscienceless beast. He was that. At least.

It was not unexpected, then, to find a growing wave of ma.s.s hatred in the town. A hatred that continually emerged in the words, "Lynch the b.a.s.t.a.r.d."

At first, the word black was not even inserted between the and b.a.s.t.a.r.d. It wasn't needed. It came later, when the concept of lynching gave way to a peculiar itch in the palms of many white hands. An itch that might well be scratched by a length of hemp rope.

It had to happen quickly, or it would not happen at all. The chief of police would call the mayor, the mayor would get in touch with the governor, and in a matter of hours the National Guard would truck in. So it had to happen quickly, or not at all.

And it was bound to happen. There was no doubt of that. There had been seeds planted-the school trouble, darkie rabble-rousers from New Jersey and Illinois down talking to the nigras in Littletown, that business at the Woolworth's counter-and now the crop was coming in.

Daniel White was safe behind bars, but outside, it was getting bad: ... the big-mouth crowd that hung out in Peerson's Bowling and Billiard Center caught Phil the clean-up boy, and badgered him into a fight. They took him out back and worked him over with three-foot lengths of bicycle chain; the diagnosis was double concussion and internal hemorrhaging.

... a caravan of heavies from the new development near the furniture factory motored down into Littletown and set fire to The Place, where thirty-five or forty of the town's more responsible Negro leaders had gathered for a few drinks and a discussion of what their position might be in this matter. Result: fifteen burned, and the bar scorched to the ground.

... Willa Ambrose, who washed and kept house for the Porters, was fired after a slight misunderstanding with Diane Porter; Willa had admitted to once taking in a movie with Daniel White.

... the Jesus Baptist Church was bombed the same night Daniel White made his confession. The remains of the building gave up evidence that the job had been done with homemade Molotov c.o.c.ktails and sticks of dynamite stolen from the road construction shed on the highway. Pastor Neville lost the use of his right eye: a flying spiked shard from the imported stained gla.s.s windows.

So the chief of police called the mayor, and the mayor called the governor, and the governor alerted his staff, and they discussed it, and decided to wait till morning to mobilize the National Guard (which was made up of Georgia boys who didn't much care for the idea of Daniel White, in any case). At best, ten hours.

A long, hot, dangerous ten hours.

Daniel White slept peacefully. He knew he wasn't going to be lynched. He also knew he was going to become a cause celebre and might easily get off with a light sentence, this being an election year, and the eyes of the world on his little central Georgia town.

After all, the NAACP hadn't even made an appearance yet. Daniel White slept peacefully.

He knew he didn't deserve to die for Marion Gore.

She hadn't really been a virgin.

The NAACP man's name was U. J. Peregrin and he was out of the Savannah office. He was tall, and exceedingly slim in his tailored Ivy suit. He was nut-brown and had deep-set eyes that seemed veiled like a cobra's. He spoke in a soft, cultivated voice totally free of drawl and slur. He had been born in Matawan, New Jersey, had attended college at the University of Chicago and had gone into social work out of a mixture of emotions. This a.s.signment had come to him chiefly because of his native familiarity with the sort of culture that sp.a.w.ned Daniel White-and a lynch mob.

He sat across from Henry Roblee (who had been picked by the terror-stricken Negro residents of that little central Georgia town as their spokesman) and conversed in three A.M. tones. Seven hours until the National Guard might come, seven hours in which anything might happen, seven hours that had forced the inhabitants of Littletown to douse their lights and crouch behind windows with 12-gauges ready.

"We've never had anything like this here," Henry Roblee admitted, his square face cut with worry. He rubbed his blocky hands over the moist gla.s.s. A thin film of whiskey colored the bottom of the gla.s.s. A bottle stood between them on the table.

Peregrin drew deeply on his cigarette and stared into Roblee's frightened eyes. "Mr. Roblee," he said softly, "you may never have had anything like this before, but you've certainly got it now, and the question is, 'What do we intend to do about it?' " He waited. Not so much for an answer as for a realization on the other man's part of just what the situation meant.

"It's not White we're worried about," Roblee added hastily. "That jail is strong enough, and I don't suppose the Chief is going to let them come by without doing something to stop them. It's what's happening all over town that's got us frightened. We never seen the people 'round here act this way. Why, they in a killing frame of mind!"

Peregrin nodded slowly.

"How is your pastor?" he asked.

Roblee shrugged. "He's gone be blind in the one eye, maybe both, but that's what I mean. That man was respected by everybody 'round here. They thought most highly of him. We got to protect ourselves."

"What do you propose?" Peregrin asked.

Roblee looked up from the empty gla.s.s suddenly. "What do we propose? Why, man, that's why we asked for help from the N-double A-CP. Don't you understand? Something terrible's gone happen in this town unless we decide what to do to stop it. Even the sensible folks 'round here are crazy mad with wanting to lynch that Daniel White."

"I can only make suggestions, that's my job. I can't tell you what to do."

Roblee fondled the gla.s.s, then filled it half full with uneven movements. He tipped it up and drank heavily. "What about if we just all moved on out for a few days?"

Peregrin shook his head.

Roblee looked away, said softly, ironically, "I didn't think so." He moved his tongue over his thick, moist lips. "Man, I am scared!"

Peregrin said, "Do you think the Chief would let me in to speak to White tonight?"

The other man shrugged. "You can try. Want me to give him a call?" Peregrin nodded agreement, and added, "Let me speak to him. The organization might carry a little weight."

It was decided, after the call, that Peregrin and Roblee would both go to see Daniel White. The chief of police advised them to come by way of the police emergency alley, where the chance of their being seen and stopped would be less.

In the cell block, Peregrin stood for several minutes watching Daniel White through the bars. He studied the face, the att.i.tude of relaxation, the clothing the man wore.

He mumbled something lightly. Roblee moved up next to him, asked, "What did you say?"

Peregrin repeated the words, only slightly louder, yet distinctly. "Sometimes I wonder if it's worth it. Sometimes I think there are too many fifth columnists."

Roblee shook his head without understanding what Peregrin had said.

"Should we talk to him?" the Georgia Negro said to the Ivy-tailored visitor.

Peregrin nodded resignedly. "Not much bother, but we might as well. We're here."

Roblee stepped up to the bars. He called in to Daniel White. The man woke suddenly, but without apprehension. He sat up on the striped tick mattress and looked at his two callers. He smiled, a gap-toothed grin that was at once charming, disarming, frightful and painful. "How there, y'all." He stood up and walked to the bars with a lazy, rolling strut.

"You the man from the N-double A-CP I bet," he ventured, the words twisted Georgia-style. Peregrin nodded.

"Glad t'meetcha. You gone to keep them sonofab.i.t.c.hes from hangin' my black a.s.s?" He continued to grin, a self-a.s.sured, c.o.c.ky grin that rankled Peregrin.

The tall Negro moved his face very close to the bars. "You think I should?"

Daniel White made a wry face. "Why, man, you and me is brothers. We the same, fellah. You can't let them string up no brother of yours. Got to show that d.a.m.n Mistuh Charlie we as good as him any day."

Peregrin's face momentarily wrenched with distaste. "Are we the same, White? You and me? You and Mr. Roblee here? Are we all the same?" He paused, and leaned his forehead against the bars.

"Perhaps we are, perhaps we are," he murmured.

Daniel White stared at him for some time, without speaking. But he grinned. Finally, "I gone beat this thing. Mister NAACP, you just wait an' see. I gone get outta this."

Peregrin raised his eyes slowly. "You don't even feel any remorse, do you?"

White stared at him uncomprehending. "Whatch'ou mean?" Peregrin's face raised to the ceiling, helplessly, as though drawn on invisible wires. "You really don't know, do you?" he said to himself.

Daniel White grunted and bared rotten teeth. "Listen to me, Mister NAACP you. I gone tell you somethin'. That little white b.i.t.c.h that Gore child, she a b.u.m from a long way back; Jim, I seen her in the woods with half a dozen boys from time on time. She not such a hot piece, I tell you that."

Peregrin turned to Roblee. "Let's go," he said, slowly. "We've done all we can here."

They moved back down the cell block; the empty cell block from which the three drunks and the vag had been removed when the first rumors of lynch had begun circulating.

Outside, it was not so quiet. There were mutterings from dark corners of the central Georgia town. Murmurings, unrests, fear, and rising voices.

In his cell, Daniel White returned to sleep. He knew what was going to happen. He had it locked. He was a poor darkie who was going to get all the benefits so long overdue his people.

The man from the NAACP would tend to all that ...

... even if he was a fruity-looking cat in a funny suit.

"What the h.e.l.l you mean, for the greater good? Are you crazy or something, Mister? You can't let that mob take him and lynch him?" Roblee's face was a mask of horror. "Are you crazy or what?"

Peregrin's forehead was a crisscross of weaving shadow, caught in the flickering light of the candle. They sat at the table once more, joined by five others, all hidden in the gray and black of the room. The shades were drawn, and behind the shades, curtains had been pulled. And they sat staring at the man from the NAACP, Peregrin, who had just told them, without preamble, that they must not only let the whites lynch Daniel White, but they must do everything in their power to aid the act.

"Say, listen, Mister Peregrin, I think you out of your mind. That's murder, man!" The speaker was a stout, balding man with coffee-color skin and a wart at the side of his wide nose.

"Just what do you mean 'For the greater good'?" Roblee sank a hand heavily on Peregrin's sleeve. Peregrin continued to sit silently, having said what he felt he must say.

Roblee shook him. "Dammit, fellah, you gone answer me! What'd you mean by that?"

Peregrin looked up at them, then. His eyes caught the candlelight and threw it back in two bright lines. His face was shattered; there was conflict and fear and desperation in it. But a determination. "All right," he said, finally.

They stared at him as he dry-washed his cheekbones and temples with moist hands. "Daniel White is sleeping up in that jail, and he doesn't care what happens to any of you. He had his fun, and now he wants to capitalize on all the work we've done for so long, to escape punishment. He's banking on everyone making such a hue and cry that no one will dare hurt the poor n.i.g.g.e.r being taken advantage of, down in rotten Georgia."