Invisible man - Ralph Ellison [107]
"Leave us alone," she cried, "leave us alone!" as the men pulled their heads out of range and sat her down abruptly at the curb, hurrying back into the building.
What on earth, I thought, looking about me. What on earth? The old woman sobbed, pointing to the stuff piled along the curb. "Just look what they doing to us. Just look," looking straight at me. And I realized that what I'd taken for junk was actually worn household furnishings.
"Just look at what they doing," she said, her teary eyes upon my face.
I looked away embarrassed, staring into the rapidly growing crowd. Faces were peering sullenly from the windows above. And now as the two men reappeared at the top of the steps carrying a battered chest of drawers, I saw a third man come out and stand behind them, pulling at his ear as he looked out over the crowd.
"Shake it up, you fellows," he said, "shake it up. We don't have all day."
Then the men came down with the chest and I saw the crowd give way sullenly, the men trudging through, grunting and putting the chest at the curb, then returning into the building without a glance to left or right.
"Look at that," a slender man near me said. "We ought to beat the hell out of those paddies!"
I looked silently into his face, taut and ashy in the cold, his eyes trained upon the men going up the steps.
"Sho, we ought to stop 'em," another man said, "but ain't that much nerve in the whole bunch."
"There's plenty nerve," the slender man said. "All they need is someone to set it off. All they need is a leader. You mean you don't have the nerve."
"Who me?" the man said. "Who me?"
"Yes, you."
"Just look," the old woman said, "just look," her face still turned toward mine. I turned away, edging closer to the two men.
"Who are those men?" I said, edging closer.
"Marshals or something. I don't give a damn who they is."
"Marshals, hell," another man said. "Those guys doing all the toting ain't nothing but trusties. Soon as they get through they'll lock 'em up again."
"I don't care who they are, they got no business putting these old folks out on the sidewalk."
"You mean they're putting them out of their apartment?" I said. "They can do that up here?"
"Man, where you from?" he said, swinging toward me.
"What does it look like they puttin' them out of, a Pullman car? They being evicted!"
I was embarrassed; others were turning to stare. I had never seen an eviction. Someone snickered.
"Where did he come from?"
A flash of heat went over me and J turned. "Look, friends," I said, hearing a hot edge coming into my voice. "I asked a civil question. If you don't care to answer, don't, but don't try to make me look ridiculous."
"Ridiculous? Hell, all scobos is ridiculous. Who the hell is you?"
"Never mind, I am who I am. Just don't beat up your gums at me," I said, throwing him a newly acquired phrase.
Just then one of the men came down the steps with an armful of articles, and I saw the old woman reach up, yelling, "Take your hands off my Bible!" And the crowd surged forward.
The white man's hot eyes swept the crowd. "Where, lady?" he said. "I don't see any Bible."
And I saw her snatch the Book from his arms, clutching it fiercely and sending forth a shriek. "They can come in your home and do what they want to you," she said. "Just come stomping in and jerk your life up by the roots! But this here's the last straw. They ain't going to bother with my Bible!"
The white man eyed the crowd. "Look, lady," he said, more to the rest of us than to her, "I don't want to do this, I have to do it. They sent me up here to do it. If it was left to me, you could stay here