The Heart is a Lonely Hunter - Carson McCullers [127]
9
JAKE AND SINGER waited on the front porch. When they pushed the doorbell there was no sound of a ring in the darkened house. Jake knocked impatiently and pressed his nose against the screen door. Beside him Singer stood wooden and smiling, with two spots of color on his cheeks, for they had drunk a bottle of gin together. The evening was quiet and dark. Jake watched a yellow light shaft softly through the hall. And Portia opened the door for them.
‘I certainly trust you not been waiting long. So many folks been coming that us thought it wise to unlatch the bell. You gentlemens just let me take you hats--Father been mighty sick.’
Jake tiptoed heavily behind Singer down the bare, narrow hall.
At the threshold of the kitchen he stopped short The room was crowded and hot. A fire burned in the small wood stove and the windows were closed tight. Smoke mingled with a certain Negro smell. The glow from the stove was the only light in the room. The dark voices he had heard back in the hall were silent.
‘These here are two white gentlemens come to inquire about Father,’ Portia said. ‘I think maybe he be able to see you but I better go on in first and prepare him.’
Jake fingered his thick lower lip. On the end of his nose there was a latticed impression from the front screen door. ‘That’s not it,’ he said. ‘I come to talk with your brother.’
The Negroes in the room were standing. Singer motioned to them to be seated again. Two grizzled old men sat down on a bench by the stove. A loose-limbed mulatto lounged against the window. On a camp cot in a corner was a boy without legs whose trousers were folded and pinned beneath his stumpy thighs. ‘Good evening,’ Jake said awkwardly. ‘Your name Copeland? ‘ The boy put his hands over the stumps of his legs and shrank back close to the wall. ‘My name Willie.’
‘Honey, don’t you worry none,’ said Portia. ‘This here is Mr. Singer that you heard Father speak about. And this other white gentleman is Mr. Blount and he a very close friend of Mr. Singer. They just kindly come to inquire about us in our trouble.’ She turned to Jake and motioned to the three other people in the room. This other boy leaning on the window is my brother too. Named Buddy. And these here over by the stove is two dear friends of my Father. Named Mr. Marshall Nicolls and Mr. John Roberts. I think it a good idea to understand who all is in a room with you. ‘Thanks,’ Jake said. He turned to Willie again. ‘I just want you to tell me about it so I can get it straight in my mind.’
‘This the way it is,’ Willie said. ‘I feel like my feets is still hurting. I got this here terrible misery down in my toes. Yet the hurt in my feets is down where my feets should be if they were on my l-l-legs. And not where my feets is now. It a hard thing to understand. My feets hurt me so bad all the time and I don’t know where they is. They never given them back to me. They s-somewhere more than a hundred m-miles from here.’
‘I mean about how it all happened,’ Jake said. Uneasily Willie looked up at his sister. ‘I don’t remember very good.’
‘Course you remember, Honey. You done already told us over and over.’
‘Well--’ The boy’s voice was timid and sullen. Us were all out on the road and this here Buster say something to the guard. The w-white man taken a stick to him. Then this other boy he tries to run off. And I follow him. It all come about so quick I don’t remember good just how it were. Then they taken us back to the camp and--‘ ‘I know the rest,’ Jake said. ‘But give me the names and addresses of the other two boys. And tell me the names of the guards.’
‘Listen here, white man. It seem to me like you meaning to get me into trouble.’
‘Trouble!’ Jake said rudely. ‘What in the name of Christ do you think you’re in now?’
‘Less us quiet down,’ Portia said nervously. ‘This here the way it is, Mr. Blount. They done let Willie off at the camp before his time were served. But they done also impressed it on him