Native Son Part 3

"Oh, if it's about the n.i.g.g.e.rs, I'll be right there, Mr. President," Gus said.

They hung up imaginary receivers and leaned against the wall and laughed. A street car rattled by. Bigger sighed and swore.

"G.o.ddammit!"

"What's the matter?"

"They don't let us do nothing nothing."

"Who?"

"The white white folks." folks."

"You talk like you just now finding that out," Gus said.

"Naw. But I just can't get used to it," Bigger said. "I swear to G.o.d I can't. I know I oughtn't think about it, but I can't help it. Every time I think about it I feel like somebody's poking a red-hot iron down my throat. G.o.ddammit, look! We live here and they live there. We black and they white. They got things and we ain't. They do things and we can't. It's just like living in jail. Half the time I feel like I'm on the outside of the world peeping in through a knothole in the fence...."

"Aw, ain't no use feeling that way about it. It don't help none," Gus said.

"You know one thing?" Bigger said.

"What?"

"Sometimes I feel like something awful's going to happen to me," Bigger spoke with a tinge of bitter pride in his voice.

"What you mean?" Gus asked, looking at him quickly. There was fear in Gus's eyes.

"I don't know. I just feel that way. Every time I get to thinking about me being black and they being white, me being here and they being there, I feel like something awful's going to happen to me...."

"Aw, for Chrissakes! There ain't nothing you can do about it. How come you want to worry yourself? You black and they make the laws...."

"Why they make us live in one corner of the city? Why don't they let us fly planes and run ships...."

Gus hunched Bigger with his elbow and mumbled good-naturedly, "Aw, n.i.g.g.e.r, quit thinking about it. You'll go nuts."

The plane was gone from the sky and the white plumes of floating smoke were thinly spread, vanishing. Because he was restless and had time on his hands, Bigger yawned again and hoisted his arms high above his head.

"Nothing ever happens," he complained.

"What you want to happen?"

"Anything," Bigger said with a wide sweep of his dingy palm, a sweep that included all the possible activities of the world.

Then their eyes were riveted; a slate-colored pigeon swooped down to the middle of the steel car tracks and began strutting to and fro with ruffled feathers, its fat neck bobbing with regal pride. A street car rumbled forward and the pigeon rose swiftly through the air on wings stretched so taut and sheer that Bigger could see the gold of the sun through their translucent tips. He tilted his head and watched the slate-colored bird flap and wheel out of sight over the edge of a high roof.

"Now, if I could only do that," Bigger said.

Gus laughed.

"n.i.g.g.e.r, you nuts."

"I reckon we the only things in this city that can't go where we want to go and do what we want to do."

"Don't think about it," Gus said.

"I can't help it."

"That's why you feeling like something awful's going to happen to you," Gus said. "You think too much."

"What in h.e.l.l can a man do?" Bigger asked, turning to Gus.

"Get drunk and sleep it off."

"I can't. I'm broke."

Bigger crushed his cigarette and took out another one and offered the package to Gus. They continued smoking. A huge truck swept past, lifting sc.r.a.ps of white paper into the sunshine; the bits settled down slowly.

"Gus?"

"Hunh?"

"You know where the white folks live?"

"Yeah," Gus said, pointing eastward. "Over across the 'line'; over there on Cottage Grove Avenue."

"Naw; they don't," Bigger said.

"What you mean?" Gus asked, puzzled. "Then, where do they live?"

Bigger doubled his fist and struck his solar plexus.

"Right down here in my stomach," he said.

Gus looked at Bigger searchingly, then away, as though ashamed.

"Yeah; I know what you mean," he whispered.

"Every time I think of 'em, I feel feel 'em," Bigger said. 'em," Bigger said.

"Yeah; and in your chest and throat, too," Gus said.

"It's like fire."

"And sometimes you can't hardly breathe...."

Bigger's eyes were wide and placid, gazing into s.p.a.ce.

"That's when I feel like something awful's going to happen to me...." Bigger paused, narrowed his eyes. "Naw; it ain't like something going to happen to me. It's.... It's like I was going to do something I can't help...."

"Yeah!" Gus said with uneasy eagerness. His eyes were full of a look compounded of fear and admiration for Bigger. "Yeah; I know what you mean. It's like you going to fall and don't know where you going to land...."

Gus's voice trailed off. The sun slid behind a big white cloud and the street was plunged in cool shadow; quickly the sun edged forth again and it was bright and warm once more. A long sleek black car, its fenders glinting like gla.s.s in the sun, shot past them at high speed and turned a corner a few blocks away. Bigger pursed his lips and sang: "Zoooooooooom!"

"They got everything," Gus said.

"They own the world," Bigger said.

"Aw, what the h.e.l.l," Gus said. "Let's go in the poolroom."

"O.K."

They walked toward the door of the poolroom.

"Say, you taking that job you told us about?" Gus asked.

"I don't know."

"You talk like you don't want it."

"Oh, h.e.l.l, yes! I want the job," Bigger said.

They looked at each other and laughed. They went inside. The poolroom was empty, save for a fat, black man who held a half smoked, unlit cigar in his mouth and leaned on the front counter. To the rear burned a single green-shaded bulb.

"Hi, Doc," Bigger said.

"You boys kinda early this morning," Doc said.

"Jack or G.H. around yet?" Bigger asked.

"Naw," Doc said.

"Let's shoot a game," Gus said.

"I'm broke," Bigger said.

"I got some money."

"Switch on the light. The b.a.l.l.s are racked," Doc said.

Bigger turned on the light. They lagged for first shot. Bigger won. They started playing. Bigger's shots were poor; he was thinking of Blum's, fascinated with the idea of the robbery, and a little afraid of it.

"Remember what we talked about so much?" Bigger asked in a flat, neutral tone.

"Naw."

"Old Blum."

"Oh," Gus said. "We ain't talked about that for a month. How come you think of it all of a sudden?"

"Let's clean the place out."

"I don't know."

"It was your plan from the start," Bigger said.

Gus straightened and stared at Bigger, then at Doc who was looking out of the front window.

"You going to tell Doc? Can't you never learn to talk low?"

"Aw, I was just asking you, do you want to try it?"

"Naw."

"How come? You scared 'cause he's a white man?"

"Naw. But Blum keeps a gun. Suppose he beats us to it?"

"Aw, you scared; that's all. He's a white man and you scared."

"The h.e.l.l I'm scared," Gus, hurt and stung, defended himself.

Bigger went to Gus and placed an arm about his shoulders.

"Listen, you won't have to go in. You just stand at the door and keep watch, see? Me and Jack and G.H.'ll go in. If anybody comes along, you whistle and we'll go out the back way. That's all."

The front door opened; they stopped talking and turned their heads.

"Here comes Jack and G.H. now," Bigger said.

Jack and G.H. walked to the rear of the poolroom.

"What you guys doing?" Jack asked.

"Shooting a game. Wanna play?" Bigger asked.

"You asking 'em to play and I'm paying for the game," Gus said.

They all laughed and Bigger laughed with them but stopped quickly. He felt that the joke was on him and he took a seat alongside the wall and propped his feet upon the rungs of a chair, as though he had not heard. Gus and G.H. kept on laughing.

"You n.i.g.g.e.rs is crazy," Bigger said. "You laugh like monkeys and you ain't got nerve enough to do nothing but talk."

"What you mean?" G.H. asked.

"I got a haul all figured out," Bigger said.

"What haul?"

"Old Blum's."