Standing at the Scratch Line (102 page)

Failing to elicit a response from his mother, LaValle said, “He wants to humiliate me. He just wants to rub my face in what he didn’t give me! There was no party like this when my son was born two years ago! Why does everything go to Jack?”

“I think your actions have some bearing—”

“Okay! Okay, that may be true now, but I remember he treated us differently from the time we were children! I was just thinking about it last night. He and Jack used to go hunting and fishing all the time, but I was never invited! Jack was allowed to play with the hunting dogs, but I wasn’t! Jack was the only one ever invited to go down to Mexico! Jack used to go with him everywhere, but I had to stay with you! Why is that? Why did he treat us differently? Why, Mama?”

Serena did not respond. What could she say? What good would it do now to tell LaValle that it had been her decision that he stay by her side, not King’s. King had asked to take LaValle with him and Jack countless times, but always she had refused, fearing that LaValle would be subject to pressures and demands that he could not meet. She never trusted King to treat LaValle with fairness. So eventually, over the years, King had stopped asking and LaValle had been left solely in her charge.

She looked across at her son. Even with the discoloration and swelling, anyone could see that he was a handsome specimen of a man, even-featured, smooth light-brown skin and a dazzling smile when he chose to show it. She saw his lip tremble and realized that he was on the verge of crying. “Pull yourself together, LaValle! You don’t want to break down here!”

“Look at me, Mama! I’m living in hell! I’m a member of one of the most powerful colored families in San Francisco, yet everywhere I go I’m the laughingstock!” Tears started to collect in the corners of LaValle’s eyes. “Maybe I’m not much of a man now, maybe I’m weak, but I was born with everything that Jack has! If Papa had taken me under his wing like he did Jack, he could’ve taught me to be strong! He could’ve helped me be more than I am! It was like that time he took us to that boxing gym; when I came home with a black eye, I couldn’t go back! Jack came home with a lot worse than that, but he was allowed to stay in the program and he learned to box! It’s a story that’s repeated over and over throughout my life! Why didn’t he have faith in me? Why didn’t he take the time with me like he did with Jack, Mama?”

Serena sat still as if she had been impaled to her chair. LaValle was complaining about her decisions, not King’s. An overwhelming sadness settled upon her. She felt the tears welling up from deep within, but with an iron will she forced the tears back down. She was emotionally drained and exhausted, yet she would not give in to self-pity. She straightened her back and tilted her head up so that her jaw was high. She was strong enough to handle whatever life dealt out.

Serena saw that the tears were now streaming down LaValle’s face and he made no effort to wipe them away. “Stop that!” she ordered with an edge in her voice. She was impatient with his lack of control. “You’re in a public place! Act like a man!”

“Act like a man!” LaValle chuckled humorlessly. “That’s the biggest problem in my life! Act like a man! You don’t know how hard that is for me! That’s the battle I fight every day! You need to be taught how to be a man, Mama! It doesn’t just come to you automatically! There’s more to it than that! I don’t know what it is, but I know that Jack learned it and I didn’t!”

“That’s absurd!” Serena protested. “You know everything that Jack knows! You’re both sons of King Tremain! What more do you need?”

“Okay, Mama,” LaValle answered with a dismissive wave of his hand, as if making her understand what he was truly saying was beyond her ability. There were several seconds of silence and then LaValle began to speak again. “You know, Mama, I asked Papa if I was his son on the way home last night. You know what he told me? Everything has to be earned! I have to change my actions if I want him to call me his son! In all that talk, he never answered my question directly! I wonder if Jack ever had to earn it?” LaValle shuddered as the tears took over.

Serena stood up. She couldn’t take anymore. The weight was too much. “Of course, you’re his son! Now, stop crying! Stop it!” she hissed. “Do whatever you have to do, but stop it! Remember that this is Jack’s day! Think of somebody other than yourself!”

LaValle gave her a look filled with resentment and stood up. “It’s always Jack’s day!” he muttered before he turned away and ran down the stairs.

Serena watched as LaValle descended the staircase and walked out the ornate front door of the hotel. She took a deep breath and then checked her makeup in her powder-case mirror. Everything was still in order. She turned and went down the stairs slowly, as if she were royalty, but inside she felt as if a bomb had been detonated in her soul and everything of value had been destroyed.

Serena saw several reporters from the colored papers standing in the lobby by the entrance to the ballroom. Though she was intent on returning to the party, she felt she still needed a few moments to gather herself. She didn’t feel up to talking with any reporters, so she went through a service entrance into the catering hall, which lay between the kitchen and the various dining areas. She saw a group of men standing around King. She recognized Fred Witherspoon, Reverend Goodlett, the union man from West Oakland, and Rosetta Hughes’s husband, Maurice. There was a fifth man she didn’t recognize. Before she could turn around and leave, Fred saw her and beckoned her over. As she walked toward the group, she heard guffaws of laughter.

Fred raised his glass in Serena’s direction and said, “To the hostess with the mostest! This is one hell of a party!” There was a chorus of voices in support.

Maurice nodded his head in agreement. “You’ll have to tell my wife where you got this caterer. The food was just fabulous!”

Serena answered, “You have to ask my husband. It’s a friend of his. He brought him in from New York!”

“You brought a caterer in from New York?” Reverend Goodlett exclaimed. “You Tremains go all out when you throw a party!”

King said, “He may be movin’ his business out to the Bannaker and if he does, he’ll take over the kitchen and buy out one of my partners in the hotel!”

“I didn’t know you owned part of this hotel!” Fred Witherspoon said with surprise.

“Forty percent. I paid for the renovation of the place!”

“You’ve got all sorts of business deals going,” Maurice observed, rubbing his jaw thoughtfully.

“Gentlemen! Gentlemen! We forget ourselves,” Reverend Goodlett declared. “Mrs. Tremain obviously came in here to talk with her husband. We should be sensitive to their needs!”

“No! No!” protested Serena. “You don’t have to go!”

“That’s alright, Mrs. Tremain,” the man from West Oakland said. “I think we’ve talked enough business and probably should get back to our wives.”

“Wydenia’s probably looking for me right now!” Fred declared.

“Emmm,” grunted Maurice. “Rosetta is going to accuse me of abandoning her! You know she didn’t want to come, but I know tomorrow she’ll be happy to tell her friends she was here! This was a fine party! And what a great idea it was to have everyone dress in white. It made everything extra classy!”

“Best christening party I’ve ever been to,” Reverend Goodlett said with a nod as he led the way out.

“No doubt about it!” Fred agreed. “Did you see those reporters out in the lobby? This will certainly be a major article in the colored papers tomorrow!” Fred waved to Serena as he followed the reverend.

“My wife will be talking about this party for weeks!” Maurice declared as he slipped a business card in King’s hand. “I’ll call you next week about that idea!” King nodded in response.

The men began to file out until the fifth man, the one she did not know, stopped in front of Serena. He was a short, well-built man in his early thirties dressed in very dapper white clothes. His skin was a rich, luminescent caramel and there was considerable vitality in his smile. He turned to King. “You haven’t introduced me to the missus yet, King. I know I ain’t no businessman, but I’s still respectable.”

“I’m sorry, Henry! I thought you had met my wife, Serena Tremain! Serena, this is Henry Armstrong, one of the greatest boxers in the world pound for pound! He’s a champion in three different weight classes!”

“How do you do, Mr. Armstrong,” Serena said, shaking his hand.

“Seems pretty clear, it ain’t as good as King’s doin’ if’en he got a pretty wife like you! You’ll pardon me, ma’am, but King must’ve married you right out of the cradle, if’en you got a big old hardhead boy like Jack.”

“Thank you for the compliment, Mr. Armstrong. You know our youngest son?”

“Jack and me is like fingers in a fist. I was best man at his wedding. We started hangin’ around together at the hunting parties King gives twice a year. I think we got to be real good friends the year that Big Ed Harrison organized the trip to Alaska and Jack came home on leave from the service to join us. That was back in 1940 maybe.”

“I had no idea you knew Jack that well,” Serena said with a polite smile.

“And I’m proud to know him too! Anyway, I think I best get back to my girl. I been in here shootin’ the breeze with the men too long! It was nice meetin’ you, Mrs. Tremain. You sure do know how to throw a party!” He clapped King on the arm and went out into the main ballroom. Serena and King were alone in the catering hall.

Serena exhaled and leaned back against a heavy wooden table. During the celebration she had noticed the warm familiarity with which King’s older friends interacted with Jack and how well the sons of all the men got along with each other. She had wondered about it, but with all the pressures of coordinating an event her mind was occupied with other things. Armstrong’s words had given her a brief glimpse of the world LaValle had never known and she realized that he had missed something valuable.

“You gave a great party,” King declared, lighting a cheroot.

Serena looked at him. He seemed to be the picture of the ideal happy and proud grandfather. In fact, he looked like a man riding the wave of success. King’s well-being caused a surge of resentment within her, but she suppressed her feelings of ill will and answered tonelessly, “That was the contract. I fulfilled my responsibility.”

King studied her a moment before he spoke. He flicked the ash off his cheroot into an ashtray. “You ain’t fulfilled the whole contract yet. You still obliged to carry out the rest of yo’ bargain! This party is just another shindig in a line of shindigs. In two weeks it won’t be remembered by anyone but them social butterflies. But my grandson, if he should ever need yo’ help in any way, you best be johnny-on-the-spot! And if the worst should happen, you’ll take him to home and raise him in yo’ house! That’s the most important part of the contract. That’s the reason I had you sign in blood! That’s the only reason LaValle is walkin’ around now!”

The smile of superiority on King’s face infuriated Serena. Her world was in shambles while he acted as if he was on top of the world, like the birth of this child meant something. She had seen the baby. It looked just like she imagined Elroy must’ve looked like when he was a baby. It looked like King. Whatever genetic contribution Eartha made was not visible. The boy was a Tremain. He had King’s stamp on him. It looked like Jack had just been a conduit for his father. Serena could see nothing of herself in the baby’s brown body. Somewhere Mamie was laughing, laughing, laughing. King interrupted her reverie with his own, coarse chuckle.

“Looks like you steamin’ ’bout to pop,” he said, the smile spreading across his face.

Serena couldn’t take it anymore. “Sometimes I hate you almost as much as I hated my father!”

“If you still hate yo’ father, then you must hate yo’self!”

“What are you talking about?”

“You done become Charles Baddeaux! He’s alive in you! You got the same size heart he had. His blood run pure in you!”

“How dare you! I’m nothing like my father! We are worlds apart!”

“Oh yeah? You used to say you hated him because he would lie ’bout important things. That’s you to a tee! You lie about important things, don’t you?” King began to pace as he spoke. “You used to say you hated him ’cause he was small, mean, and stingy; he wasn’t generous! That’s you! You didn’t think there was enough for LaValle if you let Elroy in. It didn’t matter that he was my son. You made a small, mean, and stingy decision when you left him in that orphanage!” King turned and pointed to her. “You said you hated yo’ father ’cause he was ignorant! That’s you! Like a piece of discount furniture, you got the veneer of learning, but underneath you’s cheap pine! You’s still an ignorant farm girl! You’s still runnin’ the same high-yellow bullshit game you was when you was eighteen, like color should mean somethin’! You ain’t learned that color is only important to fools who done bought into the race game, people who think yo’ color should determine yo’ privilege. The white man is laughin’ ’cause he got us fightin’ amongst ourselves.”

“I’m no ignorant farm girl!” Serena protested. “I run a real estate development firm! I move in the very best of social—”

“Usin’ my money!” King exhaled the smoke of his cheroot. “Still, I’ll admit you’s pretty good when it comes to buyin’ and sellin’ property, but that ain’t important in the long term! The problem is you ain’t learned nothin’ ’bout investin’ in people! You ain’t learned nothin’ ’bout earnin’ respect and loyalty. You ain’t about givin’! You into takin’ just like yo’ father!”

“That’s not true! That’s not true! I donate time and money to a lot of charitable organizations!”

“ ’Cause you into social climbin’!” King scoffed. “The only time you’s generous is when there’s a purpose behind it.”

Serena said nothing. She merely shook her head. She didn’t have the strength to continue. The events of the last few hours had robbed her of her zeal to argue further.

King walked over and stood in front of her. “The surest sign that you done turned into yo’ father is the mood in yo’ house. It’s dark and cold, just like the way he used to keep it. Ain’t no laughter or joy in yo’ house!”

Jack walked through the swinging door. “Mama! Papa! The baby’s awake now. We’d like to introduce him to the guests. Aunt Leah, Uncle Rico, and Captain Garrity have all asked to see him!”