Such Sweet Thunder (11 page)

He says that every time! — watching the crawdads scramble more confusedly than ever, their black beady eyes glistening on the outsides of their heads like miniature stars. It looked like they had been snowed on.

Mrs. Derby came out of the kitchen carrying a No. 2 tub, a little smaller than the No. 3. She placed it beside the other one and without a word went back into the kitchen. Then there was the sound of a rush of water beating against the bottom of a tin bucket from within the kitchen, and of water splashing against water, and of the pipe moaning just before she turned off the tap. Then came another bucket and the same medley of sounds, after which she immediately appeared on the porch with two buckets full of water, which she poured into the No. 2 tub. She patiently repeated this process four times, until the tub was full. Then she returned to the kitchen and did not return for a while.

She’s making the fire. Mr. Derby bit off a plug of his Brown Mule chewing tobacco, which he had withdrawn from his left jumper pocket. The plug made a bulge in his jaw. He put the rest of the plug back into his pocket and set to work, pulling out the entrails of the crawdads.

“You have to git hold a that middle tail fin an’ yank it out clean, ’Mereego,” he said. “The entr’l is connected to that. Like the bowels in humans.”

Mrs. Derby stepped back out onto the porch, carrying the seat of an old wooden chair that had a broken back.

“You kin come down an’ help, if you wanna, ’Mer’go,” she said, looking up with a warm smile, unconsciously cleaning the cracks between her teeth with the chewed end of a match, which she wielded with her free hand. She put the chair down and continued looking up at him, shading her blue eye with the palm of her stool hand, placing the matchstick hand on her generous hip.

He looked through the screen door in order to read the answer on his mother’s face, but she was already out on the porch leaning over the banister before he could utter the question, much less decipher the answer. Standing upon the clean spot upon which the cat had died she was saying: “This mister don’ deserve no kind treatment today, Mrs. Derby, not after the boner
he
’s pulled.” He heard the words but he didn’t really understand them because he was busy framing his question: “Mom, Mrs. Derby says kin I come down an’ help clean the crawdads?” But before he could hear his own thoughts articulated into words the screen door had swung open and Viola had stepped out onto the porch and was leaning over the banister, her feet planted on the spot.
Boom!

“This mister don’ deserve no …” But that was a long time ago, he suddenly realized now, noticing that the sun was deeper, redder, and
that a cool breeze rippled through the shade that drenched the porch!
A searing pain shot through his hand and bared the bone of his knuckle. He put the kitten down
.

“Good evenin’, Mister Derby,” she was saying. “Why looka there! You sure caught a heap a good ’uns taday! You gonna have some for us?”

“A course!” said Mrs. Derby, “I’ll bring you up some myself— just as soon as they git done.” Mr. Derby nodded assent, still bent upon his work.

“What my boy do, Mrs. Jones?” asked Mrs. Derby.

“This smart young man,” He listened with interest, as though she were talking about somebody else, noticing that a deep amber ray of sunlight cut Mrs. Derby’s face into two parts, reflecting fiery points of light within the pupil of her blue eye on the sunny side and casting her brown eye in shade, while her short, neatly combed, kinky hair blazed in fine filaments of rainbow-colored light:

“This smart young man went traipsin’ off into the alley — bare-footed! After me workin’ like I don’ know what to buy ’im shoes an’ things, an’ him with that bad little Sammy Hilton an’ his bunch. He let ’um talk ’im into goin’
all the way downtown!
To
the soup line!
I
know
he didn’ think that up hisself, but he’s gotta learn to do what me an’ his daddy tell ’im, else it’s gonna be too bad, Jim! Imagine how I felt when I come home an’ find out that he’s been in the
soup line?
People think we ain’ feedin’ ’im!”

“Naw!”
cried Mrs. Derby, “my boy ain’ been in no
soup line!
Why, I don’ believe it! ’Mer’go ain’ just no ord’nary boy. Just look at that head! An’ them big bright eyes a his’n. Honest to goodness! Sometimes that child kin look plumb through you. He never coulda done a thing like that all by hisself. Why, when I saw ’im this mornin’ he was playin’ as pretty as you please.”

“Yes’m, I know, he’s a good boy. I ain’ braggin’ just ’cause he’s mine, but ain’ a child in this alley as well mannered or as well spoke of as he is, but he’s gotta learn not to let the other boys lead ’im astray!”

“You sho’ said that right! You gotta make ’um walk the chalk line ’cause Lord knows it’s hard enough to bring ’um up an’ have to go out an’ work for the white folks every day. The way folks is fightin’ an’ a-killin’ each other nowadays, ain’ no tellin’ what’ll happen next. Did you hear ’bout what happened down on the avenue today?”

“Ask
him
,” pointing at Amerigo.
“He saw it!”
lowering her voice discreetly, covering her mouth with the palm of her hand.

“Naw!”

Mr. Derby looked up from his work. His eyes were also blue but of a darker shade than Mrs. Derby’s. The whites were rusty while hers were clear. He looked curiously at the little square patch of mustache under his pointed nose. It wiggled up and down as he munched his tobacco. He threw back his head and spat out a long brown stream of tobacco juice that landed on the sewer grate.

“Yeah,” his mother was saying, “him an’ that little bunch a ragamuffins was right in the middle of the whole thing! My heart, I’m tellin’ you, almost jumped out a my mouth when I heard about it.”

“How did you find out?”

“Mr. Gol’berg told me. John Henry told him.…”

“Boy, you hadn’ oughtta be scairin’ your momma like that!” said Mrs. Derby. “I
heard
all that commotion up there but I didn’ know what in the world he was gittin’ a spankin’ about. What’s his daddy gonna say?”

“I guess he’s had enough whippin’ for one day, but he’s sure gonna git a good lacin’ down, all right!”

Just then Mrs. Crippa came out on the back porch and descended the steps with her wine pitcher. They all watched her with a suspicious silence.

“Good evening!” she said with a grunt, as she heavily ascended the cellar steps and started the short climb to her porch. She set the pitcher on the windowsill and went once more to the cellar, this time returning with a long red water hose.

“Good evenin’,” said Viola with a faint smile.

“Evenin’,” said Mrs. Derby.

Mr. Derby worked silently without looking up. He skillfully pulled the middle fins from the tails of the crawdads, threw the long grayish entrail tracts into a can and the freshly cleaned crawdads into the No. 2 tub.

“Well,” said Viola, throwing a significant glance at Mrs. Crippa, “I guess I’d better git back in the kitchen an’ git that man’s grub on the table. It just don’ do for ’im to come home from work — all hot an’ tired
an’
evil — an’ supper ain’ ready!”

“If you think your man’s bad ’bout that, this’n heah’s
worse!
Sometimes I think men ain’ nothin’ but stomachs, an’ you know what I mean!”

Viola went back into the kitchen and the Derbys continued their task together, while Mrs. Crippa hooked up the water hose, turned on the water, and screwed the nozzle until the water came out in a fine spray.
It sparkled in the sunlight that caught the edge of the garden, arched high in the early-blue evening air, and descended upon the thriving rows of green things that sprang up from the rich black earth.

I’m going to have a garden when I grow up and water it every day. With tomatoes and radishes and onions and … His thoughts trailed off into the little river of muddy water between the rows of vegetables, down over the concrete wall in front of Mr. Derby’s porch, and into the drain, disturbing the quiet of a little swarm of blue flies.

The pleasant smell of fish frying, sizzling in the frying pan, came from the kitchen. Mr. Derby, having finished the crawdads, poured off the dirty salt water and threw the entrails in the garbage can. Then he swished them around in clean water, poured that off and added fresh, until they shone clear. They no longer scrambled over each other, clawing and scratching. They lay clean and still and dead.

Meanwhile Mrs. Derby had gone into the kitchen to attend to her boiling pots and to prepare the seasoning. Mrs. Crippa had finished watering the garden and was propping the hose between the prongs of a tall forked stick, leaving the water to flow by itself. She dried her hands on her apron and wiped the wisps of silvery hair from her face, taking the pitcher of wine from the sill on her way into the kitchen. Several minutes later she appeared on the porch with a torn paper sack containing cucumber peelings. Lifting the lid of the garbage can, she smiled up at him and said:

“Ah, To-ny-eh! You beena a badda badda boy? You beata yo’ momma? Tisch! tisch! tisch!” sucking the spittle between her teeth and smiling until her nose wrinkled and the cat’s paws around her eyes deepened into fragments of humor throughout the lower part of her face like cracks in a piece of shattered glass.

He looked at the kitchen door. Rutherford stood behind the screen, looking at him. Sunlight broke across the toe of his right shoe and painted it red. He shifted his weight and the foot disappeared while his outline remained barely visible behind the screen.

He heard Bra Mo’s truck in the alley.

“What you say, boy?” said Rutherford.

The door swung open and the torn screen flapped quietly, dangerously, as Rutherford stepped out onto the porch, propping the door open with his left foot while he reached into the kitchen and lifted two large suitcases onto the porch.

He’s goin’ away!

His face turned ashy and his lips quivered.

“What’s the matter with you, boy?” Rutherford asked, setting the suitcases against the wall.

“Nothin’.”

“Oh, it’s
somethin’
, all right!” cried Viola from within the kitchen. “Ask ’im what happened to his foot! Ask ’im where he’s been taday!” She stepped to the door, her face between his and the light.

“Move over there, son, an’ let your daddy set down.”

He moved over onto the few inches of hearthstone that protruded between the screen door and fixed his gaze upon the boards of the porch. A fly perched upon the crust of blood that filtered through the gauze wrapped around his toe.

“What happened to your foot? Where you been taday? Your momma told me to ask you.”

“In the alley.”

“But how did you git in the alley when you was in the yard?”

He shrugged his shoulders.

“What happened to your foot?”

“Stubbed it on a rock.”

“Where?”

“In the alley.”

“Ain’t you got no shoes? What happened to your shoes?”

He shrugged his shoulders.

“What you say? I can’t hear you.”

“Nothin’.”

“Your momma told me to ask you where you been!”

“It ain’ funny, Rutherford!” said Viola angrily.

“I know it ain’!” fixing her with a meaningful glance. She diverted her attention to Amerigo.

“Where you been, son?” he asked mockingly.

“Down on the avenue.”

“An’ then where?” Viola asked.

“In the soup line.”

“In the
soup line!
” Rutherford smiled broadly.

“Men!”
cried Viola in disgust, sharply turning into the kitchen.

“What give you that idea?”

“Sammy said you kin git ice cream an’ cake an’ things for nothin’!”

“For nothin’! An’ you believed ’im? Unh! You
is
a fool! Go in the house an’ git me that paper, boy!”

He went into the house.

“You let your son go in a soup line, Babe?” said Rutherford.

He returned with the paper.

“Thank you, son.”

Viola appeared in the door with a tomato and a paring knife in her hands.

“
Ten
people told me they saw ’im. What’re they gonna
think? Our
son in a
soup line
with a bunch a tramps, an’ us slavin’ all day long to keep ’im decent. Well,
I
care, even if you
don’!
” She slammed the door. The pane rattled.

“Unh-unh! She sho’ is mad, ain’ she? Boy, you done the wrong thing — makin’
that
woman mad. I bet she sho’ brought the tears to your eyes!”

He looked down uncomfortably at the porch. The kitchen door opened.

“You kin come in an’ git your supper. An’ wash your hands an’ face — both a you! Comin’ down to the laundry with all them little brats — an’ him dirtier than all the rest!”

“Was you at the laundry,
too!
M-a-n! Now I
know
she got you! Lettin’ those niggahs — an’ white folks, too! — see you when you wasn’ all shined up.” Looking down at him though the towel. “Say, you got a bandage on your knee, did she break any of your bones, do you think?”

“He coulda been
killed
, Rutherford! A dago got shot in the head an’ he was
there when it happened. He stayed there to watch him bleed to death!”

Rutherford finished drying his hands and face, and gave the towel to Amerigo. The smile had left his face. He sat down at the table with a serious air, his back to the door. Viola sat on his right in front of the sink and he sat opposite his father.

“Say the blessin’, Amerigo,” he said gravely.

“Lord, we thank Thee for the blessin’s we are about to receive.” When he had finished Rutherford looked up and said:

“Well, son, I guess your momma’s punished you enough for one bad thing. She’s tellin’ you right.” Viola put a helping of buffalo fish fried in cornmeal and some fried potatoes on his plate. She filled his glass with iced tea. “Why do you think we try to keep you out a the alley? ’Cause we like for you to have to stay cooped up by yourself ever’ day? It’s dangerous in the alley! You kin git killed by a car. It coulda been you that got hit by that bullet ’stead a that I-talian, or by a stray bullet! Just from lookin’. Curiosity! We live in a tough neighborhood. We got some a
ever’thin’!
Hustlin’ women, dope peddlers, bootleggers all
around us. If we tell you to keep away from those things, we know what we talkin’ about. It’s hard for a child to grow up in this slum an’ not git hurt, maimed for life by dope or whiskey or low-life habits. My sister an’ brother came to a bad end ’cause a things like that. Now, listen to me: If this ever happens
agin
, if ever I even hear
tell
a you gallivantin’ all over the street like that
agin
, you gonna hear from
me!
You heah!”