Corky's Brother (6 page)

Now, as he began reading the piece of paper, he laughed again. When he looked up, most of the men on his assembly line were already in their places.

“Get me my relief man,” Josh said to his foreman, not waiting to get an O.K. from the foreman but already walking in Emmett's direction, the paper now folded in one hand, the other hand loose at his side, itching for the pocket.

“Whaddaya mean? Hey, Russell! Where you going? Come back here. We gotta get the line started up. Goddamn you
—
I said come back or I'll slap a reprimand on you.…”

Emmett heard him approaching (he was leaning over his toolbox, getting out his electrician's holster), but he didn't look up.

“I'm thinking you left somethin' over by my chair, mister,” Josh said, his voice low, cracking just a bit with nervousness.

“What?” Emmett said, looking up and seeing Josh's eyes gleaming at him as if there were little flashlight bulbs behind the lenses. For the first time he seemed to notice Josh's size, his hulking broad body. But he'll be slow, Emmett thought, and if I have a little room I'll be too quick for him. And too smart. This nigger can't be as smart as he tries to put on. “You ad-dressin' me?”

“You heard me.”

“Well, as far as I can figger, I ain't fergot nothin'. You better be gettin' to work.”

Emmett strapped on his holster and turned, walking out into the aisle toward the intersection, where there would be more room. He passed Jim Bryant, his buddy, and winked. Already the men in the vicinity had stopped whatever they were doing and were waiting, their eyes eager for the violence they anticipated. Within a minute, by the time Emmett had reached the intersection of the aisles, men were closing around, and groups of Negroes sauntered slowly over, already hearing the whispers that the fight between Em and Josh had come.

Josh followed Emmett, not hurrying, knowing that Emmett wanted to fight, to get it over with also.

“Hold it there, mister,” Josh said. “I was talkin' to you. I haven't finished.”

“What else ya got to say?” Emmett said, turning on Josh, a slight smile at the comer of his mouth, his hand resting on the hammer that hung in his holster.

“You recognize this?” Josh said, showing him the application.

“Oh, this—?” Emmett said, and laughed for the benefit of the men circled round them. A mule driver honked to get through but stopped as soon as he saw the two men facing each other. “I didn't forget it. I figgered I was doin' ya a favor. Figgered ya might be interested in fillin' it out.”

One of the men started to laugh but stopped quickly, noticing a group of Negro workers to his right.

“Ya mean ya got it filled out already? You're pretty smart fer a—f er a—”

“Nobody treats me like dirt, mister,” Josh said, moving slowly forward. The circle around them was wide now, fifteen feet in diameter.

“I put five bucks on ole Josh,” one man whispered.

“I'll cover that.”

“Any o' you boys wanna bet?” Jim Bryant said to a group of Negro workers. “I got fifteen bucks I'd like to double.”

“We'll cover it, man. Be like pickin' cherries.”

“Nobody pushes me around, mister,” Josh said. He thrust his arm forward, the application clenched in his fist. Emmett started back, whipping the hammer out of his holster. Betting stopped. “You better say you're sorry and bend down and pick up this thing and tear it up or I'll cut you from your belly button to the tip of your ugly head.”

Josh tossed the piece of paper in front of him. Emmett rubbed his palms with his fingertips. Wet. But nobody'd make him cower before a nigger. Not in front of all the men.

“Sure,” Emmett said, moving a step forward. “I'll pick it up.”

He held the hammer in his hand as he began to bend over in front of Josh. But then, his body bent over, his hand darted up suddenly in whiplash and the hammer glanced off Josh's cheek, red blood showing immediately on the black perforated face. With his other arm he grabbed Josh's leg behind the knee and tripped him, falling upon him and raising the hammer to his full arm's length and starting it in its downward arc, but never landing another blow because even while Josh was falling backward he had slipped it out of his pocket and as Emmett fell on top of him you could hear the intake of breath as every last man saw the light flash, glint from the switchblade.

Emmett rolled off Josh, clutching at his stomach, and Josh stood up and bent his shoulders down, the knife now visible to all, its silver blade tipped with a dripping of blood, crimson and liquid. Emmett backed away, breathing in deeply, cursing under his breath, gasping.

“Gimme yer bottle o' whiskey, Jim. Damn it. Where are ya? Gimme yer bottle.”

Bryant reached into his side pocket. He took the bottle out of its paper bag and handed it to Emmett. Emmett took a quick swallow and moved backwards along the rim of the circle, watching, waiting, while Josh just glared and followed him with his eyes, not saying a word; but even Emmett could read the expression in his eyes now. Emmett looked to the side and lifted the bottle, bringing it down with a gurgling crash against a post.

“We're even now, big man,” he said, dropping the hammer to the floor and holding the jagged edges of the bottle forward. “Yer yeller'll show now.”

Josh continued stalking.

“Man, he looks like the old Brown Bomber now, don't he?”

“Don't look like no Brown Bomber to me.”

“Five bucks says he mops the floor with your boy.”

“Make it ten.”

“You're on, man.”

Emmett smiled now, despite the pain that seemed to be somewhere in his back, pulling down and ripping, but he smiled because he felt the worst was over. He wouldn't be stupid enough to get that close again. Because Josh might be fast with that knife, but he'd be slow otherwise, like all niggers, slow at everything except running. Them nigger boys could run. That was one thing. Like when they used to hell up down in Louisville when he was a kid and get one of them alone and paint on him in white:
Keep this nigger running. Keep this nigger running
.

Emmett lunged forward, but Josh parried with his forearm and they backed away from each other. Good, Emmett thought. I'll set him up. He lunged again, and again Josh parried with a sweep of his arm, cutting Emmett's sleeve with the knife. Emmett backed away and then came forward a third time and lunged. Josh went to parry, but before he could, Emmett had ducked his head and his hand wasn't there when Josh's arm went flailing out to meet it. Instead, Emmett's fake had worked and he had ducked his head and had come plowing into Josh's midsection, the glass edges aimed for Josh's groin. In missing Emmett, though, Josh stumbled and avoided the brunt of Emmett's charge, so that the broken bottle ripped into his thigh and with his left hand Josh clubbed the top of Emmett's head as he went by. Emmett fell to the floor.

The broken bottle slid across the floor and shattered. Josh moved in for the kill now, hulking above Emmett.

“Lift his liver, man,” someone shouted to Josh.

“I got another ten on Josh if anyone'll see me.”

“Who's got a knife?” Jim Bryant asked. He turned toward two Negroes. “One of you got a knife or a razor?”

“You talkin' to us, Jim?”

“Keep it fair. Throw Em a knife.”

The boys looked at each other, then one of them shrugged, reached into his pocket, and flipped a knife into the open circle. Josh kicked it at Emmett, who picked it up and rose to one knee. Josh moved forward slowly, wary now. Emmett watched him, seeing two Joshes as his head refused to clear. He flicked the knife open and waited. The two black faces merged into one and then separated, then merged again. There was a dull ache at the back of his head and his legs felt cold and damp. Above him he saw the black figure coming and he began to lift up from his knee but then everything went blank and the only thing he remembered was being thrown back down and then the sound of something dull, like punching against a sponge, and a warm, liquid feeling all over him, a quiet, almost peaceful feeling, doubled up, his knees trying to reach his chest, his arms rigid, straining.

Josh saw his chance and was on Emmett before he could rise, knocking away the knife and crashing his body against him, driving the knife up to its hilt into the flesh of Emmett Rumple. Satisfaction came with the plunge and he licked his lips and there was no world for him in that instant but only a pale white face before him, under him, and the knife red, withdrawn from the soft bodyflesh, and now a speck of blood on that white face and now another and the eyes that had hated him all these years started to close. Then he hesitated. The factory was still: a hush, funeral quiet in which the workers paid their respects to the act they were waiting for him to conclude.

The silence startled him; he wouldn't be satisfied! It seemed impossible. It hardly seemed fair. The thought terrified him and his body hurried to carry out the execution; but in the backlash his mind had already reverted, and he was utterly disappointed, petulant, child-like—and he knew it was all over for him. The knife hung in the air, and seeing it there, seeing the doubt on his face, Jim Bryant took advantage and rushed into the circle, knocking him away. Nobody said anything, or even began to collect on the bets. They just stood there, staring, quiet.

The Zodiacs

W
HEN
I
WAS
in the seventh grade at P.S. 92 in Brooklyn, Louie Hirshfield was the only one of my friends who wasn't a good ballplayer. Which is putting it mildly. Louie was probably the worst athlete in the history of our school. He was also the smartest kid in our class and you'd think this combination would have made him the most unpopular guy there, but it didn't. He wasn't especially well liked, but nobody resented him. Maybe it was because he let you copy from his homework—or maybe it was just because he didn't put on any airs about being smart. In fact, Louie didn't put on airs about anything. He was one of the quietest kids I'd ever met.

The only time I ever saw him excited—outside of what happened with him and our baseball team—was when our fathers would take the two of us to baseball games at Ebbets Field. Louie lived one floor under me, in my apartment building on Lenox Road, and we'd grown up together, so I knew lots about Louie that nobody at school knew. He was an interesting guy, with lots of hobbies—tropical fish, rocks, stamps, Chinese puzzles, magic tricks, autographs.

That was the one thing the guys did know about. I don't know how many days he'd waited outside Ebbets Field to get them—all I know is he had the best collection of baseball players' signatures of any guy in school. Lots of them were addressed personally, too—like “To Louie, with best wishes from Jackie Robinson.” What amazed me most about Louie, though, was that he could figure out a player's batting average in his head. If a guy got a hit his first time up in a game, Louie would say, “That raises his average to .326”—or whatever it was—and sure enough, the next time the guy came up, when the announcer would give the average, Louie would be right.

Louie had no illusions about his athletic ability—he was never one of those guys who hangs around when you're choosing up sides for a punchball or stickball game so that you
have
to pick him. Whenever he did play—like in gym class at school—he did what you told him and tried to stay out of the way. That was why I was so surprised when he came up to my house one night after supper and asked if he could be on our baseball team.

“Gee, Louie,” I said, “we got more than nine guys already—anyway, we're not even an official team or anything. We'll be lucky if we get to play more than five or six games all year.”

“I don't really want to play,” Louie said. “I—I just want to be on your team.”

“Well, I suppose you can come to practices and games,” I said. “But I can't promise you'll ever get in a game.”

“Honest, Howie—I know all the guys on your team are better than me. I wasn't even thinking of playing.—What I'd like to do is be your general manager.” His eyes lit up when he said that. I looked at him, puzzled.

“Look,” he said. “What do you think makes the Dodgers draw almost as many fans as the Yankees? What was it that made people stick with the Dodgers when they were hardly in the league?”

“I don't know,” I said. “They were just Dodger fans, I guess.”

“Sure—that's it. Don't you see? Being a Dodger fan means something because being a Dodger means something colorful to the fans. And you know why? Because the Dodgers have what my dad calls ‘a good press'—they know how to get headlines in the papers whether they're winning or losing.”

I nodded. “But what's that got to do with us?”

“What's your team like now? I'll tell you. It's the same as ten thousand other teams of guys our age all over Brooklyn. Nobody cares if you win or lose—except maybe you guys. If I'm general manager, Howie, I'll promise you this—your team will be noticed. Guys won't say, ‘We got a game with Howie's team.' They won't come to the Parade Grounds to see all the older guys play. They'll come to see
The Zodiacs!”

“The who—?”

Louie stopped for a second and I realized that I'd never heard him speak so fast before. “That's—that's the first thing you have to do, it seems to me.” He spoke more hesitantly now, the way he usually did, not looking right at you. “You have to have a name that's different.”

“What's wrong with calling ourselves the Sharks?”

“Nothing's wrong with it—but don't you see, nothing's right with it, either. I'll bet there's a hundred teams in Brooklyn alone called the Sharks. Sharks, Tigers, Lions, Phantoms—every team has a name like that. But calling ourselves—I mean, your team—
The Zodiacs
, will make them different—”