The Kill-Off (7 page)

I cut off the thought. Somehow the thought of parricide, entirely justifiable though it was, interfered with the other.

I would get what I needed in some way. That was all that mattered. And meanwhile I could be preparing her, laying the necessary groundwork. And meanwhile I
knew.

I KNEW!

I reached the car. I climbed in, smiling.

She had her coat draped over her, but she was still undressed. I told her, lovingly, to get dressed. Lovingly, with tender pats and caresses, I started to help her.

“D-don’t…!” She shivered. “What d-do you want?”

“Nothing,” I said. “Only what you want, darling. Whatever you want, that’s what I want.”

She stared at me like a snake-charmed bird. Her teeth chattered. I took her in my arms, gently pressed my mouth against hers. I smiled softly, dreamily, stroking her hair.

“That’s all I want, honey,” I said. “Now, you tell me what you want.”

“I w-want to go home. P-please, Bobbie. Just—”

“Look,” I said. “I love you. I’d do anything in the world for you. I—”

I kissed her. I crushed her body against mine. And her lips were stiff and lifeless, and her body was like ice. And the glow was leaving me. The life and the resurrection were leaving me.

“D-don’t,” I said. “I mean, please. I only want to love you, only to love you and have you love me. That’s all. Only sweetness and tenderness and—”

Suddenly I dug my fingers into her arms. I shook her until her silly stupid head almost flopped off.

I told her she’d better do what I said or I’d kill her.

“I’ll do it, by God!” I slapped her in the face. “I’ll beat your goddamned head off! You be nice to me, you moronic bitch! Be sweet, you slut! Y-you be gentle and tender and loving—you love me, DAMN YOU, YOU LOVE ME! Or I’ll…I’ll…”

I
t may ring false when I say so, but I did love her. Back in the beginning and for several years afterward. It became impossible later on, will it as I would and despite anything I could do. For we could share nothing but a bed, and that less and less frequently. We could not share the most important thing we had. It
was
impossible—you see that, do you not? So the love went away.

But once long ago…

She was twenty-two or -three when she came to me. She was practically illiterate—a shabby, life-beaten slum-dweller. There was a great deal of race prejudice in that state—there is still, unfortunately, so much everywhere—and Negroes got little if any schooling; they had no place to live but slums.

I hired her as my housekeeper. I paid her twice the pittance, the prevailing and starvation wage for Negro houseworkers. I gave her decent quarters, a clean attic room with a lavatory, there in my own house.

She was thin, undernourished. I saw to it that she got plenty of good wholesome food. She needed medical attention. I gave it to her—taking time from paying patients to do so.

I shall never forget the day I examined her. I had suspected the beauty of her body, even in the shabby ill-fitting clothes I had first seen her in. But the revelation of it was almost more than the eyes could bear. Of all the nude women I had seen—professionally, of course—I had seen none to compare with her. She was like a statue, sculpted of ivory by one of the great masters. Even frail and half-starved, she—

But I digress.

She was very grateful for all I had done for her. Overflowing with gratitude. Her eyes followed me wherever I went, and in them there was that burning worship you see in a dog’s eyes. I think that if I had ordered her to take poison she would have done so instantly.

I did not want her to feel that way. At least, I made it very clear to her that she owed me nothing. I had done no more than was decent, I explained. No more than one decent person should do for another—circumstances permitting. All I wanted of her, I said, was that she be happy and well, as such a fine young woman should be.

She would not have it so. I wanted—was more than willing to, at any rate—but not she. There was an immutable quality about her gratitude. Wherever I was, there was it: quietly omnipotent, passively resistant, a constant proffering. Impossible to dispose of; beyond, at least, my powers.

I did not wish to hurt her feelings. I could see no real harm in accepting what she was so anxious to give. It was all she had to give. And the gift of one’s all is not lightly rejected.

Finally, around the middle of her second month of service with me, I accepted it.

There was no love in it that first time. None on my side, that is. It was merely a matter of saving her pride, and, of course—to a degree, at least—physical gratification. But after that, very quickly after that, the love came.

And it was only natural, I suppose, that it should.

I came from a very poor family; migrant sharecroppers. My parents had twelve children—three stillborn, five who died in early childhood. The largest house we ever lived in was two rooms. I was six or seven years old before I tasted cow’s milk, or knew that there was such a thing as red meat. I was almost a grown man before I owned a complete set of clothes.

If it had not been for a plantation overseer’s taking an interest in me, if he had not induced my father to let me remain with his family when my own moved on, I should probably have wound up like the rest of the brood. Like my living brothers and sisters…if they are living. Hoe-hands. Cotton-pickers. White trash.

Or, no, I do myself an injustice. I could never have been like them. I would have found some way to push myself up, overseer or no (and life with him, believe you me, was no bed of roses).

Through grade school, high school, college and medical school—in all that time, I cannot remember having a complete day of rest.

I worked my way every step of the way. I did nothing but work and study. I had no time for recreation, for girls. When I did have the time, when I was at last practicing and reasonably free from financial worry, I had no, well, knack with them. I was ill at ease around girls. I was incapable of the flippery-dippery and chitchat which they seemed to expect. I learned that one young lady I liked—and who, I thought, reciprocated my feeling—had referred to me as a “terrible stick.”

So, there you have it. Hattie loved me. A woman more beautiful than any I had ever seen loved me. And I could be with her in the most intimate way—talk to her of the most intimate things (although she could not always answer intelligently)—and feel not a whit of awkwardness.

I fell in love with her deeply. It was inevitable that I should.

I was, of course, quite alarmed when I learned that she was pregnant. Alarmed and not a little angry. For she had failed to take the precautions I had prescribed and entrusted her to take. As I saw it, there was nothing for it but an abortion, even though she was three months along. But much to my chagrin, for she had always done as I wanted before, Hattie refused.

She was virtually tigerish in her refusal, threatening me with what she would do if I attempted to take the foetus from her. Then as I became firm—considerably shocked by her conduct—she turned to pleading. And I could not help feeling touched, nor the feeling that I had been taken sore advantage of.

The boy (she always spoke of him as a boy) would be able to “pass.” After perhaps two hundred years of outrace-breeding, after eight generations, there would be a child of her blood who could pass for white…Couldn’ I understand? Didn’ I see why she jus’
had
to have it?

I relented. I could have insisted on the abortion, and she would have had to submit. But I did not insist. Except for me, the child would not have been born.

When the pregnancy began to show, I moved her out of the house. From that day on, until she gave birth, I called on her at least twice a week.

I could not go through such an experience now. There were times, even then, when I thought I could stand no more. A white man—
a white doctor!
—visiting in the Negro slums! Treating a Negro woman! It was unheard of, unprecedented—a soul-shaking, pride-trampling experience. White doctors did not treat Negroes. Generally speaking, no one did. They simply did without medical attention, administering to themselves, when it was necessary, with home remedies and patent nostrums; delivering their own babies or depending on midwives.

All in all, they seemed to get by fairly well in that manner—although, Negro vital statistics being what they are, or were, one cannot be sure. And in the good health she was enjoying, I think that Hattie could have gotten by quite well without me. But it apparently didn’t occur to her to suggest it. She
didn’t
suggest it, anyway; and I hardly felt able to.

For that matter, I don’t know that I would have been willing to leave her untended. In fact, and on reflection, I am quite sure that I would not. I was deeply in love with her, deeply concerned for her and our child. Otherwise, I would not have done what I did when the birth became imminent.

Negroes were not treated by white doctors, as I have said. This meant that they were not admitted to white hospitals—and there were nothing but white hospitals. There was a ramshackle, poorly staffed county institution which admitted Negroes, but not unless it was absolutely impelled to. If a Negro was dying he might get in. If he did, he would probably never live to regret it.

Well. I was on the staff of one of the white hospitals. I had only recently obtained the appointment. I got Hattie admitted to it as a white woman, of Spanish-Indian descent.

I did that, knowing almost certainly that the fraud would be discovered. I loved her that much, thought that much of her—and, needless to say, the child.

They were giving her narrow-eyed looks from the moment she stepped through the door. They suspected her from the beginning; me and her. I could see that they did, see it and feel it. Then, when she was coming out of the anaesthesia, when she began to talk…

I shall never forget how they looked at me.

Or what the chief of staff said to me.

I was forced to remove her and the child the following day. I did not put it to an issue—how could I?—but if I had refused to remove them, I believe they would have been thrown out.

That was the end of my staff job, of course. The end of my practice, of everything in that state. Probably I can consider myself lucky that I wasn’t lynched.

It was several days before I could nerve myself even to leave the house.

There was only one thing to do: relocate. Move to some place so remote and far away that no word of my secret would ever reach to it. Some place, yes—now that the die was cast—where Hattie could be accepted as my wife.

Down here where we were, they were always on the lookout for colored blood, expert at detecting it. But in a new location—the kind I had in mind—and with a little intensive coaching for Hattie, as to her speech and mannerisms…well, my plan seemed entirely feasible.

I believe it would have been, too, if circumstances had not turned out as they did.

I saw a practice advertised here at Manduwoc. I left Hattie and the boy behind, and came here to look at it.

It seemed to fit my needs to a
t;
in remoteness, in distance from that other state. It was not too big a thing financially, the town being as small as it was. But there was a large farm-trade area to draw from, and I was confident that a live-wire could double or even triple the present practice.

I decided to buy it. I went to Henry Clay Williams to have the papers drawn up.

Hank, I should say, was not then the county attorney. He was, in fact, only a few years out of law school. But he was a very shrewd man, very knowing; and he took an immediate liking to me. He looked upon me as a friend, as I did him. He was determined that I should get off on the right foot, and he knew how to go about it.

I owe a lot to Hank. More than any man I know of.

He was very adroit with his advice; he came out with it in a rather backhanded way. He’d lead with a feeler as to my notion on things; then, on the next time around, he’d move in with something a little stronger.

I mustn’t think he was nosy, he said. Far be it from him to give a whoop what a man’s politics or his religion or his race was. But there were still a hell of a lot of hidebound mossbacks around. People with foolish prejudices—shameful prejudices, in his opinion—although, of course, they had the same right to their ideas that he had to his. And the center of population for those people, by God—Hank gets pretty salty at times—seemed to be right here in Manduwoc!

I laughed. I said it was certainly unfortunate that people had to be that way.

“But what’s a man going to do, Jim?” he said. “A man’s got a living to make and wants to get somewhere, what can he do about ’em?”

“I guess there’s nothing much he can do,” I said. “It’s a problem of education, evolution. Something that only time can take care of.”

“I don’t see how he can go around with a chip on his shoulder, do you, Jim?” he said. “Why, look, now. Some of my very best friends are—well, let’s say, people that aren’t exactly popular around here. My
very
best friends, Jim. But a man can’t live off his friends, can he? That wouldn’t be fair to them, would it? He has to live with the community as a whole, doesn’t he?”

“That’s the way it is,” I said. “It’s too bad, but—”

“It’s outrageous,” he said. “Absolutely outrageous, Jim. Why, my blood actually boils sometimes at some of the carryings-on in this town. I don’t mean that they’re not good people, understand? The salt of the earth in many respects. They’re just narrow-minded, and they don’t want to broaden. And if you try to buck ’em, give ’em the slightest reason to get their claws into you—hell, they don’t actually need a real reason, if you know what I mean—why, they’ll rip you apart. I’ve seen it happen, Jim. There’s a man here in town, now, a Bohunk contractor name of Pete Pavlov. He…”

“I see,” I said. “I understand what you mean, Hank.”

“And you think I’ve got the right slant, Jim? You agree with me?”

“Oh, absolutely,” I said. “There’s no question about it. Now, there is one thing—in view of what you’ve told me. As I’ve mentioned, my wife died recently, and—”

“A great loss, I’m sure. My deepest sympathies to you, Jim.”

“—and I have our infant son to take care of,” I said. “Or, I should say, I have a Ne—nigger woman taking care of him. A wet nurse. I suppose I could get another one for him, but—”

“Oh, well,” Hank shrugged. “She’s a southern nigger, isn’t she? Knows her place? Well, that’ll be all right. After all, no one could expect you to take a baby away from its nurse.”

“Well, I certainly wouldn’t want to,” I said.

“And you don’t have to. As long as she stays in her place—and I guess you’ll see to that, won’t you? ha-ha—she’ll get along fine.”

…I don’t see how I could have done anything else.

I certainly had no easy row to hoe myself.

It is only in recent years that I have been able to take things a little easy. Before that it was work, work, work, until all hours of the day and night. Fighting to hold onto the old practice, to build it into something really worthwhile. Fighting to be someone, to build something…for nothing.

I had no time for them, the boy and her. No time, at least, on many days. Perhaps—to be entirely truthful—I did not want time for them. And if I did not, I hardly see how I can be faulted for it.

It was awkward being with her, even in intimacy. She made me feel uncomfortable, guilty, hypocritical. I had become something here, and I was rapidly becoming more. I was a big frog in a little puddle. A deacon in the church. A director of the bank. A pillar in the community. Yet here I was, sleeping with a Negro wench!

I would have stopped it even if it had not become dangerous. My conscience would not have allowed me to continue.

As for the boy, I did—and do, I am afraid—love him…as I did her, so long ago. He was my own flesh and blood, my only son. And I loved him, as I loved her. But like her, although in a different way, he made me uncomfortable. It distressed me to be around him.