Savage Holiday

by Richard Wright

  “Let me decide that,” he begged her.

  “Are you sure you want me, Erskine?”

  “I’m sure,” he said, looking into her eyes with tears in his own. “Are you engaged to anyone?”

  “No.”

  “Then you’ll marry me? There can be no question of my hiding or covering up something now,” he argued. “We both know what happened and now we’re free from that...You’ll marry me?”

  “But, Erskine, we re so different,” she protested weakly, shaking her head.

  “Look, I’ll change some and you’ll change some,” he said, figuring it all out neatly. “Tell me: will you marry me? Tell me now...”

  “You really want it?”

  “I do, with all my heart. Now, tell me...Will you?”

  She began weeping afresh.

  “Tell me; tell me,” he implored her, squeezing her shoulders.

  “Yes; yes, Erskine,” she sighed. ,

  He crushed her to him. “Well make up for little Tony, won’t we? We may have a son, hunh? Well have something around which to build a joyful and solemn relationship, hunh? You understand?”

  “Yes,” she whispered. “And I need somebody...”

  She threw her arms about him and clung to him.

  “Erskine, teach me how to live, won’t you?” she asked him. “I’m through; I’m licked...You’ll teach me, tell me what’s right?”

  “Yes, yes,” he assured her.

  She lowered her eyes and then started violently.

  “What’s the matter?” he asked.

  “What’s that?” she asked. “Your hand...It’s bleeding...God, blood’s running on my arm...”

  Erskine saw that the bandage on his left palm had worked loose and that the gash was pulsing red, staining Mabel’s arm.

  “I cut myself,” he mumbled.

  “How did you do that?”

  “I was climbing through the bathroom window,” he told her. “I ripped my hand on a corner of the sill.”

  “Oh,” she breathed. She gazed off, then she turned and looked questioningly at him.

  He knew that she was now connecting that bloody patch on the newspapers with the bleeding wound on his palm.

  “Mabel,” he began in humble tones, “I lied to you about that blood on your newspaper...I made that stain...And I was too scared to tell you...”

  “But how? When?”

  Erskine sighed, avoiding her eyes.

  “I was holding my newspaper in my hand when they took you down to see Tony,” he explained. “I know I ought to have spoken up then, ought to have told the truth...But I couldn’t, just couldn’t...One moment I was ready to tell, then the next I’d think of what people would say if I told how it had happened...You see, I just couldn’t believe that anybody’d believe me...”

  “Oh, God!” she exclaimed.

  “I switched your paper for mine, because mine was all crumpled,” he went on doggedly. “I didn’t think that you’d look at yours; I thought you were too worried to bother about the paper, and you’d throw it away...Mabel, it was a cowardly thing to do. Now, you have the whole truth. Do you believe me?”

  Her eyes deepened with pity as she gazed at him. A ghost of a sad smile flitted across her wan lips.

  “You and Tony,” she said with a sigh. “Come here; let me wash that blood off your hand...”

  She caught his arm and led him to the bathroom and washed his hand and bound it securely with tape.

  “I said that I needed somebody,” she said. “But, by God, I think you need somebody, too.”

  He caught her and kissed her for the first time.

  “Mabel,” he murmured.

  “Erskine,” she whispered. “You’re really so silly, like a boy...”

  “We’ll redeem everything, won’t we, honey?”

  “Yes.”

  “Our love will be a monument to Tony...”

  “Yes.” She grew thoughtful. “Erskine, what about your family and friends? Would you acknowledge me before them?”

  “I want you in spite of them,” he said. “If they don’t accept you, they reject me. I’m with you; understand?”

  “Yes.”

  The phone in Mabel’s apartment began to ring, the sound coming clear and sharp through the night air, through Erskine’s opened window. Mabel cocked her head.

  “That’s my phone,” she said in a voice that was suddenly matter-of-fact, practical.

  He hugged her closer, frantically.

  “Mabel,” he whispered.

  “My phone’s ringing,” she said, trying to disengage herself.

  “Let it ring...”

  “But that’s Harry,” she protested. “I must answer that...”

  His face went white. She pulled herself out of his arms; his hand clutched involuntarily at the sleeve of her robe and, as she went from him, the robe slid from her body and she stood naked before him.

  “Give me my robe,” she said with tense impatience. “I must answer the phone.”

  The phone was still ringing.

  “No; no...Let it ring,” he insisted. He still held her robe. “What do we care about who’s calling?”

  “But, Erskine?”

  He seized her nude body and held her close to him.

  The phone rang once more, then fell silent. She turned and stared at him with a strange expression on her face.

  “You are jealous,” she said in amazement

  “Yes,” he admitted shamefacedly.

  “But how could we ever live together?” she asked in open wonder.

  “We’d be together,” he muttered.

  “Not all the time,” she said. “There are things that you must do, and there are things that I must do. We couldn’t be together every minute...”

  “But you’d be faithful to me, wouldn’t you?” he asked her.

  She stared, smiled a ghost of a smile, and looked off.

  “If I were married to you, yes,” she said cryptically.

  “Why ‘if,’ Mabel?” His frown was dividing his forehead now.

  “Listen, Erskine, if two people are married and are satisfied with each other, they are faithful,” she explained.

  Erskine was tortured. A moment ago he had felt that he had her forever, and now he was not so sure. She was fleeing from him again. He was feeling abandoned, naked, lost...

  “And if you were dissatisfied with me, you’d b-b-be unfaithful, wouldn’t you?” he asked.

  She did not answer.

  “Mabel,” he called to her in a heavy voice. She was a stranger to him now. She loomed as the personification of an enemy.

  “Yes.”

  “You’ve had many men, haven’t you?”

  She pulled away from him. Her face was chalk white.

  “No; tell me,” he insisted, speaking through his teeth. He attempted to take hold of her hand, but she snatched it beyond his reach. She grabbed her robe and flung it on.

  “Tell me,” he all but threatened her.

  A flicker of fear went over her eyes as she stared at him.

  “I’m not asking you about what women you’ve had,” she said. “So, why are you asking me this—?”

  “I’ve got to know,” he said stubbornly.

  “I’m not married now,” she said evasively.

  “Ah...So you’re free for everybody, hunh?” he cut at her. “Is that it? But if you were married to me, you’d be faithful to me, wouldn’t you?”

  “If you were faithful to me; yes,” she countered ironically.

  Erskine gritted his teeth. Why wouldn’t she come clean with him? Why did she forever hover agonizingly beyond his reach?

  “How many men are sleeping with you now,” he demanded to know.

  “Goddamn you!” she blazed. “You can go straight to hell!” She started for the door.

  He grabbed her arm. If he lost her now, it was for always...

  “No; no; you can’t go now!” he told her.

  “You turn me loose!” she said, twisting and tryin
g to evade him.

  “Mabel, talk to me...” There was a mixture of threat and pleading in his voice. He despaired of making her know how serious he was.

  “I’m tired,” she moaned suddenly, wilting. “Listen, Erskine, all of this is impossible...I can’t marry you. We’d never get along. I don’t understand you...”

  “Are you sleeping with this Harry?” he questioned her in a low, tense voice.

  “No.”

  “What about that fellow called Jack?”

  “Good God! Leave me alone!” she yelled at him.

  “And if I married you, you’d say the same damn thing, wouldn’t you!” He spoke through clenched teeth. “You’d never tell me the truth! I’d never know where you were...”

  She wrenched herself free, her eyes wide with fear and hysteria.

  “You’re crazy!” she shouted. “I’ll never marry a man like you...You’d drive me out of my mind! What’s the matter with you?” She began a high-pitched, choking land of laugh that stopped quickly, then she looked at him with cold detachment. “Listen, I sleep with whom I damn please. I’m a woman; I’m free...What the hell’s the matter with you? Why do you keep on prying into me? Your mind works in a strange way...Really! What do you want to find out about me?”

  “I’ve found out what I want to know—”

  “Erskine, there’s something wrong with you,” she said soberly. “Maybe we ought to go to the police station, after all. You’ve told me so many lies that I can’t tell what you’ve done...By God, I’m going to report you—”

  “You stinking bitch,” he said. The expression on his face was distorted, mobile.

  “To hell with you,” she snapped, her hand reaching for the doorknob.

  He lunged at her and she shrank away, flinging out her arms to protect her face, her robe falling open and loose about her. Erskine stood over her like a waiting cat. She lifted her head and lowered her hands to look at him. In that split second Erskine’s flexed fingers flew to her throat. She screamed.

  “No! You’re hur—!”

  Her voice died in her chest. He forced her to the floor, screaming: “You re no damned good!”

  She twisted from him and ran, nude, to the opposite wall. When he came at her this time §he screamed again and ran into the kitchen. She flicked on the light and stood nude amid the white refrigerator, the white gas stove, the gleaming sink, the white-topped table. He followed her. She put the table between them, her mouth open. Erskine’s long arm shot across the table and his flexed fingers seized her throat once more. He snatched her brutally forward, bending her naked body backward over the table. She was fighting desperately now, clawing frantically at his hands that were trying to strangle the breath from her panting throat. Once again she succeeded in pulling herself partially free and tried to scream again. Erskine then brought his right fist down hard on the side of her head and she lay with glazed eyes, moaning:

  “Oh, God, don’t kill me...God, help me...”

  Erskine glared about, then he snatched open the drawer of the kitchen table and drew out a long butcher knife with a stainless steel blade and a plastic handle. She raised her head and looked at him with eyes of terror.

  “No, no, no...“ she was whispering, her breath issuing through her nostrils.

  As she opened her mouth to scream, he brought the knife down hard into her nude stomach and her scream turned into a long groan.

  With machinelike motion, Erskine lifted the butcher knife and plunged it into her stomach again and again. Each time the long blade sank into her, her knees doubled up by reflex action. He continued to hack into her midriff and, from the two-inch slits which appeared in the flesh of her abdomen, blood began to run and spurt. Her breathing was heavy, as though she was trying to catch her breath. Huge drops of sweat popped out upon Erskine’s face; his lips were flexed. He stabbed her over and over and he did not cease until his arm grew so tired that it began to ache. Her knees no longer jumped now; her legs had stretched out and hung downward from the table, swinging a little. Her lips moved wordlessly, as though trying to form pleas for which there was not enough air in her lungs to give sound...Her house slippers had fallen off her feet and lay on the white-tiled floor. Her blood was running from her body to the table top, and drops began to splash on the shining tiles.

  Erskine stepped back from the table and lifted his eyes. Daylight stood in the room; dawn showed white through the windows and Erskine’s hand, which still gripped the bloody knife, fell limply to his side and his breath came and went in his chest with a wild, sobbing sound. He stared at the sprawled, bloody body on the table, as though amazed to find it still there, yet knowing that it had to be there, that he’d killed her. He heard the sound of blood dripping into pools that had began to form on the floor. He started away from the table, then turned back and tossed the bloody butcher knife carelessly on top of the slashed and bleeding stomach.

  With slow feet, as in a dream, he walked into the bathroom and stared at his white and sweaty face in the mirror above the washbowl, and he seemed dully surprised to find that the face he saw was still his own...

  ...he was looking in the mirror to see how bad he was, for his mother had said: “Go and look in the mirror at yourself and see how bad you are!” And he was looking at his face and the face he saw was his own and it wasn’t bad...His mother had lied to him. He hadn’t changed; he could see no bad in his face...

  Yesterday he had been playing with the little girl next door—Gladys was her name—and he had taken her little doll and had “killed” it and had told Gladys that the doll was his mother and he had “killed” her because all the boys had said that his mother was bad...

  He had taken a dirty brick bat and had beaten the doll’s head in, had crushed it and had told Gladys: “There’s my mama....I killed her; I killed her ‘cause she’s a bad woman...”

  And Gladys had cried and had told her mother and Gladys’ mother had told his mother and his mother had asked him if he’d said it and he’d refused to answer. And his mother had said: “Look in the mirror and see how bad you are!” And now he was staring at his face in the mirror and it was his own face and it had not changed...

  For perhaps five minutes Erskine stood before the mirror in the bathroom staring at his face which evoked that dimly remembered, far-off scene. Then he felt sick; lie bent over the commode and vomited. He leaned against the wall, breathing heavily. Finally he washed the blood from his hands and dried them. He paused in the bathroom door, staring into the kitchen with a kind of sullen, stolid pride at the nude, bloody body stretched on the table. Huge, gleaming pools of red blood had now formed on the tiled floor.

  He dressed and stood glowering into space. He went to the open window and looked out at New York stretching glitteringly in the bright Tuesday morning sunshine. He turned with sudden purpose and went out of his door, rode down in the elevator, and walked four blocks west and entered a police station. He saw a policeman reading a newspaper behind a tall black desk. He walked slowly up to him and placed both of his hands on top of the wooden railing.

  “I want to see the officer in charge,” he said in a clear, distinct voice.

  “That’s me. What can I do for you?” the policeman asked, lowering his newspaper.

  “I want to surrender,” Erskine said quietly.

  “What? What’s that?”

  “I want to surrender,” Erskine repeated.

  “What’s the matter, Mister?” the policeman asked, leaning forward.

  “I just killed a woman— Her body’s in my apartment.”

  “All right, now. Just take it easy,” the policeman said, coming from behind the tall desk. “You’re sure that you’re not drunk?”

  “I’m not drunk.”

  “Do you realize what you just said to me?”

  “Yes. I do.”

  The policeman frowned and stared at Erskine.

  “You’ve never been in an institution, have you?”

  “No.”

  “W
here do you live?”

  Erskine gave his address.

  “What apartment?”

  “10B.”

  The policeman pushed a buzzer and then looked at Erskine from his head to his feet.

  “What kind of work do you do?”

  “I’m a retired insurance man.”

  “Are you armed?”

  “No,” Erskine said, shaking his head.

  Two other policemen came rushing forward.

  “Give us the keys to your apartment,” the first policeman said to Erskine.

  Erskine surrendered his keys.

  “This man says he killed a woman at this address,” the policeman said, giving the other two policemen the keys and a slip of paper. “Get over there and see what it’s all about...”

  “Listen, the body’s on the kitchen table,” Erskine roused himself and spoke helpfully. He glanced at his watch. “I wish you’d try to get there quickly. The maid comes in in a few minutes and she oughtn’t to see all that mess...”

  The policemen looked at one another; then the two who had been summoned ran out.

  “When did this happen?”

  “About an hour ago.”

  “How did you kill her?”

  “With a knife, a kitchen knife; a butcher knife, they call it.”

  The policeman stared a moment, then pointed to a chair. Erskine sat heavily and sighed. The policeman went to him and quickly patted his pockets.

  “I’m not armed,” Erskine said in surprise.

  “You want a cigarette?”

  “I don’t smoke.”

  “Now, why did you kill this woman?”

  “I don’t know!”

  “You had an argument?”

  “Sort of...”

  “She was your woman?”

  “Well...”

  “You were keeping her? Sleeping with her?”

  “No”

  “She was cheating on you?”

  “No.”

  “You were living with her?”

  “No.”

  “She was trying to trick you out of your money?”

  “No.”

  “You’re married?”

  “No.”

  “Was there another woman involved in this? Was somebody jealous?”

  “No.” He coughed nervously. ‘It was just between me and the one I killed.”