Three Days Before the Shooting . . .

by Ralph Ellison

  And Donelson had sung, “Oh, while I sit on my ass on the ass of my ass a curious paradox comes to my mind, While three-fourths of my ass is in front of my ass the whole of my ass is behind.” Oh, Donelson, that impossible Donelson. That bad boy with his toy. Sometimes I wondered if any of it had meaning for him beyond the joy of denying the reality of all that which he turned his lenses upon….

  From the walk I was listening to the dry, rhythmical, bounce-scrape-scrape-bounce of the knucklebone jacks and ball of the two little girls continuing—when suddenly from behind us a dark old fellow wearing a black Cordoba hat, blue denim jacket, and a scarf of fuchsia silk wrapped around his throat moved stiffly past on a fine black seven-gaited mare. Small and dry, he sat her with the stylized and monumental dignity of an equestrian statue and in the sun-slant the street became quite dream-like. His leathery hands held the gathered reins upon the polished horn of a gleaming cowboy saddle and his black, high-heeled boots, topped by the neat, deep cuff of short tan cowhide riding chaps, rested easy and spurless in the stirrups as he moved slowly past in meditation, his narrowed eyes bright glints in the shadow of his hard-brimmed hat. Donelson started to speak but I silenced him as I watched with whirling mind, filled with the sight and listening now to the mare’s hooves beating with measured gait through the bright suspense of the afternoon—when suddenly a little boy in blue overalls exploded from between two small houses across the street and ran after the horseman, propelled by an explosion of joy.

  Hi, there, Mister Love, he yelled. Make her dance, Mister Love, I’ll sing the music. Will you, Mister Love? Won’t you please, Mister Love? Please, please, Mister Love? Clapping his hands as he ran pleading beside the mare’s flank.

  Dance her, Mister Love, he called, and I’ll call the others and we’ll all sing for you, Mister Love.

  Well, I’ll be goddam, Donelson said beside me. What does the little bastard mean, he’ll sing the music?

  He means what he says, I guess, I said.

  And who the hell is that, the Pied Piper on a gaited mare?

  The children were singing now, following alongside the arch-necked mare as she moved, the old fellow holding his seat as though he were off somewhere in an elder’s chair on a church platform—or on the air itself—watching the kids impassively as he stroked the horse’s mane in time to its circus-horse waltzing.

  There, I said, Now there’s something we can use. We could use that man, I said.

  Donelson looked at me. So write a part for the nag and the kids, he said. You decided all of a sudden to make it a horse opera? He laughed. Now, by God, I’ve seen everything, he said.

  No, I said, I was looking at the children move, some were waltzing in a whirl along the sidewalk, their arms outstretched, shouting and singing. They went past the houses, whirling in circles as they followed the dancing mare. A dog barked along a fence and I could hear through it all the first little boy’s pure treble sounding high above the rest.

  Suddenly I looked at Donelson. Why the hell aren’t you shooting, I said, and saw his mouth drop open in surprise.

  No film in the camera, he said. You told me to shoot exteriors of that mansion up in the north section of town. I forgot to reload. Besides, you know we’re short of film.

  And all this happening right before our eyes, I said.

  Maybe we could get them to run it through some other time, Donelson said. With a few chocolate bars and cones of ice cream you could buy all the pickaninnies in town. Though God knows what the horse and rider would cost. That old bastard looks like weathered iron. D’ya ever see anyone like him?

  No, I said, and it’ll never happen like this again. How often do I have to tell you that you have to have film in the camera at all times? We don’t have the dough to make up everything, we have to snatch everything that passes and in places like this anything can happen and does.

  I cursed our luck.

  A woman came out to stand on the porch of one of the houses shaking her head and hugging her body as though she were cold.

  That Love, that ole hoss and those chillen, she said. They ought to put them all out in the meadow somewhere.

  What is his name? I called.

  That’s ole Love, she said. That’s ole Love New.

  Then another voice spoke up and I became aware of an old woman sitting in a rocking chair on a porch two houses away down the street.

  That’s him all right. He’s just the devil hisself and he’s going to take those chillen off to Torment one of these days. You just mark my words.

  She spat into the yard. Calling hisself an Indian and hound-dogging around. The old black tomcat. She spat again and I saw the snuff flash brown through the sunlight, then snake across the bare yard to roll into a ball, like quicksilver across the face of a mirror.

  Find out where the old fellow lives, I told Donelson. I watched them dancing on past the big cottonwood tree, the glossy horse moving with ceremonial dignity, its neck beautifully arched, and hearing the children’s bright voices carrying the melody pure and sweet along the air. They were coming to the corner now and suddenly I saw the old man rear the horse, the black Cordoba hat suddenly rising in a brisk salute above his white old head, freezing there for a moment as the mare danced a two-step on her well-shod hooves. Then, as he put her down I could hear the hooves ringing out on the road as he took the corner at a gallop, the children stringing after, cheering.

  Damn, Donelson said, where do you think he comes from? Is there a circus in town?

  Only you, I said. Only us out here without film.

  We found Karp with one of his faith who ran a grocery store. They were discussing politics. We drank a soda and went back to the hotel to discuss the film. So how do we start? Donelson said. With a covered wagon? There must be enough of them rotting away in barns around this town.

  Or how about an Indian attack? Karp said. Enough of them look like Indians to make things go fairly well….

  I was watching a little boy in blue overalls who had been left by the others. He had suddenly become a centaur, his foreleg arched as he waltzed horse-style to his own Taaa ta ta ta taaa ta ta, back between the houses. At that age I preached Job, boils and all, but I didn’t dance, and all his losses my loss of mother….

  What about doing the Boston Tea Party, Donelson said, with these coons acting both the British and the Beantowners? That would be a riot. Make some up as Indians, take the rest and Harvard-up their talk. Even the camera would laugh. Too bad we can’t film sound. We could out do the minstrels, ‘Lasses White and all. I understand enough of them around here are named Washington and Jefferson and Franklin—put them in powdered wigs, give them red coats, muskets, carpetbags….

  Some are named Donelson too, I said, watching the smile die out on his face.

  So why not, he said. I’d feel awful bad if my folks didn’t get their share.

  No, I said, it’ll be a modern romance. They’ll have dignity and they’ll play simple Americans. Good, hardworking, kindly ambitious people with a little larceny here and there…. Let’s not expect to take their money and make fools of them while doing it.

  What! And how the hell are we going to make these tar babies look like God’s fair chosen creatures?

  That’s your problem, Donelson, I said.

  God’s going to turn you into a crow for that…. Who? You, that’s who.

  You must think you’re a magician, Donelson said. Sometimes I have the feeling that you think you can do anything with a camera. So what’s the romance all about? What’ll we call it?

  The Taming of the West, I said, or The Naming of the Baby, or Who’s Who in Tamarac….

  That’s enough, Donelson said, I’ll get it by-and-by.

  Donelson, I said, we can shoot the scene right here. See, the lights should shine from above there, at an angle, cutting the shadow. And the leading lady will move through just as the hero comes into the door….

  Okay, okay, but who’s going to play the part?

  Never mind, there�
�s bound to be some good-looking young gal in this town who’ll be anxious to play it. There’s bound to be plenty of talent here. I have a hunch.

  Donelson looked at his glass. Say, he said, what you say they call this drink?

  Black Cow.

  You sure it isn’t white mule? From the way you’re talking I’d think so.

  You just wait, you’ll see.

  I’ll have to wait but we’d better get something going quick, because the dough is going fast. Go West, young man, where the pickings are easy…. That’s still the best idea for us.

  We’ll go West, but for the while we’ll linger here.

  So we’ll stay, but what about a script?

  She smiled, her head back, and I could see the sweet throbbing of her throat. Thinking, Time—time is all I need to take the mountain. But now her mind was on the sheerest shadow she hoped to be upon the wall. I looked into the trees, the shadows there. Blossoms fall.

  He had called me to him on a bright day….

  Bliss, Daddy Hickman said, you keep asking me to take you even though I keep telling you that folks don’t like to see preachers spending too much time around a place they think of as one of the Devil’s hangouts. All right, so now I’m going to take you so you can see for yourself, and you’ll see that it’s just like the world—full of sinners and a few believers, a few good folks and a heap of mixed-up and bad ones. Yes, and beyond the fun of sitting there looking at the marvelous happenings in the dark, there’s all the same old snares and delusions we have to sidestep every day right out here in the bright sunlight. Because you see, Bliss, it’s not so much a matter of where you are as what you see….

  Yes, sir, I said.

  He shook his head. No, don’t go agreeing too quick, Bliss; wait until you understand. Now like old Saint Luke says, “The light of the body is the eye,” so you want to be careful that the light that your eye lets into you isn’t the light of darkness and confusion.

  I nodded my head, watching his eyes. I could see him studying the Word as he talked, the way his eyes seemed to look inside in order to look out. He was looking through and beyond me.

  Yes, sir, I said.

  That’s right, he said, many times you will have to preach goodness out of badness, little boy. Yes, and hope out of hopelessness. God made the world and gave it a chance, and when it’s bad we have to remember that it’s still his plan for it to be redeemed through the striving of a few good women and men. So come on, we’re going to walk down there and take us a good look. We’re going to do it in style too, with some popcorn and peanuts and some Cracker Jacks and candy bars. You might as well get some idea of what you will have to fight against, because I don’t believe you can really lead folks if you never have to face up to any of the temptations they face. Christ had to put on the flesh, Bliss; you understand? And I was a sinner man too.

  Yes, sir.

  But wait here a second, Bliss—

  He looked deep into me and I felt a tremor. Sir? I said.

  He hesitated, his eyes becoming sad. Then:

  Now don’t think this is going to become a habit, Bliss. I know you’re going to like being there looking in the dark, even though you have to climb those filthy, piss-soaked stairs to get there. Oh, yes, you’re going to enjoy looking at the pictures just about like I used to enjoy being up there on the bandstand playing music for folks to enjoy themselves to, back there in the olden days before I was called. Yes, you’re going to like looking at the pictures, most likely you’re going to be bug-eyed with the excitement; but I’m telling you right now that it’s one of those pleasures we preachers have to leave to other folks. And I’ll tell you why, little preacher: Too much looking at those pictures is going to have a lot of folks raising a crop of confusion. The picture show hasn’t been here but a short while but I can see it coming already. Because folks are getting themselves mixed up with those shadows spread out against the wall, with things that are no more than some smoke drifting up from hell or dreams pouring out of a bottle. So they lose touch with who they’re supposed to be, Bliss. They forget to be what the Book tells them they were meant to be—and that’s in God’s own image. One of the preacher’s jobs, his main job, Bliss, is to help folks find themselves and to keep reminding them to remember who they are. So you see, those pictures can go against our purpose. If they look at those shows too often they’ll get all mixed up with so many of those shadows that they’ll lose their way. They won’t know who they are, is what I mean. So you see, if we start going to the picture show all the time, folks will think we’re going to the Devil and backsliding from what we preach. We have to set them an example, Bliss; so we’re going in there for the first and last time—

  Now don’t look at me like that; I know it seems like every time a preacher turns around there’s something else he has to give up. But, Bliss, there’s a benefit in it too, because pretty soon he develops control over himself. Self-control’s the word, Bliss. That’s right, you develop discipline, and you live so you can feel the grain of things and you learn to taste the sweet that’s in the bitter and the bitter in the sweet too and you live more deeply and earnestly. A man doesn’t live just one life, Bliss, he lives more lives than a cat—only he doesn’t like to face it because the bitter is there nine-times-nine, right along with the sweet that he wants all the time. So he forgets.

  You too, Daddy Hickman? I said. Do you have more than one life?

  He smiled down at me.

  Me too, Bliss, he said. Me too.

  But how? How can they have nine lives and not know it?

  They forget and wander on, Bliss. But let’s us leave this now and go face up to those shadows. Maybe the Master meant for them to show us some of the many sides of the old good-bad. I know, Bliss, you don’t understand that, but you will, boy. You will….

  Ah, but by then Body had brought the news:

  We were sitting on the porch-edge eating peanuts, goober peas, as Deacon Wilhite called them. Discarded hulls littered the ground below the contented dangling of our feet. We were barefoot—I was allowed to be that day—and in overalls. A flock of sparrows rested on the strands of electric wire across the unpaved road, darting down from time to time and sending up little clouds of dust. Body was humming as he chewed. Except in church we were always together, he was my right hand.

  Body said.

  Bliss, you see that thing they all talking about?

  Who, I said.

  All the kids. You seen it yet?

  Seen what, Body? Why do you always start preaching before you state your text?

  You the preacher, ain’t you? Look like to me a preacher’d know what a man is talking about.

  I looked at him hard and he grinned, trying to keep his face straight.

  You ought to know where all the words come from, even before anybody starts to talk. Preachers is supposed to see visions and things, ain’t they?

  Now don’t start playing around with God’s work, I warned him. Like Daddy Hickman says, everybody has to die and pay their bills…. Have I seen what?

  That thing Sammy Leatherman’s got to play with. It makes pictures.

  No, I haven’t. You mean a kodak? I’ve seen one of those. Daddy Hickman has him a big one. Made like a box with little pearly glass windows in it and one round one, like an eye.

  He shook his head. I put down the peanuts and fitted my fingers together. I said,

  Here’s the roof

  Here’s the steeple,

  Open it up and see

  the people.

  Body sneered. That steeple’s got dirt under those fingernail shingles, why don’t you wash your hands? Besides, you think I’m a baby? Lots of folks have those kodaks, this here is something different.

  Well, what is it then?

  I don’t rightly know, he said. I just heard some guys talking about it down at the liberty stable. But they was white and I didn’t want to ask them any questions. I rather be ignorant than ask them anything.

  So why didn’t you a
sk Sammy, he ain’t white.

  Naw, he a Jew; but he looks white, and sometimes he acts white too. Specially when he’s with some of those white guys who think they so fine.

  He always talks to me, I said. Calls me rabbi.

  The doubt came into Body’s eyes like a think cloud. He frowned. He was my right hand and I could feel his doubt.

  You look white too, Rev, he said. Why you let him call you “rabbit”?

  I looked away, toward the dusting birds. They were ruffled out and fluttering.

  Body, cain’t you hear? I said he calls me rabbi.

  Oh, it sounds like my little brother trying to spell rabbit. Re-abbi-tee, rabbit, he say. He a fool, man.

  He sure is, he’s your brother, ain’t he?

  Don’t start that now, you a preacher, remember? How come you let Sammy play the dozens with you, you want to be white?

  NO! And Sammy ain’t white and that’s not playing the dozens, it means “preacher” in Jew talk. Quit acting a fool. What kind of box is this you heard them talking about?

  His lids came down low and his eyes hid when I tried to look for the truth in them.

  All I know is that it makes pictures, Body said.

  It makes pictures and not a kodak?

  That’s right, Rev.

  I chewed awhile and thought of all the things I had heard about but hadn’t seen; airplanes and angels and Stutz Bearcats and Stanley Steamers. Then I thought I had it: