by Randy Alcorn
“But…he didn’t answer?” Dani said.
“Oh, yes he did, chile, he surely did.”
“But—”
“Sure enough, we’s all here together, just like we prayed for, now ain’t we? You hasn’t met Abe and Ruth yet, they been busy since you came, but they’s here all right. What better place than this one? Now, the answer to my prayer took a tad bit longer than I wanted. But Elyon doesn’t always do it our way, now does he?”
“No, he doesn’t,” Dani said. “So Mr. Collins sold off part of your family?”
“We chose to have Nancy and Ruth stay at the Collins place, because they’d be safer, I thought. At least nobody was rapin’ the slave women there. Abraham and I was hauled off to an old plantation outside Louisville. Them peoples didn’t seem to care much ’bout how us slaves grieved when they split up our families.”
Dani watched Zeke and Nancy and Abraham and Ruth torn out of each other’s arms and the man and boy pushed into the back of a wagon. It rode off leaving a trail of dust covering a weeping Nancy on her knees, huddling next to little Ruth.
“Knowin’ we’d be parted,” Zeke said, “we set up a meeting place not far from the Collins plantation. I told Nancy that one year later to the day I’d do anything to get me and Abe there.”
“Did you make it?”
“Well, we made it to a different meetin’ place. But it wasn’t a year later I came, it was six. And then it was fifteen more years after that before Nancy made it. She always was one to run late!” Zeke laughed uproariously.
“You met again…here?”
“Yes’m, we surely did. Can you imagine a better place? And Abe and Ruthie met us too, in their own time.” Zeke stared toward the throne on which the Carpenter sat. The liberated slave’s eyes gleamed just like Dani’s father’s. “Come with me, Dani. I’s gonna take you to meets some folk. For starters, Darla and Big Sam and Little Sam.”
“And then?”
“Well, I think she’s comin’ back soon from Elyon’s mission. And soon as she does, I’m gonna introduce you to somebody who looks a lot like you. Your grandma, my precious darlin’ Ruth.”
“Geneva? I’ll be on the computer awhile. When Ty gets home, tell him I need to talk to him. Okay?” Clarence closed the door to his home office.
He surfed the Internet via America Online, checking out a half-dozen favorite Web sites, then moved over to the forums on CompuServe. He loved the Sports Forum, where he always called up the latest AP stories on the Packers. He scanned the African American Culture Forum, as always finding a few discussions of interest. He especially enjoyed going into the Journalism Forum and interjecting his conservative commentary then waiting for the hysterical responses. He’d spent long hours here arguing politics. He delighted in the debate format. He especially liked the fact that computers were colorblind. He could enter into the exchange of ideas without people thinking, “What do you expect, he’s black,” or “I wouldn’t have thought that from a black man.” Here he wasn’t a black man. He was just a man.
He checked the responses to his last post about whites and blacks both needing to take responsibility for their lives rather than blaming others and looking for government to solve problems.
“Clarence,” began the post from Bernie in New York City, “I wish you conservatives would have some compassion on those who weren’t born with silver spoons in their mouths. I’d point out the racist assumptions underlying your comments, but they’re all too obvious.”
Clarence read the other posts piggybacked on his, as well as the comments on Bernie’s. He was used to being called a racist by white liberals. Once in another forum he’d finally given in to the temptation to reveal that he was black. Those he’d been arguing with for months refused to believe him. He considered requesting their snail mail addresses so he could send them an autographed picture. It wouldn’t have mattered. If he’d convinced them he was black, it would only have meant that by advocating black responsibility and self-sufficiency he was a rear-kissing Uncle Tom.
He recalled seeing police officers posting notes in the gang section of one of the Crime Forums. He composed a question about drive-by shootings and the HK53 and threw it out for response. He’d turn any wheels he could. What was it Ollie had said about panning for gold?
“Grab a chair, Ty. The vice principal and I talked today.”
Ty hesitated, but seeing his uncle’s glare he sat down, slouched back with both legs splayed out in front of him.
“Sit up!”
He didn’t budge.
“I said sit up before I make you sit up.”
Ty sat up.
“I called the school because I hear you’re having trouble with your studies. And then I find out that’s not the half of it. Why’d you hit that boy?”
“He was foolin’ with me, dissin’ me. He talk trash to me.” His voice was low, as if speaking under protest or asserting his masculinity.
“So?”
“So I fixed to get some get back. I rearranged his face.” His voice swelled with pride.
“That’s not a good enough reason.”
“Not fo’ you. Good enough fo’ me.”
“Look, people are going to be jerks. You can’t stop them.”
“You can stop ’em if you packin’ heat.”
“You think a gun’s the solution? Well, it isn’t. I carried a gun awhile when I was your age, till your grandpa found out and thrashed my rear end till tomorrow. Thought I was one bad dude. I walked around shakin’ dice in my hand like that really meant somethin’. Bangin’ isn’t new, you know I was in the Chicago jets, man. I barely made it out with my life, and wouldn’t have if it wasn’t for Daddy. And that was before the hard drugs and the big money and the automatic weapons. You get in and you’ll never get out. I see your strut, like you’re the hot new rooster in the coop. You’ve got to get over this macho garbage. They’ll kick you out of school, and school’s your ticket out of here, boy.”
“I don’t want out of here. This is my hood. They ain’t gonna kick me outta school. Just for swingin’ on someone? Man, nobody’d be in school if that took you out. Shoot, Flash pulled hardware on a dude and he didn’t get kicked out. They ain’t gonna do it, no way”
“Aren’t. I’ve never heard you say ain’t. Don’t pull this ghetto lingo on me. Your mama taught you better than that. I know you know better. What’s happened to your English?”
“Nothin’ wrong wich da way I talkin’. You want me talkin’ white?”
“No. I want you talking right. Some whites talk right, some wrong. Some blacks talk right, some wrong. You use bad English and it’s not going to make you cool. It’s just going to make you poor. You say, ‘Lemme ax you a question,’ and you may as well burn up your résumé, bro, because they’re not going to hire you.”
“Teacher say it Black English. Jus’ the way we talk. Don’t need to talk white.”
“Your teacher’s wrong. It’s not white and it’s not black. It’s American. It’s the language of business and newspapers. That’s the way it is. If you’re going to succeed as a businessman in Kenya you have to speak good Swahili. In America, you have to speak good English.”
“Teacher say it don’t matter. If black folk make it to the top, they get pushed down by whites. Like the Surgeon General three years ago or somepin’. Teacher said they couldn’t stand a black woman doin’ important work.”
“Jocelyn Elders? They couldn’t stand someone doing lousy work, that’s what they couldn’t stand. Didn’t matter what color or gender. Incompetence knows no color or gender. Neither does excellence. Look at Colin Powell and Alan Keyes and Thomas Sowell and Kay Coles James, that’s where you should be looking.”
“Don’t push on me. I ain’t no punk.”
“I’ve never thought you were a punk. Until now. Because now you’re talking like a punk and acting like a punk. I used to be a punk when I was your age. But your granddaddy wouldn’t let me. And I won’t let you. You hear me? There won’t be a
ny punks in my house. Ain’t gonna happen.”
“Isn’t going to happen,” Ty shot back.
“You got that right, boy,” Clarence fired at him. He felt the pain in his lip and waited to regain composure.
“The vice principal said you were caught cheating. That you took a test from a teacher’s desk.”
“Wasn’t cheating.”
“Then why’d they think you were?”
“One of my homies, he put de tes on my des.”
“Put the test on my desk. Say it.”
Ty looked down.
“Say it!”
Geneva rushed to the door of Clarence’s office, alarmed by the shouting.
“Test on my desk!”
“See, you can speak English. If one of your friends stole the test and put it on your desk, you’re hanging with the wrong friends.”
“They my homies. They straight. Righteous. We watch each other’s backs.”
“You better start watching your books, Ty.”
“Cut me some slack, Jack. You don’t know nothin’ about nothin’.”
Clarence grabbed Ty by the shoulders and lifted him out of the chair. Geneva peered around the doorjam, trembling.
“The name’s not Jack. Got it? And I know more than your homies ever will. Because I work at it. And if you don’t work at it, you’ll end up nowhere, knowin’ nothin’.” He pushed Ty back on the chair.
“Are we done now?” Ty tried not to sound afraid, but the squeak in his voice gave him away.
“No. I’ll tell you when.” Clarence sat down, trying to come up with something that might get through.
“Look, Ty, the vice principal told me what I already know—that you’re really a good kid underneath it all. But I want to tell you something. You stop going to class, neglect your homework, hang with the wrong kids, get into fights, and that’s just the beginning. Next thing you know you’ll be stealing and doing drugs and gangbanging and shooting people, getting a police record. Then it isn’t going to matter. Good can’t just be buried underneath. Good is how you live, what you do with your life. Good is the choices you make. You make bad choices and before long you won’t be good anymore. You make good choices, and you can have a good life. Otherwise you’re gonna end up in that chalk circle, boy. Nobody’s gonna help you then.”
Clarence looked at Ty, who stared at the floor, unresponsive to his uncle’s words. Clarence’s mind went back just a few years ago to when this same boy loved to talk with him, loved to hear his grandpa’s stories, loved to hear his uncle read. He remembered his childlike excitement about winning the spelling bee at Tubman Grade School just two years ago.
Now he’d lost something. Innocence. Kindness. A sense of purpose and hope. He didn’t seem like the same boy.
Where did the child go?
He looked at his watch. Two hours to finish his column. After that a half hour for lunch, and on to Ollie’s, who’d asked him to meet again. Like most columnists, he knew how to hone his natural gifting with focused hard work. The reward was a flexible schedule, since you were paid by the bottom line, not successive hours at a desk. Clarence felt fortunate he could grab time most people couldn’t.
This column began like most, with a grain of an idea that becomes an irritant. The same irritants that produce pearls in oysters produce good copy in writers. But a column also has to have fire. Some logs just smoke and smolder, some catch fire quickly and burn hot. That’s what he was looking for. Before him sat three piles of three-by-five cards paper-clipped together, representing three column ideas. In keeping with the maxim “as goes the lead so goes the column,” he was trying to write a lead for each, then let the best lead determine the column.
Looking for inspiration, a kick-start, Clarence pulled a file of clippings containing his best column leads. One article on Hollywood’s adverse effects on America began, “According to my research, one in three Hollywood conservatives goes on to be president of the United States.”
For another column, he’d interviewed a Mexican-born ranch hand from California who was a legal immigrant. He’d asked him what he thought about his children being taught in Spanish in their California public school. His response became Clarence’s lead: “In the school they teach my children Spanish so they can grow up to be busboys and waiters. At home I teach them English, so they can grow up to be doctors and teachers.”
He’d written some columns on abortion that were among his most controversial. He looked at the one in front of him, written after Susan Smith drowned her children in that Carolina lake:
Susan Smith killed her two sons. Amid all the shock and dismay expressed in the media, I can only ask, What’s the big deal? Why is everybody so upset? After all, people all over the country, including columnists at this newspaper, have for years defended her right to kill the same two children. Their only stipulation was that Susan Smith kill them when they were younger and smaller. Based on this I can only conclude that Susan Smith, exercising her right to privacy and freedom of choice, was not guilty of doing a bad thing. She was only guilty of bad timing. What she did to her sons was just a very late-term abortion.
He’d concluded the article, “It’s time for abortion advocates to be honest and admit that Susan Smith is the poster child for pro-choice America.”
He looked at the file folder full of angry responses to this column. Winston, Jess, everyone but Jake had tried to talk him out of it. But Clarence went to those upstairs and asked, “Are you going to censor your first-ever black columnist? If you do, I may have to file a complaint.”
He’d played hardball and made some enemies. They toned down the column, but Clarence’s lead and conclusion held.
“Hey, Clabern.”
“Jake, my man!” He turned outward from his cubicle and slapped hands with his friend.
“Sorry to bother you,” Jake said. “I know you’ve just got an hour before deadline.”
“No problem,” Clarence said. “What’s up?”
“Just heard from Pam in Metro that the Portland Hispanic Coalition had a meeting. Apparently they expressed concern that police are harassing Latinos, questioning them about your sister’s shooting.”
“Nobody’s accusing the whole Hispanic community of doing it. Just two guys.”
“I know. Guess they think they’re getting bad press and it’s creating racial division.”
“Sure it is. It always does. White guy kills somebody and nobody says, ‘That’s what white guys do.’ Black or Latino does it and people think, ‘Yeah, it figures.’”
“Well,” Jake said, “apparently Raylon is considering giving them space for a guest opinion. They think the Trib has been more pro-black than pro-Hispanic.”
Clarence shook his head. “It’s like slicing up a pie. Everybody wants a bigger piece.”
Ollie took Clarence and Manny into an interrogation room, carrying the HK53 the armorer had showed them.
“I twisted some arms and checked this baby out from SERT just for the day. Thought maybe if I threatened you two with it I could talk you into kissing and making up.” Manny and Clarence both stared blankly at him, neither amused. “Okay Bad joke. Look, before we get going on the rifle, can I talk off the record Clarence, just between the three of us?”
“Yeah.”
“Captain says there’s been a backlash from the Hispanic community. Manny and I were poking around on this murder and word got out. They want to know who’s making the accusation.”
“They have a right to know,” Manny said.
“Look, Manny, we’ve been through this,” Ollie said. “We don’t want Mookie intimidated into silence. I told him his name wouldn’t get out for now so he and his family don’t have to worry about the old witness elimination program. If we nail somebody, we’ll worry about it when we have to put his name forward, but till then, why risk it?”
“It stinks,” Manny said, “and they can smell it. Some black kid accuses Latino kids of doing a murder in the black part of town where the black
gangs rule.”
“You seem hung up on the word black, Junior Detective,” Clarence said. “If you’ve got problems with blacks and you don’t think Hispanics commit crimes, maybe you should get off the case.”
“I should get off the case? I’m a detective. The only one who should be taken off this case is you, you…”
Go ahead and say it.
“Knock it off you two,” Ollie stepped between them. “Let’s be civil, okay? You don’t have to like each other. But we’re on the same side, all right?” Both men stared at each other. Neither blinked. “Now, Manny, tell Clarence who you’ve been talking to.”
Manny hesitated, then finally spoke. “I’ve been with the leaders of all the big Latino gangs—from Nuestra Familia to the Mexican Mafia, to all the locals. They’re all laughin’ at us. They say if anyone from the barrios did a hit in North Portland they’d know all about it. To them it’s a joke.”
“So you’re trusting the word of gangbangers?” Clarence asked. “You think they’re going to confess to you they did it? Who’s side are you on?”
“I’m trusting gangbangers, Mr. Bigshot Journalist? Who’s the one that paid a black gangbanger a hundred bucks for a good story?”
“Mookie’s not a banger.” Clarence looked at Ollie. “Is he?”
“I was just going to tell you that,” Ollie said. “I asked around, found out he’s not a big name, but he’s more than a wannabe. He’s a Rollin’ 60s Crip.”
“I still say he’s telling the truth,” Clarence said. “Don’t you think so, Ollie?”
“Yeah, I lean that way. His story seems solid enough. But I see Manny’s point too. Anyway the captain doesn’t want us overstepping our bounds with the Hispanic gangs. We can’t turn people into suspects just because they’re male Latinos driving a lowrider. We have to move carefully.”
