The Third Generation

by Chester B Himes

  He felt her slender cool hand groping for his fingers and took it gratefully.

  “I always wanted a brother,” she confessed.

  “I guess we wanted a sister too, although I don’t remember ever thinking of it.”

  Then for a long time they just walked through the cool, dim night, matching strides. Their arms swung a little with their fingers locked together as, they walked along without talking, caught in the entrancement of the moment.

  Finally she said, “We’re going back to Brinkley in the mornin’.”

  “We’re going to St. Louis tomorrow too.” It frightened him.

  “Don’t be scared,” she said intuitively. He choked to keep from crying. “You can do a lot of things all by yourself.”

  “I know,” he said. His voice sounded strange and thick. He tried to make it clear. “I’m always doing something.”

  “Not what you used to do together.”

  “No, I couldn’t do that by myself.”

  Now they were in the bright lights that extended down past Main. Instinctively they turned into the darkness of Cherry Street.

  “But I used to never tell my dreams,” he said. “I mean—you know—while you’re awake. Just sort of making up things you’d like to do if everything was different.”

  “Like what?”

  “Oh, like I’d say you were Penelope and I was Ulysses returning home from twenty years of wandering. Then I’d make out you’d been waiting for me all those years.” He didn’t feel embarrassed; he was excited telling it. “But you couldn’t really be there; I mean, if you were there I couldn’t make it up.” The back of the icehouse loomed up, loading docks vague in the darkness.

  “Why can’t you do it with me here?” she whispered timidly. “You’ve never tried.”

  He stopped to look at her and she turned from one step ahead and shyly searched his face.

  “I don’t know,” he mumbled.

  Then awkwardly they groped together, clumsy from inexperience. But there was a young sweet poetry in their clumsy hands and awkward motions. His mouth kept searching for her lips as they tried to adjust their faces and his arms about her slender body. Finally their lips were meeting, softly pressing in a clear, cool kiss. The queerest sort of feeling surged from deep inside him; an overwhelming sense of love and purity gathered in his heart. He was flooded with the impulse to defend her. Wordlessly they broke apart and looked straight into each other’s eyes. There was no shame; only the bright, luminous quality of their love. Her long dark hair, worn in loose curls down on her shoulders, made a soft, delicate cameo of her thin, fragile face.

  “You’re very pretty,” he said chokingly. “You look something like my mother used to look. Only her hair was lighter.”

  “Would you like me better if my hair was lighter?”

  “No.”

  “You’re a funny boy,” she said tremulously, catchy-like, as if she thought he might vanish or fly away.

  He laughed from happiness. “I’m just natural nuts.”

  Now she laughed along with him. “You are not; you’re nice.”

  “Come on.” He took her hand. “There’s a carnival at the fairgrounds.” He must show her what he knew.

  Time and parents were forgotten. The night was filled with magic as they swung along. Clouds drifted in disorder across the moon. He drew her to a stop and pointed.

  “See, it’s Pegasus. See how the wings spread out and the hoof is raised.” He was all excited.

  “That’s a horse, isn’t it?”

  He laughed uproariously. “What a question! Didn’t you ever do that? Play at finding things in the clouds? Will and I used to all the time.”

  “Oh, with my sister, yes. But we just found people mostly; just folks whom we both knew.”

  “You ought’ve been with us. We used to find all sort of things.”

  “You and I could too,” she said stoutly.

  “Race you!” he said suddenly. They leaped and ran with joy. The darkness sang with happiness as they sped along. Then, there in the distance was the carnival, a noisy, crowded, ecstatic wonderland. They wandered down the midway and breathed in the excitement. White people eyed them curiously, but none bothered. They swung along, hand in hand, enveloped in a dream.

  But time, that old iconoclast, kept tugging at their elbows.

  They made the journey home in silence, walking rapidly to keep ahead of tears. But at the end they cried anyway. She wouldn’t let him come to where her parents waited with the whipping they held in store for her. He had to say good-bye at a distance and watch her walk away alone. Briefly they embraced, clumsily as at first, clinging for dear life. And as at first, their cool, young lips searched before meeting, and the taste of each other’s tears was in their kiss.

  The next night he was on the train going to St. Louis. He couldn’t stop the crying. It just kept on coming up and flooding out. These good-byes were coming too rapidly for him. He was getting so he cried easily as a baby.

  He thought continuously of her. In the outside night that raced along the window he saw her face in all its exquisite moods. And her voice kept time with the thumping of the wheels over the section joints…You’re a funny boy…a funny boy…a funny boy…a funny boy…a funny boy…a funny boy…a funny boy…It felt as if his heart would burst with aching. He loved her so…loved her so…loved her so…loved her…a funny boy…a funny boy…a funny boy…loved her so…It seemed as if the turmoil in his head would flame explosively.

  “Don’t cry, son,” his father gestured with vague helplessness. “It’s going to work out all right. You boys’ll be together before another year.”

  Charles looked up at his father, choking back his tears. Deep, sinking lines like mutilations pulled down the full, strong features of his father’s face. And his skin had lightened, taken on a grayish pallor beneath the black. The settled look of age shocked Charles to reality.

  “I’ll be all right,” he mumbled, knuckling at his eyes. “I’ll be all right, Dad, I’ll be all right.” Then later on he asked, “Can I get you a drink of water, Dad?”

  “No, son, thanks…I’m not thirsty.” The wheels clacked endlessly…“I’m just tired…”

  Gone! It was gone…gone-gone-gone-gone-gone-gone…Mississippi…Then Will…Then his mother…His love had gone…And now his father…Gone-gone-gone-gone, the wheels clacked. Came arapping and atapping and atapping and atapping…A funny boy…gone-gone-gone-gone-gone…

  15

  ST. LOUIS BECAME A CITY of frustration for the Taylor family. Though they’d gotten back their house, it never became a home. Within it they became prisoners of their despair.

  William was being treated by famous specialists at the great hospital. He went five times a week. But no miracle had happened. One eye could distinguish light from dark; the other could make out type print held an inch or two away, and distinguish outlines at a distance of four or five feet. Grafting corneas to both eyes was considered, but only a few such operations had been attempted, and the ratio of success was low. There was the added difficulty of obtaining corneas; they had to be taken from the eyes of living persons or from corpses shortly dead. His mother offered hers, but the doctors didn’t think it worth the risk. Charles was never told for fear he might do something rash.

  The major hope was to remove sufficient scar tissue so light could penetrate. It was a slow, nerve-racking process that went on all that summer. But William never seemed discouraged, never complained. Charles was awed by his brother’s courage. In William’s presence he became inarticulate, but worshiped him across the gap.

  Tom was there that summer. He did all the things for William that Charles would have liked to do—little things like walking him to the store, taking him to the barbershop, buying him something special. Their mother did the special things, like taking him to the hospital and cutting up his food. Charles felt left out. It seemed as if he was too young to be of any good at all.

  Tom was working as a bus boy in a down
town restaurant. He’d come home with an armache that made him miserable. Then Charles would massage his arm and feel that he was helping.

  Professor Taylor had no ability at all for city life. At heart he was a missionary. He’d lived his life in southern Negro colleges. There, a professor was somebody. He counted in the neighborhood. His family counted too. But in St. Louis he didn’t count.

  He’d gotten a job waiting on tables in a roadhouse out near Carondulet.

  “It’s a goddamned crying shame about that son of yours, Willie,” his boss, Joe Terry, would say, shaking his head in real lament. “You oughta be back teaching your people instead of here waiting on roughnecks like these.”

  Professor Taylor would smile courageously. “Mr. Terry, the world’s not coming to an end because I’m away from teaching for a year or two.”

  It was in his home that he’d been defeated. He was a pathetic figure coming home from work; a small black man hunched over and frowning, shambling in a tired-footed walk, crushed old cap pulled down over his tired, glazed eyes, a cigarette dangling from loose lips.

  His occupation was never mentioned before the children. But they’d overheard their parents discussing it, and were ashamed for him. Usually they were long in bed when he returned from work. But once, going to the bathroom, Charles saw his father slowly trudging up the stairs. He looked so old and stooped and beaten. It frightened him. Suppose his father died. What would become of them?

  For a short time at summer’s end, after Tom had returned to school, Charles had William to himself. The bandages had been removed from William’s eyes but the burnt lids and bluish-tinted irises were more shocking then before. Both tried desperately to recapture the old feeling. They fell into their old-time habit of playing rough, tussling with each other and doing feats of strength and agility. But suddenly William would turn to shout excitedly and Charles would catch sight of the bluish pebbles in the burnt dark flesh. Agony could cut him to the bone. He just couldn’t get over it. Or William would bump head-on into something, and the hurt would course through Charles like brackish, bitter venom. He was always keyed up, too anxious to make his playing seem natural.

  They’d rob a huckster’s wagon in the early dusk and race wildly down the alley with the apples and bananas. William’s foot would catch on some obvious obstruction, an overturned garbage can, a kid’s tricycle, and he’d pitch headlong, sprawling on the bricks. Quick, violent protest would shake Charles loose from reason; with a savage insane gesture he’d throw his own stolen fruit in a blind arc, breaking windows, he didn’t care.

  Once they were out in the alley throwing rocks at a garbage can placed against the schoolyard wall. William had got the range and was doing fine. Their mother called Charles and he was gone for a moment. William went forward to grope beside the can for rocks. Charles dashed back, throwing on the run, and didn’t see his brother until the rock was on its way.

  “Will!” he screamed in terror.

  William looked quickly up, seeing nothing, and the rock struck him in the center of the forehead right between the eyes. Caught in rigidity, hurt surged through Charles like acid in his veins. Then he ran forward. But William had gotten up and was dabbing at the cut with a handkerchief. He heard his younger brother’s gasping breath and laughed it off.

  “It wasn’t your fault, Chuck. I wasn’t looking.”

  Charles couldn’t take it. After that he quit playing with his brother. And the gap widened.

  Charles hated the city high school. He was given entrance examinations and assigned to the second year. The teachers found it hard to comprehend that he’d attended college.

  “Now what’s the name of that school you attended in Arkansas?” his home room teacher, Mr. Sawyer, asked.

  “Well, they called it a college.”

  “Oh.”

  He couldn’t say he was Professor Taylor’s son because they didn’t know Professor Taylor either.

  And there was something about the students he never liked. They were all so preoccupied with themselves, so quick to ostracize and condescend. They seemed to him so cheap-smart and city-dirty. At first they were distant and unfriendly. He was alone now; alone against them all.

  William had entered the state school for the blind and Charles went with him on Saturdays. Unlike the city schools, here Negroes weren’t segregated. Charles wondered if it was because the students couldn’t see.

  William enjoyed it. But for Charles, Saturdays became a time of death. There was something unearthly about the blind students moving so cheerfully among the grim, forlorn buildings. He couldn’t meet the teachers’ eyes. A sense of guilt shattered him. He felt so awfully ashamed for having sight. He’d leave his brother at the door and run until he couldn’t breathe.

  William studied braille and took lessons on the clarinet and soon was playing in the band. A deep camaraderie existed among the students. Most of them had a wonderful sense of humor. Their errors due to blindness were a constant source of merriment. William was always recounting something funny he’d done, such as entering the girls’ toilet by mistake. In the darkness he couldn’t see at all. He felt around and his hand had encountered hair.

  “I said, ‘Excuse me, I’m looking for the urinal.’ Then someone said in a shrill voice, ‘Wrong department.’” He laughed uproariously.

  It made the goose flesh crawl on Charles. Finally he asked in a small, strangled voice, “What’d you do?”

  “Heck, I just laughed and went across the hall.”

  Nights when the band rehearsed, all of them were accompanied by relatives. It was something like a party; they laughed and talked between rehearsals and ate ice cream and cake. Everyone but Charles had fun; he sat apart, self-conscious, fuming with impotent rage, cauterized with guilt…How could they laugh, goddamn ‘em! How could they? How could they? his mind protested. Sometimes his brother turned and spoke to him, thinking him nearby, and he’d have to hurry over.

  “What’d you say, Will?”

  “Oh—nothing much. Where were you?”

  “I—I wasn’t listening, is all.”

  The other relatives looked at him curiously. Frequently they smiled in his direction. But he held himself rigidly aloof and unapproachable. In all his actions he was braced against the world.

  Athletics gave some relief. Across from the high school was a public playground where gangs of city hoodlums collected after school and played a dirty, vicious brutal game which they called football. That became Charles’s outlet. He played out of a deep subconscious compulsion to kill himself. Bareheaded and wearing only a sweater over his shirt, he’d dive headfirst to make a tackle, flying through the air to meet with full impact a pair of pumping feet.

  “Nine—nineteen—twenty-nine—shift!” he’d sing, calling the signals, unconsciously calling the death row in lottery, and he’d receive the ball and start heading, high-kneeing and swivel-hipping, toward the violent men, spinning away from one, jumping over another, until they pulled him down. They’d pile on top of him, dig their elbows into his back, slam his face into the rocky ground. He’d get up grinning, teeth chipped, slightly dazed. And for a moment he’d be free of all the hurt and guilt inside of him.

  A curious phenomenon took place within his mind that winter. Whole periods of his past became lost to recollection. There was no pattern, no continuity, no rational deletions, as the editing of a text. Fragments of days, whole months, a chain of afternoons were drawn at random, a word would be missing from a sentence which he recalled with startling clarity, the intended meaning now gone. He didn’t remember a single recitation period from all the years of his mother’s teaching in Mississippi. The evening of William’s accident, the afternoon leading up and the nightmare afterwards, were branded on his brain. But from the time he and his father left the hospital to return home, until William, with their mother, boarded the train for St. Louis, was a complete blank. He didn’t remember the girl, Jessie, how she looked, what she said, nor their walk out to the carnival on Cher
ry Street that night at all. But he remembered the discovery of their love like the lingering poignance of a moving dream, the dream itself having vanished on awakening. And the feeling of the emotion was still so strong within him at nights it made him cry. It was as if a madman had snatched pages from a treasured book, the story stopping eerily in the middle of a sentence, a gaping hole left in the lives of all the characters, the senses groping futilely to fill the missing parts, gone now, senselessly gone, now the meaning all distorted as if coming suddenly and unexpectedly into a street of funny mirrors. In after years it was as if they’d never lived within their house at all; never eaten a meal in the dining room, never sat together in the living room.

  But outwardly he was helpful and obedient. He was wonderfully considerate toward his brother. When it became cold enough to freeze the lakes they went sledding in Forest Park. Directly in front of the Art Museum was a long, steep slope adjoining the lake and when the snow was packed the sleds went down at a furious pace and coasted far across the lake.

  William loved to sled. Charles sat at the front to steer, William clung behind, and when it came their turn the policeman on duty gave them a mighty push. It seemed as if they soared through the air. William whooped and yelled like an Indian, putting out his face to catch the hard cold push of air. Charles set his teeth and braced his body against disaster. He always felt a sense of trepidation, a fragile, fluttery feeling inside, such as he experienced when looking down from heights. He knew if he saw William hurt just one more time he’d come apart inside.

  But Forest Park held their fondest times together. On Sunday afternoons their father came with them. The zoo enthralled them both. William, his head cocked, listened to the scolding of the monkeys.

  “You can almost understand them, Chuck.”

  Charles was fascinated by the lion’s silent prowling, back and forth, back and forth, his gaze caught in the lambent, hypnotic eyes coming forward toward the bars, the fluid body turning like running water, his gaze released, caught, released, caught, released, endlessly.