Never Love a Stranger (27 page)
Harry registered the sale and gave me the change. I counted it out to the lady and said: “Thank you. Call again.” I had made my first sale. I turned to the next customer, but Harry had cleared them up. He came over to me.
“You’ll be all right,” he said with a smile. “There’s still a few things to learn, though. When you cut cheese and it’s a little over the weight called for, don’t be afraid to charge a little more than it registers. The customers don’t know it anyway and most of them can’t figure, and it helps to make up for what we eat in the morning and other things, such as egg breakage, that the office doesn’t give us any credit on.”
“I understand,” I said. I sure did! This only confirmed my ideas. Everything had an angle. All you had to do was look for it.
I
T
was Sunday and I slept late. When I woke up I looked over at the dresser where I had placed the new sixty-cent alarm clock I had bought last night. It showed a few minutes after eleven. I looked over at the floor where I had placed the bag with some groceries in it. It was there. I turned over in bed, reached out and took a packet of cigarettes from my pocket, placed one in my mouth, and lit it. I lay back comfortably on the pillow and looked at the smoke swirling up to the ceiling. I felt relaxed and at ease, and put one arm under my head while I thought about the day before.
The past few weeks seemed far away. I had never been cold and worked on the snow and been hungry. I felt good.
I remembered the night before about ten o’clock when Mr. Rayzeus had come around he had another man with him. Harry told me it was the boss, the Mr. Big who owned all these stores that we and others like us worked in. He was a quiet, smiling, little, grey- haired man, who nodded pleasantly to me as he came in the door. I was waiting on a customer and I had smiled back at him, not knowing then who he was. He went over to the register and looked in. Then he turned to Harry, and they shook hands and talked for a few minutes. He walked around the store and then left. Mr. Rayzeus spoke a few words to Harry after Mr. Big left, and then he too went out. He said: “Good night, Frank,” to me as he walked out, and I felt pretty good that he remembered me.
And later, after we had closed up and I had swept out the store, Harry called me over to the register to get my pay. He handed me seven dollars and asked me if that was all right.
For a moment I was confused; then I said: “You gave me too much. I only worked three days. That’s half a week. Five dollars.”
Harry smiled. “The extra two is for me. I always let the boys take home a package of groceries Saturday night. But you don’t need any, so I thought this would come in handy. You play square with me and I’ll treat you right.”
I looked at the money in my hand and then at Harry. “Thanks,” I said, “I’ll do my best to earn it.”
“You will,” Harry said, and laughed.
“If it’s all right with you,” I said, “I would like to get a grocery order for some people.
They’ve been nice to me. I’ll pay for it.”
“Pick it out,” Harry said, turning back to the register to balance his cash.
I took a dozen of the best eggs, a pound of real butter, a package of lean bacon, some old-fashioned American cheese, sugar, flour, some cans of good vegetables, and a few packages of cereal. I figured out how much this amounted to, and then I added to it two loaves of white bread and a large twenty-five-cent cake. I went over to Harry and gave him the bag. I had written down the name of each article and the price next to it. It came to three dollars and ten cents. I put three dollars and ten cents on the register and started to pack it up.
Harry came over to me, still holding the money in his hand. “Who are the groceries for?” he asked.
“Friends of mine,” I answered. “When I got to New York in February, I was broke and they took me in. They’re pretty poor and I couldn’t stay too long, but without them I would have been licked.”
He was silent a few minutes while I tied up the bag and put a wooden handle on it so I could carry it better. Then he held out the money to me. “Here,” he said, “keep it.”
I didn’t take the money. “I want to pay for it,” I said. “I got enough money. I made over two bucks in tips today.”
“Take it,” he urged. “We’ll make it up in the store this time.”
I took the money and put it in my pocket. “Thanks again, I said, “I appreciate this.” “Forget it!” He smiled. “Come on over to the restaurant and have some coffee with me
before we go home.”
I had been sitting there in the ice-cream parlour an hour with him before we left for home. It was near two o’clock and I rode down on the trolley to the hotel. The night clerk recognized me as I came in, and handed me my key. He saw the package and smilingly said: “No cooking in the rooms, Mr. Kane.”
I laughed. “Don’t worry!” I called over my shoulder as I strode towards the stairway, “I won’t.”
The cigarette was almost out. I put it out in a small plate on the dresser, shaved, and then went down the hall to the shower. It was late and there wasn’t a line. I went right in, turned on the warm water, and soaped myself. The warm water felt good as it ran the soap down my back. I stepped out and dried myself on the rough towel, rubbing till I could feel my skin turn red and tingle. Then I went back to my room and dressed. I took the subway and went uptown. At 125th Street I got off and walked over to the Harrises. It was near one o’clock. I walked up the stairs in the dimly lit hallway, smelling that old fried-porky smell, and knocked on the door.
Tom opened it. His face broke into a smile as he saw me. “Man!” he said, grinning, “we was jus’ tawkin’ about you. Come on in.”
I stepped inside as he called into the other room, “Maw, guess who’s here?” He turned back to me and grabbed my hand and shook it enthusiastically. “How ah yuh, boy?”
I managed to grin and rescue my hand before he crushed it. “Fine!” I said, “just fine!”
Sam and Elly came running into the room, followed more slowly by their mother. I shook hands with Sam and Elly and kissed Mrs. Harris. From the way they greeted me, a person would think I hadn’t seen them in years, instead of just five days. When the excitement died down a little, I put the package on the table.
“I got a job,” I announced proudly, “a real job, in a grocery store, like Sam. I thought I’d bring something up to you.” I opened the bag and took out the food. “The best eggs,” I said, “real butter and cheese and cake and …” I stopped. Mrs. Harris had sat down in her chair and was weeping.
I went over to her and put my arm around her shoulders. I could feel the thin bones of them near her neck. “Why, Maw,” I said softly, “what’s the matter?”
She looked up at me and smiled through her tears. “Nothing, Frankie,” she spoke softly. “Nothing—I’m just glad, I guess. I was a-prayin’ for you evvy day—— A-prayin’ for you to git somethin’ that would let you smile again an’ kinda turn the cohnehs of youah mouth up a little.”
I was silent—I didn’t know what to say. I looked at Sam and Tom and Elly. Tom nodded his head. “Thass right, Frankie. She tole us evvy day to pray fer you. An’ we did— all of us.” He looked at his brother and sister. “Didn’t we?”
They shook their heads in silent assent. I looked around at them and down at Maw Harris. “I don’t know what to say.”
Maw Harris smiled at me. “Don’ say nothin’. You don’ have to say nothin’. It’s just that the Lawd has heard us an’ all we can say is: ‘Thank you, Lawd. Thank you foah all youah kindnesses.’”
Later, when we had eaten and I had told them all my story— how I got the job and how much I was making and what I was doing—and we were sitting back and I was smoking, Mrs. Harris spoke again: “This has been a good week foh us folks, too.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
She looked proudly at Elly. “Elly’s done got herself a good job too—thass what! She is wuhkin’ over at anothuh ribbon fact’ry an’ makin’ most fifteen dollars a week.”
“That’s swell!” I said automatically, looking at Elly, happy for them. Elly was sitting there, her face stony. She stared right back at me almost defiantly. I knew instantly what Elly was doing, and yet couldn’t say anything. I had to play along with the old woman.
“She has to wuhk pretty late some nights though,” the old woman continued. “But Elly’s a good girl. She doan’ mind that.” She looked at the old clock on the closet shelf. “My, my!” she said, getting to her feet. “The day does fly. It’s mos’ fouah o’clock an’ I mus’ go down to the Sunday-aftehnoon meetin’. Come on, Tom, an’ you too, Sam. You has to go with me. Elly went this mohnin’, an’ she can stay an’ keep Frankie com’ny till we gits back. Hurry now!”
They left, the two young men and their mother, one on each side or her, holding her gently as they went down the steps. The Queen of England couldn’t have been held with more care, more respect, and more devotion than the touch of their hands on her arms or the soft, tender look on their faces. I closed the door behind them and turned to Elly.
She was sitting on the edge of the window-sill, looking out into the dirty brown courtyard. I sat down in a chair near her and watched her. We didn’t speak. I lit a cigarette. “So you got a job, Elly,” I said quietly.
She didn’t look at me. Her voice was low and bitter. “You know I haven’t.” “I don’t know anything,” I said. “Supposing you tell me.”
She didn’t answer for a while. Then she spoke, her voice tense and strained, but controlled. “I wuhk oveh at an apahtment with some women.” Her dialect was more pronounced than usual. “We splits with the ownuh.”
“There must be something else you can do,” I said. “Is theyah?”
I had no answer for that question.
After a minute she continued, her voice deliberately mimicking mine. “Theyah mus’ be
somethin’ else you can do. Sho’ they is. I can go intuh the five-an’-ten or the depahtment stoh on One Hundred and Twenty-fifth Street an’ say: ‘I is white an’ you can hiyeh me to sell youeh muchandise to the poh black people who cain’t git jobs because they is black an’ oney white people is hiyed heanh in this stoh.’
“An’ Tom wouldn’t have to sit in the house all day an’ look at his han’s—his big, strong, capable han’s while they opens an’ closes oveh a piece of wuhk he ain’t got until he gets filled with feelin’s he don’t know he’s got inside him. An’ yuh throat huts just sittin’ theyah an’ watchin’ his min’ slip down an’ down an’ down until they fixes an’ comes up with an ansuh. An’ then he goes out an’ drinks—cheap rotten gin, made by some white man who is kind enuff to sell to poh folk foh a nickel a drink so they kin inflame they min’s until the fiyeh buhns them up inside an’ they doan’ remembunh anymoh they is black. But foh a few minutes they is white an’ the worl’ is they oystuh and they laughs an’ is happy until they falls down. An’ when they wakes up the next mohnin, they head bustin’ an’ they throat raw an’ they stummic buhnin’, they brings they han’s to they heads an’ holds it tight an’ they sees they han’s is black an’ dirty and has no wuhk to keep them busy. They cries to themselves, not with teahs, not with they eyes, but with they hearts an’ ask themselves: ‘Wheanh is the beautiful white, busy han’s I had yesterday?’
“An’ Sam wuhkin in a stoh evvy mohnin befoh school. He knows evvythin’ in the stoh— all the prices, all the stock. An’ all he does is delivuh groceries. He cain’t wait on customehs. He ain’t allowed to cut buttunh or cheese. His black might come off’n his hands and git on some nice white cream cheese that has to go down on nice white bread that has to go down some nice white throat. Sho, theyah mus’ be somethin’ else I kin do.”
She turned towards me.
“I’m all right, mistuh,” she said.
The way she said it went down deep inside of me. I put the cigarette out and stood up, holding my arms out to her. “You’re all right with me, lady,” I said.
She came into them and laid her head against my chest and cried and cried and cried. I let her cry herself out. After a while she stopped. For a few minutes we stood there silently.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
She stepped out of my arms and took a cigarette from the packet I had put on the table and lit it and sat down. “I don’t know why I tell you these things,” she said so softly I almost couldn’t hear her. “It’s not your fault that’s the way they are. But I got to tell somebody and I can’t tell them.”
“I know how it is when you got something on your mind and have no one to tell it to,” I said. “I felt the same way many times.”
She went over to the sink and washed her face, then combed her hair. Her hair was kinky, but she had used some cream to soften it out so that it framed her face loosely. Her black skin was thin and fine and shone with a pale blue translucence that seemed to give it a white undertone. Her body was thin, her breasts pointed, a little stomach, a high behind, and thin legs in high-heeled shoes that made them look even thinner. She sat down and picked up the lit cigarette and puffed at it. “I feel better now,” she said in a
normal tone of voice.
I felt rotten. We sat there silently a while, waiting for the family to come back. We heard Tom’s booming voice downstairs in the hall. She put out the cigarette and went over to the sink and rinsed out her mouth.
“Maw doesn’t like fer me to smoke,” she explained.
I left there about seven o’clock before they ate supper. I didn’t want to take anything from them. My portion would only have come from their scanty share. I promised to come up to see them next week and went to eat in a cafeteria on 125th Street. Then I went into the Loew’s Victoria and saw a picture called Skippy. It was based on the comic strip in the American. But it wasn’t real. Nobody lived like that.
A
T
the end of the next week life had settled down into a routine of a sort for me. Friday evening after coming from work, I spoke to the desk clerk about a permanent room. For three dollars a week I got a room with an adjoining bath. It was a larger room than the one I had before. It had two windows facing the street and a large closet. There were two easy chairs and a regular chair and a small table next to the bed. A dresser on one side and a chest of drawers opposite it completed the picture.