The other room was still hot and crowded, but no matter where you turned people were dancing. The music was blaring all over the place. I stood in there a while talking to Jack Claiborn who was leaning on the mantelpiece; then I went in the kitchen. The kitchen wasn’t so crowded but it was twice as hot. Josie was dishing up a bowl of gumbo for a man standing at the window.
“How’s the beer?” I asked Josie.
“They been drinking it hot,” she said.
“I better get one,” I said.
“Get him one, Tick,” Josie said to Tick-Tock.
“Get yourself one, too,” I said to Tick-Tock.
Tick-Tock opened the bottles on an opener against the wall and gave me mine. It was cool but it was long ways from cold.
“Your boy Marcus got through unloading that corn,” Tick-Tock said to me. “He came down the quarter few minutes ago. Jim, why don’t you make him leave Pauline alone. Not that nobody go’n tell Mr. Sidney, but he might catch him hisself.”
“I’ve talked to him already,” I said, “and he won’t listen. If Bonbon catch him, it’ll just be his hard luck.”
A few minutes later Pauline came in. She stopped in the front room to talk a while; then as she started into the kitchen one of the Aguillard brothers came out of the other room and asked her to dance. She danced with him to a couple records, then she came on back where we were.
“Oh, it’s hot,” she said. She was fanning with a little white handkerchief. “Hi, Jim.”
“How’s it going?”
“It’s burning up.”
“Beer?” I said.
“I don’t mind.”
“Not cold.”
“I’ll take anything. Then I have to go. Left the children by themself.”
“Let Aunt Ca’line look after them.”
“Who’ll look after Aunt Ca’line?” Pauline said.
I smiled at her and she smiled back. I looked at her a long time to let her know how much I liked her. But she already knew how much I liked her, and she also knew I knew that there was somebody else in her life.
I bought her another beer; then she bought two pralines for the twins and left. Tick-Tock had told her she ought to get somebody to walk home with her, but she told Tick-Tock that she had left the gallery light on and she would be all right.
Just after Pauline walked out of the house a squabble broke out in the room where the men were gambling. It sounded like somebody had overturned the gambling table. Then it sounded like somebody picked up somebody else and slammed him against the wall. There was a lot of tussling in there a while, then everybody came out. They were still arguing but nobody was throwing any punches. That is, nobody threw a punch until Marcus came in there and hit Murphy Bacheron up ’side the head.
But I’m getting a little ahead of myself here. I was talking about Pauline. As she went out of the yard, who should she see coming down the quarter but Marcus. I wasn’t there, I didn’t see it, but Aunt Ca’line and Pa Bully were still on the gallery, and Aunt Ca’line talked about it later. Josie’s gallery light was on and Pauline’s gallery light was on, so Aunt Ca’line could see the two people coming toward each other. They came closer and closer, and Aunt Ca’line could see how Pauline was moving toward the ditch to get out of his way. But Marcus moved there, too. Then they stopped. Pauline wanted to pass by but Marcus wouldn’t let her. They were standing just outside the fence, and Aunt Ca’line could hear them talking.
“Let me pass, Marcus,” Pauline was saying. “I’m telling you, now.”
“What he got on you?” Marcus said. “What’s the matter with you, woman?”
“I’m telling you, let me pass,” Pauline said.
“What’s the matter with you?” he said. “I been working up there all night like a slave, like a dog—and all on ’count of him. What’s the matter with you?”
“I’m telling you,” she said. “Let me pass.”
He moved closer.
“Don’t you put your hands on me,” she said. “I mean it, don’t you put your hands on me, you killer.”
He hit her and knocked her down. She got up.
“If I tell him, he’ll kill you for this. He’ll kill you.”
“You white man bitch,” he said. He hit her again. She fell again.
“Leave that woman ’lone, boy,” Pa Bully hollered at him.
“Mr. Grant,” Aunt Ca’line said, warningly.
“You hear me out there, boy?” Pa Bully called.
Pauline was up again.
“You bitch,” Marcus said to her. “You bloody whore.”
She was running toward the gate now.
“You whore,” he called to her.
She was running in the yard now. She ran in the house and locked the door. He stood there a while looking at the house; then he went on.
When Marcus came into Josie’s house, everything stopped. Everybody stopped dancing, everybody stopped talking—they stopped everything to look at him. They hadn’t heard the noise outside, but they had heard about him. And now here he was in person.
Marcus pushed his way back into the kitchen. He wore a pair of white pants and a blue silk shirt. He wore a brown plaited-cloth belt round his waist. He had on black and white shoes.
“What you know, buddy?” I said to him.
“Give me a beer,” he said to Josie.
“I’m out,” Josie said.
He didn’t believe she was out. He thought she didn’t want to sell him any.
“She’s out,” I said.
“What you got?” Marcus said. “Give me some whiskey. You want anything?” he asked me.
“I’ll take a shot,” I said.
“Give me some whiskey,” he told Josie.
Josie got the bottle out of the safe and poured me and him a shot.
“Fifty cents,” she said.
Marcus paid her. Then he downed his drink quickly and asked for another one.
“You want another one?” he asked me.
“No,” I said. “This is good.”
“Just took that for old buddy sake, huh?” he said.
“Fuck it,” he said.
“I don’t like that kind of talk in here,” Josie said.
“No?” Marcus said.
“No,” Josie said, looking hard at him and meaning it. And she had that bottle in her hand to back her up.
“Pour,” Marcus said.
She poured. He paid her and drunk it down.
“Give me another one,” he said.
“You had enough, Marcus,” I said.
“Yeah?” he said. “Pour,” he told Josie.
“This your last one,” Josie said. “I don’t want your money.”
“What’s the matter with my money?” he said.
“Nothing,” I said. “Come on, let’s—”
“Take your fucking hands off me,” he said, knocking my hand away.
“All right, buddy,” I said.
He downed the drink Josie had poured him; then he just stood there breathing deep and hard. I thought he had drunk that whiskey too fast and it had shot up to his brains. I asked him what was the matter, but he turned away from me. He started toward the front like he was definitely going somewhere; then all of a sudden, like he had just remembered he didn’t have any place in the world to go, he stopped, looked quickly each way, then slammed Murphy Bacheron up ’side the head. I supposed he hit Murphy because Murphy was closest to him, but he couldn’t have picked a worse choice.