We got back to the quarter just after dark. Bonbon’s yard was red. I didn’t know what it was at first; then I remembered Marcus had to burn the leaves after he raked them up. When we went by the house I saw him standing against the fire. The whole yard and the front part of the house was lit up.
Bonbon took me and Pauline home and went back up the quarter. Aunt Margaret said when he came into the yard, he stood on the walk looking at Marcus a while before he came up to the house.
“Still here, Margaret?” he said to her.
“Yes sir,” she said.
He went in the kitchen and washed his face and hands and sat down at the table. A minute later Louise and Tite came out of the bedroom. Louise wore a pink dress with a black patent-leather belt round her waist. She wore sandals—not shoes; she never wore shoes. Tite had on a little blue dress with a white collar and white lace on the sleeves.
“Van-wah,” Bonbon said to Tite.
Tite went to him and he picked her up and sat her on his knee. He looked at her and passed his hand over the side of her face and her hair. Her hair looked whiter still with his big red hands going through it, Aunt Margaret said. Bonbon and Tite exchanged a few words in Creole, then he kissed her and put her back on the floor. He watched Tite go back to her chair. Aunt Margaret said she never saw a father who loved his child more than Bonbon loved Tite at that moment.
Bonbon and Louise looked at each other and Bonbon said something under his breath. Louise didn’t say anything; she sat down at the table and waited for Aunt Margaret to serve them. Aunt Margaret put the food on the table and moved back near the stove.
They ate quietly. Aunt Margaret was looking at Louise all the time. She wasn’t worried about Louise telling—she knew Louise wasn’t going to tell from the moment Louise came out in the yard to hold the dog back; she was looking at Louise to see what change this had made, if it had made any change at all.
Louise raised her head and looked at Bonbon. After a while Bonbon looked back at her. He said something about New Orleans. Louise didn’t say anything; her face was as plain as a piece of blank paper. Bonbon glanced at his little girl and looked down at his food again. Louise looked at Bonbon a moment longer, then she looked at Aunt Margaret. Her face showed no more expression than it did when she was looking at Bonbon.
“Wait now,” Aunt Margaret thought. “Wait now, wait. Maybe he can’t see anything. Maybe you need one of them loud-speakers to make him know you been bouncing on that bed all evening, but I heard you, remember?”
Louise chewed her food slowly and looked at Aunt Margaret. Her expression didn’t change.
“Wait now,” Aunt Margaret thought. “Wait now. You trying to tell me you don’t know what you did?”
“Hot in New Orleans?” she said. But she looked down at her plate before Bonbon could answer her.
Bonbon glanced up at her and grunted. Louise looked up at him again after he had lowered his head. She was chewing her food slowly; her face hadn’t changed.
“Wait now,” Aunt Margaret thought. “Wait now—now wait. You got that much control, you, to pretend that nothing happened? Wait now.” Then she thought: “Yes, yes, I see, something did happen. You nothing but a girl, and a boy come to play with you. You got tired painting your toenails and looking through that old magazine; you wanted a boy to come play with you. He come, he jumped through that window and he run’d you all over that room, and when he caught you he took you to that bed, and he made you forget everything because that was the first time a boy had ever did that to you. Oh, another one had got on you (Tite there to prove that) but he hadn’t jumped through the window to get on you, he hadn’t run’d you all over the room to get on you, he hadn’t teared your clothes off, called them two little titties sweet little pears. But this one did, and because he did, did you forget the plan you had in mind? Is that all you wanted was for somebody—black or white—to tear your clothes off and say your titties looked like sweet pears? Or is that it until you get tired of him—because children do get tired. Or is that it until they catch y’all together or until you remember all the hurt you done suffered? What is it? What is it? Don’t tell me that that fool out there can wipe away everything that easy—things you been planning ever since you been here. And how long you think this can go on before your husband find out? Do you know what you doing? Do you know? I done heard the screaming of lynching, and it’s no pleasant sound, I ’sure you.”
Without changing expression at all, Louise looked down at her plate again. Aunt Margaret looked at Bonbon.
“When you leave, Margaret, tell him to go,” Bonbon said.
“Yes sir,” Aunt Margaret said.
“Can I see the fire, Papa?” Tite asked in Creole.
“Go with Margaret,” he said.
Tite slid away from her chair. Aunt Margaret took her by the hand and led her in the front room. After putting on her big yellow straw hat that she had worn up the quarter that morning, she led Tite out in the yard. The fire had died down, but still there was enough left to light up a part of the yard. Aunt Margaret could see Marcus leaning on the rake, gazing down at the fire. Tite broke away from her and ran toward Marcus. Marcus looked down at Tite and smiled at her, then he started watching Aunt Margaret from over his shoulder.
“I ain’t the one to watch,” Aunt Margaret said. “I ain’t go’n do you a thing. He say you can go home. That’s if you don’t feel like jumping through that window again.”
“I’m ready to leave.”
“You quite sure?” Aunt Margaret said. “He look tired and sleepy, you won’t have to worry ’bout him. Just another nickel for Tite.”
“Kess-coo-sey?” Tite said.
Nobody answered Tite. Aunt Margaret and Marcus were still looking at each other. Aunt Margaret wanted to hit him, but she knew it wouldn’t have been any use.
Marcus raked up the few leaves that laid round the edge of the fire. When the fire had burned down again, he leaned the rake and broom against one of the trees and went out of the yard. As Aunt Margaret started toward the house with Tite, she saw Louise standing in the door. Louise was watching Marcus go out of the yard.
Aunt Margaret told me all this later that night while we sat in the kitchen at the table. The longer she talked, the madder I got. I already saw myself walking into that room and busting Marcus in his mouth. And I wanted him to swing back so I could really beat the hell out of him.
“And the ones in Baton Rouge?” Aunt Margaret said. She sat close to the table, leaning on it with her hands clasped together.
I told her about Pauline and Bonbon in Baton Rouge.
“Look like you went to that saloon much as I went to that door?” she said.
I nodded. Then I thought, “Hit Marcus for what? Why hit Marcus? Didn’t I play the pimp? Didn’t I drink with them? Didn’t I find the place so he could go in and lay with her? Why hit Marcus?
“Hit him because you know what can happen, that’s why,” I thought. “Because you know they have no pity when they come for one, that’s why. Hit him because if they found out about him, every man, woman and child’s life would be in danger, that’s why.”
I stood up to leave.
“You ate supper?” Aunt Margaret asked me.
“I’m not hungry, Aunt Margaret. Thanks.”
I thought about one thing when I left Aunt Margaret’s house: going home and busting Marcus in his mouth. But before I got halfway there I had changed my mind again. Because I knew that this wouldn’t stop Marcus. Nothing was going to stop him. Nothing could stop him unless you killed him or locked him up in prison. I was hoping that when his trial came up they would lock him in prison, but after thinking about it I knew that wasn’t going to happen. Not after Miss Julie Rand had given Marshall Hebert’s people forty years of her life.
When I came to the house, instead of going to Marcus’s room I went to my own room. I opened up a bottle of beer and drank half of it, then I threw the bottle out of the door. I went back on the gallery, grinding my fist in the palm of my hand. I don’t know how many times I went from one end of the gallery to the other before I went in the room where he was. He was laying on the bed in the dark. I went to the bed and stood right over him. He didn’t move, he didn’t even look at me.
“When they come after you, Marcus, don’t come to me,” I said, calmly as I could. “Don’t come to me, because I won’t hide you.”
He didn’t even look at me. My fist was clenched, but I knew I wasn’t going to hit him. I only hit people to protect myself or to protect somebody else. But to hit Marcus was just a waste of time.