HE joined us in a Florida town. He was not a typical circus roughneck in appearance. His hair was a wavy black turned prematurely grey. His eyes were deep brown, his jaw was firm, his lips tight, and his body large, well shaped, and muscular.
“Any work here?” he asked Silver Moon Dugan.
“Nope. All filled up. But the property boss needs a man,” was the terse reply.
The property boss gave him a sixteen-pound sledge and told him to drive tent stakes. It was before breakfast. By the time the meal was announced he had driven, with the help of two other men, over a hundred stakes to hold the property tent.
He unloaded property effects belonging to performers. He also wore a bright red and green uniform and led a group of Shetland ponies inside the big top when the special act was on.
As Sunday was wash day with the circus, he would always take time to wash his rough clothing.
He worked hard. He smoked a twisted pipe when sitting alone, and acted disdainful of everybody, including Cameron. We called him “Blackie” among ourselves.
It was not long before we looked upon him as a superior being. His good looks, his strong and clean body, his proud manner fascinated us. We respected his disdain.
He seldom talked to us. When he did, his speech was direct and brutal.
Having created an air of mystery about himself, we were always anxious to learn something about him.
Silver Moon Dugan soon heard of his ability to swing a heavy sledge. He induced him to leave the property boss and join his unit at ten dollars a month increase, or forty dollars a month, top wages on the canvas crew.
He made the change with no more concern than he took in filling his pipe. The stakes were always laid out for him when the tent was to go up. Once the stake was started in the ground by his two helpers he would slam it downward in nine strokes. The sledge would swing upward, the steel glistening in the sun. After making a circle at least eight feet it would hit the stake squarely. No other man with the circus could drive a stake in the ground with less than twelve strokes.
Even Silver Moon Dugan respected him.
“Where you from, Buddy? Been troupin’ long?” he asked him.
“Sure thing. I was raised with a circus. My father was Barnum’s mother.”
Silver Moon Dugan muttered contemptuously to Buddy Conroy, “Funny guy,” and let him alone afterward.
“What do you think of Blackie?” I asked Jock.
“You git it, say it yourself, kid. He’s no regular circus stiff. Look at that nose and that jaw and those eyes that cut like steel. He’s got razors in ’em. He was born to be hanged.” Jock would say no more.
We left Pensacola, Florida, and played a small town about eighty miles distant. It had drizzled all day and the lot was slippery. Blackie had a habit of walking around it, head bent low, left hand holding the pipe in his mouth.
It was about seven in the evening and the drizzly day lingered faintly. Blackie saw a form in the semi-darkness. “Here—what are you doing there?” he asked quickly.
A scared Negro girl, not over fourteen, had been trying to crawl under the tent. She stood before him.
“I doan do nothin’, jist a peerin’ in,” she answered, with a half petulant smile.
She was more yellow than black. Her face was beautiful and round, her mouth small, her teeth even and white, her lips full and she was dark-eyed. She wore a plaid dress which curved above her hips and accentuated her lithe and lovely form.
Blackie held her shoulders in his immense hands.
“God damn, but you’re nice,” he said, “slender and clean like a new whip. GOD DAMN!” He crushed her to him.
Pushing her away at arm’s-length, he still held her shoulders and looked in her eyes.
“Why in the hell you should have to sneak in a circus is what I’d like to know.”
The girl looked up at him with wide eyes of wonder. He put his arm about her. She clung to him at once and pulled his head down and kissed him.
Blackie’s eyes blazed. He led the slender young girl, now all animal herself, to the rear of the snake-charmer’s wagon. She was heard to cry, “Oh Misteh Man, Misteh Man,” a few times as if in pain. Then all became very still.
Later, he put her on a mattress in an empty canvas-covered wagon and stood guard over it while fifteen white circus roughnecks entered one at a time. Before entering, each man gave Blackie a half dollar.
When the last man had gone Blackie smuggled the girl into the big top.
Late that night, as the circus train was ready to pull out, the little Negro girl saw Blackie standing in the open door of a car.
Running with arms extended she yelled, “Misteh Man, Misteh Man!” and tried to board the car as the train started.
We watched Blackie’s unchanging expression. The girl held desperately to the car and tried to swing her lithe body inside. “Let her come on in,” yelled Silver Moon Dugan.
“What? A nigger wench?” snapped Blackie as he put his foot against the girl’s forehead and kicked her from the car.
The girl could be heard wailing pitifully above the accumulating noise of the rolling cars, “Misteh Man, Misteh—Man—do come on back, Misteh Man!”
The engine whistle shrieked as we rattled by red and green lights.
* * *
No man spoke for a long time. I watched their changing expressions. Silver Moon Dugan’s eyes looked a trifle sad. I heard Blackie trying to puff his pipe. It had gone out. He remained silent for some minutes. He then lit a match and smoked.