THE BOY let Calvin and his friends hustle him away. He wanted to find the girl and simply leave, running somewhere. But she was gone when he looked for her, and he wasn’t able to resist Calvin, who pulled him through the door and out into the night.
He wondered what they were going to do to him. He thought they would probably beat him up because he had kicked Pardoe when he wasn’t looking. That was a cowardly thing to do, he knew. That’s one of the reasons he was a goat, because he did things like that. Calvin and the others hadn’t known he was a goat, but now they would.
He felt bad about hurting Pardoe, too. When Pardoe had been lying on the floor and crying, he hadn’t
looked tough anymore. He had looked like a little kid. That had been such a surprise. The boy could hardly believe it.
In the cabin Calvin threw himself on one of the bunks. He was holding his stomach and laughing.
“Oh, man,” he said. “We’ve got a kung fu expert here. Did you see Pardoe go down? Bang!”
“What’s so funny? That ain’t funny.” It was a stocky kid named Mason. He slouched over to the door so the boy couldn’t make a break for it.
“What’s the matter with you, Mason?” Calvin asked.
“The little creep. He popped Pardoe from behind. When he wasn’t looking.”
Calvin hadn’t seen that, thought the boy. Now he wouldn’t laugh anymore.
But Calvin was still smiling. “So who says Pardoe has to be looking?”
Mason licked his lips and looked at the others. “It ain’t fair,” he said stubbornly.
“Oh, man, don’t give me that knights-and-armor stuff. You been watching too much TV. Pardoe starts messing with a bandit, he might get hurt. He ought to know better.”
“What do you mean, a bandit?”
“A bandit, man! They got their own rules!”
The boy didn’t understand. Neither did Mason.
“What rules? What are you talking about?” he asked.
Calvin sat up and motioned everyone to come close. “Listen, children, I’m going to tell you the first bandit
rule.” He held up a long, straight finger. “If you see you’re going to get popped in a fair fight, don’t fight fair.” He lay back on the bunk, his arms behind his head. “It’s like society, don’t you see? They got all these rules that everybody’s supposed to play by. But sometimes you see that those rules are going to cut you up. That makes you a bandit. You’re a smart bandit when you know you don’t have to play that game no more.”
The boy still didn’t understand very clearly what Calvin was talking about. He didn’t think he was really a bandit. But then maybe he wasn’t a goat either.
Lydia held her pretty arms up to the cabin ceiling so that her golden bracelets slid down over her elbows.
“Oh, man, that Clyde is so bad! Did you see those eyes? Those are bedroom eyes.” She did a little shimmy.
“Shut your mouth, Lydia,” said Tiwanda. “He’s Bonnie’s. You mess with him, she’ll mess with you. Isn’t that right, Bonnie?”
“Yes,” said the girl. “Yes, I will.” She was angry and excited. She wanted to hurt someone.
Lydia laughed. “Okay, man. Back off. But if you ever tell him to walk, point him in my direction.”
“You be quiet, Lydia,” said Susie Burns. “He’s too little for you.”
“Oh no, he’s not. I’ll be his sister and his momma.
I’ll teach him everything I know. That story about the cave? Did he really go there, Bonnie? Did he really see that special god?”
“I don’t know. Yes. I think so.” She couldn’t listen. She didn’t want to think about that now. Pardoe had frightened her. She hadn’t understood clearly what he had wanted, but she had been sickened, as if something sweet and unclean had been forced into her mouth.
She watched Tiwanda take off her dress and put it on a hanger. The black girl hung it up on a nail by the door and then put on a white bathrobe. She looked big and safe.
“Tiwanda,” the girl asked, “what’s wrong with Pardoe?”
Tiwanda sighed. “He’s got a bad family history. Don’t worry about him. He won’t mess with you no more.”
“I will kill him.”
Tiwanda looked at the girl. She was sitting stiffly on a bunk, her hands crossed between her knees. Her eyes were very big, and she was staring straight ahead.
“I will kill him,” she said again.
Tiwanda sat down on the bunk and put her arm around the girl, whose thin shoulders were shaking.
“Someday, honey, somebody’s going to. Pardoe’s been hurt bad. I don’t mean when your boy kicked him. I mean before. He’s been hurt bad deep down inside. It makes him all queer. That’s why Mr. Carlson
lets him come camping with us. He thinks he can fix the hurt.
“Mr. Carlson, he’s a good man, and he won’t see how bad Pardoe is. But someday somebody’s going to see. They’re going to say, ‘Oh, man, we hurt this thing so bad, we can’t let it live. We got to kill it.’ But that don’t have to be you, honey. That don’t have to be you.”
“Hey. Come off it, Tiwanda. Ain’t nobody going to kill that little son,” said Lydia. “Hey, Bonnie, I bet you haven’t even got a toothbrush, have you?”
The girl shook her head. She couldn’t remember when she had last brushed her teeth. Back at camp, she supposed. That seemed a long time ago.
Lydia was holding out a toothbrush to her. It was new, still in its plastic tube from the store.
“Thank you,” she said automatically. She wondered if Pardoe ever brushed his teeth. They had been a thin gray color, she remembered.
“But what will you use? I mean, I can’t take your toothbrush.”
“That’s okay. I’ve got another. See?”
“Why do you have two toothbrushes?” asked Susie, who was listening carefully to everything anyone said.
“Because you’re supposed to. You’re supposed to use one and let the other dry out. That way it doesn’t collect germs.”
“Oh,” said Susie. “Yeah. I forgot that for a minute.”
There was a small room built onto the back of the cabin, with washbasins and toilet stalls. It was a better
camp than the one her mother was spending a fortune to send her to. The girl washed her face and brushed her teeth and then sat down on Tiwanda’s bunk and watched the others get ready for bed.
They had nice things, new bathrobes and slippers. They put cream on their faces, and the black girls with cornrows in their hair put on plastic shower caps. They didn’t seem to care that you were supposed to rough it when you were camping, so they weren’t nearly as grubby as the kids at her camp. It surprised her a little, because she was sure they didn’t have as much money. They had enough, she supposed, so that they didn’t have to be grubby. They liked things nice.
She began to worry about how she was going to sleep with Tiwanda. The black girl was so big, and she’d never touched a black person’s skin. She’d never even slept with anyone since she was little, except the boy, and that was different. She was afraid that there might be some etiquette involved that she wouldn’t understand.
She decided finally that she’d take off her shoes and socks and jeans and sleep in her underwear and T-shirt. She thought that would be all right.
When she pushed down her jeans Tiwanda said, “Hey! Where’d you get underpants like that?” She looked very angry.
The girl froze, bent over with her jeans around her knees. She couldn’t understand why Tiwanda was so angry. She was afraid they were going to be mean to her.
“I found them,” she said finally, faintly.
“Yeah, I bet.”
“Come off it, Tiwanda,” said the white girl with the bright lipstick. “I think she looks cute.”
“Yeah, you would.” Tiwanda turned back to the girl. “That’s prostitute’s underwear. Your mom is going to break a broom on your butt when she sees that. Here.” She rummaged in her suitcase until she found a voluminous pair of white cotton underpants. “You put these on. These too,” she added, pulling out a pair of pajamas. “I’m not sleeping next to you in your skin.”
“I like the underwear,” said Lydia. “That’s private. You wear what you want there. But, honey, that T-shirt has got to go. Milk Bar? You don’t want to advertise. Especially what you ain’t got.”
“She’s going to cry,” said Susie. She sounded satisfied, as if this was what she had wanted all along.
“Yeah? Well, maybe she’s got a few things to cry about. She don’t need any help from you.”
The girl didn’t know why she felt like crying. She didn’t feel nervous and scared anymore. Maybe it was because they were nice to her. Nice to a goat. She’d almost forgotten that she was supposed to be a goat. No, not forgotten. She wouldn’t forget, and she wouldn’t forgive, either. But it didn’t seem important in the same way. It was as if it had all happened to some other, littler kid. She was crying a bit for that kid, too. It wasn’t the same as feeling sorry for herself, because she wasn’t quite the same person. But she
still felt bad about what had happened to that little kid.
They turned off the light and got into bed. After a few minutes the gray-haired woman put her head in the door.
“Everything all right in here?”
“Yes, Mrs. Higgins. Good night, Mrs. Higgins.”
“Good night.”
“Good night. God bless.”
The girl was squeezed up against the wall. She could feel Tiwanda’s shoulder against her own. It was soft and warm. She felt shy, uncomfortable, and safe.
Tiwanda caught her hand and held it. “What’s your real name, girl?”
The girl had to think a minute. “Laura. Laura Golden.”
“Laura. That’s a pretty name. Your mom pick that out for you?”
“Yes.”
“Laura, I want you to promise me something. Just as soon as you get to town tomorrow, you call your mom. You call her and tell her that she’s got to come get you right away. I don’t care what you say. Anything that will make her come. You promise me that?”
“Okay.”
“Say, I promise.”
“I promise.”
“Do you have any money?” Tiwanda asked.
“No. Forty-one cents.”
“That’s not enough. I’ll lend you some. But you pay me back.”
“Okay. Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. Maybe I can sleep now.”
But Tiwanda didn’t go to sleep right away. The girl could feel her lying awake, her eyes open, thinking.
“What’s your boy’s name?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” said the girl. It was a surprise to her, but it was the truth. Back on the island she hadn’t wanted to know, and then it hadn’t seemed to matter. She would have to ask him, if she could remember to.
Tiwanda grunted as if she wasn’t surprised.
“You like him a lot, don’t you?”
“Yes.”
“He’s not going to get you in trouble, is he?”
“No. He takes care of me. We take care of each other. That’s why we have to stay together.”
Tiwanda sighed and let her hand go. “Don’t I know,” she said. “Don’t I know.”
The boy woke up while it was still dark. He lay very still on the pallet of extra blankets that Calvin had fixed for him. He was listening. There was no sound but that of the others breathing in their sleep. So it had been just a dream.
He had been dreaming about the cave. In the dream it had not been dark. There had been a light down below him so bright he had not been able to see into it. He had walked through the light and emerged in
a wood. It was not the dark pine forest around the camp. The trees were olive trees. A wind from the sea lifted their leaves, flashing their silver undersides. The sun was bright and warm, and the air smelled of salt, spice, and the faint acrid tang of burning charcoal. Something was moving among the trees. He could see it out of the corner of his eye, but when he turned to look, it slipped away. At first he thought it was the girl, but then he became aware that she was standing next to him, holding his hand.
“Do you see it?” he had asked. “What is it?”
She said something, but he couldn’t understand her. There was something wrong with his ears. They were thick with a kind of roaring silence.
Awake, he tried to think what she might have been saying. He couldn’t understand. Had she been frightened? He wasn’t even sure of that.
When he knew that he wouldn’t be able to go back to sleep, he got up. He wrapped himself quietly in one of the blankets and went out of the cabin. The air was cool and fresh outside. He remembered that he hadn’t eaten much supper, but he still wasn’t hungry. He was proud of that. He thought it meant that he was getting lean and hard, so that they would be able to survive.
He found the cabin where he thought the girl must be staying and sat down on the steps outside. He scratched lightly on the screen, but there was no response. She must have been sleeping. He knew that
he couldn’t go in and look for her, but that was all right. He was close enough for the moment.
He leaned back against the screen and listened to the dark wood. Somewhere out in the brush something big and heavy was moving around. He could hear twigs and branches crushed and leaves rustling. The sound would stop occasionally, as if the creature itself were listening, and then begin again.
The boy sat very still, but he wasn’t afraid. He knew that he wouldn’t have to go into the dark alone. She would come if they had to go. It was a relief in a way to know that she was asleep and couldn’t hear it. Soon he would be able to go back to the boys’ cabin and sleep himself.
When they had been getting ready for bed, the boy had seen that Calvin’s arms were marked with small round scars, like bullet holes. They weren’t bullet holes. They were burns. Calvin’s father had made them with a cigarette when Calvin was little.
The boy couldn’t understand how someone’s father could do that. Calvin had said that there were some things you didn’t want to understand. Anyway, the man was dead.
The boy wondered if Calvin’s father was the sliced-up man in the Museum of Science and Industry. He could have been. He probably wasn’t, but he could have been.
It would have to be a man and a woman that nobody cared about. They probably hadn’t even known each
other. If they had known each other and cared, then they might have been able to stop it from happening.
He could still hardly believe that there were people who would cut someone up this way and put them in a glass case, even if the man and woman were dead and no one cared. But he knew now that there were people like that.
He wondered if Pardoe would be sliced up someday. It was possible. He wondered if they would stop when they were, say, halfway through. He pictured Pardoe’s body being run through a big machine like a meat slicer. There would be half a body, and then the rest in layered slices.
They might think, This is a terrible thing we are doing, but they wouldn’t be able to stop. It would be too late.
She found him the next morning sitting alone and slightly apart at breakfast. He was eating something white and fluffy, covered with syrup. He ate very neatly, like a cat. She felt a sudden raging tenderness toward him. She was so glad he was there. She wanted to roughhouse; to throw her arms around him and wrestle him to the ground. She bet she could do it. She was bigger than he was. She couldn’t, of course. He wouldn’t mind, but the other kids would think they were crazy. She contented herself with sliding along his bench and bumping his hip with hers as hard as she could. He smiled at her and bumped back.
“Yuck!” she said. “What’s that?”
“Grits. It’s made out of corn. Did you ever have it before?”
She shook her head.
“Me neither. It’s pretty good, though. You just put lots of syrup on it. It’s Milo’s specialty. You want some?”
“I don’t know. Can I try some of yours?”
“Sure. This is my seconds, actually.” He gave her his spoon and leaned his head on his fist so he could watch her eat. He couldn’t seem to stop smiling.
“That’s a pretty shirt,” he said. He reached out and touched the silky red collar.
“Yeah. Lydia gave it to me. She said my T-shirt was common. You know, Milk Bar.” She made a face.
He didn’t understand at first. He had to think about it.
“Hey,” he said. “Is that really what it means?” He wondered if someone had tricked the blond girl at the concession stand into wearing the shirt. That would have been mean.
“Do you think that girl knew?” he asked.
“Yeah. She had, you know, tits. Can I put on some more syrup? What are you grinning about?” She felt hot and touchy because she had never said that word to a boy before.
“I don’t know.” He wanted to tell her how important she was, but didn’t know how, so he said, “We would have been all right in the woods last night, don’t you think?”
“Yeah. I wasn’t really afraid. Well, maybe a little.
But we would have been all right. It’s better just the two of us sometimes.”
“I think so, too. They’re nice, though.”
“Except Pardoe.”
“Yes. I thought they were going to beat me up, but Calvin just laughed.”
“Why would they beat you up?”
“Well, I kicked him when he wasn’t looking.”
The girl shrugged. “He’s bigger than you. I should have kicked him, too, but he was so creepy that I was afraid to touch him. Where’s Calvin?” The boy scratched his wrist and looked around the dining room. It was nearly full now, but he didn’t see the tall black teenager.
“I don’t know. He went to find Milo. He thought he could talk him into giving us a ride into town.”
“Really? That would be great.”
“It’s the wrong town, though. It’s someplace called Barnesville. I’m not sure how we’ll get back from there.”
“Listen. It doesn’t matter. I promised Tiwanda that I’d call my mother again and make her come and get us. I didn’t explain properly before. If I tell her what they did to us, then she’s got to come. What’s the matter? Don’t you think she will?”
“I don’t know. What if she doesn’t want me to come back with you?”
“Don’t worry about it. She’ll let you come. If she won’t, then I won’t go, either. Hey, I ate it all. Shall I go get some more?”
The boy watched her carry the empty plate through the crowd toward the stove. He wished he could feel as sure about her mother as she did. He knew it wouldn’t be hard to separate them once they were with her mother. He knew what it might be like: adults holding them by their shoulders, talking over their heads. They might try to stay together, but he didn’t think they would be strong enough. They were really strong only when they were alone.