The Road to Memphis (26 page)

“What do you mean, fight on the homefront?”

’For jobs . . . for the spoils of war . . . or what this war could mean to us.”

“Then you figure we are at war?” said Stacey.

“Have to be,” said Solomon Bradley, sounding as sure as the old shoeshine man about the thing. “Reports are still coming in, but the numbers are staggering. Men killed, ships, planes destroyed. Our Navy was really hit hard. We’re not hardly walking away from this. Sunday, December seventh, 1941, is going to be a day to remember.”

One of the office people hurried over, waving a paper for Solomon to sign. Everybody seemed to be in a rush, everybody except Solomon. “Sorry to be bothering you at a bad time,” Stacey apologized.

“No bother,” Solomon said after signing the paper. “Putting together a newspaper on a day like today is what the business is all about. Course, we’ve never had news like this to handle before.” He moved toward a hallway. “Come on, let’s get out of all this traffic. We’ll go to my office in back.” He led us down the hallway into a room removed from the commotion
of the outer office. Then Stacey told him why we had come.

“We’ve just come up from Jackson, and we’re having trouble with our car. We ran onto some rough road and—”

“Some rough rednecks too,” finished Willie. “Had to try and outrun ’em.”

“Oh?” said Solomon. “Well, I’m not surprised. That’s a mean stretch of road coming up from Jackson. They had a double lynching along there just a few years back. Got quite a bit of attention because there was an anti-lynching bill up before Congress at the time. Of course now, the bill still didn’t pass. You’re lucky you got away.”

We looked somberly at him, for we all knew that was so.

“Anyway,” Stacey went on, “we ran over a stump or something and the car hasn’t been running right since. Think we’ll need a new oil pan and maybe have to repair the transmission. I want to get it checked before I put it on the road again.”

“You’re heading back to Jackson?”

Stacey glanced at Moe. “Don’t know yet. We might be going to Chicago.”

“Chicago? Not a good weekend for traveling.”

Stacey nodded that was true. “Thing is, we didn’t know that when we left Jackson. Had thought to put Moe on a train here in Memphis, but looks like with all the commotion it’ll be awhile before he can get out.”

Solomon’s eyes slid from Stacey to Moe. “You brought him all the way to Memphis to catch a train?” None of us spoke. “Trouble?” he questioned. “Oliver only told me that you might be contacting me.”

“I hit a white man,” Moe confessed.

“The truth was known,” I said, “he hit three white men.”

Solomon was thoughtfully quiet. “Are they dead?”

Moe shook his head. “Not far’s I know.”

“Thing is,” said Stacey, “we had to get him out. Figure he’ll be safe in Chicago.”

Solomon nodded. “Well, don’t know what your situation is back in Jackson, but it seems to me that you shouldn’t be staying away too long from there, especially with this war breaking out. There’ll be questions asked.”

Stacey considered and said, “We got to get Moe to Chicago.”

“You know folks there?”

“Got kin.”

Solomon looked again at Moe. “You’re welcome to stay here. I’ve got more than enough room. I’ll see you get a train out.” Moe didn’t say anything, and Solomon looked back at Stacey.

“We thank you,” Stacey said, “but that’s going to be up to Moe.”

Solomon gave a nod.

“In any case, though, we’ll have to get the fan belt replaced and the car checked over before we can get back on the road. We’re wondering if maybe you didn’t know somebody who could maybe look the car over for us this evening.”

“On an ordinary kind of Sunday evening, maybe. But today . . . I don’t know what luck we’d have. We’ll give it a try, though. There’s a fellow I know could do it, if I can catch up with him.”

“We’d be obliged.”

Solomon Bradley picked up the phone, dialed, and talked to someone a few minutes, then handed the phone to Stacey. “Just tell him the problem. Name’s Roscoe Smith. Folks call him Smitty. He’s expecting you.”

Stacey talked the matter of the car over with the man on the
phone. When he hung up, he said, “I guess we’ll be going on over there. Thank you kindly for your help. One other thing, though, if you don’t mind. I’d like to put in a call to my uncle in Chicago. I’ll reverse the charges.”

“Course you’re welcome to use the phone for any calls you need to make,” said Solomon, “but I doubt if you’ll get through. The lines are pretty tied up.” He again handed Stacey the phone and Stacey dialed the operator, but Solomon had been right. There was no getting through, not now anyway.

“Guess I’ll have to try calling him later from the garage,” Stacey said, frowning as he hung up. I knew he was worrying about the money. He looked at Solomon. “Thanks for the use of your phone and for everything else. We’re obliged.”

“It’s nothing. Look, that garage of Smitty’s isn’t the most comfortable place in the world. You’re all welcome to stay here overnight and get rested and see Smitty in the morning.”

“Well, thank you again, but we best take care of it tonight. We need to get back on the road as soon as we can.”

“All right, but the offer stands. We’ll be here all night in any case, so you want to rest, you’re welcome.”

Stacey looked at me, then turned back to Solomon. “Well, I’d be obliged if my sister could stay here. She wasn’t feeling so well earlier—”

“I’m fine now,” I interjected thinking of how I must look to Solomon.

“And I’ll just stay on with her,” volunteered Little Willie, eyeing one of the young women in the outer office.

“Fine,” said Solomon. “Smitty tell you how to get over to his place?”

“Yes. Shouldn’t have any trouble.”

“Good. You folks eaten? We’re sending out for some fried
chicken, and there’ll be plenty. You come back, it’ll be waiting here for you.”

Stacey nodded appreciation, then looked at me. “You’ll be all right?”

“I’ll be fine.”

“I’ll watch out for her,” said Little Willie, his eyes still on the woman.

Stacey shook Solomon’s hand and thanked him once again, then he and Moe left. Little Willie followed them into the outer office and didn’t come back. I was left alone with Solomon Bradley.

“Would you like to rest your coat, Cassie?” he asked.

“No, I’m kind of cold,” I said. But I lied. The room was hotter than blazes, but I didn’t want him to smell the vomit or to see the stains on my dress. The mud on my coat was bad enough.

He looked at me as if he could read my mind, then turned from me as a skinny young man wearing glasses came in. “Need your okay on this, Solomon,” said the young man. “Mag says she’s ready to run it soon’s you approve it.”

He pushed several pages at Solomon, and Solomon said, “Cassie, meet my left hand, Mort Jones.”

“I got left because Mag’s his right,” said Mort with a grin.

“Mort, Cassie Logan,” finished Solomon, taking a look at the papers. “I met this young lady in Jackson yesterday reading
The Law: Case Histories of a Free Society
, a book I didn’t lay eyes on until I was in law school.”

“Oh, yeah?” said Mort. “You in college?”

“No.”

“I’m a junior at Fisk.”

“I’ve been thinking maybe I’d like to go to Fisk,” I said.

“That a fact?” returned Mort.

“Course, now, with this Pearl Harbor business I don’t know.”

“That’s something, isn’t it? Never expected the war would come from the East. Always figured it would be Germany—”

“Mort, you double-check these quotes?” asked Solomon, still looking at the pages Mort had given him.

“Hazel was supposed to—”

“But you don’t know if she did?”

“I can find out,” said Mort, turning for the door.

“Never mind. Something else I want to check with her anyway. Just keep Cassie company.” He left then, and my eyes followed him out.

Mort turned back to me. “Can’t hardly wait till morning. I’m going to sign up.”

“What?” I mumbled as my mind lingered on Solomon.

“I’m going to join the Army.”

I gave him my attention again. “I was a man, I sure wouldn’t, not until I got called, and then I’d be trying to figure a way not to go.”

“How can you say that? The Japs bombed us—”

“They didn’t bomb Mississippi. Didn’t bomb Tennessee.”

“Bombed the U.S. of A. or same as it!” proclaimed patriotic Mort. “Bombed our ships! Killed our men!”

“I heard men got killed over there were Navy folks, and I’ve heard from my uncle that there weren’t all that many colored folks in the Navy, and those that were, weren’t hardly fighting men. Fact, he said that’s the worst branch of the service for colored folks, so how come you want to go join up so fast for?”

“Have to! Can’t let Hitler win this thing!”

“Hitler? Now, how’d Hitler get into this? Thought we were talking about the Japanese.”

“Well, Solomon says now that the Japanese have given us no choice but to fight, we’ll finally be at war with Germany because, you see, Germany and Italy are all tied up in this Tripartite Pact with Japan. We fight Japan, we got to fight them, too, and Negroes got to fight Hitler.”

“Why?” I said.

“Why?
Why? Haven’t you heard his talk about the master race? Way he figure, nobody is as good as folks of that so-called superior race!”

“White folks figure the same here.”

“Yeah . . . well . . . it’s not the same. We can’t let the country fight this war without us! We sure can’t stand by and let our country lose—”

“So what happens if we win? What difference would it make to us? I mean, if we win, are we going to be able to do everything the white folks can do then? We going to be able to use
their
restrooms in a gas station or eat in
their
cafes or sleep in
their
hotels or go to
their
hospitals? We going to be able to do any of that?”

“Hold on, girl! You not fighting a war with me, you know! What got you so riled?”

“I just don’t believe in fighting for nothing. Just tell me we’re going to be able to do those things. They’re simple enough.”

“Well . . . maybe not . . . but still we got to fight, Cassie. We got to put all those differences between the white folks and us aside for the time being because we have to go fight. Can’t let Hitler win. Can’t let the Japs win either.” He turned as Solomon came back. “Solomon, you tell her,” he said.

Solomon tossed some papers on his desk. “Now, just what am I supposed to tell her, Mort? What are you two into it about?”

“He told me he’s going to go sign up to fight this war, and I told him I didn’t know what he had to fight for.”

“Told her the country’s been attacked—”

“Ought to let the white folks fight the war. They’re the ones run everything.” Solomon smiled, seemingly bemused, and I said, “What’re you smiling about?”

Now he laughed. “You’re getting pretty hot under the collar there, Miss Logan,” he said, sitting at his desk.

“Well, it’s not right the way white folks do. They treat us any old way they want, and now they’re in a war, they’ll be wanting us to help them fight it. My Uncle Hammer fought in that other war they had, and he said when the war was over and he came back home, wasn’t anything changed. Said the white folks got free in Europe, but things stayed just the same over here for us. If anything, they just got worse way colored folks, especially colored soldiers, were lynched after that war.” My voice rose, and I trembled. “Here we can’t even use a toilet in a gas station, and they’ll be wanting our boys to go fight! Can’t even stand in front of a toilet door without them making you feel like—” I stopped. Solomon was watching me closely; so was Mort. I was saying too much. I shied away from saying more. “Never mind,” I murmured and crossed my arms and turned away.

There was an awkward moment, then Solomon said to Mort, “Tell Mag you can run that piece.”

Mort hesitated. “All right.” He glanced again at me and left.

Solomon looked after him in silence, then turned to me and spoke softly. “Just what happened out on that road, Cassie?”

“Nothing.”

“You expect me to believe that?”

“Believe what you want,” I said and looked away as the humiliation of what had happened burned at my gut like a searing iron.

“Cassie?” His voice was so soft. “What happened? And don’t tell me nothing happened. There’s mud on your coat, and your stockings are torn. That didn’t come from ‘nothing.’”

Embarrassed, I backed away from him, out of the glare of the overhead light, and looked down at myself. I thought of how I had looked when I had met him yesterday. I had been pleased with how I looked then. Now I was ashamed.

“What happened? Tell me.”

I shrugged. “I fell. We stopped at a gas station, and I fell.”

“That’s all?”

I met his eyes. There was a quiet to him, like Papa. I wanted to tell him. I wanted to tell somebody what had happened. I was tired of holding it in. “Stacey doesn’t know . . .”

“I’m listening.”

I cleared my throat, growing husky with the pain of the words to come. “We . . . we stopped at a gas station and I . . . I had to use the toilet. The gas station man, though, said they didn’t have a toilet for colored folks. Told me to use the bushes behind the station.” I glanced away from him. “I . . . I went down to do that. Stacey and Moe and Willie, they didn’t know I had gone. They were all in the store. But I never got as far as the bushes. On my way down I had to pass the restrooms they had for the white folks. Nobody was there and . . . and one of the doors was open. I thought about going in. I stopped right there in front of that open door and was trying to figure whether or not to take a chance when this white woman came over, and she saw me. She called the gas
station man over on me, and two other men came with him. They . . . they talked something awful to me, and when I tried to get away, I . . . I fell and I dropped my purse and they wouldn’t let me get it. They . . . scared me. They scared me something terrible and they—” I looked at Solomon now. I looked straight at him to confess the worst part. “—and they kicked me . . . like a dog.” Then I flicked away a falling tear. I didn’t want to cry. I had done my crying.