CHAPTER THREE

When the voice drawled TEN I was lifted up and dragged to a chair. I sat dazed. My eyes pained and swelled with each throb of my pounding heart and I wondered if now I would be allowed to speak. I was wringing wet, my mouth still bleeding. We were grouped along the wall now. The others ignored me as the congratulated Agnar and speculated as how much they would be paid. One boy whimpered over his smashed hand. Looking up front, I saw attendants in white jackets rolling the portable ring away and placing a small square rug in the vacant space surrounded by chains. Perhaps, I thought, I will stand on the rug to deliver my speech.

Then the M.C called us, "Come on up boys and get your money."

We ran forward to where the men laughed and talked in their chairs, waiting. Everyone seemed friendly now.

"There it is on the rug," the man said. I saw the rug covered with coins of all dimensions and a few crumpled bills. But what excited me, scattered here and there, were gold pieces.

"Boys, it's all yours," the man said. "You get all you grab."

"That's right, Rufus," a blond man said, winking at me confidentially.

I trembled with excitement, forgetting my pain. I would get the gold and the bills, I thought. I would use both hands. I would throw my body against the boys nearest me to block then from the gold.

"Get down the rug now," the man commanded, "and don't touch it until I give the signal."

"This ought to be good," I heard.

As told, we got around the square rug on our knees. Slowly, the man raised his freckled hand as we followed it upward with our eyes.

"I heard, "These niggers look like they're about to pray!"

Then , "Ready," the man said. Go!

I lunged for a yellow coin, lying on the blue design of the carpet, touching it and sending a surprised shriek to join those rising around me. I tried frantically to remove my hand but could not let go. A hot, violent force tore through my body, shaking me like a wet rat. The rug was electrified. The hair bristled up on my head as I shook myself free. My muscles jumped, my nerves jangled, writhed. But I saw that this was not stopping the others. Laughing in fear and embarrassment, some were holding back and scooping up the coins knocked off by the painful contortions of the others. The men roared above us as we struggled.

"Pick it up, goddammit, pick it up, " someone called like a bass-voice parrot. "Go on, get it."

I crawled rapidly around the floor, picking up the coins, trying to avoid the coppers and to get greenbacks and the gold. Ignoring the shock by Laughing as I brushed the coins off quickly, I discovered that I could contain the electricity-a contradiction, but it works. Then the men began to push us onto the rug. Laughing embarrassedly we struggled out of their hands and kept after the coins. We were all wet and slipper and hard to hold. Suddenly I sae a boy lifted into the air, glistening with sweat like a circus seal, and dropped, his wet back landing flush upon his back, his elbows beating frenzied tattoo upon the floor, his muscles twitching like the flesh of a horse stung by many flies. When he finally rolled off, his face was gray and no one stopped him when he ran from the floor amid booming laughter.

"Get the money," the M.C called. "That's good hard American cash!" And we snatched and grabbed, I was careful not to come too close to the rug now, and when I felt the hot whiskey breath descend upon me like a cloud of foul air I reached out and grabbed the leg of a chair. It was occupied and I held on desperately.

"Let go, nigger! Let go!"

The huge face wavered down to me as he tried to push me free. But my body was slippery and he was too drunk. Mr. Castor, who owned a chain of movie houses and "entertainment palaces." Each time he grabbed me I slipped out if his hands. It became a real struggle. I feared the rug more than I did the drunk, so I held on, surprising myself for a moment by trying to topple him upon the rug. It was such an enormous idea that I found myself actually carrying it out. I tried not to be obvious, yet when I bragged his leg, trying to tumble him out of the chair, he raised up roaring with laughter, and, looking at me with soberness dead in the eyes, kicked me viciously in the chest. The chair leg flew out of my hand and I felt myself going and rolled. It was as though I had rolled through a bed of hot coals. It seemed a whole century would pass before I would roll free, a century in which I was seared throughout the deepest levels of my body to the fearful breath within me and the breath seared and heated to the point of explosion. It'll all be over in a flash, I thought as I rolled clear. It'll all be over in a flash.

But not yet, the men on the other side were waiting, red faces swollen as though from apoplexy as they bent forward in their chairs. Seeing their fingers coming towards me I rolled away as a fumbled football rolls of the receiver's fingertips, back into the coals. That time I luckily sent the rug sliding out of the place and heard the coins ringing against the floor and the boys scuffing to pick them up and the M.C. calling, "Alright boys, that's all. Go get dressed and get your money."

I was limp as a dis rag. My back felt as though it had been beaten with wires.

When we ha dressed, the M.C. came in and gave us each five dollars, except Agnar, who got ten for being last in the ring. Then he told us to leave. I was not to get a chance to deliver my speech, I thought. I was going out into the dim alley in despair when I stopped and told to go back. I returned to the ballroom, where men were pushing back their chairs and gathering in groups to talk.

The M.C. knocked on a table for quite. "Gentleman," he said "we almost forgot an important part of the program. A more serious part gentleman. This boy was brought here to deliver a speech which he made at his graduation yesterday..."

"Bravo!"

"I'm told that his is the smartest boy we've got out there in Greenwood. I'm told that he knows more big words than a pocket-sized dictionary,"

Much applause and laughter.

"So now, gentlemen, I want you to give him your attention"

There was still laughter as I faced them, my mouth dry, my eyes throbbing. I began slowly, but evidently my throat was tense, because they began shouting, "Louder! Louder!"

"We of the younger generation extol the wisdom of the great leader and education," I shouted "who first spoke these flaming words of wisdom: 'A ship lost at sea for many months suddenly sighted a friendly vessel. From the mast of the unfortunate vessel was seen a signal: "Water, water; we die of thirst!" The answer from the friendly vessel came back: "Cast down your bucket where you are. The captain of the distressed vessel, at last heading the injunction, cast down his bucket, and it came up full of fresh sparkling water from the mouth of the Amazon River.' And like him I say, and in his words, "To those of my race who depend upon bettering their condition in a foreign land, or who underestimate the importance of cultivating friendly relations with the Southern white man, who is his next-door neighbour, I would say: "Cast down your bucket where you are "- cast it down in making friends in every manly way of the people of all races by whom we are surrounded..."

I spoke automatically and with such fervor that I did not realise that the men were still talking and laughing until my dry mouth, filling up with blood from the cut, almost strangled me. I coughed, wanting to stop and go to one of the tall brass, sand-filled spittoon to relieve myself, but a few of the men, especially the superintendent, were listening and I was afraid. So I gulped it down, blood saliva and all, and continued. (What powers of endurance I had during those days! What enthusiasm! What a belief in the rightness of things!) I spoke even louder in spite of the pain. But still they talked and still laughed, as though deaf with cotton in dirty ears. So I spoke with greater emotional emphasis. I closed my ears and swallowed blood until I was nauseated. The speech seemed a hundred times as long as before, but I could not leave out a single word. All had to be said, each memorized nuance considered, rendered. Nor was that all. Whenever I uttered a word of three or more syllables a group of voices would yell for me to repeat it. I used the phrase "social responsibility" and they yelled:

"what's that word you say, boy?"

"Social responsibility," I said.

"What?"

"Social..."

"Louder."

"... responsibility."

"More!"

"Respon-"

"Repeat!"

"sibility."

The room filled with the uproar of laughter until, no doubt distracted by having to gulp down my blood, I made a mistake and yelled a phrase I had often seen denounced in newspaper editorials, heard debate in private.

"Social..." "What?" they yelled. "...equality‐–"

The laughter hung smoke like in a sudden stillness. I opened my eyes, puzzled. Sounds of displeasure filled the room.

The M.C. rushed forward. They shouted hostile phrases at me. But I did not understand.

A small dry moustached man in front row blared out, "Say that slowly, son!"

"What you just said!"

"Social responsibility, sir," I said.

"you weren't being smart, were you, boy?" he said, not unkindly.

"No, sir!"

"You sure that about 'equality' was a mistake?".

"Oh, yes, sir," I said. "I was swallowing blood."

"Well, you had better speak more slowly so we can understand. We mean to do right by you, but you've got to know your place at all times. All right, now go on with your speech."

I was afraid. I wanted to leave but I also wanted to speak and I was afraid they'd snatch me down.

"Thank you, sir." I said, beginning where I had left off, and having them ignore me as before.

Yet when I finished there was a thunderous applause. I was surprised to see the superintendent come forth with a package wrapped in white tissues paper, and gesturing for quiet, addressed the men.

"Gentleman, you see that I did not over praise this boy. He makes a good speech and some day he'll lead his people in the proper paths. And I don't have to tell you that it's important in these days and times. This is a good, smart boy, and so to encourage him in the right direction, in the name of the Board of Education, I wish to present him a prize in the form of this.."

He paused, removing the tissue paper and revealing a gleaming calfskin brief case.

"... in the form of this first class article from Leo Jasper's shop."

"Boy," he said, addressing me, take this prize and keep it well. Consider it a badge of office. Prize it. Keep developing as you are and some day it will be filled with important papers that will help shape the destiny of your people."

I was so moved that I could hardly express my thanks.