All de brass bands played ‘Nearer My God to Thee.’
Out on de deep blue ocean de people sleep
In a cold wet cradle, three miles deep.
It’s yo’ las’ trip, _Titanic_.”
After several verses Willie began to feel a personal sorrow for the
passengers of the _Titanic_. The music stopped suddenly, and the Great
Lord God commanded, “Little David, play something quick and lively. Let
the skies rock with mirth. Let the heavens open wide. Let the stars and
the moon shine out. Let my people shout with joy.”
And as soon as the command was issued all the angels began dancing and
singing as Little David played:
“Two little babies a-layin’ in de bed,
One of’m sick an’ de yuther mos’ dead.
Sont fer de doctor an’ de doctor said,
‘Give dem babies some shortnin’ bread.’
So put on de skillet an’ thow way de led,
Cause mammy gonter make a little shortnin’ bread.”
Several more songs followed and finally Willie began to tire of
singing. The party broke up, the angels flying away in groups of twos
and threes. Soon no one was left before the throne except Willie.
Willie felt slightly embarrassed there, with no one around except the
Great Lord God. He figured he might be intruding or something, or that
perhaps he’d better go out and fly some more. But as he was turning
over the idea a tall, kindly looking angel, more strikingly handsome
than any he had ever seen, strolled up and sat down familiarly by
the side of the Great Lord God. At first Willie thought it was Cap’m
Archie. There was kindness and understanding in his face, just like
Cap’m Archie’s face. But it wasn’t Cap’m Archie. Cap’m Archie had no
scars on his hands and feet as had this angel.
As he puzzled over the matter he faintly remembered a story his old
mammy had told him about a man with scars on his hands and feet, and
he recalled the lines of a song that Cap’m Archie used to make him sing:
“They nailed His hands and they rivet His feet,
An’ de hammers wuz heard in Jerusalem street.”
Some way, Willie could not place him. But he felt much more at ease for
his presence.
“What you thinking about, Willie?” the kindly angel asked. “You don’t
seem to be enjoying yourself so much.”
Willie did not know exactly what to reply. He rummaged through his
mind hastily. He had been entirely happy for ever so long, not a thing
had gone wrong. Everybody had been so nice to him. The music had
been beautiful and just the songs he liked to sing. His wings fitted
perfectly and St. Peter had been wonderful. So had Jehu. And Cap’m
Archie--he had given him everything he could think of and a heap he
did not think of. Of course there was the matter of the cigar. He
wanted to go to the gallows with a cigar in his mouth. But that wasn’t
Cap’m Archie’s fault ... and, too, maybe Cap’m Archie had forgotten
the cigar. He had so many things to think about. Willie concluded that
if it were the cigar he would say nothing about it to the kind angel
because he did not want to embarrass Cap’m Archie. He did not really
want to go to the gallows with a cigar, anyway, he decided.
“But I did want ter make dat speech,” he concluded.
“What speech is that?” asked the kindly faced angel.
Willie explained in great detail, and the angel and the Great Lord God
listened intently.
“But hit wa’n’t Cap’m Archie’s fault,” he declared.
“Whose fault was it, then?” demanded the Great Lord God.
“Hit mought er been--onderstan’, I ain’ s’cusin’ nobody,” Willie
faltered, “but hit mought er been Ole Green Eyes. But I loves
ev’ybody--him, too,” he added hastily.
“I know the scoundrel,” declared the Great Lord God. “He’s been
plaguing me for years and years. But this is too much.” The brow of
the Great Lord God clouded in anger and he shouted with a terrible
roar, like seven peals of thunder, “Cherub, bring me a bolt of forked
lightning that I may strike that man from the face of the earth.”
The cherub brought the lightning, and the Great Lord God was about to
hurl it. But the kind angel touched his arm gently.
“I wouldn’t, Father,” said the angel. “He might not have understood
that the speech was to have been the biggest thing in Willie’s life.”
The Great Lord God stayed his hand and turned upon the kind angel. “Of
course he understood. That’s why he didn’t let him make it. He’s just
low-down mean. I’ve put up with enough of it.”
“But,” insisted the kind angel, “it will do no good to strike him down
with lightning. It would frighten many people. And it would start new
arguments over religion and that would lead to controversies and they
would lead to hatreds and hatreds lead to----”
“I’ve heard that speech a million times, Son,” said the Great Lord God,
“and you needn’t go into details. I admit you are right,” and he handed
the lightning bolt back to the cherub. “But,” continued the Great Lord
God, “I will not let this thing pass.” His brow clouded in anger again.
“I am the Great I am,” he roared, “and my commands shall be obeyed.”
The kind angel sat meekly and argued no further.
“Willie Malone,” commanded the Great Lord God in a tone of thunder.
“Yassuh, Great Lord God,” replied Willie, jumping to his feet.
“You go right back down yonder and make that speech. He’s sitting
in the jail office right now with Captain Archie. Now go and do my
commands.”
* * * * *
Willie lost no time in getting to the jail. As he approached, he
noticed a half-dozen Negroes--friends of his--standing in the rain
about the big steel door entry to the lower cells. But he hurried by
them with only a curt “hy-dy, boys.” The fact that they ignored him
stung a little but he had no time to lose. He went straight to the
office entrance.
The green-eyed man was seated at a table fingering five new
ten-dollar bills. The coroner was scratching away with a pen on a big
official-looking document. The editor and the two Gibbses were talking
in low tones. Cap’m Archie was hunched down in his chair at his desk,
looking at the floor. Willie stood a minute respectfully, hoping Cap’m
Archie would notice him and inquire what he wanted.
But Cap’m Archie did not look toward him and Willie tried a scheme that
had worked many times for him.
“Cap’m, suh,” he said, “don’ you want dis ole dirty flo’ swep’ up er
somethin’?”
But Cap’m Archie acted as though he did not hear.
Willie cogitated. Maybe he was worrying about forgetting the cigar.
But as the thought came to Willie Cap’m Archie slowly reached to his
vest pocket and drew out a single long black cigar and studied it
intently.
“You got the mate to that’n, Sheriff?” Ole Green Eyes quit shuffling
the new bills and directed his attention toward the cigar.
“Nope,” replied Cap’m Archie, “I ain’t got the mate to this’n.” And he
tightened his grip on the cigar until he had broken and crushed it.
“And if I did have it,” he added, “I’d damn well keep it.”
“No hard feelings, Sheriff,” offered Green Eyes. “I see you ain’t used
to it. Cheer up. It’s just another nigger less.”
A scraping of feet in the jail hall at the side of the office attracted
the attention of both Cap’m Archie and Green Eyes. Willie followed
their gaze through the barred hall door and saw six Negroes carrying
a long black box toward the big jail door. Behind the box marched
Preacher Moore, directing and exhorting as he went.
“There he goes now--out of yer jail and out of yer life. It’s all over
and yer duty’s done.”
Cap’m Archie squeezed the cigar tightly, crumbling it into tiny bits.
The green-eyed man essayed a cackling laugh. “And so’s mine,” he
continued, picking up the five bills, “so I guess I’ll be going.”
Willie had been standing by in respectful silence since the white folks
had indicated by ignoring him that they were too busy to talk to him.
White people are that way, Willie had learned. Sometimes they will
talk with you and laugh with you. And sometimes when they are busy
they won’t pay any attention to you unless you get in their way or
something. Then they will curse you. Willie knew how to get along with
white folks.
But things were different now. He had business with Mister Green Eyes.
“Wait a minute, Cap’m, suh,” he addressed the green-eyed man.
Green Eyes stiffened, blinked his eyes, passed his hand across his
forehead, and frowned. He stuck the money into his pocket quickly and
grabbed for his hat.
“Wait a minute, Cap’m,” Willie pleaded. “I got ter make my speech.”
The green-eyed man turned pale and shut his eyes tightly, gritting his
teeth and shaking his head as if in an effort to clear his brain.
“Sheriff,” he said with a great struggle for calmness in his voice, “I
need a drink. I--I--I’m sort of nervous, I reckon.”
“There’s the doctor,” Cap’m Archie replied calmly, nodding toward the
coroner.
“But, Cap’m, suh, wait,” interjected Willie, “lemme make my speech----”
The green-eyed man yelled and ran to the doctor.
“Get me a drink, Doctor!” he begged. “A drink! For God’s sake. I’m all
shot to hell, Doctor. Get me a drink, quick.”
“What’s the matter, man?” demanded the doctor. “What is it?”
“That damned nigger, Doctor. I’m seein’ things. So help me. He wants to
make a speech, Doctor----”
“Dat’s all right, Cap’m,” Willie insisted. “Hit ain’t no mean speech.”
“O-ww-w-w--Doctor,” screamed the green-eyed man. “There he is again.”
The coroner and Cap’m Archie caught the hangman and led him to a chair.
“Calm down, man,” said the doctor. “Your nerves are upset.”
“But that nigger, that damned nigger! I see him.”
“Well, he isn’t going to hurt you, man. He’s----”
“Nawsuh, I wa’n’t gonter hurt nobody,” Willie assured him. “I jes’ was
gonter say a few words.”
The man struggled wildly, and it was only with the added strength of
the two Gibbses and the editor that they succeeded in holding him in
his chair. He was alternately crying and cursing, trembling weakly and
fighting wildly.
“That damned nigger! I see him! I see him!” he kept shouting. “He wants
to make a speech!”
“Hold him until I can fix a hypodermic,” ordered the doctor.
“I jes’ gonter make my speech,” Willie pleaded again in an effort to
calm the green-eyed man. “I ain’ gonter do nothin’ but jes’ tawk.”
But instead of being soothed, the man became more violent and but for
the utmost strength of four men, he would have escaped. They held him,
though. Held him in the chair while his eyes glared in wild frenzy, his
huge neck swelled even bigger, his face turned purple, and his breath
came in short rasping gasps. “Git away, damned nigger. I see you.
Ow-ww-ww!”
“I jes’ on’y got a few words I wanner say,” Willie began again. And
after one lunge at the sound of Willie’s voice the man quieted down,
and his eyes stared glassily at nothing, although his neck still
bulged. The colour of his face changed to an ugly blue and his mouth
dropped open and dripped frothy saliva. And while the green-eyed man
sat limp in the chair Willie Malone completed his speech:
“I jes’ wanner say I ain’t got no hard feelin’s agin nobody an’ I don’
want nobody to has no hard feelin’s agin me. An’ I wants to meet you
all in heaven.”
THE KILLERS
BY ERNEST HEMINGWAY
From _Scribner’s_
The door of Henry’s lunch room opened and two men came in. They sat
down at the counter.
“What’s yours?” George asked them.
“I don’t know,” one of the men said. “What do you want to eat, Al?”
“I don’t know,” said Al. “I don’t know what I want to eat.”
Outside it was getting dark. The street-light came on outside the
window. The two men at the counter read the menu. From the other end of
the counter Nick Adams watched them. He had been talking to George when
they came in.
“I’ll have a roast pork tenderloin with apple sauce and mashed potato,”
the first man said.
“It isn’t ready yet.”
“What the hell do you put it on the card for?”
“That’s the dinner,” George explained. “You can get that at six
o’clock.”
George looked at the clock on the wall behind the counter.
“It’s five o’clock.”
“The clock says twenty minutes past five,” the second man said.
“It’s twenty minutes fast.”
“Oh, to hell with the clock,” the first man said. “What have you got to
eat?”
“I can give you any kind of sandwiches,” George said. “You can have ham
and eggs, bacon and eggs, liver and bacon, or a steak.”
“Give me chicken croquettes with green peas and cream sauce and mashed
potatoes.”
“That’s the dinner.”
“Everything we want’s the dinner, eh? That’s the way you work it.”
“I can give you ham and eggs, bacon and eggs, liver---”
“I’ll take ham and eggs,” the man called Al said. He wore a derby hat
and a black overcoat buttoned across the chest. His face was small and
white and he had tight lips. He wore a silk muffler and gloves.
“Give me bacon and eggs,” said the other man. He was about the same
size as Al. Their faces were different, but they were dressed like
twins. Both wore overcoats too tight for them. They sat leaning
forward, their elbows on the counter.
“Got anything to drink?” Al asked.
“Silver beer, bevo, ginger ale,” George said.
“I mean you got anything to drink?”
“Just those I said.”
“This is a hot town,” said the other. “What do they call it?”
“Summit”
“Ever hear of it?” Al asked his friend.
“No,” said the friend.
“What do you do here nights?” Al asked.
“They eat the dinner,” his friend said. “They all come here and eat the
big dinner.”
“That’s right,” George said.
“So you think that’s right?” Al asked George.
“Sure.”
“You’re a pretty bright boy, aren’t you?”
“Sure,” said George.
“Well, you’re not,” said the other little man. “Is he, Al?”
“He’s dumb,” said Al. He turned to Nick. “What’s your name?”
“Adams.”
“Another bright boy,” Al said. “Ain’t he a bright boy, Max?”
“The town’s full of bright boys,” Max said.
George put the two platters, one of ham and eggs, the other of bacon
and eggs, on the counter. He set down two side dishes of fried potatoes
and closed the wicket into the kitchen.
“Which is yours?” he asked Al.
“Don’t you remember?”
“Ham and eggs.”
“Just a bright boy,” Max said. He leaned forward and took the ham and
eggs. Both men ate with their gloves on. George watched them eat.
“What are _you_ looking at?” Max looked at George.
“Nothing.”
“The hell you were. You were looking at me.”
“Maybe the boy meant it for a joke, Max,” Al said.
George laughed.
“_You_ don’t have to laugh,” Max said to him. “_You_ don’t have to
laugh at all, see?”
“All right,” said George.
“So he thinks it’s all right.” Max turned to Al. “He thinks it’s all
right. That’s a good one.”
“Oh, he’s a thinker,” Al said. They went on eating.
“What’s the bright boy’s name down the counter?” Al asked Max.
“Hey, bright boy,” Max said to Nick. “You go around on the other side
of the counter with your boy friend.”
“What’s the idea?” Nick asked.
“There isn’t any idea.”
“You better go around, bright boy,” Al said. Nick went around behind
the counter.
“What’s the idea?” George asked.
“None of your damn business,” Al said. “Who’s out in the kitchen?”
“The nigger.”
“What do you mean the nigger?”
“The nigger that cooks.”
“Tell him to come in.”
“What’s the idea?”
“Tell him to come in.”
“Where do you think you are?”
“We know damn well where we are,” the man called Max said. “Do we look
silly?”
“You talk silly,” Al said to him. “What the hell do you argue with this
kid for? Listen,” he said to George, “tell the nigger to come out here.”
“What are you going to do to him?”
“Nothing. Use your head, bright boy. What would we do to a nigger?”
George opened the slit that opened back into the kitchen. “Sam,” he
called. “Come in here a minute.”
The door to the kitchen opened and the nigger came in. “What was it?”
he asked. The two men at the counter took a look at him.
“All right, nigger. You stand right there,” Al said.
Sam, the nigger, standing in his apron, looked at the two men sitting
at the counter. “Yes, sir,” he said. Al got down from his stool.
“I’m going back to the kitchen with the nigger and bright boy,” he
said. “Go on back to the kitchen, nigger. You go with him, bright
boy.” The little man walked after Nick and Sam, the cook, back into
the kitchen. The door shut after them. The man called Max sat at the
counter opposite George. He didn’t look at George but looked in the
mirror that ran along back of the counter. Henry’s had been made over
from a saloon into a lunch-counter.
“Well, bright boy,” Max said, looking into the mirror, “why don’t you
say something?”
“What’s it all about?”
“Hey, Al,” Max called, “bright boy wants to know what it’s all about.”
“Why don’t you tell him?” Al’s voice came from the kitchen.
“What do you think it’s all about?”
“I don’t know.”
“What do you think?”
Max looked into the mirror all the time he was talking.
“I wouldn’t say.”
“Hey, Al, bright boy says he wouldn’t say what he thinks it’s all
about.”
“I can hear you, all right,” Al said from the kitchen. He had propped
open the slit that dishes passed through into the kitchen with a catsup
bottle. “Listen, bright boy,” he said from the kitchen to George.
“Stand a little further along the bar. You move a little to the left,
Max.” He was like a photographer arranging for a group picture.
“Talk to me, bright boy,” Max said. “What do you think’s going to
happen?”
George did not say anything.
“I’ll tell you,” Max said. “We’re going to kill a Swede. Do you know a
big Swede named Ole Andreson?”
“Yes.”
“He comes here to eat every night, don’t he?”
“Sometimes he comes here.”
“He comes here at six o’clock, don’t he?”
“If he comes.”
“We know all that, bright boy,” Max said. “Talk about something else.
Ever go to the movies?”
“Once in a while.”
“You ought to go to the movies more. The movies are fine for a bright
boy like you.”
“What are you going to kill Ole Andreson for? What did he ever do to
you?”
“He never had a chance to do anything to us. He never even seen us.”
“And he’s only going to see us once,” Al said from the kitchen.
“What are you going to kill him for, then?” George asked.
“We’re killing him for a friend. Just to oblige a friend, bright boy.”
“Shut up,” said Al from the kitchen. “You talk too goddam much.”
“Well, I got to keep bright boy amused. Don’t I, bright boy?”
“You talk too damn much,” Al said. “The nigger and my bright boy are
amused by themselves. I got them tied up like a couple of girl friends
in the convent.”
“I suppose you were in a convent.”
“You never know.”
“You were in a kosher convent. That’s where you were.”
George looked up at the clock.
“If anybody comes in you tell them the cook is off, and if they keep
after it, you tell them you’ll go back and cook yourself. Do you get
that, bright boy?”
“All right,” George said. “What you going to do with us afterward?”
“That’ll depend,” Max said. “That’s one of those things you never know
at the time.”
George looked up at the dock. It was a quarter past six. The door from
the street opened. A street-car motorman came in.
“Hello, George,” he said. “Can I get supper?”
“Sam’s gone out,” George said. “He’ll be back in about half an hour.”
“I’d better go up the street,” the motorman said. George looked at the
clock. It was twenty minutes past six.
“That was nice, bright boy,” Max said. “You’re a regular little
gentleman.”
“He knew I’d blow his head off,” Al said from the kitchen.
“No,” said Max. “It ain’t that. Bright boy is nice. He’s a nice boy. I
like him.”
At six-fifty-five George said: “He’s not coming.”
Two other people had been in the lunch room. Once George had gone out
to the kitchen and made a ham-and-egg sandwich “to go” that a man
wanted to take with him. Inside the kitchen he saw Al, his derby hat
tipped back, sitting on a stool beside the wicket with the muzzle of a
sawed-off shotgun resting on the ledge. Nick and the cook were back to
back in the corner, a towel tied in each of their mouths. George had
cooked the sandwich, wrapped it up in oiled paper, put it in a bag,
brought it in, and the man had paid for it and gone out.
“Bright boy can do everything,” Max said. “He can cook and everything.
You’d make some girl a nice wife, bright boy.”
“Yes?” George said. “Your friend, Ole Andreson, isn’t going to come.”
“We’ll give him ten minutes,” Max said.
Max watched the mirror and the clock. The hands of the clock marked
seven o’clock, and then five minutes past seven.
“Come on, Al,” said Max. “We better go. He’s not coming.”
“Better give him five minutes,” Al said from the kitchen.
In the five minutes a man came in, and George explained that the cook
was sick.
“Why the hell don’t you get another cook?” the man asked. “Aren’t you
running a lunch counter?” He went out.
“Come on, Al,” Max said.
“What about the two bright boys and the nigger?”
“They’re all right.”
“You think so?”
“Sure. We’re through with it.”
“I don’t like it,” said Al. “It’s sloppy. You talk too much.”
“Oh, what the hell,” said Max. “We got to keep amused, haven’t we?”
“You talk too much, all the same,” Al said. He came out from the
kitchen. The cut-off barrels of the shotgun made a slight bulge under
the waist of his too tight-fitting overcoat. He straightened his coat
with his gloved hands.
“So long, bright boy,” he said to George. “You got a lot of luck.”
“That’s the truth,” Max said. “You ought to play the races, bright boy.”
The two of them went out the door. George watched them through the
window pass under the arc light and cross the street. In their tight
overcoats and derby hats they looked like a vaudeville team. George
went back through the swinging door into the kitchen and untied Nick
and the cook.
“I don’t want any more of that,” said Sam, the cook. “I don’t want any
more of that.”
Nick stood up. He had never had a towel in his mouth before.
“Say,” he said. “What the hell?” He was trying to swagger it off.
“They were going to kill Ole Andreson,” George said. “They were going
to shoot him when he came in to eat.”
“Ole Andreson?”
“Sure.”
The cook felt the corners of his mouth with his thumbs.
“They all gone?” he asked.
“Yeah,” said George. “They’re gone now.”
“I don’t like it,” said the cook. “I don’t like any of it at all.”
“Listen,” George said to Nick. “You better go see Ole Andreson.”
“All right.”
“You better not have anything to do with it at all,” Sam, the cook,
said. “You better stay way out of it.”
“Don’t go if you don’t want to,” George said.
“Mixing up in this ain’t going to get you anywhere,” the cook said.
“You stay out of it.”
“I’ll go see him,” Nick said to George. “Where does he live?”
The cook turned away.
“Little boys always know what they want to do,” he said.
“He lives up at Hirsch’s rooming house,” George said to Nick.
“I’ll go up there.”
Outside the arc light shone through the bare branches of a tree. Nick
walked up the street beside the car tracks and turned at the next arc
light down a side street. Three houses up the street was Hirsch’s
rooming house. Nick walked up the two steps and pushed the bell. A
woman came to the door.
“Is Ole Andreson here?”
“Do you want to see him?”
“Yes, if he’s in.”
Nick followed the woman up a flight of stairs and back to the end of a
corridor. She knocked on the door.
“Who is it?”
“It’s somebody to see you, Mr. Andreson,” the woman said.
“It’s Nick Adams.”
“Come in.”
Nick opened the door and went into the room. Ole Andreson was lying
on the bed with all his clothes on. He had been a heavy-weight
prizefighter and he was too long for the bed. He lay with his head on
two pillows. He did not look at Nick.
“What was it?” he asked.
“I was up at Henry’s,” Nick said, “and two fellows came in and tied up
me and the cook, and they said they were going to kill you.”
It sounded silly when he said it. Ole Andreson said nothing.
“They put us out in the kitchen,” Nick went on. “They were going to
shoot you when you came in to supper.”
Ole Andreson looked at the wall and did not say anything.
“George thought I better come and tell you about it.”
“There isn’t anything I can do about it,” Ole Andreson said.
“I’ll tell you what they were like.”
“I don’t want to know what they were like,” Old Andreson said. He
looked at the wall. “Thanks for coming to tell me about it.”
“That’s all right.”
Nick looked at the big man lying on the bed.
“Don’t you want me to go and see the police?”
“No,” Ole Andreson said. “That wouldn’t do any good.”
“Isn’t there something I could do?”
“No. There ain’t anything to do.”
“Maybe it was just a bluff.”
“No. It ain’t just a bluff.”
Ole Andreson rolled over toward the wall.
“The only thing is,” he said, talking toward the wall, “I just can’t
make up my mind to go out. I been in here all day.”
“Couldn’t you get out of town?”
“No,” Ole Andreson said. “I’m through with all that running around.”
He looked at the wall.
“There ain’t anything to do now.”
“Couldn’t you fix it up some way?”
“No. I got in wrong.” He talked in the same flat voice. “There ain’t
anything to do. After a while I’ll make up my mind to go out.”
“I better go back and see George,” Nick said.
“So long,” said Ole Andreson. He did not look toward Nick. “Thanks for
coming around.”