your position and usefulness by permitting you to come back here and be seen and suspected by all your people. So I’m going to tell you what I want you to do. You bring the list to me at midnight. I’ll be waiting down by the Harlem River underneath the subway extension to the Polo Grounds in my cah, and I’ll pay you right then and there. It will be dark and deserted at that time of night and nobody’ll see you.”
Barry hesitated, looking torn between fear and greed. “Well, frankly, sir, that’s a good sound idea, but I’m scared of the dark, sir,” he confessed.
The Colonel chuckled. “There’s nothing about the dark to fear, my boy. That’s just nigra superstition. The dark never hurt anyone. You’ll be as safe as in the arms of Jesus. I give you my word.”
Barry looked relieved at this. “Well, sir, if you give me your word I know can’t nothing happen to me. I’ll be there at midnight sharp.”
Without further ado, the Colonel waved a hand, dismissinghim.
“Are you going to trust that —” the blond young man began.
For the first time the Colonel showed displeasure in a frown. The blond young man shut up.
As he was leaving, Barry noticed the small sign in the window through the corners of his eyes:
Wanted, a bale of cotton.
What for? he wondered.
9
No one knew where Uncle Bud slept. He could be found any night somewhere on the streets of Harlem, pushing his cart, his eyes searching the darkness for anything valuable enough to sell. He had an exceptional divination of anything of value, because in Harlem no one ever threw anything away valuable enough to sell, if they knew it. But he managed to collect enough saleable junk to exist, and when day broke he was to be seen at one of those run-down junkyards where scrawny-necked, beady-eyed white men paid a few cents for the rags, paper, glass and iron he had collected. Actually he slept in his cart during the summer. He would wheel it to some shady spot on some slum street where no one thought it strange to find a junk man sleeping in his cart, and curl up on the burlap rags covering his load and sleep, undisturbed by the sounds of motor-cars and trucks, children screaming, men cursing and fighting, women gossiping, police sirens wailing, or even by the dead awakening. Nothing troubled his sleep.
On this night, because his cart was filled with the bale of cotton, he wheeled it towards a street beneath the 125th Street approach to the Triborough Bridge, where he would be near Mr Goodman’s junkyard when he woke up.
A police cruiser containing two white cops pulled up beside him. “What you got there, boy?” the one on the inside asked.
Uncle Bud stopped and scratched his head and ruminated. “Wal, boss, I’se got some cahdbo’d and papuh an’ I’se got some bedsprings an’ some bottles an’ some rags an’–”
“You ain’t got no money, have you?” the cop cracked. “You ain’t got no eighty-seven thousand dollars?”
“Nawsuh, wish I did.”
“What would you do with eighty-seven grand?”
Uncle Bud scratched his head again. “Wal, suh, I’d buy me a brand new waggin. An’ then I reckon I’d go to Africa,” he said,adding underneath his breath: “Where wouldn’t any white mother-rapers like you be fucking with me all the time.”
Naturally the cops didn’t hear the last, but they laughed at the first and drove on.
Uncle Bud found a spot beside an abandoned truck down by the river and went to sleep. When he awakened the sun was high. At about the same time Barry Waterfield was approaching Colonel Calhoun on Seventh Avenue, he was approaching the junkyard alongside the river south of the bridge.
It was a fenced-in enclosure about piles of scrap iron and dilapidated wooden sheds housing other kinds of junk. Uncle Bud stopped before a small gate at one side of the main office building, a one-storey wooden box fronting on the street. A big black hairless dog the size of a Great Dane came silently to the gate and
Barry hesitated, looking torn between fear and greed. “Well, frankly, sir, that’s a good sound idea, but I’m scared of the dark, sir,” he confessed.
The Colonel chuckled. “There’s nothing about the dark to fear, my boy. That’s just nigra superstition. The dark never hurt anyone. You’ll be as safe as in the arms of Jesus. I give you my word.”
Barry looked relieved at this. “Well, sir, if you give me your word I know can’t nothing happen to me. I’ll be there at midnight sharp.”
Without further ado, the Colonel waved a hand, dismissinghim.
“Are you going to trust that —” the blond young man began.
For the first time the Colonel showed displeasure in a frown. The blond young man shut up.
As he was leaving, Barry noticed the small sign in the window through the corners of his eyes:
Wanted, a bale of cotton.
What for? he wondered.
9
No one knew where Uncle Bud slept. He could be found any night somewhere on the streets of Harlem, pushing his cart, his eyes searching the darkness for anything valuable enough to sell. He had an exceptional divination of anything of value, because in Harlem no one ever threw anything away valuable enough to sell, if they knew it. But he managed to collect enough saleable junk to exist, and when day broke he was to be seen at one of those run-down junkyards where scrawny-necked, beady-eyed white men paid a few cents for the rags, paper, glass and iron he had collected. Actually he slept in his cart during the summer. He would wheel it to some shady spot on some slum street where no one thought it strange to find a junk man sleeping in his cart, and curl up on the burlap rags covering his load and sleep, undisturbed by the sounds of motor-cars and trucks, children screaming, men cursing and fighting, women gossiping, police sirens wailing, or even by the dead awakening. Nothing troubled his sleep.
On this night, because his cart was filled with the bale of cotton, he wheeled it towards a street beneath the 125th Street approach to the Triborough Bridge, where he would be near Mr Goodman’s junkyard when he woke up.
A police cruiser containing two white cops pulled up beside him. “What you got there, boy?” the one on the inside asked.
Uncle Bud stopped and scratched his head and ruminated. “Wal, boss, I’se got some cahdbo’d and papuh an’ I’se got some bedsprings an’ some bottles an’ some rags an’–”
“You ain’t got no money, have you?” the cop cracked. “You ain’t got no eighty-seven thousand dollars?”
“Nawsuh, wish I did.”
“What would you do with eighty-seven grand?”
Uncle Bud scratched his head again. “Wal, suh, I’d buy me a brand new waggin. An’ then I reckon I’d go to Africa,” he said,adding underneath his breath: “Where wouldn’t any white mother-rapers like you be fucking with me all the time.”
Naturally the cops didn’t hear the last, but they laughed at the first and drove on.
Uncle Bud found a spot beside an abandoned truck down by the river and went to sleep. When he awakened the sun was high. At about the same time Barry Waterfield was approaching Colonel Calhoun on Seventh Avenue, he was approaching the junkyard alongside the river south of the bridge.
It was a fenced-in enclosure about piles of scrap iron and dilapidated wooden sheds housing other kinds of junk. Uncle Bud stopped before a small gate at one side of the main office building, a one-storey wooden box fronting on the street. A big black hairless dog the size of a Great Dane came silently to the gate and
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