Chester Himes - If he hollers let him go

'You don't want a tacker, sho 'nuff?' Hank said, trying to get back his advantage.

But he had lost it. 'Sho 'nuff,' I drawled. 'An' ri' now.'

We looked at each other, measuring. His eyes were hard blue, hostile but not quite angry. I don't know how mine looked but I tried to make them as hard as his.

He decided to play it straight, where he always had the advantage. 'To tell you the truth, Bob, all of my tackers are busy, will be busy all day.'

I tried to get it back again. 'How about one of these ladies?' I'd started to say 'Southern' ladies, but decided not to press him that far.

'They're busy too,' he said. Now he got some of his smile back.

I started to turn away, saw a couple of tackers lounging over at the port rail by the generators, gabbing; turned back. 'How about one of them?' I nodded in their direction.

He glanced over at them, looked back at me. Now he had all of his smile back. 'They're busy too,' he said. 'You're just out of luck, Bob. Why don't you try Tommy?' Tommy was another cracker bastard.

I couldn't call him a liar; that's where he had me. I couldn't go down to Kelly and say, 'Hank said he ain't got any tackers'-even if I would have, which I wouldn't. He'd look at me as if I was nuts and say, 'Why, goddamn, why tell me?' I turned away, thinking. The white folks win again, trying to laugh it off. But it stuck in my craw. If I couldn't get the work done I'd have to take Kelly's riding; and in order to get it done I had to eat everybody else's. I had my usual once-a-day urge to tell them to take their leaderman job and shove it.

But half-way down the ladder I thought, What the hell, and turned around and went back to the tackers who were gabbing by the rail. I saw they were Southerners, but I asked anyway.

'Look, can I get one of you fellows to tack a couple of stays for me?'

They looked at each other. For a moment I thought neither one was going to answer, then one said, 'We's waitin' fuh Hank.'

'You're not working on a job, though, are you?'

'No, we's jes waitin'.'

I couldn't tell whether they were making fun of me or just talked like that. I decided to try again. 'If Hank says it's all right, can I get one of you then?'

They looked at each other again. The other one spoke this time. He said, 'Sho.'

All of a sudden I had to laugh. They knew that Hank wasn't going to assign them to me. 'Okay, boys,' I said. 'Get your rest.'

I walked off but I didn't know where I was going. I couldn't go down and tell Red that Hank wouldn't give me a tacker, either; they'd get down on me too. Then I thought of Don. I found him at the forward end supervising the installation of a cowl vent.

'Wanna do me a favour?' I said.

He turned that bright speculative stare on me. 'Shoot Kelly?' He didn't crack a smile, but I laughed once anyway to show him it was funny.

Then I said, 'Let me borrow one of your tackers for about a half-hour.'

He thought for a moment. 'There's a girl down aft-Madge. They're doing these things.' He kicked at the cowl. 'You can have her till dinner-time, anyway.'

'Fine,' I said, hurrying off. I noticed the white mechanics give him a dirty look, but I didn't think anything about it at the time.

She had her back to me and her hood up so it covered her hair, so I didn't recognize her right off. I was about twenty feet away, hurrying toward her, when one of the white mechanics looked up, and that caused her to turn. I saw that she was the big, peroxide blonde I'd run into on the third deck earlier; and I knew the instant I recognized her that she was going to perform then-we both would perform.

As soon as she saw me she went into her frightened act and began shrinking away. I started off giving her a sneer so she'd know I knew it was phoney. She knew it anyway; but she kept putting it on me. I didn't know how far she'd go and I got apprehensive. Before I got too close to her I began talking to her, like you do to a vicious dog to gentle it.

'Look, Madge, Don said you could work with me for a while.'

A wild excited look came into her eyes and her mouth went tight-lipped and brutal; she looked as if she was priming herself to scream. This bitch is crazy, I thought, but I walked on up to her and picked up her line as if nothing was happening. 'It's just a short job,' I said. 'I'll carry your line for you.'

She came out of her phoney act and jerked her line out of my hand, 'I ain't gonna work with no nigger!' she said in a harsh, flat voice.

I didn't even think about it. I just said it right out of my stomach. 'Screw you then, you cracker bitch!'

I stood there for a moment swapping looks with her. She didn't even bat her eyes; she just gave me a long hard brazen look and turned to the two mechanics squatting open-mouthed and said, 'You gonna let a nigger talk tuh me like that?'

One started up tentatively, a bar in his hand. 'Well now, by God-'

I gave them a glance. They were both elderly men, small, scrawny, nothing to worry about. I turned and walked away, went down to the head and told Red that I couldn't find him a tacker, he'd have to take the job over to the sheet-metal shop and get it welded.

'These white folks just refuse to work with us niggers this morning,' I laughed. I felt better now I'd cursed somebody out.

At eleven-thirty MacDougal, the department superintendent, sent for me. I walked across the yard to the sheet-metal shop where he had his office.

'Hello, Bob, the boss'll see you in a minute,' Marguerite said, looking up from her desk by the door. She was a small, compact, black-haired woman with sharp brown eyes and skin that was constantly greasy. She wasn't pretty but she wore expensive clothes. She looked thirty and she was hard as nails.

'How's it going, Marguerite?' I said, but she had turned away to answer the phone and didn't hear me.

I stood there for a time then Marguerite noticed me again and said, 'Sit down, Bob. Mr. MacDougal's busy now, he'll see you in a minute.'

I went over and sat in one of the chairs along the wall and looked at Mac. His desk was out from the wall across the room. He was talking to one of the white shop leadermen and didn't look at me. The shop super and two other shop leadermen came in and he talked to them in turn. Then he made a phone call. Another fellow came in and took the chair at the end of the desk with his back to me and Mac talked to him for a time; then he looked up at me and beckoned.

I went over to his desk. 'Hello, Mac,' I said.

He didn't like for the coloured fellows to call him Mac, but he wouldn't tell them outright; he'd tell Marguerite to tell them to address him as Mr. MacDougal. She had told me twice; she didn't tell me any more.

He was a fat man in shirt sleeves, weighing three hundred or more. He had a jolly red face and twinkling eyes and when he laughed he shook all over. Now he sat there overflowing in his huge desk chair, beaming at me.

'Hello, Bob, I'm glad you dropped in,' he said.

'You sent for me,' I said.

He quit beaming and his face got vicious. 'You cursed a woman worker this morning,' he charged.

I was suddenly conscious that everyone in the office had stopped to listen. 'She called me a nigger,' I said.

He carefully crossed his hands over his fat belly and leaned back in his chair. Then he began beaming again. 'You expect all kind of things when you work with people,' he began in a careful voice. 'But one of the first things people in authority gotta learn is they can't lose their temper. I can't lose my temper. My superior can't lose his temper. You didn't have no right to lose your temper about it either. Things happen every day that make me mad enough to curse somebody-but I don't do it. I couldn't keep the respect of my workers. Some of them would get mad and curse me back. I'd lose my discipline over them, I'd lose their respect, I wouldn't be able to keep my job. You can understand that, Bob, you're an intelligent boy.'