James Baldwin - Another Country

“Hey, old lady,” Richard called, “want to make it in?”

“I guess so,” she said, and yawned. “I suppose we’ve celebrated enough for one night, one book.”

She rose and returned to her side of the table and began to gather her things together. Rufus was suddenly afraid to see her go.

“Can I come to see you soon?” he asked, with a smile.

She stared at him across the width of the table. “Please do,” she said. “Soon.”

Richard knocked his pipe out and put it in his pocket, looking around for the waiter. Vivaldo was staring at something, at someone, just behind Rufus and suddenly seemed about to spring out of his seat. “Well,” he said, faintly, “here’s Jane,” and Jane walked over to the table. Her short, graying hair was carefully combed, which was unusual, and she was wearing a dark dress, which was also unusual. Perhaps Vivaldo was the only person there who had ever seen her out of blue jeans and sweaters. “Hi, everybody,” she said, and smiled her bright, hostile smile. She sat down. “Haven’t seen any of you for months.”

“Still painting?” Cass asked. “Or have you given that up?”

“I’ve been working like a dog,” Jane said, continuing to look around her and avoiding Vivaldo’s eyes.

“Seems to suit you,” Cass muttered, and put on her coat.

Jane looked at Rufus, beginning, it seemed, to recover her self-possession. “How’ve you been, Rufus?”

“Just fine,” he said.

“We’ve all been dissipating,” said Richard, “but you look like you’ve been being a good girl and getting your beauty sleep every night.”

“You look great,” said Vivaldo, briefly.

For the first time she looked directly at him. “Do I? I guess I’ve been feeling pretty well. I’ve cut down on my drinking,” and she laughed a little too loudly and looked down. Richard was paying the waiter and had stood up, his trench coat over his arm. “Are you all leaving?”

“We’ve got to,” said Cass, “we’re just dull, untalented, old married people.”

Cass glanced over at Rufus, saying, “Be good now: get some rest.” She smiled at him. He longed to do something to prolong that smile, that moment, but he did not smile back, only nodded his head. She turned to Jane and Vivaldo. “So long, kids. See you soon.”

“Sure,” Jane said.

“I’ll be over tomorrow,” said Vivaldo.

“I’m expecting you,” Richard said, “don’t fail me. So long, Jane.”

“So long.”

“So long.”

Everyone was gone except Jane and Rufus and Vivaldo.

I wouldn’t mind being in jail but I’ve got to stay there so long ….

The seats the others had occupied were like a chasm now between Rufus and the white boy and the white girl.

“Let’s have another drink,” Vivaldo said.

So long ….

“Let me buy,” Jane said. “I sold a painting.”

“Did you now? For a lot of money?”

“Quite a lot of money. That’s probably why I was in such a stinking mood the last time you saw me — it wasn’t going well.”

“You were in a stinking mood, all right.”

Wouldn’t mind being in jail ….

“What’re you having, Rufus?”

“I’ll stick to Scotch, I guess.”

But I’ve got to stay there ….

“I’m sorry,” she said, “I don’t know what makes me such a bitch.”

“You drink too much. Let’s just have one drink here. Then I’ll walk you home.”

They both looked quickly at Rufus.

So long ….

“I’m going to the head,” Rufus said. “Order me a Scotch with water.”

He walked out of the back room into the roaring bar. He stood at the door for a moment, watching the boys and girls, men and women, their wet mouths opening and closing, their faces damp and pale, their hands grim on the glass or the bottle or clutching a sleeve, an elbow, clutching the air. Small flames flared incessantly here and there and they moved through shifting layers of smoke. The cash register rang and rang. One enormous bouncer stood at the door, watching everything, and another moved about, clearing tables and rearranging chairs. Two boys, one Spanish-looking in a red shirt, one Danish-looking in brown, stood at the juke box, talking about Frank Sinatra.

Rufus stared at a small blonde girl who was wearing a striped open blouse and a wide skirt with a big leather belt and a bright brass buckle. She wore low shoes and black knee socks. Her blouse was low enough for him to see the beginnings of her breasts; his eye followed the line down to the full nipples, which pushed aggressively forward; his hand encircled her waist, caressed the belly button and slowly forced the thighs apart. She was talking to another girl. She felt his eyes on her and looked his way. Their eyes met. He turned and walked into the head.

It smelled of thousands of travelers, oceans of piss, tons of bile and vomit and shit. He added his stream to the ocean, holding that most despised part of himself loosely between two fingers of one hand. But I’ve got to stay there so long …. He looked at the horrible history splashed furiously on the walls — telephone numbers, cocks, breasts, balls, cunts, etched into these walls with hatred. Suck my cock. I like to get whipped. I want a hot stiff prick up my ass. Down with Jews. Kill the niggers. I suck cocks.

He washed his hands very carefully and dried them on the filthy roller towel and walked out into the bar. The two boys were still at the juke box, the girl with the striped blouse was still talking to her friend. He walked through the bar to the door and into the street. Only then did he reach in his pocket to see what Cass had pushed into his palm.

Five dollars. Well, that would take care of him until morning. He would get a room at the Y.

He crossed Sheridan Square and walked slowly along West Fourth Street. The bars were beginning to close. People stood before bar doors, trying vainly to get in, or simply delaying going home; and in spite of the cold there were loiterers under street lamps. He felt as removed from them, as he walked slowly along, as he might have felt from a fence, a farmhouse, a tree, seen from a train window: coming closer and closer, the details changing every instant as the eye picked them out; then pressing against the window with the urgency of a messenger or a child; then dropping away, diminishing, vanished, gone forever. That fence is falling down, he might have thought as the train rushed toward it, or That house needs paint, or The tree is dead . In an instant, gone in an instant — it was not his fence, his farmhouse, or his tree. As now, passing, he recognized faces, bodies, postures, and thought. That’s Ruth. Or There’s old Lennie. Son of a bitch is stoned again . It was very silent.

He passed Cornelia Street. Eric had once lived there. He saw again the apartment, the lamplight in the corners, Eric under the light, books falling over everything, and the bed unmade. Eric — and he was on Sixth Avenue, traffic lights and the lights of taxis blazing around him. Two girls and two boys, white, stood on the opposite corner, waiting for the lights to change. Half a dozen men, in a heavy gleaming car, rolled by and shouted at them. Then there was someone at his shoulder, a young white boy in a vaguely military cap and a black leather jacket. He looked at Rufus with the greatest hostility, then started slowly down the Avenue away from him, waving his rump like a flag. He looked back, stopped beneath the marquee of a movie theater. The lights changed. Rufus and the two couples started toward each other, came abreast in the middle of the avenue, passed — only, one of the girls looked at him with a kind of pitying wonder in her eyes. All right, bitch . He started toward Eighth Street, for no reason; he was simply putting off his subway ride.