Caryl Phillips - Dancing In The Dark

Bert continues to perform nightly in the new Williams and Walker production, Bandana Land , but he does so with a weary spirit for the experience of Abyssinia appears to have taught George very little. His erratic partner seems even more determined than ever to make a pageant as opposed to offering a coherent production, but Bert decides against trying to talk with George for he knows that his words will have little, if any, effect. It is clear, not only to Bert but to others, including Mother, that artistically speaking the two men are moving in different directions for Bert’s queer clothes and quaint colored humor contrasts bizarrely with the bejeweled opulence of George’s vision. Sadly, the two partners no longer share the same stage with ease for George’s desire for swell grace and romance makes no sense when set against Bert’s old-fashioned imitation of a nigger coon.

He continues to soap the man’s face, all the while looking closely at his client’s features, until he loses sight of the individual beneath the white foam. He sharpens his razor on the strop and then makes a few small movements of his wrist as though carving the air into thin slices. A seated customer suddenly exclaims, “Don’t you know it’s the man’s son you’re talking about?” He tries not to listen to their gossip as he gives the razor a few final strokes against the strop, but what can he do? He knows that this is a barbershop, and that a barbershop is a colored man’s country club, where folks feel free to run their mouths in all directions, but his Bert has bought the shop for him, and in spite of everything, he has his loyalties to his son. This being the case, he knows that eventually he’ll have to say something to these crispy-haired American men for they cannot talk about his West Indian son and expect a big man like Fred Williams to endure much more of this discourtesy. Next comes the water. He likes to rinse his hands one final time before touching a man’s skin, and so he lets the warm water ribbon gently through his fingers. All the boy is trying to do is entertain people; he is trying to make them happy and make them laugh, but the truth is he has never been able to watch his son perform beyond that first time. He takes up the towel and dries his hands as another customer gets his point across. “Making us all look foolish, don’t care what nobody says, the nigger makes us all look bad.” He takes the razor and drags it gently across his client’s face, careful to ensure that his strokes are smooth and true. How many more of these conversations? Damn it, this is his son, and people should respect this, and appreciate the fact that Williams and Walker is an all-Negro organization that employs coloreds and gives them a chance to succeed, and often presents them with a start in the entertainment business. However, whichever way you look at it, a barbershop is not a good place to frequent if you don’t wish to hear talk, and soon Fred Williams had heard enough talk. Eventually everybody knew the story of what happened on the morning Fred Williams finally closed down his barbershop, but nobody ever heard the story from Fred. In fact, according to Billy “Too Fine” Thomas, after Fred was through with his craziness he just took off his smock, tossed it over the back of one of those big old padded leather chairs, and locked the door behind him. Billy “Too Fine” Thomas worked with Fred in the shop as some kind of apprentice, doing the easy cuts, wiping down the counters, and sweeping up hair from the floor, and for years after Fred Williams’s patience finally ran out, Billy could ride three or four free drinks in any bar in Harlem on the back of his story — a story that got bigger with every retelling.

“You see, that morning I knowed something was wrong with Fred for I could smell the whiskey on his breath, but Fred ain’t no liquor head and it wasn’t like Fred at all, and then when he starts to organize his scissors and blades and everything, he’s banging things down like he’s spoiling for a fight and I figure something must have happened at home with the wife, for most of the worriments that trouble a man go right back to the wife, and most likely he’s dealing with some kind of problem behind closed doors that he got to play out in public, so I don’t say nothing and I swear I just try to stay out of the nigger’s way and so I go through to the back and try to reckon up how I’m going to survive this day, but in the end I know I just gotta watch carefully and see what old Fred does with that temper of his for the man’s just crashing around like a crazy fool, and then when I come back through there’s a customer sitting high up in the chair, been in a few times, but he ain’t no regular, and I don’t even know the man’s name, but already I see that blade going back and forth, back and forth, and then I see the blood for Fred’s cut the man, cut him good, but it’s like Fred don’t notice or something, so I move toward Fred and just at that moment the man cries out in pain, I mean his cheek is cut good and proper, and now the man can feel the blood begin ning to trickle down his face, all hot and flowing, and so he raises his hand and touches his face, then he looks at his hand and he’s fierce angry, shouting and cussing, and just when I’m about to put my hand on Fred’s arm to tell him, ‘Hey, Fred, the man’s bleeding,’ I’ll be damned if the island nigger doesn’t turn and cut me too, doesn’t say a word to me, just a quick movement of his wrist and I’m holding on to my arm and blood pumping through it like I sprung a leak and so I look at the man with blood on his face, and me with blood on my arm, and right there and then I know that old Fred’s come unglued and so me and the customer start to back away from him and move toward the door, all the while keeping an eye on that blade for we both know that anything can happen with Fred for it’s clear that he ain’t through with his cutting for the day, but we both hightail it out of there and leave him to wait for whoever else is dumb enough to venture into Fred Williams’s barbershop, but I know right away that I’m going to have to get me another job, either in barbering or something else, but I don’t much care what it is as long as I don’t have to work with this crazy man for the devil had surely seized old Fred’s soul and good sense had jumped clear out of the man’s head.”

George knocks at the door and waits. He holds on to the railing for his head is spinning, but the news of his new social organization will soon be made public and it is important that he formally invite Bert to participate, for he knows that Bert can be a mighty formal kind of a man. George looks around and notices a few people staring up at him as he stands at the top of the flight of steps. They know who he is, and the tasty suit leaves them in no doubt. He waves and they smile, and then the door opens and a grim-faced Lottie ushers him in and she announces that Bert is in his library keeping company with his books. She speaks with a strange mixture of both pride and contempt, but he has heard this tone before and he therefore tries his best to ignore it. Lottie and Aida remain friends, and this being the case he seldom says more to Lottie than is absolutely necessary, but he knows exactly what she thinks of him. He only has to see the way she looks him up and down, as though inspecting him for some external evidence of the inner taint that she obviously feels disfigures his personality.

Bert rests the book in his lap and looks up as his wife withdraws and leaves the two men alone.

— Everything all right?

— Figured I’d just come by and talk to you for a minute about the social organization.

— Won’t you take a seat?

George nods and carefully closes in the door behind him, but try as he might he cannot disguise the fact that his legs are shaking and his gait is unsteady.