Jeffery Allen - Song of the Shank

Another guest, a pretty young woman, a bright vision of elegance in her flowing white gown — some fancy drape guarding a sculptor’s prized creation — came over and started up a conversation. Somehow the talk got around to the Bethune children. The young woman raised a slender wrist sparkling with three silver bracelets of separate diameter and actually pointed out their son, Sharpe, who was standing in another segment of the garden with a circle of listeners. Is that so? He feigned interest. Took her hand into both of his own. What a pleasure this has been. She raised her chin to move her face closer to his. He let her hand fall. If you will excuse me. Freed himself of her company under the pretense that he was off to meet the son. And there she stood, smiling, while he hurried through waves of guests bustling about with cheerful faces. But he only walked far enough to observe and listen.

Sharpe was a handsome man of around twenty — some vague resemblance between him and his father, or mother for that matter, although there was more of her in his facial features — possessing that special self-consciousness that only actors have. (He was no professional actor, as far as Perry Oliver knew.) He wore a splendid shirt and tie, without a jacket. But the most striking thing about him was the exceptional length of his legs, which he displayed in well-polished knee-length black leather boots. The young women in attendance certainly seemed stirred by the style and quality of his dress, but he struck Perry Oliver as dull, colorless, and stupid, for the moment anyone started a discussion with him he would start talking about himself — what concerts he had attended, what paintings he had seen, what business he had conducted, where he hoped to travel. Otherwise he spoke about things that were common knowledge. He seemed most engaged with people of comparable age and tastes.

As though he had heard every silent word and wished to prove Perry Oliver wrong, Sharpe actually parted company with the circle and sought out a group of elderly guests to talk to. At one point Perry Oliver was engaged in conversation with another pretty young woman — about breeding expensive racehorses, a subject he cared little about — and since the lady’s perfect lips were taking too long to form a word, he turned his head to discover that Sharpe was watching him. It was hard to say how long he had been looking. He did not come over. Instead he found a group of elderly women and started kissing hands and cheeks.

The party went on this way. Perry Oliver seemed to always catch the attention of some busybody who liked to rattle on. He sometimes smiled and sometimes sputtered at a loss for words. Even found himself repeating phrases in parrot fashion. He blamed himself. What kind of feeling, what motive had compelled him to linger in this city for a full week to attend a party of posers reeking of elitism, and at that, a party he had not been invited to?

A week earlier while he was on business at the orphanage — the director corrected him, We are a Christian mission —he had overheard the elderly director discussing the party with her young assistant, holding up the perfumed invitation to the other woman’s nose. The orphanage had turned out to be of little use to him — he would have better luck finding an understudy a few days later in the next town he visited — but he did learn of this party being put on by perhaps the most powerful man in the county, General Bethune, a newspaper publisher and political player. He decided to hang around. So, here he was, thoroughly bored and wanting to leave. (He also worried at the thought of chancing upon the fragrance-awed orphanage director or her assistant. Why hadn’t he thought about this sooner?) But leaving might be awkward. So he continued to make conversation mechanically, careful not to make the error of stretching the truth too little or too much or of supposing too soon or too late. And he went on this way until they were called into the mansion.

Barely a minute after all of the guests had taken their seats, Perry Oliver saw General Bethune struggling into the room, his fists gripped around the looped ends of two black canes. (So that was why General Bethune had remained standing in one place back in the garden.) The son Sharpe was at his side, walking at a measured pace with his hands behind his back and carrying on an ordinary conversation with his father. The other guests seemed to notice them as well, and their chatter started to die down, replaced by a gradual hush. Father and son seated themselves in two of the three mahogany chairs positioned under the mantelpiece of the marble fireplace. Then the Bethunes’ three daughters entered the room, dressed in white gowns, each with a different shade of rose — red, white, yellow — pinned to her collar. All three girls wore their hair wound in a Grecian knot. Perry Oliver estimated that they ranged in age from seven to ten, which meant that the oldest of the three daughters was only half Sharpe’s age.

Mary Bethune returned to the room, with a little nigger boy walking beside her, hand in hand. She led him over to the piano, where he sat down perfectly straight on the stool and positioned it under him with the legs turned at a slight angle toward the audience. He was no more than ten feet away from Perry Oliver, who would estimate that the boy was no older than five or six (although with a nigger age was never certain). His eyes bulged as if someone had fitted stones in the hollow sockets then sealed them over. They had outfitted him in a black suit with short sleeves and pants and a freshly pressed white shirt with a rounded collar. His hair was as glossy as his highly polished shoes. There on the angled stool he started twitching his shoulders and trembling as if he were feverish. He seemed to move his head in the direction of the daughters, who giggled when they saw his curious gesture.

This is our prized attraction for the evening, Mary Bethune said, our boy, Tom. Rather than prejudice the performance that you are about to see and hear, I will ask that Tom simply begin. Mary Bethune took a seat slotted between her husband and son.

Tom positioned his small hands over the ivory keys and began playing the piano so violently that the furniture rattled and the paintings on the wall trembled. Perry Oliver kept a mistrustful ear to a melody that ran along, then jerked at intervals.

While Tom played, the three daughters remained perfectly still, only the occasional movement of an eye, a twitching of a nose, or a trickle of sweat indicating that they were living and breathing creatures. Even as he played, two niggers dressed in white top hats, tails, and gloves went about serving the guests savories and dainty glasses of French wine from silver trays. (Hungry, Perry Oliver would have been satisfied with a main dish.)

Tom sounded the chord that closed his first song. His listeners gave him generous applause, a sound that sent him into long loud fits of laughter and handclapping. General Bethune and his wife looked at each other. They seemed equally delighted to see Tom receiving such a warm response. The wife was smiling openly, and her husband showed some easing up of his habitual reticence, only to quickly resume his old expression, perhaps thinking it an improper display of affection.

As the applause died down, Perry Oliver heard someone whisper behind him, Now that’s my kind of nigger. He’ll do what you tell him with his eyes closed.

Tom began his next song. In Perry Oliver’s hearing and perception, the music broke off now and again, and the great glass over the mantelpiece, faced by the other great console glass at the opposing wall, increased and multiplied the image of Tom at the piano, until you saw the piano fading away in endless perspectives. The music knew no denial. Perry Oliver felt like a hunter being lured into ambush by some unidentified prey just up ahead beyond his field of vision. Music set the trail. Somehow in all of this he managed to study the faces of those seated around him. Their eyes were mocking, tender, clear. And perhaps their eyes showed something else that he had no name for and that they themselves would fail to name even if they knew it existed. (Best they didn’t know, for awareness negated any possibility of acknowledgment and could only bring denial under the regulatory lens of social custom.)