Colson Whitehead - The Intuitionist

He has worked here for twenty years, driving the control lever into its seven slots, opening and closing the doors to the floors. Studied engineering at the colored college downstate, saw North: the big cities he knew were coming, the citadels pushed from the planet’s guts like volcanoes and mountains to take the sky. He knew the next step, had a beautiful woman and a child sleeping in that woman. In magazines he’d read about the new field of elevator inspection, and it seemed like a good opportunity for a man like him, an industrious fellow like himself. The secretary handed him a package when he walked in the door. He returned it to her thin white hands and informed her he was here for an interview. Wasn’t a messenger boy. When he stood before the man’s desk, the professor glanced up from his papers for only a moment, the time in which it takes to say, “We don’t accept colored gentlemen,” not meeting Marvin’s eyes and returning quickly to his paperwork.

Old man Huntley was hiring, or so the newspaper said. He needed some colored boys to run his elevators.

“Third Floor,” he says to the rabid pack behind him, “Boys’ Clothes, Sporting Goods and Boys’ Shoes,” and a flurry of multicolored hats gushes out to his left. It’s not a race. Sometimes he wonders what would happen if he shoved the lever as they ran out of his cab, but knows that Number Two will not move, neither up nor down, when the doors are open. They’re not built that way.

He wanted to be close to elevators so he took the position at Huntley’s. Saw North vanish until the only North was the top of the road as it dipped over the hill.

The man enters the car on the first floor and declares, “Department of Elevator Inspectors.” He flips open his badge, that gold nova, to the agitated wives, who suddenly see their afternoon assignation get complicated. “Everybody out.” He is authority. The white men in town have their own armor as they walk through the squares and up stone steps, totems of minute affectation their wives have picked out in this very store: silk cravats from France, hand-carved walking sticks from darkest Congo, the odd ascot and plum bowtie. But this man, Marvin sees, is not from here. Look at that gray fedora slashing across his brow, brim bent downward to hide his eyes, casting shadows just where shadows need to be, the sophisticated craftsmanship of his solemn pinstripe suit, cut in a Continental, the skin of his authority. Look at that. He is an elevator inspector down from the capitol to kick their hamlet into shape, taking charge, checking for rust.

Marvin stands with the visitor in the empty car. Beyond the shaft the people hustle on their angry ant errands, a legion of impulse and need. Marvin wears the same uniform he has worn for too many years now, a red double-breasted lackey’s getup that radiates threads here and there and strains against his burgeoning belly. Old stains that won’t come out. The defects are not visible in the poor light of the cab, so Huntley Jr. says they’re good enough for now. Marvin turns to the officer and says, “She’s a real beauty, this car. I’ve been working with this baby for over twenty years now and she’s never let me down. Sometimes she catches when we pass three — I think there’s something wrong with the selector. And I have to work to make her flush with the landings sometimes — I keep telling them to have the indicator adjusted, but they’re too stingy to get someone in here.”

“You too,” the inspector says.

“What?”

“Get off. The day I need some nigger to tell me how to do my job is the day I quit. Now get off.”

Marvin Watson vacates his elevator. The elevator inspector slams the door shut behind him, and Marvin hears him struggle with the inside gate. It sticks sometimes. You have to know how to jiggle it. The inspector curses and continues to wrestle with the capricious metal. Marvin considers shouting instructions through the door but thinks better of it. Bobby takes his break about this time. Bobby owes Marvin money and has been ducking him for a while now. Marvin departs for the back stairwell, whistling along to the piped-in music.

* * *

Bright day, sparks erupting off car chrome, the fins on the cars in front of her cutting through bright day. It has rained too long, the city slept in mercury light for too long. Umbrellas stand exhausted behind closed closet doors, their dripped rain puddles dry beneath disdained galoshes. The city air is sweet today.

She is in the city’s car. A few hours ago, before the weary dayshift trudged into work (weary this day especially, following last night’s excess and post-catastatic exhaustion), she intercepted Jimmy’s legs. His legs stuck out from beneath one of the Department sedans. She kicked him lightly and heard his head bang on the undercarriage of the car. He rolled out from beneath the vehicle, his customary Lila Mae smile withering as she told him she needed a car for a few days and that he would have to cover for her. Tough sell in the motor pool this morning. She had never flirted with him before so as not to encourage him and create a situation she had little experience in. But she flirted this morning, cupped his youthful cheek in her bold hand, did not flinch at his rickety teeth (Jimmy has never been to a dentist) or avoid prolonged eye contact. He gave her the key and assured her he would square it with the garage logs. She agreed to be careful with the car, lying to him as usual.

She is not on the clock. She is not working now and is driving aimlessly on the most famous street in the world and is quite pleased with herself. Lila Mae has never taken a day off in her three years with the Department and is discovering that the city is different on weekday afternoons. That there is a secret scofflaw city within the known city, afternoons without a thought in their heads. City workers with orange uniforms repair this street, tending to broken macadam. The potholes have a new meaning this day, do not injure this city car and summon forth reams of paperwork but share with the wheels a secret. A secret that is rough and more intimate for it. She drives and looks at the storefronts, the shopkeepers’ entreaties, but her eyes never stray above street level. Because that is not her job today. She need not concern herself with that different city today.

She stops at a phone booth identical to the dozens she has passed on her drive today. There is no reason she chose this one. She just felt like stopping. The booth is empty, save for a piece of paper lying on the metal sill beneath the phone. Lila Mae takes it into her hand and erases the creases. It is a drawing of a stick figure with a large round head that has no features except for a smile. She watches the people through the sooted panes. They walk slower than they do when she reports to work and when she leaves work, and differently still from weekend strolling. They are the tin men and rag dolls who wake after hours in the toy store. She counts to ten slowly and takes ten deep breaths. He answers. Today she finds that ridiculous quiver in his voice sweet. “It’s Lila Mae,” she says.

Chuck starts whispering and she can see him turning away from the Pit to hide the receiver. “Where have you been?” he whines. “Things are going crazy around here.”

“I’ve been around.”

“Everyone’s been asking where you are. Are you alright?”

“I’m fine, Chuck.”

“This place is a madhouse!” He remembers and lowers his voice again. “Last night at the Follies—”

“I know Chuck. I heard.”

“He’s in the hospital. His leg is broken.”

“He’ll live.” Through the window the sleepy citizens progress up the sidewalk in trances.

“That’s not the point. You don’t understand. The scuttlebutt says it was Lever who sabotaged the elevator, that they were paying Chancre back for Fanny Briggs. A crash for a crash. Wade even suggested that you might have done it.”