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It was mean to pester Catherine like that but he hadn't wanted to do anything for her anyway. And why did she have to holler like that and bring Aunt Ha
The others really did pay him some attention, though. Anybody here ought to know, it's him. His daddy got killed. Yeah you tell it. Come on and tell us. Just a chance in a million. A million trillion. Never even knowed, knew, what hit him. Shut yer Goddamn mouth. Ain't you got no sense at all?
Instantly killed.
Concussion, that was it. Concussion of the brain.
Knocked him crazy as a loon, bibblibblebble.
Shut yer Goddam mouth.
But there was something that made him feel wrong.
Ole Tin Lizzie.
What you get for driving a auto when you're drunk, that's what my dad says.
Good ole whiskey.
Something he did.
Ole Tin Lizzie just rolled back down on top of him whomp.
Didn't either.
He didn't say it didn't. Not clear enough.
Heck, how can that kill anybody?
Did, though. Just a chance in a million. Million trillion.
Instantly killed.
Worse than that, he did.
What.
How would your daddy like it?
He would like me to be with them without them teasing; looking up to me.
How would your daddy like it?
Like what?
Going out in the street like that when he is dead.
Out in the street like what?
Showing off to people because he is dead.
He wants me to get along with them.
So I tell them he is dead and they look up to me, they don't tease me.
Showing off because he's dead, that's all you can show off about. Any other thing they'd tease me and I wouldn't fight back.
How would your daddy like it?
But he likes me to get along with them. That's why I-went out-showed off.
He felt so uneasy, deep inside his stomach, that he could not think about it any more. He wished he hadn't done it. He wished he could go back and not do anything of the kind. He wished his father could know about it and tell him that yes he was bad but it was all right he didn't mean to be bad. He was glad his father didn't know because if his father knew he would think even worse of him than ever. But if his father's soul was around, always, watching over them, then he knew. And that was worst of anything because there was no way to hide from a soul, and no way to talk to it, either. He just knows, and it couldn't say anything to him, and he couldn't say anything to it. It couldn't whip him either, but it could sit and look at him and be ashamed of him.
"I didn't mean it," he said aloud. "I didn't mean to do bad."
I wanted to show you my cap, he added, silently.
He looked at his father's morsechair.
Not a mark on his body.
He still looked at the chair. With a sense of deep stealth and secrecy he finally went over and stood beside it. After a few moments, and after listening most intently, to be sure that nobody was near, he smelled of the chair, its deeply hollowed seat, the arms, the back. There was only a cold smell of tobacco and, high along the back, a faint smell of hair. He thought of the ash tray on its weighted strap on the arm; it was empty. He ran his finger inside it; there was only a dim smudge of ash. There was nothing like enough to keep in his pocket or wrap up in a paper. He looked at his finger for a moment and licked it; his tongue tasted of darkness.
Chapter 17
They were told they could eat, that morning, in their nightgowns and wrappers. Their mother still wasn't there, and Aunt Ha
First thing after breakfast Aunt Ha
They heard her let out a long, tired, angry breath and they could hear her joints snapping as she sprinted up the stairs. They were sitting exactly where she had left them. Rufus thought, Maybe she will say we were good children, but without a word she finished with Catherine's stockings. She gave Rufus a new white shirt from which he slowly and with fascination drew the pins, ru
Then she cleaned their nails and combed and brushed their hair, and put a clean handkerchief in Rufus' breast pocket and blacked their shoes. "Now wait a moment," she said, leaving the room. They heard her rap softly on their mother's door.
"Mary?" she said.
"Yes," they heard dimly.
"The children are ready. Shall I bring them in?"
"Yes do, Ha
"Come in now and see your mother," she told them from the door.
They followed her in.
"Oh, they look very nice;" she exclaimed, in a voice so odd that it seemed to the children that she must be sorry that they did. Yet by her face they could see that she was not sorry. "Ha
But Ha
They stood and looked at her with curiosity. Her eyes seemed larger and brighter than usual; her hair was done up as carefully as if she were going to a party. She wore her wrapper and where it opened in front they could see that she had on something dull and black underneath. Her face was like folded gray cloths.