Golden Apples of the Sun. Ray Bradbury

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СКАЧАТЬ to watch them dance. They just naturally got …”

      “Rhythm,” said Mother.

      “That’s the word,” said the lady. “Rhythm. That’s what they got. Land, you should see the colored maids up at the hotel. They been buying satin yardage in at the big store in Madison for a month now. And every spare minute they sit sewing and laughing. And I seen some of the feathers they bought for their hats. Mustard and wine ones and blue ones and violet ones. Oh, it’ll be a sight!”

      “They been airing out their tuxedos,” I said. “I saw them hanging on lines behind the hotel all last week!”

      “Look at them prance,” said Mother. “You’d think they thought they were going to win the game from our men.”

      The colored men ran back and forth and yelled with their high, fluting voices and their low, lazy, interminable voices. Way out in center field you could see the flash of teeth, their upraised naked black arms swinging and beating their sides as they hopped up and down and ran like rabbits, exuberantly.

      Big Poe took a double fistful of bats, bundled them on his huge bull shoulder, and strutted along the first-base line, head back, mouth smiling wide open, his tongue moving, singing:

      

      “—gonna dance out both of my shoes,

      When they play those Jelly Roll Blues; Tomorrow night at the Dark Town Strutters’ Ball!”

      

      Up went his knees and down and out, swinging the bats like musical batons. A burst of applause and soft laughter came from the left-hand grandstands, where all the young, ripply colored girls with shiny brown eyes sat eager and easy. They made quick motions that were graceful and mellow because, maybe, of their rich coloring. Their laughter was like shy birds; they waved at Big Poe, and one of them with a high voice cried,, “Oh, Big Poe! Oh, Big Poe!”

      The white section joined politely in the applause as Big Poe finished his cakewalk. “Hey, Poe!” I yelled again.

      “Stop that, Douglas!” said Mother, straight at me.

      Now the white men came running between the trees with their uniforms on. There was a great thunder and shouting and rising up in our grandstand. The white men ran across the green diamond, flashing white.

      “Oh, there’s Uncle George!” said Mother. “My, doesn’t he look nice?” And there was my Uncle George toddling along in his outfit which didn’t quite fit because Uncle has a potbelly, and jowls that sit out over any collar he puts on. He was hurrying along, trying to breathe and smile at the same time, lifting up his pudgy little legs. “My, they look so nice,” enthused Mother.

      I sat there, watching their movements. Mother sat beside me, and I think she was comparing and thinking, too, and what she saw amazed and disconcerted her. How easily the dark people had come running first, like those slow-motion deer and buck antelopes in those African moving pictures, like things in dreams. They came like beautiful brown, shiny animals that didn’t know they were alive, but lived. And when they ran and put their easy, lazy, timeless legs out and followed them with their big, sprawling arms and loose fingers and smiled in the blowing wind, their expressions didn’t say, “Look at me run, look at me run!” No, not at all. Their faces dreamily said,, “Lord, but it’s sure nice to run. See the ground swell soft under me? Gosh, I feel good. My muscles are moving like oil on my bones and it’s the best pleasure in the world to run.” And they ran. There was no purpose to their running but exhilaration and living.

      The white men worked at their running as they worked at everything. You felt embarrassed for them because they were alive too much in the wrong way. Always looking from the corners of their eyes to see if you were watching. The Negroes didn’t care if you watched or not; they went on living, moving. They were so sure of playing that they didn’t have to think about it anymore.

      “My, but our men look so nice,” said my mother, repeating herself rather flatly. She had seen, compared the teams. Inside, she realized how laxly the colored men hung swaying in their uniforms, and how tensely, nervously, the white men were crammed, shoved, and belted into their outfits.

      I guess the tenseness began then.

      I guess everybody saw what was happening. They saw how the white men looked like senators in sun suits. And they admired the graceful unawareness of the colored men. And, as is always the case, that admiration turned to envy, to jealousy, to irritation. It turned to conversation like:

      “That’s my husband, Tom, on third base. Why doesn’t he pick up his feet? He just stands there.”

      “Never you mind, never you mind. He’ll pick ’em up when the time comes!”

      “That’s what I say! Now, take my Henry, for instance. Henry mightn’t be active all the time, but when there’s a crisis—just you watch him. Uh—I do wish he’d wave or something, though. Oh, there! Hello, Henry!”

      “Look at that Jimmie Cosner playing around out there!”

      I looked. A medium-sized white man with a freckled face and red hair was clowning on the diamond. He was balancing a bat on his forehead. There was laughter from the white grandstand. But it sounded like the kind of laughter you laugh when you’re embarrassed for someone.

      “Play ball!” said the umpire.

      A coin was flipped. The colored men batted first.

      “Darn it,” said my mother.

      The colored men ran in from the field happily.

      Big Poe was first to bat. I cheered. He picked up the bat in one hand like a toothpick and idled over to the plate and laid the bat on his thick shoulder, smiling along its polished surface toward the stands where the colored women sat with their fresh flowery cream dresses stirring over their legs, which hung down between the seat intervals like crisp new sticks of ginger; their hair was all fancily spun and hung over their ears. Big Poe looked in particular at the little, dainty-as-a-chicken-bone shape of his girl friend Katherine. She was the one who made the beds at the hotel and cottages every morning, who tapped on your door like a bird and politely asked if you was done dreaming, ‘cause if you was she’d clean away all them old nightmares and bring in a fresh batch—please use them one at a time, thank yoah. Big Poe shook his head, looking at her, as if he couldn’t believe she was there. Then he turned, one hand balancing the bat, his left hand dangling free at his side, to await the trial pitches. They hissed past, spatted into the open mouth of the catcher’s mitt, were hurled back. The umpire grunted. The next pitch was the starter.

      Big Poe let the first ball go by him.

      “Stee-rike!” announced the umpire. Big Poe winked good-naturedly at the white folks. Bang! “Stee-rike two!” cried the umpire.

      The ball came for the third time.

      Big Poe was suddenly a greased machine pivoting; the dangling hand swept up to the butt end of the bat, the bat swiveled, connected with the ball———Whack! The ball shot up into the sky, away down toward the wavering line of oak trees, down toward the lake, where a white sailboat slid silently by. The crowd yelled, me loudest! There went Uncle George, running on his stubby, wool-stockinged legs, getting smaller with distance.

      Big Poe stood for a moment watching the ball go. Then he began to run. He went around the bases, СКАЧАТЬ