roadhouses, motor inns, and billboards: Highbridge’s outskirts. (Gas rationing had killed most of the inns and roadhouses.) Camp Penticuff lay six or seven miles southeast of town. The Panhandle-Seminole Railway line we’d come in on cut a slant through the post. Civilians got off in town, soldiers kept riding.
Climbing down from the train, I finally saw some of the other nonmilitary types who’d been aboard. They stood in knots on the platform fanning themselves and greeting friends. Don’t ask me where they’d hid themselves. I’d seen mostly uniforms aboard—one damned uniform too many. With all the signs around asking you to limit your time in the dining car and to forgive any travel delays, you realized the railroad preferred military cargo to nonessential civs like me.
At Highbridge station, I began to get scared. I’d figured Mister JayMac would meet me, but Mister JayMac was nowhere to be found. Now what? If somebody could’ve proved to me that Pumphrey had got off in Alabama, I would have ridden on into camp with the dogfaces.
Instead, I wandered into the depot. My duffel saved me. It had a bat—a red bat—poking up through it.
“ Yoobo? ” said a high-pitched voice in the gloom. I looked around, bumpkinlike. Louder, the voice said, “ Yoobo? ” I turned and looked down. There, staring up at me blank-faced out of chocolately eyes, slouched a twelve- or thirteen-year-old urchin, barefoot. He wore a too-big man’s shirt and shiny cotton trousers. Little Black Sambo. On top of my manners, I might’ve called him a colored, or a pickaninny. I only had a few years on him, but at our ages that was a generation. What did he want? A handout? “ You Danny Bo? ” he shouted, like I was deaf as a jackhammer jockey.
Holy cow. Someone in Highbridge—a barefoot nigger kid out of Uncle Tom’s Cabin —knew my name. Sort of.
“ Yookla .” He stuck out his hand—to shake, I figured. So I reached to give his hand a pump. His look curled from blankness to suspicion. He didn’t pump back. His hand dropped like a slab of raw liver, detouring to my duffel bag, his aim all along. He was my reception committee, sent out by Mister JayMac to fetch me to him. Should I feel honored or snubbed?
“ Cmn ,” he mumbled, then dragged my duffel through the waiting room to the street. Out front, at the curb, hulked a rusty brown-and-white bus, a wingless Flying Fortress. The kid jumped up its steps and disappeared inside.
The bus had some fancy curlicue writing on its side: HIGHBRIDGE HELLBENDERS. Under that, in smaller letters, terrors of the cvl. On the fender above the front wheel ran a line of script giving the bus’s nickname: The Brown Bomber .
“Well, Mr. Boles, you riding or admirin?” said a deep voice from the driver’s seat. It belonged to a well-built colored in his mid to late twenties. He had one big hand on the steering wheel and one on the door lever. To show him I couldn’t talk, I touched my throat and shook my head. I didn’t want him, nigger or no, thinking I was stuck up.
“So thoat?” he said. “Damn. A so thoat in summer’s bout the wusst.”
Uh-uh. I waved off his guess, tapping the end of my tongue with my finger. Passersby gave me looks.
“Git on up here,” the driver said. “Keep that up, somebody haw you off to the rubber room.”
I climbed aboard. The kid with my duffel had gone all the way to the back. Above a far seat, the top of his head poked up like a nappy black cactus.
“Cain’t talk, eh?” the driver said. When I shook my head, he stipulated, “Sit down and lissen, then.”
I slid into a seat catawampus to the driver’s, sweating so bad I put a Rorschach blot on it. Except for him and my half-pint porter, I had The Brown Bomber to myself.
“At boy back there’s Euclid,” the driver said. “Euclid. Like the Greek geometry man.”
Yookla , I thought. Yookla equaled Euclid.
“I’m Darius Satterfield.” He drew out the long i in the middle of Darius.
Climbing down from the train, I finally saw some of the other nonmilitary types who’d been aboard. They stood in knots on the platform fanning themselves and greeting friends. Don’t ask me where they’d hid themselves. I’d seen mostly uniforms aboard—one damned uniform too many. With all the signs around asking you to limit your time in the dining car and to forgive any travel delays, you realized the railroad preferred military cargo to nonessential civs like me.
At Highbridge station, I began to get scared. I’d figured Mister JayMac would meet me, but Mister JayMac was nowhere to be found. Now what? If somebody could’ve proved to me that Pumphrey had got off in Alabama, I would have ridden on into camp with the dogfaces.
Instead, I wandered into the depot. My duffel saved me. It had a bat—a red bat—poking up through it.
“ Yoobo? ” said a high-pitched voice in the gloom. I looked around, bumpkinlike. Louder, the voice said, “ Yoobo? ” I turned and looked down. There, staring up at me blank-faced out of chocolately eyes, slouched a twelve- or thirteen-year-old urchin, barefoot. He wore a too-big man’s shirt and shiny cotton trousers. Little Black Sambo. On top of my manners, I might’ve called him a colored, or a pickaninny. I only had a few years on him, but at our ages that was a generation. What did he want? A handout? “ You Danny Bo? ” he shouted, like I was deaf as a jackhammer jockey.
Holy cow. Someone in Highbridge—a barefoot nigger kid out of Uncle Tom’s Cabin —knew my name. Sort of.
“ Yookla .” He stuck out his hand—to shake, I figured. So I reached to give his hand a pump. His look curled from blankness to suspicion. He didn’t pump back. His hand dropped like a slab of raw liver, detouring to my duffel bag, his aim all along. He was my reception committee, sent out by Mister JayMac to fetch me to him. Should I feel honored or snubbed?
“ Cmn ,” he mumbled, then dragged my duffel through the waiting room to the street. Out front, at the curb, hulked a rusty brown-and-white bus, a wingless Flying Fortress. The kid jumped up its steps and disappeared inside.
The bus had some fancy curlicue writing on its side: HIGHBRIDGE HELLBENDERS. Under that, in smaller letters, terrors of the cvl. On the fender above the front wheel ran a line of script giving the bus’s nickname: The Brown Bomber .
“Well, Mr. Boles, you riding or admirin?” said a deep voice from the driver’s seat. It belonged to a well-built colored in his mid to late twenties. He had one big hand on the steering wheel and one on the door lever. To show him I couldn’t talk, I touched my throat and shook my head. I didn’t want him, nigger or no, thinking I was stuck up.
“So thoat?” he said. “Damn. A so thoat in summer’s bout the wusst.”
Uh-uh. I waved off his guess, tapping the end of my tongue with my finger. Passersby gave me looks.
“Git on up here,” the driver said. “Keep that up, somebody haw you off to the rubber room.”
I climbed aboard. The kid with my duffel had gone all the way to the back. Above a far seat, the top of his head poked up like a nappy black cactus.
“Cain’t talk, eh?” the driver said. When I shook my head, he stipulated, “Sit down and lissen, then.”
I slid into a seat catawampus to the driver’s, sweating so bad I put a Rorschach blot on it. Except for him and my half-pint porter, I had The Brown Bomber to myself.
“At boy back there’s Euclid,” the driver said. “Euclid. Like the Greek geometry man.”
Yookla , I thought. Yookla equaled Euclid.
“I’m Darius Satterfield.” He drew out the long i in the middle of Darius.
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