Read Online Native Son by Richard Wright - Free Book Online Page A

Street.
    “We better get our guns,” Bigger said.
    “Yeah.”
    “We got about fifteen minutes.”
    “O.K.”
    “So long.”
    He walked home with a mounting feeling of fear. When he reached his doorway, he hesitated about going up. He didn’t want to rob Blum’s; he was scared. But he had to go through with it now. Noiselessly, he went up the steps and inserted his key in the lock; the door swung in silently and he heard his mother singing behind the curtain.
    Lord, I want to be a Christian ,
    In my heart, in my heart ,
    Lord, I want to be a Christian ,
    In my heart, in my heart… .
    He tiptoed into the room and lifted the top mattress of his bed and pulled forth the gun and slipped it inside of his shirt. Just as he was about to open the door his mother paused in her singing.
    “That you, Bigger?”
    He stepped quickly into the outer hallway and slammed the door and bounded headlong down the stairs. He went to the vestibule and swung through the door into the street, feeling that ball of hot tightness growing larger and heavier in his stomach and chest. He opened his mouth to breathe. He headed for Doc’s and came to the door and looked inside. Jack and G.H. were shooting pool at a rear table. Gus was not there. He felt a slight lessening of nervous tension and swallowed. He looked up and down the street; very few people were out and the cop was not in sight. A clock in a window across the street told him that it was twelve minutes to three. Well, this was it; he had to go in. He lifted his left hand and wiped sweat from his forehead in a long slow gesture. He hesitated a moment longer at the door, then went in, walking with firm steps to the rear table. He did not speak to Jack or G.H., nor they to him. He lit a cigarette with shaking fingers and watched the spinning billiard balls roll and gleam and clack over the green stretch ofcloth, dropping into holes after bounding to and fro from the rubber cushions. He felt impelled to say something to ease the swelling in his chest. Hurriedly, he flicked his cigarette into a spittoon and, with twin eddies of blue smoke jutting from his black nostrils, shouted hoarsely,
    “Jack, I betcha two bits you can’t make it!”
    Jack did not answer; the ball shot straight across the table and vanished into a side pocket.
    “You would’ve lost,” Jack said.
    “Too late now,” Bigger said. “You wouldn’t bet, so you lost.”
    He spoke without looking. His entire body hungered for keen sensation, something exciting and violent to relieve the tautness. It was now ten minutes to three and Gus had not come. If Gus stayed away much longer, it would be too late. And Gus knew that. If they were going to do anything, it certainly ought to be done before folks started coming into the streets to buy their food for supper, and while the cop was down at the other end of the block.
    “That bastard!” Bigger said. “I knew it!”
    “Oh, he’ll be along,” Jack said.
    “Sometimes I’d like to cut his yellow heart out,” Bigger said, fingering the knife in his pocket.
    “Maybe he’s hanging around some meat,” G.H. said.
    “He’s just scared,” Bigger said. “Scared to rob a white man.”
    The billiard balls clacked. Jack chalked his cue stick and the metallic noise made Bigger grit his teeth until they ached. He didn’t like that noise; it made him feel like cutting something with his knife.
    “If he makes us miss this job, I’ll fix ’im, so help me,” Bigger said. “He oughtn’t be late. Every time somebody’s late, things go wrong. Look at the big guys. You don’t ever hear of them being; late, do you? Naw! They work like clocks!”
    “Ain’t none of us got more guts’n Gus,” G.H. said. “He’s been with us every time.”
    “Aw, shut your trap,” Bigger said.
    “There you go again, Bigger,” G.H. said. “Gus was just talkingabout how you act this morning. You get too nervous when something’s coming off….”
    “Don’t tell me I’m nervous,”