John Nobel
[On down to New Orleans1925]

Niggers singing and dancing on the wooded raft, must had drifted down the Ohio to the Mississippi, must be at least twenty of them, said John to himself, out loud. There were also some Negro babies he observed, women, and a few half breads, on the raft.

It was 1925; John Nobel was on a boat going down the Mississippi when he caught sight of the raft: going to New Orleans, he murmured, just like him; except he had left St. Paul, not like them, up river a long, long ways. He was standing on deck, holding a book, Windy McPhersons Son, by Sherwood Andersonon page thirteen, as the boat got closer to the shorescloser to the point, one could see the moss growing along the banks, stacks of sugarcane and cotton and more Negros doing the labor.

John got thinking of all the books he wanted to read, and had heard: such as, Andersons new book coming out: Black Laughter, and the new writers such as Faulkners, Soldiers Pay, and Hemingways Torrents of Spring, along with Fitzgeralds, The Great Gatsby. He was short of time, no time to read them, yes, even at 47-years old; he needed more time, maybe fifteen more years would do, but what would he do with those many years: read, read and read more books? It was a rhetorical question. He was the lone stone, in the valley no one ever hears when it falls and breaks off from a higher peak: cracks and rolls down the hill to the bottom, there it rests; people walk by and pay no attention to it, as if it, indeed as if it, was there a million years. Yes, he was looking into an endless gulf of water, as far as you could see, or not see, the day now had turned into night as the Mississippi Queen chugged along, going down this endless riverempty except for water, his inner voice telling him what he knew, Time was short, very short.

Un-tearful, un-self-pitying: he thought about his wife, it was night, of the next dayhis wife, no children, Rose, she died from childbirth, as did the child, years, and years agohow many years past, he had forgot (he yawned, but he didnt move, just stared into the black river). Rose was her name, he told himself, several times, Rose, Rose! looking at the moon now a ting slanted, or so it seemed to him, as it faded in and out of drifting cloudsmystic shadows, it was full dusk. The Riverboat went down the river string-straight: slowly, slowly the riverboat tugged along, frogs, fireflies, crickets: he could hear them all, yawning for a nights sleep, like him.

Ever since he was a kid he had a notion to travel down the Mississippi like Mark Twain, right on down to New Orleans, only now he was dying, and when he thought of it he was quite young. Rose was quite young also; Rose was the sister to Ella (Mrs. Ella Sillvc: something similar to that, he couldnt remember the name clear, or pronounce itRussian, everyone pronounced it and wrote it differently).

He had noticed one of the Mac Camp boys were on the boat going to the same location he was: perhaps he was nineteen-years old he told himself, perhaps twenty, no older. His family came up from the South, or was it, a few of them went to the south, and the rest stayed here in the Middle-West, or as they were starting to call it, the Midwest. They saw one another a few times, both acknowledging the other on the boat, both going about their day-dreaming. Heabout writing the Great American Novel; and Nobel, about other things, and possibly reading that novel Mac Camp was wishing to write.

It was a darkish-blue black night, and the pilot was a bit nervous he had noticed, observing him in the pilots cabin above him. He knew that the Captain knew the Mississippi like the back of his hand, but this river could change from one steam boat trip to the next, and there the old coot was, pacing the square cabin as if he was talking to a ghost.

Out of the dark, came voices, Negro voices, whispered Nobel: thinking it was that raft of blacks he saw before, singing away, laughing as if not to have a damn care in the world: almost jealous the way they lived, free as a bee it seemed. Old man Gnter had given him a loan; it was nice him he thought, it would come in handy. He kept the $500 hidden for this very thing, this trip. Not in the damn bank, but in his sock, underneath the wooden steps that went down into the basement of his rooming house. No one knew it. He sold him his shack of a house on the levee, a shanty, it wasnt much, but the old man said hed use it for someone he was thinking about, who might need it. He knew John had only a limited time to live; cancer was eating him up slowly, like a garbage worm, a maggot. He could have taken the railroad down along the river, faster, but this was more scenic he thought, more mystic, silent. Down to St. Louis, now down to New Orleans.

New Orleans

When John arrived at the Port of New Orleans, the place of his boyhood dreams, the place where he never thought hed get to, go to, he got off the boat slowly, and onto land, and walked, walked right over to Jackson Park: he still had over $400 on him. He had hidden it in his socks; in his pocket, big pockets where he also kept four bottles of homemade brewed, strong whiskey. With his book in his hands and with the wind blowing through his hair he found a place to sit in the sun. It was 11:00 AM. He had purchased a few sandwiches before he got off the boat, to eat for lunch, and so he sat in the park, looking back at the boat, the and the Mississippi River, taking a drink of his whiskey, eating his ham and cheese sandwich, and putting down another shot of whisky after each bite; looking at his book and the people in the park.

Jack London, he said out loud, I would like to read more of his stuff, he liked especially the book, Before Adam, it was his favorite of Londons.

He had fallen to sleep now, for a spell, than woke up again, too a few more shots of whiskey, it went down with a push, a hard, very hard push, one that didnt want to go downit squeezed his heart, pained him to push it down farther, he looked at his book, opened it, it was on page #13, his face tired, and sleepy, almost drooping like a dogs, tired-droopy, he took another shot, rested his book on his lap, laid his head back caught some of that fine bright sun seeping through the leafier part of the trees, and never woke up again.

The Mac Camp Boy
[1925New Orleans]

The young lad had gotten off the boat just like Mr. Nobel, but he went his own way, slim, milky-white skin from those long winters in Minnesota, blond hair, not tall, nor short, deep blue eyes. He hung around Bourbon Street drinking and doing what pleased him; going into the bars and listening to the Jazz Age come alive, the Fitzgerald age some called it; walking drunk down side streets giving tips to the street players that rested against the walls of the buildings playing their saxophones and trumpets, trombones, and drums; sleeping here and there, at housesnew friends hed meet in the bars; a few women taking him in, taking their share of his money. It seemed after three weeks of this dauntless city life: in the City of Night, He wore his welcome out, as often we do when we have no more to offer the recipient, or friend; and thus, the doors were being closed to him, one right after the other. He got a few drinks though, but only a few.

Consequently, he was becoming a burden to his friends; friends he knew for only a few weeks; friends that had already been settled. He looked for Mr. Nobel, but could not find him; nor was he told by anyone of his death. In consequence he had no place to go, nor knew anyone to help himyet he found a few dimes and nickels to buy a pint of whiskey, begging here and there.

He walked stiffly past the outskirts of the City, rigid faced with pride, unbecoming. He had been looking for an abandon house, or its equivalent: possibly an open door to an outside basement, potato cellar. His posture and face was in despair, pale and thin, he seemed to have aged over night; it was vanity and stupidity that got him into this mess; yet he kept a jonquil-colored voice to the situation.

And like Mr. Nobel, he had close to four hundred dollars: I say had. A sum not to laugh at, yet he had nothing left to provide for his survival until he found work, and an apartment. He wanted to be a writer, and so, carried a pencil and pad of paper always writing poetry or something. It had seemed to him, after a while he forgot the days, the names of the days to the week he was living in a stupor [a trance]; He even forgot the names of food, but not for the taste, for he had to eat, did he not.

It was close to 2:00 AM, and he had just found a barn door opened, a little ways outside the cityhe had walked long and steady, past an old cemetery that had old seashells for tombs, molded into its marble like substance, crushed into its masonry

the wind must had opened the door, he thought. He could hear horses in there (he breathed deep and slow, feeling with each breath hisself diffused, becoming one with the hay and loft, and horses, he was so very tired). The sky was building up a storm behind him, outside, and the countryside was dark as a black birds wings, with no lighting except for the moon, and the house, a house that, that was about three-hundred feet from the barn, perhaps morehad no light in it either. But you knew someone lived there, it look so. It had curtains in the window; he could see that from the refractor of light of the moon beaming on them. Then suddenly it started to rain (as expected), not pour, just a medium-heavy rain, a few sparks of lightening, and a roar now and then that accompanies such lightening.

(He looked about as with a tremendous effort, as with a tremendous effort to find a place to rest, sleep, Yes, O yes, he said, in a whisper, with his suffocating voice, looking up to where the loft was.)

He climbed up the ladder onto and into the loft, it was filled with hay, and laid back, listened to the horses, two of them, letting them know he was there, they moved a bit to see who had entered, the wind woke them, disturbed them more than he did, as did the crackling of the door with their old hinges. Then he laid back and fell deep into the hay, covered a portion of his body with it, his mind had lost orderliness, space and time was oblivious to him: except he knew it was raining, for he could hear itit was a blur, but he knew it, and it was dark, very, very dark, so it had to be night.

It must not had been but thirty-minutes, and the lad was woken up to the singing, the singing voices of Niggers, so was his notion, thats what it sounded like, and so he laid back down again to sleepagain after pushing his body up a bit, like a turtle coming out of a shell, most of the hay falling off his legs, his bare shoulders and unbuttoned pants, his shoes off, and his long neck showing. But no sooner had he rested his head back on the hay, no sooner than five-minutes or so, the voices of the Negros had entered the barn, and now the horses got a little more aroused, unsettled you might say, not all that much, to wake the people in the house up, but then the storm covered that noise up pretty good, so everything remained stone silent under the sounds of the storm.

All three of these huge black-bucks stumbling about, drunker than a mule on local-weed; then one saw something move in the loft. Said the taller of the three black man,

I hers a noise up in dhe loft, Lucas? Wuhs you think its is, da rat? said Silas.

They all started laughing, his voice was deliverable: for young Lee Dennis Mac Camp heard it loud and clear, matter-of-fact, he pushed himself back a bit to get out of their focus, but he looked even more like a female to the stumbling drunk Negros as did, his hands now trembling as six-eyes stared up into the loft. He told hisself, be quiet, but out of fear and terror of being raped or death, he couldnt help himself. Lucas caught a glimpse of his milky white skin, and didnt think of how the white folks would treat him should they find out what he was thinking: hang him for raping a white women, he just started climbing up the ladder like a bulldog after a cat, like a cat after a birddrunk as can be: in the heat, and saturated with alcohol, lust seeped out of his pours, like sweat on the back of a horse, what man can be talked to or reasoned withwhen intoxicated with both alcohol and lust, indomitable, he continued up the ladder with his two huge buck friends behind him.

Silas: I ain never mess up round white folk kaze da hang ya ef dey catch yaw uh her wit a white womanI guh see thing I ain wan seeshe sho look white.

Tad: Some niggers is mighty fool, dey is, but dey an dat fool, wes best get on out of her!

Lucas: Some women sho has a heap er hope, some on em needs itI hears her breathencryin.

Silas: Dont you forget me! Oh, Lawd, have mercy on my soul

Tad: Yous bunch of helpless niggers, cus you got a mind for murderI knows it.

Lucas: White folks got my body; efs da finds me now, da lynch me anywa.

The horses were now standingcurious as to what the commotion was all about. All of a sudden, Locus had the young figure, framed within his vision. Long blond hair, covering his ears, and he must had shaved, or couldnt shave yet, for his face was smooth, no one could tell, for his skin looked as a womans.

(He had for gotten for a moment on how to reason, he was thinking on how to reason his way out, but his head wouldnt work, it was blank, as if he fell down some stairs, knocked himself out, he was in a daze looking into big black faces, big eyeballswhite and red, then he suddenly woke up a ting more, more and more: something grabbed him

Im not a female, shouted the boy, Stop, stop, but the big Negros just jumped on him, as he was already laying somewhat backwards trying to pull his pants completely off him, and the other two, holding his hands, his legssuccessfully, pulled his pants below his kneeshe know noticedafter he pulled his cloths offLucas, and the other two men, also it was a boy, just a pretty white boy living like a nigger in a loft, he grabbed him; which infuriated the boy, but could no little about it

Fooled by a ignant white, wid de cunning of da fox

you is a pretty boylike da of a bird in de dark, and I jes a fool nigger said Lucas with a sacrilege tone to his voice, turning the boy around on his stomach: all peering over this young lad

[And the sexual taboo was thenceforth broken, his boyishness was all but gone, completely gone, feminized with fear, brooded fear]

(he stared into the water for a moment) for the second time, he shifted and re-connected his feet into the holes of the roof, the holes his feet had sunken down into, bottomless morass nowto secure his balance on the roof tops edge. The hut, or shanty, his daughter hime, was living in (the one Nobel sold him years ago) and that she was standing in now (wet, crying, somewhat crying, trying to hold her face steady, as not to show her father her panic) was not much more than a matchstick for a house he thought, it would never last much longer, he was surprised it held in place against the pushing waters and drenching rains, the down pouring of the storm and its torrential windsthe torrents of rain was no match for such a structure much longer: the dying spring was melting away, and summer was to be, but what a horrid way to move into its existence thought the man.

The only and I mean only in the sense of a single solitary reason it didnt go under [the house] was because it was built on 4x4s that were built on a dock type area. And so the river had to rise over twenty-feet [from the edge of the river that is] to be underneath its floor, and it was there now, right next to it, just starting to seep through the woodsoftening the wood, making it soggy to the point it would at any given moment, any given moment for sure, should a shake of the earth come about, or a blast of thunder roar loud enough to destabilize the shifting of the waves to a harder push, the house would for sure, without a doubt meet its maker. He had expected by the time the storm was over, it could rise another ten plus feet.

As he took his eyes off his daughter for a moment, just a moment, he saw: rats and rabbits, dogs, cats, squirrels and another horse in the water, all swimming, trying to survive amongst, rotting and worm riddled food floating by them, on them, dragging behind them, trying to find a haven, a dry and safe area, as must have been the likes of the Great Floods, when all of mankind looked for something to hang on to, or climb up upon, such as the highest mountains, anything for safety; then he saw a muskrat, floatingbloated and dead. As he continued to look, observer closer his eyes now filled with the rats, rats, water rats, grouping up, scampered up and down, and around; floating on wooden planks, and every other kind of debrissqueaking, scratching and gnawing, at the death threat that faced them. Their eyes lit up, yellow-orange like, like little lit lamps, as the light of the moon danced through them. But Gnter, somewhat accustomed to them from his basement apartments, dismissed this as playfulness, compared to his dilemma facing him at the moment, with his daughter.

Hush, said he, concentrating on his daughter; the larger rat, the one that seemed to catch his eyes, simply looked at him and fled. He said [complacently, to hisself]: There nowmy daughter, keep going north, north, north! as if he was practicing for a later moment.

(We all live in a long parade of days, stretched out into years, like a fence, a road, and like it or not there is an end to it, the fenceand one day you wake up tono more time, and there you are, its all over: youre at the end of the fenceso old man Gnter was feeling at this very moment, so it is, there is a time for everything under the sun: so it has been written.)

The swirling of the water, and the winds were sweeping everything out into the middle of the Mississippi, as the mud sunk the foundations of houses [within the vicinity] to their floor boards; --and many of the walls started caving in; roofs looking like barrages were floating out into the Mississippi, or getting stuck by a tree on their way out, or buried deeper into the mud so they couldnt float out, so they couldnt float out and get caught on something else; everything bumping into everything else, or into everyone else. Even a few cars were floating about, sinking slowly, and its owners hanging on to the roofs, going down with their merchandise: foolshe called them, all fools