The first agreement between the two sides was that the twenty-four-hour deadline be extended. The second agreement was that wooden planks should be laid over the hole in the street. Father went back and forth doing his job capably but in a state of peculiar numbness, like a sleepwalker. He did not look at his relative. He could feel queer pulses of bitter glee breaking over his back.
While these points were being settled Whitman was on the telephone using all the means at his disposal to find Willie Conklin. He had the police looking for him in every borough. Then he thought of calling Big Tim Sullivan, Fourth Ward leader and the grand old man of the Tammany machine. He roused him out of his sleep. Tim, he said, there’s a visitor in town, a Willie Conklin from up in Westchester County. I don’t know the feller, Big Tim said, but I’ll see what I can do. I’m sure you will, Whitman said. In less than an hour Conklin was brought up the stairs of the brownstone by the scruff of the neck. He was wet and disheveled and frightened. He had lost the lower buttons of his work shirt and his belly protruded over his belt. He was shoved in a chair in the hallway and told to shut up. A policeman stood guard over him. His teeth were chattering and his hands shook. He reached in his back pocket where he carried his pint in a paper bag. The cop grabbed his arm before he could withdraw it and swung a pair of handcuffs like a whip against his head.
By dawn the crowds, somewhat diminished during the night, filled up again four and five deep behind the barricades. The rusted-out Model T stood on 36th Street along the curb in front of the Library. At a designated moment, the door of the brownstone opened and out on the stoop came two policemen holding between them the forlorn figure of Willie Conklin. He was held there on exhibit. Then he was taken back in, and Whitman, having in good faith brought forth the two items of debate, the car and the Fire Chief, now gave his terms. He would urge his counterpart in Westchester to bring charges against Willie Conklin for malicious mischief, vandalism and illegal detainment of a citizen. In addition the Fire Chief would right there in the street in full sight of everyone help to restore the Model T. It would be a humiliation that he would live with for the rest of his life. And the car of course would be made over new. Whitman wanted in return the surrender of Coalhouse and his men. And then I guarantee that you will have your full privileges and rights under the law, he said.
When Father brought these terms to the Library the young men laughed and hooted. We got him, they called to each other. He givin in. We gonna get the whole pie. They had been buoyed by the sight of the car and the exhibit of Conklin. But Coalhouse himself was silent. He sat alone in the West Room. Father waited on him. Gradually Coalhouse’s somber reflection overcame the spirits of the young men. They became apprehensive. Finally Coalhouse said to Father I will surrender myself but not my boys. For them I want safe passage away from here and full and total amnesty. But stay here, please, until I have a chance to tell them.
Coalhouse rose from his chair and went out to talk to the young men in the hall. They gathered around the detonation box. They were stunned. You don’t have to give him nothing, they said. We got Morgan’s balls! You don’t have to negotiate nothing. Give us Conklin and that car and let us out of here and you get the Library back! That’s the negotiation, man, that’s the kind of negotiation!
Coalhouse was calm. He spoke softly. None of you is known to the authorities by name, he said. You can disappear into the city and reclaim your life. So can you, came the answer. No, Coalhouse said. They would never let me out of here, you know that. And if they did they would spare no effort to hunt me down. And everyone with me would be hunted down. And you would all die. To what purpose? For what end?
We always talked before, one of them said. Now you doing this. You can’t, man! We all Coalhouse! We can’t get out we’ll blow it up, another said. Younger Brother said What you are doing is betraying us. Either we all ought to go free or we all ought to die. You signed your letter President of the Provisional American Government. Coalhouse nodded. It seemed to be the rhetoric we needed for our morale, he said. But we meant it! Younger Brother cried. We meant it! There are enough people in the streets to found an army!
Certainly no theorist of revolution could have denied the truth that with an enemy as vast as an entire nation of the white race, the restoration of a Model T automobile was as good a place to start as any. Younger Brother was shouting now. You can’t change your demands! You can’t reduce the meaning of your demands! You can’t betray us for a car! I have not changed my demands, Coalhouse said. Is the goddamn Ford your justice? said Younger Brother. Is your execution your justice? Coalhouse looked at him. As for my execution, he said, my death was determined the moment Sarah died. As for my Godforsaken Ford it is to be made over as it was the day I drove past the firehouse. It is not I who reduce my demands but they who magnified them as long as they resisted them. I will trade your precious lives for Willie Conklin’s and thank God for him.
A few minutes later Father walked back across the street. To get justice Coalhouse Walker was ready to have it done to him. But the people following him were not. They were another generation. They were not human. Father shuddered. They were monstrous! Their cause had recomposed their minds. They would kick at the world’s supports. Start an army! They were nothing more than filthy revolutionaries.
Coalhouse’s famous stubbornness had now become a fortress against the arguments of his men. It was he who stood between Mr. Morgan and disaster. Father confided none of this to the District Attorney. He felt Whitman would have trouble enough with the official terms. This turned out to be the case. Whitman threw back several shots of whiskey. Stubble covered his face. His protuberant eyes were red and his collar was wilted. He paced. He stood at the window. He made a fist of his right hand and several times smacked the palm of his left. He looked again at the wire from Morgan. Father cleared his throat. It does not say you have to hang the confederates, Father said. What? said Whitman. What? All right, all right. He looked for a chair to sit down in. How many of them are there, did you say? Five, Father said, unconsciously excluding Younger Brother. Whitman sighed. Father said I think this is the best you can do. Sure, said the District Attorney. And what do I tell the newspapers. Why, Father said, you can tell them, one, Coalhouse Walker is captured, and two, Mr. Morgan’s treasures are saved, and three, the city is safe, and four, the entire facilities of your office and the police will be used to track down the underlings until every last one of them is behind bars where he belongs. Whitman thought about that. We’ll tail them, he muttered. Right back to the woodpile. Well, Father said, that may not be possible. They’re taking a hostage and they won’t let him go until they know they’re safe. Who is the hostage, Whitman said. I am, Father said. I see, Whitman said. And what makes the coon think he can hold the building alone? Well, Father said, he will be out of the sightlines of skylight or windows with his hands on the dynamite box. That would do it, I should think.
Perhaps Father at this moment nourished the hope that after his release he could lead the authorities back to the criminals’ lair. He thought without Coalhouse they would lack the spirit and intelligence to continue successfully to defy the law. They were anarchist murderers and arsonists but he was not personally afraid. He knew their stamp and was a better man than any of them. From Younger Brother he was so totally alienated that he felt at this moment only joy in the thought of being responsible for his capture.
Whitman was staring into space. All right, he said. All right. Maybe if we wait till dark nobody will see what we’re doing. For Mr. Morgan’s sake, and his goddamn Gutenberg Bible and his five-page goddamn letter from George Washington.
And so the negotiations were completed.
39
Several calls to the Ford motorcar people had brought forth by eight in the morning a truck carrying all the interchangeable parts for a Model T. The Pantasote Company delivered a top. Aides of Morgan had agreed that he would be billed for everything. As the crowd watched from the corner, Fire Chief Conklin, under
the direction of two mechanics, piece by piece dismantled the Ford and made a new Ford from the chassis up. A block and tackle was used to hoist the engine. Sweating, grunting, complaining and at times crying, Conklin did the work. New tires replaced old, new fenders, new radiator, magneto, new doors, running boards, windshield, headlamps and upholstered seats. By five in the afternoon, with the sun still blazing in the sky over New York, a shining black Model T Ford with a custom pantasote roof stood at the curb.
All day the followers of Coalhouse had come to him with appeals to change his mind. Their arguments became wilder and wilder. They said they were a nation. He was patient with them. It became apparent they wouldn’t know what to do without him. They recognized his decision as suicide. They were forlorn at their abandonment. By the late afternoon the Library was in gloom. The young men watched listlessly from the windows as the automobile in which Coalhouse had done his courting reappeared at the curb.
Coalhouse himself never once went to the window to look at it. He sat at Pierpont Morgan’s desk in the West Room and composed his will.
Younger Brother had withdrawn in silent bitterness. Father, who was now closeted in the Library as an official hostage, wanted to talk with him. He was thinking what he would have to tell Mother. Only when it grew dark and the hour of the departure was approaching could he bring himself to confront him. It might be the last privacy they would have.
The young man was in the lavatory behind the entrance hall. He was wiping the burnt cork from his face. He glanced at Father in the mirror. Father said I myself require nothing from you. But don’t you feel your sister deserves an explanation? If she thinks about me, Younger Brother said, she will have her explanation. I could not transmit it through you. You are a complacent man with no thought of history. You pay your employees poorly and are insensitive to their needs. I see, Father said. The fact that you think of yourself as a gentleman in all your dealings, Younger Brother said, is the simple self-delusion of all those who oppress humanity. You have lived under my roof and worked in my business, Father said. Your generosity, Younger Brother said, was what you felt you could afford. Besides, he added, I have repaid that debt, as you will discover. Younger Brother washed his face with soap and hot water. He used a vigorous motion, his head over the basin. He dried himself with a hand towel embroidered with the initials JPM. He threw the towel on the floor, put on his shirt, dug in his pockets for cuff links, buttons, placed his collar over the shirt, tied his tie, raised his suspenders. You have traveled everywhere and learned nothing, he said. You think it’s a crime to come into this building belonging to another man and to threaten his property. In fact this is the nest of a vulture. The den of a jackal. He put on his coat, ran his palms over his shaved head, placed his derby on his head and glanced at himself in the mirror. Goodbye, he said. You won’t see me again. You may tell my sister that she will always be in my thoughts. For a moment he gazed at the floor. He had to clear his throat. You may tell her I have always loved her and admired her.
The band met in the entrance hall. They were dressed now in their Coalhouse uniforms of suit and tie and derby. Coalhouse told them they should pull their brims down and turn up the collars of their jackets to avoid identification. Their means of safe conduct was the Model T. He explained how to set the spark and throttle and how to turn the crank. You will ring the telephone when you’re free, he said. Father said Am I not to go? Here is the hostage, Coalhouse said, indicating Younger Brother. One white face looks just like another. They all laughed. Coalhouse embraced each of them before the great brass doors. He embraced Younger Brother with the same fervor he accorded the others. He looked at his pocket watch. At this moment the floodlights in the street went out. He took his place in the alcove at the back of the hall, straddling the white marble bench with his hands on the dynamite detonation box. There is slack in the plunger to a point halfway down, Younger Brother called to him. All right, Coalhouse said. Go on now. One of the young men unbolted the doors and with no further ceremony they filed out. Then the doors closed. Bolt them, please, Coalhouse commanded. Father did so. He put his ear to the doors. All he heard was his own heavy and frightened breathing. Then after what seemed a torturously long interval, in which almost all his hope for his own life flowed from him, he heard the sibilant cough and sputter of a Model T engine. A few moments later the gears were engaged and he heard the car drive off. There was a thump thump as it went over the planks laid over the crater. He ran to the back of the hall. They’re gone, he said to Coalhouse Walker Jr. The black man was staring at his hands poised on the plunger of the box. Father sat down on the floor with his back to the marble wall. He raised his knees and rested his head. They sat like that, neither of them moving. After a while Coalhouse asked Father to tell him about his son. He wanted to know about his walking, whether his appetite was good, whether he’d said any words yet, and every detail he could think of.
IV
40
About two hours later Coalhouse Walker Jr. came down the stairs of the Library with his arms raised and started to walk across 36th Street to the brownstone. This was according to the negotiated agreement. The street had been cleared of all observers. Facing him on the opposite sidewalk was a squad of New York’s Finest armed with carbines. Lined up from one sidewalk to the other were two troops of mounted police facing each other at a distance of thirty yards, the horses shoulder to shoulder, so that a kind of corridor was formed. Coalhouse was therefore not visible to anyone looking on from the intersections at Madison Avenue or, more remotely, Park Avenue. The generators on the corner made a fearsome roar. In the bright floodlit street the black man was said by the police to have made a dash for freedom. More probably he knew that all he must do in order to end his life was to turn his head abruptly or lower his hands or smile. Inside the Library, Father heard the coordinated volley of a firing squad. He screamed. He ran to the window. The body jerked about the street in a sequence of attitudes as if it were trying to mop up its own blood. The policemen were firing at will. The horses snorted and shied.
Up in their Harlem hideout the Coalhouse band could reason what the outcome would be. They were all there but the man they had followed. The rooms seemed empty. Nothing mattered. They could barely bring themselves to talk. All but Younger Brother thought they would remain in New York. The Model T was hidden in an adjoining alley. They assumed it had been marked. Since Younger Brother wanted to leave town he was awarded the car. He drove that night to the waterfront at 125th Street and took the ferry to New Jersey. He drove south. Apparently he had some money although it is not known how or where he got it. He drove to Philadelphia. He drove to Baltimore. He drove deep into the country where Negroes stood up in the fields to watch him pass. His car left a trail of dust in the sky. He drove through small towns in Georgia where in the scant shade of the trees in the squares citizens spoke of hanging the Jew Leo Frank for what he had done to a fourteen-year-old Christian girl, Mary Phagan. They spit in the dirt. Younger Brother raced freight trains and clumped his car through the cool darkness of covered bridges. He used no maps. He slept in the fields. He drove from gasoline pump to gasoline pump. He collected in the back seat an assortment of tools, tire tubes, gascans, oilcans, clamps, wires and engine parts. He kept going. The trees became more scattered. Eventually they disappeared. There was rock and sagebrush. Beautiful sunsets lured him through valleys of hardened sun-cracked clay. When the Ford broke down and he couldn’t fix it he was pulled by children sitting up on wagons drawn by mules.
In Taos, New Mexico, he came upon a community of bohemians who painted desert scenes and wore serapes. They were from Greenwich Village in New York. They were attracted by his exhaustion. He was passionately sullen, even when drinking. He replenished himself here for several days. He enjoyed a brief affair with an older woman.
By now Younger Brother’s thinning hair was just long enough to fall flat on his crown. He wore a blond beard. His fair skin peeled constantly and he squinted from the sun. He dro
ve on into Texas. His clothes had worn away. He wore bib overalls and moccasins and an Indian blanket. At the border town of Presidio he sold the Ford to a storekeeper and, taking with him only the desert water bag that he had hung from the radiator cap, he waded across the Rio Grande to Ojinaga, Mexico. This was a town that had seen successive occupations of federal troops and insurgents. The adobe houses of Ojinaga lacked roofs. There were holes in the church walls made by field guns. The villagers lived behind the walls of their yards. The streets were white dust. Here were billeted some of the forces of Francisco Villa’s Division of the North. He attached himself to them and was accepted as a compañero.
When Villa did his march south to Torreón, two hundred miles along the destroyed tracks of the central railroad, Younger Brother was in the throng. They rode across the great Mexican desert of barrel cactus and Spanish bayonet. They encamped at ranchos and in the coolness of the castellated abbeys smoked macuche wrapped in cornhusks. There was little food. Women with dark shawls carried water jars on their heads.
After the victory at Torreón, Younger Brother wore the cartridge belts crisscrossed over his chest. He was a villista but dreamed of going on and finding Zapata. The army rode on the tops of railroad freight cars. With the troops went their families. They lived on the tops of the trains with guns and bedding and baskets with their food. There were camp followers and babies at the breast. They rode through the desert with the cinders and smoke of the engine coming back to sting their eyes and burn their throats. They put up umbrellas against the sun.