And that’s it, Avery thought. Somebody in Washington sends you a yellow square of paper with pasted words and your brother is dead. Just like that, dead. No more Martinique parish, no more Papa, no more fallen down house that somebody built a hundred years ago for a way of life that is as dead as Papa and Henri. And the last of the noble line of French and Spanish aristocracy is now lying on his back in the parish drunk tank on a mattress that smells of vomit, waiting to go to work camp where he will have prison letters stenciled on his back and they’ll give him a pick and shovel to work with at hard labor from one to three years, and he may be one of the few aristocrat convicts in the camp.
Avery remembered the things his father used to say to him when they sat on the veranda together during the long summer afternoons. Mr. Broussard spoke of the early American democracy and the agrarian dream of Thomas Jefferson, and how they had died and there was nothing left of them save a shell. The agrarian dream had been destroyed by an industrial revolution that pierced America to its heart. The republic was gone and had been replaced by another society which bore little semblance to its predecessor. Mr. Broussard had been raised to live in a society and age that no longer existed. By blood and by heritage he was bound to the past, which was as irreclaimable as those vanished summer days of heavy cane in the fields and the Negroes going to work with the hoes over their shoulders and the full cotton wagons on the way to the gin. Only an inborn memory remained, a nostalgia for something that had flowered and faded and died before he lived. Possibly in the mellow twilight of evening he could look out from the veranda and see the column of men in their worn butternut-brown uniforms, retreating from the Union army, and hear the jingle of the saber and the labor of the horses, the creak of the artillery carriages, as the column moved up the river road to make one last fight against General Banks’ advancing troops.
He should have lived back then, Avery thought. He should have died when it died, and never had sons that end up torn to bits in France or serving time on a work gang.
Avery heard a metal object strike the side of the tank and rattle across the floor. There was angry swearing from the bullpen. He got up and walked to the door. The men were looking at LeBlanc, who sat on the floor. A tin cup lay by the wall of the tank. The men moved towards LeBlanc and circled about him. He stood up to face them with his fists clenched by his sides.
A stout, bull-chested man led the group. He walked with the clumsy motions of a wrestler, flat-footed, his thick legs slightly spread, his big hands awkward. He wore a crushed felt hat, which always remained on his head except when he slept. The men called him Johnny Big, because he was thought to be the toughest man in the tank, and the others did what he told them. He also acted as spokesman for the group. When the men needed something, they talked to Johnny Big, and he talked to Leander, and sometimes they got what they wanted. Each inmate contributed two cigarettes a day to Johnny Big. He was head man and no one questioned his authority.
Avery caught a man by the arm and pulled him aside.
“What happened?” he said.
“Let go.”
“Tell me.”
“LeBlanc slammed his cup against the tank and almost bust Sherry in the head.”
Avery released him. The man crowded into the group with the rest.
“How come you to try and hit Sherry?” Johnny Big asked.
“If I wanted to hit him he wouldn’t be walking around,” LeBlanc said. “I wouldn’t use no cup to do it with, neither.”
“You’re screwing things up for us. We got to teach you.”
“I’ll get toe-to-toe with anybody in here.”
“There ain’t going to be a fight,” Johnny Big said. “Leander said he don’t want no more. This is something else.”
“Take it easy,” an older inmate said. “Leander will put us in the tank.”
“He ain’t going to know. There ain’t anybody going to tell him.” He looked into each face. “There’s a way to do it that don’t leave any marks.”
He took a newspaper out of his back pocket and rolled it into a tight cylinder. He patted it in his open palm.
“You should know about this, LeBlanc,” he said. “It just leaves a few red marks on the ribs. It does all the work on the inside. Nobody can tell you been worked on except yourself.”
“Let him be, Johnny,” the older inmate said.
“Keep shut.”
Most of the inmates pressed forward. A few shrank back from what was about to happen.
“Grab hold of him and pull his shirt off,” Johnny Big said.
LeBlanc lunged at him, but the men caught him and pinned his arms behind him. He struggled to get free, cursing, his eyes wild. Johnny Big whipped the newspaper across his ribs. He hit him on the other side with a backhand stroke and started again. He swung harder with each blow. He was a heavy man, and he threw all his weight into his arm and shoulder. LeBlanc’s body twisted with each stab in his side. The newspaper swished through the air and whapped across his ribs. The beating became faster. The newspaper was in shreds, and suddenly all the men were upon LeBlanc, striking him with whatever they could.
Avery had plunged into the men and was tearing at bodies and clothing to get to LeBlanc. He was shoved to the floor, and someone stepped on his hand. He came back and hit the man in front of him with his fist in the back of the neck. The man he had struck didn’t seem to feel the blow. He hit again and again and could hurt no one. They were intent upon hurting LeBlanc and he could do nothing to turn their attention. An inmate pushed him in the face. He felt the sweat and grit of the man’s palm in his mouth. He drove through the men, and then he was free, stumbling forward off balance. The beating was over and they had drawn back. He looked down at LeBlanc; his lips were split and his face was covered with red swellings that were already beginning to turn blue and his forehead was knotted with bumps. He lay contorted on the floor with his bloodied and ripped shirt hanging loosely from his trousers.
“You dirty bastards. Oh, you dirty bastards,” Avery said.
“Let’s get him, too,” someone said.
“He ain’t any better than LeBlanc.”
“He hit me in the back of the neck.”
“Yeah, Johnny. Teach them both.”
Johnny Big had the stub of the frayed newspaper in his hand. He let it drop to the floor by LeBlanc’s feet.
“This one don’t look tough enough for all of us,” he said.
The men knew what Johnny Big was going to do. They had already forgotten that the jailer would lock them in the tank for what they had done to LeBlanc. They had watched or helped beat one man senseless, and they didn’t want to stop. They formed a circle around Avery and Johnny Big.
“What do you say, boy? You want to find out how good you are?” Johnny said.
Avery set himself and caught him on the chin with the first punch. Johnny Big’s head jerked back and his felt hat flew in the air. Avery hit him twice more in the stomach, and then Johnny was on him, clubbing with both fists. Avery recoiled backwards under the blows. The men were shouting and enjoying it. He felt that everything in his head was shaken loose. Each blow struck him like a hammer and sent a wave of nausea and weakness through his body. He ducked and weaved and tried to get out from under him and took one full in the face. The room tilted upwards and he spun into the wall of the tank and fell to the floor. Johnny came on. Avery tried to get up, and Johnny Big knocked him back against the tank with his knee. He lay stunned, tasting the blood in his mouth and smelling the damp concrete. A pair of thick legs stood before him. He could hear voices from afar, as though someone were shouting down a well. His eyes fixed on the rough leather work boots and the pair of legs.