Texas by the Tail

a motion picture camera.

As Zearsdale entered the room, a thin middle-aged Negro was closing the lid on a round film can. He began an immediate apology, fear shining out of his liquid eyes.

'Mr. Zearsdale, I'm sure sorry, sir. Terribly, terribly sorry, sir. I just happened to step backwards, an' I kicked that can-'

'It could have spoiled everything,' Zearsdale said mildly. 'Might have tipped him off, and left me looking like a fool. Do you think I'm a fool, Albert?'

'M-Mister Zearsdale,'-the Negro paled under his yellowish skin. 'Please, sir, M-Mister Zearsdale…'

'I've never let you down, have I, Albert?' Zearsdale went on, his voice harshly musical. 'Treat you like a white man, don't I, instead of a jig? Treat you a lot better than a lot of white men. You live just as good as I do, and you get a thousand a month for screwing around. That's all it amounts to, you know. You aren't worth a thousand cents a month. I just give it to you so that you can send your kids to school.'

The Negro's head bowed on his thin neck. He stood trembling and helpless, biting his lip. Blinking back the tears of fear and shame.

'Well, all right, then,' Zearsdale said in a gentler tone. 'I don't let my people down. I don't let my people let me down. Is that the film there?'

'Yessir, yessir, that's it.' The Negro snatched up the can and humbly tendered it to his employer. 'Think you got him, Mr. Zearsdale, sir. Can't be sure, but I thinks so.'

Zearsdale said that he would make sure; he never guessed about anything. 'How are your children getting along, Albert? Not quite ready to graduate, are they?'

'Jacob is, sir. Only got one more year of law school. Amanda, she still got two years lef' in teachers' college.'

'Amanda,' Zearsdale murmured. 'My mother would have appreciated having a child named after her.'

'Yessir, an' Jacob, he named after you, Mr. Zearsdale. Real proud of it, too, Mr. Zearsdale. Yessir, real proud.'

'I'm glad to hear it, very glad,' the oil man nodded. 'I'd hate to think that anyone with my name didn't have pride. A man without pride is no good, did you know that, Albert? If he doesn't have pride he doesn't have anything, not a damned thing to build on. I don't like a man like that. I may put up with him, but I don't like him. If he won't stand up for himself, if he'd rather have a brown nose than a bruised One, I don't and can't like him. How long have you been kissing my ass, Albert?'

'M-Mister-Mister Z-Zearsdale…'

'Twenty-three years, right? Well, that's long enough. You're fired.'

17

The bedroom shades were drawn, and the dimness of night still prevailed. Mitch rolled over in the bed, his eyes closed in sleep, his hands automatically seeking Red. It had been a very big night. A very big, very wonderful, very wild-wild night, and even in sleep the wonder and the wildness of it remained with him. He relived it, again smelling the faint perfume of her flesh, again hearing the passionate struggling of her breath, again feeling the savage sweetness of her body as it fitted itself to his.

'Red…' he mumbled, his hands probing the bedclothes. 'Let's… let's… Red?' A frown spread over his face, and the movements of his hands quickened, became desperate. 'Red?… Red! Where are-' And then his eyes flew open and he sat up with a yell.

'RED!'

There was a clatter from the bathroom. The door banged open and Red ran out. She had her shoes and stockings on, her skimpy panties and her equally skimpy bra. The way Red was built, small but richly full, her bras and panties had to be skimpy.

She had her arms around him in a split second, cradling his head against her breast, whispering endearments as she begged him to tell her what was wrong. Mitch explained sheepishly that he had been having a bad dream. Red kissed him again, murmuring an apology for not having been there.

She started to stand up. Mitch caught a hand in the waistband of her panties.

'You're here now,' he said. 'That's even better.'

'But-but I-' She broke off, forcing a bright smile. 'Okay, honey. Just let me get a hair net on, will you?'

'No. No, wait,' he said quickly. 'You were going out this morning, weren't you?'

'Well, I was but it can wait. After all-'

Mitch said firmly that it shouldn't and wouldn't wait. She was all fixed up to go out, and he wasn't going to muss her up at the last minute. 'I was just teasing you,' he lied. 'Now, you run on and I'll go back to sleep.'

She did so, but he didn't. He lay with his eyes closed, a little restless perhaps, but glad that he had done as he had. He thought back to the beginning of their intimacy, and the viewpoint she had revealed to him.

She was a woman, she pointed out (quite unnecessarily) and he was a man. And a man and a woman needed something from each other that they could get from no other source. She had known that long ago, having grown up with a large family in a one-room shack. There would be times when she would be angry, and then he had better keep away from her. But otherwise he had only to ask or hint, and what he wanted would be freely given.

Why, my goodness, how else could it be? What if she didn't feel like it just then?

Most of the time she probably would, because she had never had anyone but him and there was a lot of catching up to do. But even if she didn't, there would be no problem. Why should there be, for pity's sake? It only took a few minutes-not nearly long enough, sometimes!– and if a woman couldn't give herself to a man for a few minutes, she just didn't love him!

The bed sank gently. Mitch started, and turned. And Red's' arms went around him.

'Ah, Mitch. Darling, darling, darling! I couldn't leave with my darling needing me…!'

'But baby-Your clothes…'

'Tear 'em off of me! Tear 'em off and muss me up! I can dress again, and I can get unmussed and… and… and… Mitch!'

An hour later she left on her delayed shopping trip-a peculiar kind of shopping trip, or one that would have been peculiar for anyone but Red. Every now and then, when they had some free time, she would go on such an excursion. Spending the day at it, limiting herself to a total expenditure of five dollars, and shopping only in dime stores.

It was a thing she had always dreamed about doing as a child, and unlike any adult Mitch had ever known, she seemed to be able to satisfactorily fulfill her child's dream: Moving cautiously from counter to counter; spending a dime at one and fifteen cents at another and a quarter at another; pausing to refresh herself with a frozen lollipop on a stick. She would even eat lunch in a dime store-a prospect which made Mitch's stomach turn! Then, having gorged on some hideous concoction such as wilted lettuce and creamed frankfurters (served by a pimply-faced girl with red fingernails) she would return to the attack, so timing herself as to have the expenditure of her last dime coincide with the closing of the store.

She would be very touchy about the armload of 'bargains' she brought home (they would disappear in a day or so, just where he never knew). Once he had teased her, asking if she had left anything in the store, and the color had risen in her cheeks and she had called him a mean stupid darned old fool. And then, heart-brokenly, she had begun to cry. He had held her, cuddled her small body in his arms, rocked gently to and fro with her as the great sobs tore through her breast. And there were tears in his own eyes, as at last he understood the cause of her sorrow; for it was his also, and perhaps everyone's. The loss of innocence before it had ever endured. The cruel