Although the gravel parking lot had been dark, the rumble seat’s interior was what Hampton expected to find at the bottom of the grave. It was hot, nearly stifling. He could smell the automobile’s exhaust, its burned oil, hear its creaking and rocking as they careened down the road.
Hampton drifted into sleep. Something in his mind screamed at him to stay awake. He panicked at the thought that he could run out of air or succumb to the car’s fumes. The panic was fleeting, and soon the blackness into which he stared dematerialized. He settled into a dream in which he was still sitting on the No. 33 train as it barreled south toward Charlotte.
He did not know how long he’d been sleeping when he felt the car slow and roll to a halt. Beal’s muffled voice, and then the stranger’s, came from inside. A door opened and closed, and then another. He heard footsteps in the gravel, then the sound of water.
He arched his back until it touched the lid of the rumble seat. He pushed against it. It didn’t move. He pushed again, harder this time. Again. He felt the car rock on its axles. Another push and he heard a click as the latch released itself. Hampton unfolded his body from the compartment. The first thing he noticed was the intense smell of the air: manure, hay, a fire burning somewhere far off in the warm night. The car sat parked along a dirt road on the edge of a pasture. Nearby, a cluster of milk cows grazed silently on the other side of a low fence, their tails swishing in the shadows. Hampton turned, looked behind him, saw Beal and the other man urinating on the side of the road with their backs to him.
Hampton climbed out of the rumble seat and walked to the edge of the road and unzipped his fly. He stood there, wetting the dark ground at his feet. He stared at the cows. A few of them raised their heads and considered him; then they looked back down at the earth and continued tearing at the grass.
When he finished he turned and saw that Beal and the man now leaned against the driver’s side of the car. Both men stared at him. Beal had his arms folded over his chest, his ankles crossed before him. The other man lit a cigarette.
“This is a bad idea,” Beal said.
“What’s a bad idea?” Hampton asked. “Stopping out here? Taking a piss on the side of the road? Or are you talking about squeezing me into a rumble seat? Shit, Beal, I could’ve suffocated.”
“No,” Beal said. “I’m not talking about that.” He spread his arms, and turned his body as if to take in the entire scene around him. “I’m talking about this,” he said. “All of it, especially you. You coming down here was a bad idea. It changes everything.”
“Yeah, well maybe you need my help.”
“I don’t,” Beal said.
“The party thinks you do,” Hampton said.
“This is the South, Haywood,” Beal said. “This isn’t New York City. You don’t know the South, not like I do.”
But the darkened field that surrounded them made Hampton disagree with Beal, as did the humid air and the smells of animals and turned earth. The terror that had lived in his heart since that Mississippi night back in 1906 burst free and he threw himself at Beal, crossing the ground between them in just a few strides. He threw a right hook and caught Beal on the jaw. Hampton staggered with his own momentum and struggled to regain his footing in the damp grass. Beal covered his face and crumpled against the side of the automobile; then he sprung at Hampton, grabbed him by the collar, and pulled him to the ground. They rolled through the grass. Hampton heard Beal cussing, heard himself screaming, “Don’t tell me what I know, you son of a bitch! Don’t tell me what I know!” They stopped rolling. Hampton found himself on top of Beal, straddling his body. Beal covered his face, and just as Hampton raised his fist to strike him, he heard a gunshot. The cows flushed at the noise, galloped into the darkness, and disappeared. Hampton turned, his fist still clenched and held above his head. The stranger pointed a small revolver at him. The man cocked the hammer.
“Don’t be stupid,” he said.
Hampton lowered his arm, unclenched his fist, felt Beal’s chest heaving beneath him. He climbed off Beal and sat on the ground beside him. Beal propped himself up with his elbows. On the other side of the field, a light winked on at a small, white farmhouse. Beal and Hampton both saw it. They got to their feet. The man kept the revolver on Hampton. A dog began barking somewhere out in the dark near the farmhouse. The man looked behind him, saw the light, looked back at Hampton.
“Don’t be stupid,” he said again.
“Who are you?” Hampton asked.
“This is Carlton Reed,” Beal said. “And Carlton Reed should’ve shot you.”
“No one needs to get shot, Fred,” Reed said. “But, Haywood, he’s right about one thing: your coming down here is a bad idea. Punching a white man in the South is an even worse idea. We’re on the same side, and we’re your brothers in the struggle. You should trust us, because if we weren’t we’d be looking for a place to bury you.”
It was well past midnight now, the streets deep with shadows and the shapes of rickety houses leaning away from one another at wild angles. Hampton climbed down from the rumble seat. Reed had killed the engine, but he still sat behind the wheel, smoking. The motor popped and hissed. Beal, his hands in his pockets, stood beside Hampton. Beal turned, looked up the street behind him as if expecting someone to appear. He stared for a moment, consulted his wristwatch. Beal nodded south where a dull light hovered in the sky. “That’s Loray,” he said.
Hampton stared at the light, then his eyes took in the houses around him, most of them small, a few of them two stories or more. Beal nodded toward a house several doors down the street. It was three stories high with gables along the roof.
“You’ll be staying there,” Beal said. “Miss Adeline takes Negroes in the attic rooms. She thinks you’re visiting family. Don’t give her a reason to think any different. Use the back staircase. Use the back door. Don’t go in the common areas. Don’t talk to the white boarders. Don’t look at white women.” He sighed, lit a cigarette. “Welcome to Gastonia.”
Something over Beal’s shoulder caught Hampton’s eye. A figure made its way down the street toward them. Beal turned and watched it too. As it came closer Hampton saw that it was a woman. It was Sophia. She waved. Hampton could see that she was smiling.
“Late, as usual,” Beal said.
“Fancy seeing you here, city boy,” she said when she was close enough to be heard. Her voice was bright and clear. Hampton almost smiled for the relief of seeing someone who cared about him, but the events of the night weighed too heavily on him, and now that he was free of the rumble seat, he was aware of the aches in his body. The left side of his face throbbed too, and he wondered if Beal had hit him, although he had no memory of it.
“Your package has arrived,” Beal said.
Sophia stopped and stood before Hampton and Beal. She reached out, touched Hampton’s shoulder, which seemed the only manner of greeting she was comfortable expressing. He kept his arms by his sides, his duffel bag at his feet.
“How was your trip?” she asked.