The Heart is a Lonely Hunter - Carson McCullers [71]
After a long time her Dad came home. He said Baby wouldn’t die but that her skull was fractured. He asked for Bubber.
Nobody knew where he was. It was dark outside. They called Bubber in the back yard and in the street. They sent Spareribs and some other boys out to hunt for him. It looked like Bubber had gone clear out of the neighborhood. Harry went around to a house where they thought he might be.
Her Dad walked up and down the front porch. ‘I never have whipped any of my kids yet,’ he kept saying. ‘I never believed in it. But I’m sure going to lay it onto that kid as soon as I get my hands on him.’
Mick sat on the banisters and watched down the dark street. ‘I can manage Bubber. Once he comes back I can take care of him all right.’
‘You go out and hunt for him. You can find him better than anybody else.’
As soon as her Dad said that she suddenly knew where Bubber was. In the back yard there was a big oak and in the summer they had built a tree house. They had hauled a big box up in this oak, and Bubber used to love to sit up in the tree house by himself. Mick left the family and the boarders on the front porch and walked back through the alley of the dark yard.
She stood for a minute by the trunk of the tree. ‘Bubber--,’ she said quietly. ‘It’s Mick.’
He didn’t answer, but she knew he was there. It was like she could smell him. She swung up on the lowest branch and climbed slowly. She was really mad with that kid and would have to teach him a lesson. When she reached the tree house she spoke to him again--and still there wasn’t any answer. She climbed into the big box and felt around the edges. At last she touched him. He was scrounged up in a corner and his legs were trembling. He had been holding his breath, and when she touched him the sobs and the breath came out all at once.
‘I-I didn’t mean Baby to fall. She was just so little and cute--seemed to me like I just had to take a pop at her.’
Mick sat down on the floor of the tree house. ‘Baby’s dead,’ she said. ‘They got a lot of people hunting for you.’
Bubber quit crying. He was very quiet.
‘You know what Dad’s doing in the house?’ It was like she could hear Bubber listening.
‘You know Warden Lawes--you heard him over the radio.
And you know Sing Sing. Well, our Dad’s writing a letter to Warden Lawes for him to be a little bit kind to you when they catch you and send you to Sing Sing.’
The words were so awful-sounding in the dark that a shiver came over her. She could feel Bubber trembling.
‘They got little electric chairs there--just your size. And when they turn on the juice you just fry up like a piece of burnt bacon. Then you go to Hell.’
Bubber was squeezed up in the corner and there was not a sound from him. She climbed over the edge of the box to get down. ‘You better stay up here because they got policemen guarding the yard. Maybe in a few days I can bring you something to eat’ Mick leaned against the trunk of the oak tree. That would teach Bubber all right. She had always managed him and she knew more about that kid than anybody else. Once, about a year or two ago, he was always wanting to stop off behind bushes and pee and play with himself awhile. She had caught on to that pretty quick. She gave him a good slap every time it happened and in three days he was cured. Afterwards he never even peed normal like other kids--he held his hands behind him. She always had to nurse that Bubber and she could always manage him. In a little while she would go back up to the tree house and bring him in. After this he would never want to pick up a gun again in all his life.
There was still this dead feeling in the house. The boarders all sat on the front porch without talking or rocking in the chairs.
Her Dad and her Mama were in the front room. Her Dad drank beer out of a bottle and walked up and down the floor. Baby was going to get well all right, so this worry was not about her. And nobody seemed to be anxious about Bubber. It was something else.
‘That Bubber!’ said Etta.
‘I’m shamed to go out of the house after this,’ Hazel said.
Etta and Hazel went into the middle room and closed the door.