The Enormous Room/JEAN LE NÈGRE

by e. e. cummings

XI

JEAN LE NÈGRE

On a certain day the ringing of the bell and accompanying rush of men to the window facing the entrance gate was supplemented by an unparalleled volley of enthusiastic exclamations in all the languages of La Fertè Macé—provoking in me a certainty that the queen of fair women had arrived. This certainty thrillingly withered when I heard the cry: "II y a un noir!" Fritz was at the best peep-hole, resisting successfully the onslaught of a dozen fellow prisoners, and of him I demanded in English, "Who's come?"—"Oh, a lot of girls," he yelled, "and there's a NIGGER too"—hereupon writhing with laughter.

I attempted to get a look, but in vain; for by this at least two dozen men were at the peep-hole, fighting and gesticulating and slapping each other's back with joy. However, my curiosity was not long in being answered. I heard on the stairs the sound of mounting feet, and knew that a couple of plantons would before many minutes arrive at the door with their new prey. So did everyone else—and from the farthest beds uncouth figures sprang and rushed to the door, eager for the first glimpse of the nouveau; which was very significant, as the ordinary procedure on arrival of prisoners was for everybody to rush to his own bed and stand guard over it.

Even as the plantons fumbled with the locks I heard the inimitable, unmistakable divine laugh of a negro. The door opened at last. Entered a beautiful pillar of black strutting muscle topped with a tremendous display of the whitest teeth on earth. The muscle bowed politely in our direction, the grin remarked musically: "Bo'jour, tou'l'monde"; then came a cascade of laughter. Its effect on the spectators was instantaneous: they roared and danced with joy. "Comment vous appelez-vous?" was fired from the hubbub.—"J'm'appelle Jean, moi," the muscle rapidly answered with sudden solemnity, proudly gazing to left and right as if expecting a challenge to this statement: but when none appeared, it relapsed as suddenly into laughter—as if hugely amused at itself and everyone else including a little and tough boy, whom I had not previously noted, although his entrance had coincided with the muscle's.

Thus into the misère of La Ferté Macé stepped lightly and proudly Jean le Nègre.

Of all the fine people in La Ferté, Monsieur Jean ("le noir" as he was entitled by his enemies) swaggers in my memory as the finest.

Jean's first act was to complete the distribution (begun, he announced, among the plantons who had escorted him upstairs) of two pockets full of Cubebs. Right and left he gave them up to the last, remarking carelessly, "J'ne veux, moi."

Après la soupe (which occurred a few minutes after le noir's entry) B. and I and the greater number of prisoners descended to the cour for our afternoon promenade. The cook spotted us immediately and desired us to "catch water"; which we did, three cartfuls of it, earning our usual café sucré. On quitting the kitchen after this delicious repast (which as usual mitigated somewhat the effects of the swill that was our official nutriment) we entered the cour. And we noticed at once a well-made figure standing conspicuously by itself, and poring with extraordinary intentness over the pages of a London Daily Mail which it was holding upside-down. The reader was culling choice bits of news of a highly sensational nature, and exclaiming from time to time: "You don't say! Look, the King of England is sick. Some news!... What? The queen too? Good God! What's this?—My father is dead! Oh, well. The war is over. Good." —It was Jean le Nègre, playing a little game with himself to beguile the time.

When we had mounted à la chambre, two or three tried to talk with this extraordinary personage in French; at which he became very superior and announced: "J'suis anglais, moi. Parlez anglais. Comprends pas français, moi." At this a crowd escorted him over to B. and me—anticipating great deeds in the English language. Jean looked at us critically and said: "Vous parlez anglais? Moi parlez anglais."—"We are Americans, and speak English," I answered.—"Moi anglais," Jean said. "Mon père, capitaine de gendarmes, Londres. Comprends pas français, moi. SPEE-Kingliss"—he laughed all over himself.

At this display of English on Jean's part the English-speaking Hollanders began laughing. "The son of a bitch is crazy," one said.

And from that moment B. and I got on famously with Jean.

His mind was a child's. His use of language was sometimes exalted fibbing, sometimes the purely picturesque. He courted above all the sound of words, more or less disdaining their meaning. He told us immediately (in pidgeon French) that he was born without a mother because his mother died when he was born, that his father was (first) sixteen (then) sixty years old, that his father gagnait cinq cent franc par jour (later, par année), that he was born in London and not in England, that he was in the French army and had never been in any army.

He did not, however, contradict himself in one statement: "Les français sont des cochons"—to which we heartily agreed, and which won him the approvel of the Hollanders.

The next day I had my hands full acting as interpreter for "le noir qui comprends pas français." I was summoned from the cour to elucidate a great grief which Jean had been unable to explain to the Gestionnaire. I mounted with a planton to find Jean in hysterics, speechless, his eyes starting out of his head. As nearly as I could make out, Jean had had sixty francs when he arrived, which money he had given to a planton upon his arrival, the planton having told Jean that he would deposit the money with the Gestionnaire in Jean's name (Jean could not write). The planton in question who looked particularly innocent denied this charge upon my explaining Jean's version; while the Gestionnaire puffed and grumbled, disclaiming any connection with the alleged theft and protesting sonorously that he was hearing about Jean's sixty francs for the first time. The Gestionnaire shook his thick piggish finger at the book wherein all financial transactions were to be found—from the year one to the present year, month, day, hour and minute (or words to that effect). "Mais c'est pas là" he kept repeating stupidly. The Surveillant was uh-ahing at a great rate and attempting to pacify Jean in French. I myself was somewhat fearful for Jean's sanity and highly indignant at the planton. The matter ended with the planton's being sent about his business; simultaneously with Jean's dismissal to the cour, whither I accompanied him. My best efforts to comfort Jean in this matter were quite futile. Like a child who has been unjustly punished he was inconsolable. Great tears welled in his eyes. He kept repeating "sees-tee franc—planton voleur," and—absolutely like a child who in anguish calls itself by the name which has been given itself by grown-ups—"steel Jean munee." To no avail I called the planton a menteur, a voleur, a fils d'un chien, and various other names. Jean felt the wrong itself too keenly to be interested in my denunciation of the mere agent through whom injustice had (as it happened) been consummated.

But—again like an inconsolable child who weeps his heart out when no human comfort avails and wakes the next day without an apparent trace of the recent grief—Jean le Nègre, in the course of the next twenty-four hours, had completely recovered his normal buoyancy of spirit. The sees-tee franc were gone. A wrong had been done. But that was yesterday. To-day—

and he wandered up and down, joking, laughing, singing "après la guerre finit." ...

In the cour Jean was the target of all female eyes. Handkerchiefs were waved to him; phrases of the most amorous nature greeted his every appearance. To all these demonstrations he by no means turned a deaf ear; on the contrary. Jean was irrevocably vain. He boasted of having been enormously popular with the girls wherever he went and of having never disdained their admiration. In Paris one day—(and thus it happened that we discovered why le gouvernement français had arrested Jean)—

One afternoon, having rien à faire, and being flush (owing to his success as a thief, of which vocation he made a great deal, adding as many ciphers to the amounts as fancy dictated) Jean happened to cast his eyes in a store window where were displayed all possible appurtenances for the militaire. Vanity was rooted deeply in Jean's soul. The uniform of an English captain met his eyes. Without a moment's hesitation he entered the store, bought the entire uniform, including leather puttees and belt (of the latter purchase he was especially proud), and departed. The next store contained a display of medals of all descriptions. It struck Jean at once that a uniform would be incomplete without medals. He entered this store, bought one of every decoration—not forgetting the Colonial, nor yet the Belgian Cross (which on account of its size and colour particularly appealed to him)—and went to his room. There he adjusted the decorations on the chest of his blouse, donned the uniform, and sallied importantly forth to capture Paris.

Everywhere he met with success. He was frantically pursued by women of all stations from les putains to les princesses. The police salaamed to him. His arm was wearied with the returning of innumerable salutes. So far did his medals carry him that, although on one occasion a gendarme dared to arrest him for beating-in the head of a fellow English officer (who being a mere lieutenant, should not have objected to Captain Jean's stealing the affections of his lady), the sergeant of police before whom Jean was arraigned on a charge of attempting to kill refused to even hear the evidence, and dismissed the case with profuse apologies to the heroic Captain. "'Le gouvernement français, Monsieur, extends to you, through me, its profound apology for the insult which your honour has received.' Ils sont des cochons, les français," said Jean, and laughed throughout his entire body.

Having had the most blue-blooded ladies of the capital cooing upon his heroic chest, having completely beaten up, with the full support of the law, whosoever of lesser rank attempted to cross his path or refused him the salute—having had "great fun" saluting generals on les grands boulevards and being in turn saluted ("tous les générals, tous, salute me, Jean have more medals"), and this state of affairs having lasted for about three months—Jean began to be very bored (me très ennuyé). A fit of temper ("me très faché") arising from this ennui led to a rixe with the police, in consequence of which (Jean, though outnumbered three to one, having almost killed one of his assailants), our hero was a second time arrested. This time the authorities went so far as to ask the heroic captain to what branch of the English army he was at present attached; to which Jean first replied "parle pas français, moi," and immediately after announced that he was a Lord of the Admiralty, that he had committed robberies in Paris to the tune of sees meel-i-own franc, that he was a son of the Lord Mayor of London by the Queen, that he had lost a leg in Algeria, and that the French were cochons. All of which assertions being duly disproved, Jean was remanded to La Ferté for psychopathic observation and safe keeping on the technical charge of wearing an English officer's uniform.

Jean's particular girl at La Ferté was "LOO-Loo." With Lulu it was the same as with les princesses in Paris—"me no travaille, jam-MAIS. Les femmes travaillent, geev Jean mun-ee, sees, sees-tee, see-cent francs. Jamais travaille, moi." Lulu smuggled Jean money; and not for some time did the woman who slept next Lulu miss it. Lulu also sent Jean a lace embroidered handkerchief, which Jean would squeeze and press to his lips with a beatific smile of perfect contentment. The affair with Lulu kept Mexique and Pete The Hollander busy writing letters; which Jean dictated, rolling his eyes and scratching his head for words.

At this time Jean was immensely happy. He was continually playing practical jokes on one of the Hollanders, or Mexique, or the Wanderer, or, in fact, anyone of whom he was particularly fond. At intervals between these demonstrations of irrepressibility (which kept everyone in a state of laughter) he would stride up and down the filth-sprinkled floor with his hands in the pockets of his stylish jacket, singing at the top of his lungs his own version of the famous song of songs:

après la guerre finit,
soldat anglais parti,
mademoiselle que je laissais en France
avec des pickaninee. PLENTY!

and laughing till he shook and had to lean against a wall.

B. and Mexique made some dominoes. Jean had not the least idea of how to play, but when we three had gathered for a game he was always to be found leaning over our shoulders, completely absorbed, once in a while offered us sage advice, laughing utterly when someone made a cinque or a multiple thereof.

One afternoon, in the interval between la soupe and promenade, Jean was in especially high spirits. I was lying down on my collapsible bed when he came up to my end of the room and began showing off exactly like a child. This time it was the game of l'armée française which Jean was playing.—"Jamais soldat, moi. Connais tous l'armée française." John The Bathman, stretched comfortably in his bunk near me, grunted. "Tous," Jean repeated.—And he stood in front of us; stiff as a stick in imitation of a French lieutenant with an imaginary company in front of him. First he would be the lieutenant giving commands, then he would be the Army executing them. He began with the manual of arms.
"Com-pag-nie ..." then, as he went through the manual, holding his imaginary gun—"htt, htt, htt."—Then as the officer commending his troops:"Bon. Très bon. Très bien fait"—laughing with head thrown back and teeth aglitter at his own success. John le Baigneur was so tremendously amused that he gave up sleeping to watch. L'armée drew a crowd of admirers from every side. For at least three-quarters of an hour this game went on....

Another day Jean, being angry at the weather and having eaten a huge amount of soupe, began yelling at the top of his voice: "MERDE à la France" and laughing heartily. No one paying especial attention to him, he continued (happy in this new game with himself) for about fifteen minutes. Then The Trick Raincoat (that undersized specimen, clad in feminine-fitting raiment with flashy shoes, who was by trade a pimp, being about half Jean's height and a tenth of his physique,) strolled up to Jean—who had by this time got as far as my bed—and, sticking his sallow face as near Jean's as the neck could reach, said in a solemn voice: "II ne faut pas dire ça." Jean astounded, gazed at the intruder for a moment; then demanded: "Qui dit ça? Moi? Jean? Jamais, ja-MAIS. MERDE à la France!" nor would he yield a point, backed up as he was by the moral support of everyone present except the Raincoat—who found discretion the better part of valour and retired with a few dark threats; leaving Jean master of the situation and yelling for the Raincoat's particular delectation: "MAY-RRR-DE à la France!" more loudly than ever.

A little after the epic battle with stovepipes between The Young Pole and Bill The Hollander, the wrecked poêle (which was patiently waiting to be repaired) furnished Jean with perhaps his most brilliant inspiration. The final section of pipe (which conducted the smoke through a hole in the wall to the outer air) remained in place all by itself, projecting about six feet into the room at a height of seven or eight feet from the floor. Jean noticed this; got a chair; mounted on it, and by applying alternately his ear and his mouth to the end of the pipe created for himself a telephone, with the aid of which he carried on a conversation with The Wanderer (at that moment visiting his family on the floor below) to this effect:

—Jean, grasping the pipe and speaking angrily into it, being evidently nettled at the poor connection—"Heh-loh, hello, hello, hello"—surveying the pipe in consternation—"Merde. Ça marche pas"—trying again with a deep frown—"heh-LOH!"—tremendously agitated—"HEHLOH!"—a beautiful smile supplanting the frown—"hello Barbu. Are you there? Oui? Bon!"—evincing tremendous pleasure at having succeeded in establishing the connection satisfactorily—"Barbu? Are you listening to me? Oui? What's the matter Barbu? Comment? Moi? Oui, MOI? JEAN jaMAIS! jamais, jaMAIS, Barbu. I have never said you have fleas. C'était pas moi, tu sais. JaMAIS, c'était un autre. Peutêtre c'était Mexique"—turning his head in Mexique's direction and roaring with laughter—"Hello, HEH-LOH. Barbu? Tu sais, Barbu, j'ai jamais dit ça. Au contraire, Barbu. J'ai dit que vous avez des totos"—another roar of laughter—"What? It isn't true? Good. Then. What have you got, Barbu? Barbu? Lice—OHHHH. I understand. It's better"—shaking with laughter, then suddenly tremendously serious—"hellohellohellohello HEHLOH!"—addressing the stove-pipe—"C'est une mauvaise machine, ça"—speaking into it with the greatest distinctness—"HEL-L-LOH. Barbu? Liberté, Barbu. Oui. Comment? C'est ça. Liberté pour tou'l'monde. Quand? Après la soupe. Oui. Liberté pour tou'l'monde après la soupe!"—to which jest astonishingly reacted a certain old man known as the West Indian Negro (a stocky credulous creature with whom Jean would have nothing to do, and whose tales of Brooklyn were indeed outclassed by Jean's histoires d'amour) who leaped rheumatically from his paillasse at the word "Liberté" and rushed limpingly hither and thither inquiring Was it true? to the enormous and excruciating amusement of The Enormous Room in general. After which Jean, exhausted with laughter, descended from the chair and lay down on his bed to read a letter from Lulu (not knowing a syllable of it). A little later he came rushing up to my bed in the most terrific state of excitement, the whites of his eyes gleaming, his teeth bared, his kinky hair fairly standing on end, and cried:

"You—me, me—you? Pas bon. You—you, me—me: bon. Me—me, you—you!" and went away capering and shouting with laughter, dancing with great grace and as great agility and with an imaginary partner the entire length of the room.

There was another game—a pure child's game—which Jean played. It was the name game. He amused himself for hours together by lying on his paillasse tilting his head back, rolling up his eyes, and crying in a high quavering voice—"JAW-neeeeee." After a repetition or two of his own name in English, he would demand sharply "Who is calling me? Mexique? Es-ce que tu m'appelle, Mexique?" and if Mexique happened to be asleep, Jean would rush over and cry in his ear, shaking him thoroughly—"Es-ce tu m'appelle, toi?" Or it might be Barbu, or Pete The Hollander, or B. or myself, of whom he sternly asked the question—which was always followed by quantities of laughter on Jean's part. He was never perfectly happy unless exercising his inexhaustible imagination....

Of all Jean's extraordinary selves, the moral one was at once the most rare and most unreasonable. In the matter of les femmes he could hardly have been accused by his bitterest enemy of being a Puritan. Yet the Puritan streak came out one day, in a discussion which lasted for several hours. Jean as in the case of France, spoke in dogma. His contention was very simple: "The woman who smokes is not a woman." He defended it hotly against the attacks of all the nations represented; in vain did Belgian and Hollander, Russian and Pole, Spaniard and Alsatian, charge and counter-charge—Jean remained unshaken. A woman could do anything but smoke—if she smoked she ceased automatically to be a woman and became something unspeakable. As Jean was at this time sitting alternately on B.'s bed and mine, and as the alternations became increasingly frequent as the discussion waxed hotter, we were not sorry when the planton's shout "A la promenade les hommes!" scattered the opposing warriors. Then up leaped Jean (who had almost come to blows innumerable times) and rushed laughing to the door, having already forgotten the whole thing.

Now we come to the story of Jean's undoing, and may the gods which made Jean le Nègre give me grace to tell it as it was.

The trouble started with Lulu. One afternoon, shortly after the telephoning, Jean was sick at heart and couldn't be induced either to leave his couch or to utter a word. Everyone guessed the reason—Lulu had left for another camp that morning. The planton told Jean to come down with the rest and get soupe. No answer. Was Jean sick? "Oui, me seek." And steadfastly he refused to eat, till the disgusted planton gave it up and locked Jean in alone. When we ascended after la soupe we found Jean as we had left him, stretched on his couch, big tears on his cheeks. I asked him if I could do anything for him; he shook his head. We offered him cigarettes—no, he did not wish to smoke. As B. and I went away we heard him moaning to himself "Jawnee no see LooLoo no more." With the exception of ourselves, the inhabitants of La Ferté Macé took Jean's desolation as a great joke. Shouts of Lulu! rent the welkin on all sides. Jean stood it for an hour; then he leaped up, furious; and demanded (confronting the man from whose lips the cry had last issued)—"Feeneesh LooLoo?" The latter coolly referred him to the man next to him; he in turn to someone else; and round and round the room Jean stalked, seeking the offender, followed by louder and louder shouts of Lulu! and Jawnee! the authors of which (so soon as he challenged them) denied with innocent faces their guilt and recommended that Jean look closer next time. At last Jean took to his couch in utter misery and disgust. The rest of les hommes descended as usual for the promenade—not so Jean. He ate nothing for supper. That evening not a sound issued from his bed.

Next morning he awoke with a broad grin, and to the salutations of Lulu! replied, laughing heartily at himself "FEENEESH Loo Loo." Upon which the tormentors (finding in him no longer a victim) desisted; and things resumed their normal course. If an occasional Lulu! upraised itself, Jean merely laughed, and repeated (with a wave of his arm) "FEENEESH." Finished Lulu seemed to be.

But un jour I had remained upstairs during the promenade, both because I wanted to write and because the weather was worse than usual. Ordinarily, no matter how deep the mud in the cour, Jean and I would trot back and forth, resting from time to time under the little shelter out of the drizzle, talking of all things under the sun. I remember on one occasion we were the only ones to brave the rain and slough—Jean in paper-thin soled slippers (which he had recently succeeded in drawing from the Gestionnaire) and I in my huge sabots—hurrying back and forth with the rain pouring on us, and he very proud. On this day, however, I refused the challenge of the mud.

The promenaders had been singularly noisy, I thought. Now they were mounting to the room making a truly tremendous racket. No sooner were the doors opened than in rushed half a dozen frenzied friends, who began telling me all at once about a terrific thing which my friend the noir had just done. It seems that The Trick Raincoat had pulled at Jean's handkerchief (Lulu's gift in other days) which Jean wore always conspicuously in his outside breast pocket; that Jean had taken the Raincoat's head in his two hands, held it steady, abased his own head, and rammed the helpless T.R. as a bull would do—the impact of Jean's head upon the other's nose causing that well-known feature to occupy a new position in the neighbourhood of the right ear. B. corroborated this description, adding the Raincoat's nose was broken and that everyone was down on Jean for fighting in an unsportsmanlike way. I found Jean still very angry, and moreover very hurt because everyone was now shunning him. I told him that I personally was glad of what he'd done; but nothing would cheer him up. The T.R. now entered, very terrible to see, having been patched up by Monsieur Richard with copious plasters. His nose was not broken, he said thickly, but only bent. He hinted darkly of trouble in store for le noir; and received the commiserations of everyone present except Mexique, The Zulu, B. and me.

The Zulu, I remember, pointed to his own nose (which was not unimportant), then to Jean, and made a moue of excruciating anguish, and winked audibly.

Jean's spirit was broken. The well-nigh unanimous verdict against him had convinced his minutely sensitive soul that it had done wrong. He lay quietly, and would say nothing to anyone.

Some time after the soup, about eight o'clock, the Fighting Sheeney and The Trick Raincoat suddenly set upon Jean le Nègre à propos of nothing; and began pommelling him cruelly. The conscience-stricken pillar of beautiful muscle—who could have easily killed both his assailants at one blow—not only offered no reciprocatory violence but refused even to defend himself. Unresistingly, wincing with pain, his arms mechanically raised and his head bent, he was battered frightfully to the window by his bed, thence into the corner (upsetting the stool in the pissoir), thence along the wall to the door. As the punishment increased he cried out like a child: "Laissez-moi tranquille!"—again and again; and in his voice the insane element gained rapidly. Finally, shrieking in agony, he rushed to the nearest window; and while the Sheeneys together pommelled him yelled for help to the planton beneath.—

The unparalleled consternation and applause produced by this one-sided battle had long since alarmed the authorities. I was still trying to break through the five-deep ring of spectators (among whom was The Messenger Boy, who advised me to desist and got a piece of advice in return)—when with a tremendous crash open burst the door; and in stepped four plantons with drawn revolvers, looking frightened to death, followed by the Surveillant who carried a sort of baton and was crying faintly: "Qu'est-ce que c'est!"

At the first sound of the door the two Sheeneys had fled, and were now playing the part of innocent spectators. Jean alone occupied the stage. His lips were parted. His eyes were enormous. He was panting as if his heart would break. He still kept his arms raised as if seeing everywhere before him fresh enemies. Blood spotted here and there the wonderful chocolate carpet of his skin, and his whole body glistened with sweat. His shirt was in ribbons over his beautiful muscles.

Seven or eight persons at once began explaining the fight to the Surveillant, who could make nothing out of their accounts and therefore called aside a trusted older man in order to get his version. The two retired from the room. The plantons, finding the expected wolf a lamb, flourished their revolvers about Jean and threatened him in the insignificant and vile language which plantons use to anyone whom they can bully. Jean kept repeating dully "laissez-moi tranquille. Ils voulaient me tuer." His chest shook terribly with vast sobs.

Now the Surveillant returned and made a speech, to the effect that he had received independently of each other the stories of four men, that by all counts le nègre was absolutely to blame, that le nègre had caused an inexcusable trouble to the authorities and to his fellow-prisoners by this wholly unjustified conflict, and that as a punishment the nègre would now suffer the consequences of his guilt in the cabinot.—Jean had dropped his arms to his sides. His face was twisted with anguish. He made a child's gesture, a pitiful hopeless movement with his slender hands. Sobbing he protested: "It isn't my fault, monsieur le Surveillant! They attacked me! I didn't do a thing! They wanted to kill me! Ask him"—he pointed to me desperately. Before I could utter a syllable the Surveillant raised his hand for silence: le nègre had done wrong. He should be placed in the cabinot.

—Like a flash, with a horrible tearing sob, Jean leaped from the surrounding plantons and rushed for the coat which lay on his bed screaming—"AHHHHH—mon couteau!"—"Look out or he'll get his knife and kill himself!" someone yelled; and the four plantons seized Jean by both arms just as he made a grab for his jacket. Thwarted in his hope and burning with the ignominy of his situation, Jean cast his enormous eyes up at the nearest pillar, crying hysterically: "Everybody is putting me in cabinot because I am black."—In a second, by a single movement of his arms, he sent the four plantons reeling to a distance of ten feet: leaped at the pillar: seized it in both hands like a Samson, and (gazing for another second with a smile of absolute beatitude at its length) dashed his head against it. Once, twice, thrice he smote himself, before the plantons seized him—and suddenly his whole strength wilted; he allowed himself to be overpowered by them and stood with bowed head, tears streaming from his eyes—while the smallest pointed a revolver at his heart.

This was a little more than the Surveillant had counted on. Now that Jean's might was no more, the bearer of the croix de guerre stepped forward and in a mild placating voice endeavoured to soothe the victim of his injustice. It was also slightly more than I could stand, and slamming aside the spectators I shoved myself under his honour's nose. "Do you know," I asked, "whom you are dealing with in this man? A child. There are a lot of Jeans where I come from. You heard what he said? He is black, is he not, and gets no justice from you. You heard that. I saw the whole affair. He was attacked, he put up no resistance whatever, he was beaten by two cowards. He is no more to blame than I am."—The Surveillant was waving his wand and cooing "Je comprends, je comprends, c'est malheureux."—"You're god damn right its malheureux" I said, forgetting my French. "Quand même, he has resisted authority" The Surveillant gently continued: "Now Jean, be quiet, you will be taken to the cabinot. You may as well go quietly and behave yourself like a good boy."

At this I am sure my eyes started out of my head. All I could think of to say was: "Attends, un petit moment." To reach my own bed took but a second. In another second I was back, bearing my great and sacred pélisse. I marched up to Jean. "Jean" I remarked with a smile, "you are going to the cabinot but you're coming back right away. I know that you are perfectly right. Put that on"—and I pushed him gently into my coat. "Here are my cigarettes, Jean; you can smoke just as much as you like"—I pulled out all I had, one full paquet of Maryland, and a half dozen loose ones, and deposited them carefully in the right hand pocket of the pélisse. Then I patted him on the shoulder and gave him the immortal salutation—"Bonne chance, mon ami!"

He straightened proudly. He stalked like a king through the doorway. The astounded plantons and the embarrassed Surveillant followed, the latter closing the doors behind him. I was left with a cloud of angry witnesses.

An hour later the doors opened, Jean entered quietly, and the doors shut. As I lay on my bed I could see him perfectly. He was almost naked. He laid my pélisse on his mattress, then walked calmly up to a neighbouring bed and skillfully and unerringly extracted a brush from under it. Back to his own bed he tiptoed, sat down on it, and began brushing my coat. He brushed it for a half hour, speaking to no one, spoken to by no one. Finally he put the brush back, disposed the pélisse carefully on his arm, came to my bed, and as carefully laid it down. Then he took from the right hand outside pocket a full paquet jaune and six loose cigarettes, showed them for my approval, and returned them to their place. "Merci" was his sole remark. B. got Jean to sit down beside him on his bed and we talked for a few minutes, avoiding the subject of the recent struggle. Then Jean went back to his own bed and lay down.

It was not till later that we learned the climax—not till le petit belge avec le bras cassé, le petit balayeur, came hurrying to our end of the room and sat down with us. He was bursting with excitement; his well arm jerked and his sick one stumped about and he seemed incapable of speech. At length words came.

"Monsieur Jean" (now that I think of it, I believe someone had told him that all male children in America are named Jean at their birth) "I saw SOME SIGHT! le nègre, vous savez?—he is STRONG: Monsieur Jean, he's a GIANT, croyez moi! C'est pas un homme, tu sais? Je l'ai vu, moi"—and he indicated his eyes.

We pricked up our ears.

The balayeur, stuffing a pipe nervously with his tiny thumb said: "You saw the fight here? So did I. The whole of it. Le noir avait raison. Well, when they took him downstairs, I slipped out too—Je suis le balayeur, savez vous? and the balayeur can go where other people can't."

I gave him a match, and he thanked me. He struck it on his trousers with a quick pompous gesture, drew heavily on his squeaky pipe, and at last shot a minute puff of smoke into the air: then another, and another. Satisfied, he went on; his good hand grasping the pipe between its index and second fingers and resting on one little knee, his legs crossed, his small body hunched forward, wee unshaven face close to mine—went on in the confidential tone of one who relates an unbelievable miracle to a couple of intimate friends:

"Monsieur Jean, I followed. They got him to the cabinot. The door stood open. At this moment les femmes descendaient, it was their corvée d'eau, vous savez. He saw them, le noir. One of them cried from the stairs, Is a Frenchman stronger than you, Jean? The plantons were standing around him, the Surveillant was behind. He took the nearest planton, and tossed him down the corridor so that he struck against the door at the end of it. He picked up two more, one in each arm, and threw them away. They fell on top of the first. The last tried to take hold of Jean, and so Jean took him by the neck"—(the balayeur strangled himself for our benefit)—"and that planton knocked down the other three, who had got on their feet by this time. You should have seen the Surveillant. He had run away and was saying, 'Capture him, capture him.' The plantons rushed Jean, all four of them. He caught them as they came and threw them about. One knocked down the Surveillant. The women cried 'Vive Jean,' and clapped their hands. The Surveillant called to the plantons to take Jean, but they wouldn't go near Jean, they said he was a black devil. The women kidded them. They were so sore. And they could do nothing. Jean was laughing. His shirt was almost off him. He asked the planton to come and take him, please. He asked the Surveillant, too. The women had set down their pails and were dancing up and down and yelling. The Directeur came down and sent them flying. The Surveillant and his plantons were as helpless as if they had been children. Monsieur Jean—quelque chose."

I gave him another match. "Merci, Monsieur Jean." He struck it, drew on his pipe, lowered it, and went on:

"They were helpless, and men. I am little. I have only one arm, tu sais. I walked up to Jean and said, Jean, you know me, I am your friend. He said, Yes. I said to the plantons, Give me that rope. They gave me the rope that they would have bound him with. He put out his wrists for me. I tied his hands behind his back. He was like a lamb. The plantons rushed up and tied his feet together. Then they tied his hands and feet together. They took the lacings out of his shoes for fear he would use them to strangle himself. They stood him up in an angle between two walls in the cabinot. They left him there for an hour. He was supposed to have been in there all night; but the Surveillant knew that he would have died, for he was almost naked, and vous savez, Monsieur Jean, it was cold in there. And damp. A fully clothed man would have been dead in the morning. And he was naked.... Monsieur Jean—un géant!"

—This same petit belge had frequently protested to me that Il est fou, le noir. He is always playing when sensible men try to sleep. The last few hours (which had made of the fou a géant) made of the scoffer a worshipper. Nor did "le bras cassé" ever from that time forth desert his divinity. If as balayeur he could lay hands on a morceau de pain or de viande, he bore it as before to our beds; but Jean was always called over to partake of the forbidden pleasure.

As for Jean, one would hardly have recognised him. It was as if the child had fled into the deeps of his soul, never to reappear. Day after day went by, and Jean (instead of courting excitement as before) cloistered himself in solitude; or at most sought the company of B. and me and Le Petit Belge for a quiet chat or a cigarette. The morning after the three fights he did not appear in the cour for early promenade along with the rest of us (including The Sheeneys). In vain did les femmes strain their necks and eyes to find the black man who was stronger than six Frenchmen. And B. and I noticed our bed-clothing airing upon the window-sills. When we mounted, Jean was patting and straightening our blankets, and looking for the first time in his life guilty of some enormous crime. Nothing however had disappeared. Jean said, "Me feeks lits tous les jours." And every morning he aired and made our beds for us, and we mounted to find him smoothing affectionately some final ruffle, obliterating with enormous solemnity some microscopic crease. We gave him cigarettes when he asked for them (which was almost never) and offered them when we knew he had none or when we saw him borrowing from someone else whom his spirit held in less esteem. Of us he asked no favours. He liked us too well.

When B. went away, Jean was almost as desolate as I.

About a fortnight later, when the grey dirty snow-slush hid the black filthy world which we saw from our windows, and when people lived in their ill-smelling beds, it came to pass that my particular amis—The Zulu, Jean, Mexique—and I and all the remaining miserables of La Ferté descended at the decree of Caesar Augustus to endure our bi-weekly bath. I remember gazing stupidly at Jean's chocolate-coloured nakedness as it strode to the tub, a rippling texture of muscular miracle. Tout le monde had baigné (including The Zulu, who tried to escape at the last minute and was nabbed by the planton whose business it was to count heads and see that none escaped the ordeal) and now tout le monde was shivering all together in the anteroom, begging to be allowed to go upstairs and get into bed—when La Baigneur, Monsieur Richard's strenuous successor that is, set up a hue and cry that one towel was lacking. The Fencer was sent for. He entered; heard the case; and made a speech. If the guilty party would immediately return the stolen towel, he, The Fencer, would guarantee that party pardon; if not, everyone present should be searched, and the man on whose person the serviette was found va attraper quinze jours de cabinot. This eloquence yielding no results, The Fencer exorted the culprit to act like a man and render to Caesar what is Caesar's. Nothing happened. Everyone was told to get in single file and make ready to pass out the door, one after one we were searched; but so general was the curiosity that as fast as they were inspected the erstwhile bed-enthusiasts, myself included, gathered on the side-lines to watch their fellows instead of availing themselves of the opportunity to go upstairs. One after one we came opposite The Fencer, held up our arms, had our pockets run through and our clothing felt over from head to heel, and were exonerated. When Caesar came to Jean Caesar's eyes lighted, and Caesar's hitherto perfunctory proddings and pokings became inspired and methodical. Twice he went over Jean's entire body, while Jean, his arms raised in a bored gesture, his face completely expressionless, suffered loftily the examination of his person. A third time the desperate Fencer tried; his hands, starting at Jean's neck, reached the calf of his leg—and stopped. The hands rolled up Jean's right trouser-leg to the knee. They rolled up the underwear on his leg—and there, placed perfectly flat to the skin, appeared the missing serviette. As The Fencer seized it, Jean laughed—the utter laughter of old days—and the onlookers cackled uproariously, while, with a broad smile, the Fencer proclaimed: "I thought I knew where I should find it." And he added, more pleased with himself than anyone had ever seen him: "Maintenant, vous pouvez tous montez à la chambre." We mounted, happy to get back to bed; but none so happy as Jean le Nègre. It was not that the cabinot threat had failed to materialize—at any minute a planton might call Jean to his punishment: indeed this was what everyone expected. It was that the incident had absolutely removed that inhibition which (from the day when Jean le noir became Jean le géant) had held the child, which was Jean's soul and destiny, prisoner. From that in stant till the day I left him he was the old Jean—joking, fibbing, laughing, and always playing—Jean L'Enfant.

And I think of Jean le Nègre ... you are something to dream over, Jean; summer and winter (birds and darkness) you go walking into my head; you are a sudden and chocolate-coloured thing, in your hands you have a habit of holding six or eight plantons (which you are about to throw away) and the flesh of your body is like the flesh of a very deep cigar. Which I am still and always quietly smoking: always and still I am inhaling its very fragrant and remarkable muscles. But I doubt if ever I am quite through with you, if ever I will toss you out of my heart into the sawdust of forgetfulness. Kid, Boy, I'd like to tell you: la guerre est finie.

O yes, Jean: I do not forget, I remember Plenty; the snow's coming, the snow will throw again a very big and gentle shadow into The Enormous Room and into the eyes of you and me walking always and wonderfully up and down....

—Boy, Kid, Nigger, with the strutting muscles—take me up into your mind once or twice before I die (you know why: just because the eyes of me and you will be full of dirt some day). Quickly take me up into the bright child of your mind, before we both go suddenly all loose and silly (you know how it will feel). Take me up (carefully, as if I were a toy) and play carefully with me, once or twice, before I and you go suddenly all limp and foolish. Once or twice before you go into great Jack roses and ivory—(once or twice, Boy, before we together go wonderfully down into the Big Dirt laughing, bumped with the last darkness).