Jackson advocate. [volume] (Jackson, Miss.) 1939-current, 1942-07-11
NATIVE son
By RICHARD WRIGHT

he had lied about his not drink
ing and about Mary's going to
school? If Jan tried to protect
Mary, as he thought he would, he
would only succeed in making a
case against himself.
Bigger went to the window and
looked out at the white curtain
of falling snow. He thought of
the kidnap note. Should he try to
get money from them now? Hell,
yes! He would show that Britten
bastard! He would work fast. But
he would wait until after Jan had
told his story. He should see Bessie
tonight And he ought to pick out
the pencil and paper he would
use. And he must not forget to
use gloves when he wrote the
note so that no fingerprints would
be on the paper. He'd give that
Britten something to worry about,
all right. Just wait.
Because he could go now, run off
if he wanted to and leave it all
behind, he felt a certain sense of
power, a power born of a latent
capacity to live. He was conscious
Of this quiet, warm, clean, rich
house, this room with this bed so
soft, the wealthy white people
moving in luxury to all sides of
him, whites living in a Smugness,
a security, a certainty that he had
never known. The knowledge that
he had killed white girl they
loved and regarded as their symbol
of beauty made him feel the equal
Of them, like a man who had been
somehow cheated. but had now
eVened the score.
The more the sense of Britten
seeped into him the more did he
feel the need to face him once
again and let him try to get some
thing from him. Next time he
would do better; he had let Brit
ten trap him on that Communist
business. He should have been on
the lookout for that; but the lucky
thing was that he knew that Brit
ten had done all his tricks at
once, had shot his bolt, had played
all his cards. Now that the thing
was out in the open, he would
know how to act And furthermore,
Britten might want him as wit
ness against Jan. He smiled while
he lay in the darkness. If that hap
pened, he would be safe in sending
the ransom note. He could send it
just when. they thought they had
pinned the disappearance of Mary
upon Jan. That would throw every
thing into confusion and would
make them want to reply and
give the money at once and save
the girl.
The warm room lulled his blood
and a deepening sense of fatigue
drugged him with sleep. He stratch-
ed out more fully on the bed,
sighed, turned on his back, Swal-
lowed, and closed his eyes. Out of
the surrounding silence and dark
ness came the quiet ringing of a
distant church bell, thin, faint, but
clear. 1t tolled, soft, then loud, then
still louder, SO loud that he wonder
ed where it was. 1t sounded direct
ly above his head and when he
looked it was not there but went
on tolling and with each passing
moment he felt an urgent need to
run and hide as though the bell were
a warning and he stood on a street
corner in a red glare of light
like that which came from the
furnace and he had a big package
in his arms SO wet and slippery
and heavy that he could scarcely
hold onto it and he wanted to know
what was in the package and he
stopped near an alley corner and
unwrapped it and the paper fell
away and he say it was his own
head-his own head lying with
black face and ha1f-closed eyes
and lips parted with white teeth
showing and hair wet with blood
land tue Ied giaIc grew brighter