The Spiked Heel

“But I was never poor, understand that, too. Inside, I was never poor. My mother saw to it that I was well fed, and even though I ran around in torn, outgrown pants with my behind sticking out, I was never poor. Even though I cursed my father for his laziness and for his nigra women and for what he was doing to my mother, I was never poor. Inside I was rich because I knew that some day I was going to be somebody. Some day, I was going to wipe the mud off my face. Poor? No, I was never poor. Only weaklings are poor. Weaklings and cowards.”

Cara smiled. “And you are certainly neither a weakling or a coward.”

“If you’re laughing at me,” he said tightly, “don’t.”

“I’m not laughing,” she said, somehow frightened by the tone of his voice.

“Too many people laughed at me back home. Because of my damn no-good father, and because I was white trash, Jefferson McQuade, the piss-poor kid with the nigra-lover father and the high-and-mighty name.” He paused. “I made them stop laughing. I couldn’t do it with my head so I, did it with my body. Do you know what shoved me through high school and into the University of Georgia?”

“What?” she said.

“Football, naturally. My body again. That’s when I became an equal. I wasn’t white trash on the ball field. I was strength, and people admire strength. Nobody noticed that I got out of Georgia U. cum laude. They only noticed that I was a football hero. Muscle. Sheer muscle. Six fraternities wanted me, do you know that? Six God-damned fraternities. And only because I was eight feet tall and because I slaughtered the opposition on the ball field. Once I had that ball tucked under my arm, there was no stopping me. Nothing could stop me. They could have thrown up the Maginot Line, and it wouldn’t have stopped me. So six fraternities wanted Steamroller McQuade; but McQuade told them all to go to hell. Six fraternities wanted the boy who hadn’t owned a pair of undershorts until he was fifteen years old.”

Cara laughed spontaneously, and then cut herself short when she felt McQuade’s silence. His silence was huge and terrible. It mushroomed about her like a darkly wrathful thing.

“Fraternities,” he said bitterly. “Kid stuff! I was a hundred years old when I was ten! Every time I heard those bedsprings creaking in the next room, everytime I smelled a nigra woman in the house, I got older and older, and older! What did the dear brothers know about lying in the fields with the sun hot overhead, and looking down at the dirt and filth, and hungering to get out of it, hungering until your belly ached, knowing you had to get out. I was the lanky bastard from the shack, I was the big lout in the too-small clothes, I was the town’s laughing boy, the kid whose father lay with nigras. And now they were crawling to me! On their hands and knees, they came to me, and they begged me to join their little-boy clubs, and I told them to go to hell, and this time I was laughing.” He paused, reflecting. “Have you ever heard the laughter of a small town, Cara?”

“No,” she said, listening to his voice. The man speaking no longer sounded like the McQuade she knew. The speech was more Southern somehow, more sharply accented. There was no polish to this speech, and no politeness. She had accepted the other McQuade, and now there was a new man to contend with, and this new man frightened her.

“I very rarely laugh,” he said. “Laughter is an ugly sound. Laughter was reserved for use against the McQuades in my town. But one McQuade made them stop laughing. One McQuade stood up, and they saw that he was strong, and they were afraid, and so they stopped laughing. They used to laugh at Titanic, too, you know — but they don’t any more. They don’t laugh at Titanic, and they don’t laugh at me. Now they’re on their hands and knees to me, and now I take what I want, and when I’ve got it, I own it! I own it completely, it’s mine.” He laughed suddenly. “Do you know how I got to be a major in the army?”

“I don’t know,” she said, and she did not want to know.

“By killing more people than anybody else. By cracking skulls. I was Steamroller McQuade again, only this time we weren’t playing a game. I killed more goddam men…” He stopped. “Do you want the secret, Cara? Would you like to know the secret of success? I’ll tell you. Smile. Smile — and crack skulls. Crack them, but smile while you’re doing it. I learned how to smile when I was a boy, I had to know how to smile. I didn’t learn the other half of the secret until my body began to catch up with me. But now I know. And nobody stops me. Nobody.” He paused, and was silent for a long time. His hand came up then, and she felt his fingers touch the back of her neck.

“You’re a beautiful woman, Cara,” he whispered. His voice carried none of its previous anger now. It was a tender caress, but despite its gentleness, it filled her with dread. She was suddenly frightened. She did not want this man. She was afraid of this man and of what he would do to her.