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  Sympathetically, “Emma child, you just stand right here and I’ll be right back,” and fetched her husband. “Jim, this is Emma. She’s gonna be living with us and taking care of Bobby Joe.”

  After hearing his wife’s version of Emma’s plight, he looked the young beauty over and smiled. “That’s fine Irene, but first we got to find her some clothes. I’ll take her home and let her git herself cleaned up.” Looking back at Emma, “I bet you’d like that, wouldn’t you?”

  “Yessir.”

  “Come with me then.”

  With Emma cooking, the Swifts started taking turns coming home every day to look in on Bobby Joe and eat a hot lunch. It was Jim’s turn and he was seated at the kitchen table. Emma had her back to him, putting some things away in the cabinet. As she tiptoed to reach higher, he eyed her shapely legs and hourglass figure.

  “Emma.”

  “Yessir?”

  “You’re honestly bout the prettiest colored gal I ever saw.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Swif.”

  “Why don’t you call me Jim … when Irene ain’t here,” and helped her down.

  Soon after, Jim started giving her money and getting more than just a hot meal when he came home, while his wife tended the store. And, in addition, Emma could go to the dry goods store and Jim let her pick out anything she wanted. She quickly learned that a white man was willing to pay for “it.”

  In her off time when she went to town, Emma expanded her profitable “trade” beyond Mr. Swift. Stopping by to visit Son Buddy, the conversation drifted to her pretty clothes. “Emma, I thought you wuz workin for them whitefolks for jes room an board. Every time I see you, you got on sump’n new. Where you comin up wit all them priddy new hats an shoes an dresses?!”

  “It ain’ none a yo bizness where I got ‘em frum. I sho as hell didn’ git ‘em frum you!”

  “You didn’ answer me. Where you git the money for that stuff?”

  “Mr. Jim give it to me.”

  “Whutcha do to git it?”

  “None a yo damn bizness!”

  “Emma, you bet not be no whorish gal, messin roun wit that white man an takin money frum ‘em!”

  “Who you to talk?! You been livin a few measly miles away frum us all this time an NEVER cum seen bout us, not one time! An you ain’ NEVER raised a finger to help us! So don’tcha be tellin me shit!!”

  SMACK! The hard slap across the face sent her reeling. Soon as she cleared her head she lit into him, forcing him over backwards. Realizing he had a ferocious wildcat on his hands, he used his fists a couple of times to get her off.

  Emma’s dress was torn and by the time she got to the Swift’s house, her bloody lip had swollen to twice its size and the bruised skin under one of her eyes was bluish black. Still fuming, she hurried straight through the house to her back room. Jim looked up from his newspaper in time to see her going past, and got a glimpse of the torn dress. He went to her door and knocked.

  “Emma, can I come in?”

  “Yessir,” she sniffled.

  When he entered and saw her bloodied face, “What on earth happened to you? Who did this?” he asked angrily.

  “Nobody Mr. Jim.”

  Not masking his concern very well, he called into the kitchen, “Irene, come in here and look at what somebody did to Emma.” Irene got a wet towel and was wiping Emma’s face when Jim said, “I tried to git her to tell me who did it, but she won’t.”

  “Well Jim, maybe she doesn’t feel like talking about it right now. Why don’t you go on out and let her lie down for a while.”

  Her shiner had turned good and black by the time Jim came home for lunch the next day. Refusing to let it drop, “Emma, tell me who did it.”

  “It wuz my brother.” And she told him why.

  The following week Son Buddy was found dead in his little room at the hotel with a bullet through his chest. After a “thorough” investigation, the authorities were unable to come up with a suspect for the murder. Emma was questioned, and she said she knew nothing.

  As she dressed for the funeral Emma had only one thing on her mind, raised the corner of her mattress and got her savings to which Jim Swift and a few others had so generously contributed. On her way out, she stopped by the kitchen doorway, “Mr. Swif, Miz Swif, I’m gone.”

  Grandma Duck and her bunch had the three front benches on both sides of the aisle filled with family. Emma took a seat in the back of the little church and wouldn’t sit close to them. The old matriarch was watching her flock like a chicken does a hawk. It was clear she didn’t want them to even look around at her. Finally, Elzado got the chance to glance back long enough for Emma to catch her eye and gesture to go outside. She quickly passed the word down the bench to Grandma Duck, “Elzado gotta pee.”

  Trying not to miss a word the preacher was saying, Grandma Duck looked down the bench at Elzado and whispered loudly, “G’on! But you hurry up an git yo behind back in heah, an don’t be talkin to that ol’ Charlie-lookin devil!”

  Soon after Elzado left the church and Emma caught Grandma Duck not looking, she left. She met Elzado on the outside and they stole away. Emma had their getaway prearranged and handed the driver the thirty dollars for their fifty-mile trip. As they settled into the backseat of the car, Elzado asked excitedly, “Where we goin Emma?”

  “We goin to Longview. They havin a oil boom up there, an men is comin frum ever where bringin lotsa money wit ‘em. Don’t worry. I got some saved up to rent us a house til we kin git started.”

  “Emma, I don’t care if we ain’ got a pot to piss in. I’m jes so glad to git away!”

  “I know El. I wuzn’ gon leave you behind again.”

  They were dropped off in downtown Longview. Neither had ever seen so many people in their entire lives. Tin Lizzie horns honking, wagon mules rearing, and all the folks scurrying about had their hearts racing with excitement. Nestled in the piney woods of Deep East Texas near the Louisiana border, the town was flourishing. After finding a place to stay, it was time to sit down and go over the game plan. Elzado was ready and willing as she listened to Emma’s teachings.

  “The first time you may have to grit yo teeth. Lak I did wit Mr. Jim. But afta that, you git useta it an it don’t hurt or nuthin. White men want to git thru quick is they kin an go cuz they don’t want nobody knowin it. You kin put on a little baby whine an they’ll give you jes about anythang you ask for. They always in a hurry, so the only thang you gon git frum ‘em is money. An thas all we want! Soon as he do his bizness, suck yo belly in an git up an pee that stuff out. We gon git us two uv them long pocketknifes an we don’t never wanta be on our backs at the same time. Understand?”

  Elzado answered with a laconic “yeah.”

  “While I’m doin it, you stand guard an be ready to use that knife. When you do it, don’t be scaid, I’ll be guardin for you. We gon be awright, but we gotta stick together an not git separated frum each other. You understand?”

  “I unnerstand Emma an don’t worry, I ain’ scaid. Not half as scaid is I wuz to eat that corn you put poison in that time.” They hugged and laughed in remembrance of the occasion. After so much talking, sleep came tinted with solidarity. Even though Elzado was big for her age, she wasn’t quite fourteen when they hooked up as a team and took to the oilfields.

  Emma’s guts shone like pearls in the moonlight as she and Elzado walked toward the oilfield derrick lights. The cool autumn night air was stenched with pungent odors of burning oil and gas. The closer they got, the brighter the glare of the lights and the harder it was to see. Emma could barely make out the figure of a man walking to meet them. “Here cum somebody. ‘Member whut I tole you, El.” They stopped. He kept coming.

  “Whut in Sam Hill y’all doin out heah this time uv night?” the white man asked.

  Emma stepped closer to him. “Lookin.”

  “Fer whut, gal?”

  “Whutever we kin find.”

  The roughnecks welcomed them with open arms and billfolds. Very seldom
did anybody give them a hard time. When they did, it usually was the foreman rushing somebody back to work so he could take his turn in the tool shed.

  Emma and Elzado had been molded by their environment and were bold and hard as nails. Emma was the schemer, cunning and smart, slick and smooth. Since Elzado’s style was to just do shit and let the chips fall where they may, Emma knew if any thinking or planning was going to take place, she would be doing it for the both of them. She caught tricks three to Elzado’s one.

  Elzado was gangly with a boyish figure and wore her kinky hair in plaits. The ugly harelip Grandma Duck left her with after hitting her in the face with a skillet for “bristlin back” made her no match for Emma’s drop-dead good looks and natural gift for bullshit. Whenever Emma got on her about “fixin” herself up, Elzado would say in a funk, “I ain’ gon play lak I’m priddy when I know I ain’t,” and wouldn’t touch the rouge and lipstick Emma offered. “Anyhow, afta he git on toppa me to do his bizness, he don’t give a damn whut I look lak.”

  Their notoriety spread quickly. The other whores in town even noted how much “guts an gall” it took to be out in the fields tricking, “jes the two uv ‘em.” Danger or no danger, the team kept hiring the taxi driver to haul them from one site to another, and wait. Taking it directly to the frontlines, they were shortstopping the traffic before it got to town. They bought plenty of baubles and beads and pretty clothes, and eventually filtered into the “streets” mainstream.

  Soon thereafter, Baby Norris joined their team. Semi-foxy but with an air of cheapness about her, she was five or six years older than Emma, didn’t have a steady man, was tired of waiting on the tricks to come to town, and had the guts. Emma and Baby Norris were about the same build and complexion, and she was passed off as the third sister. To enhance her chances at a greater share of the tricks, she and Emma dressed alike to confuse the “bulls” who picked her thinking she was Emma. But Emma had enough tricks to keep them both busy.

  Even though the tool shed business was very lucrative, it was getting old and the trio started having the workers come to the little shotgun house instead. With a few tips from Baby Norris, Emma got in touch with the right people and expanded her enterprise to include bootlegging. As soon as the other whores found out about the crowds that came to her house for a “good time,” they started coming too.

  Emma hung a long piece of cloth over the open doorway separating the one small room from the kitchen. She bought a cot and placed it just inside the kitchen beyond the “curtain.” Then she laid down the law to the visiting whores. “Don’t ketch no tricks in my house an take ‘em off somewhere else. You found ‘em here, leave ‘em here. When you wanna trick an I ain’t usin it, you kin pay me to use the cot in the kitchen. An don’t be rollin no drunks, it give my house a bad name.” Although Elzado had moved out and was on her own, living with a white man in the Northcutt Heights, she was still tricking and spent much of her time at Emma’s.

  The “good time” house was fast becoming the most popular place in town. The bootlegging business was thriving and, with the other whores hanging around, the shotgun house was always crowded with oilfield workers, black and white. This soon brought the gamblers. “Where there’s hoes an boozin, there’s sho to be gamblin,” Baby Norris explained. With the lure of easy money, some of the “real” gamblers started drifting in. That’s how Emma met Allen.

  He was a tall, good-looking black devil, so black his friends called him “Blue.” He was streetwise and smooth as butter, a touch of arrogance mixed with caution. His worldly manner ofttimes betrayed his mere twenty-three years. He stood apart from the herd. His expensive tailored clothes fit snugly, accentuating his slim, muscular frame. He was a gambler by profession and always won big at Emma’s.

  She had smoked him over on several occasions when he was down on his knees shooting dice. Aside from his outright handsomeness, she was magnetized by his gambling skills and always stopped what she was doing to marvel at the way he took them to the cleaners. When he propositioned her about paying her to let him “manage all the gamblin,” she jumped at the chance to enter into the contract.

  He started coming early and staying late. For the first time in her life, Emma was infatuated and didn’t view him as just another trick. She dropped her guard and fell head over heels for this impressive young hustler who ignited her fullest passions with every touch. He soon took up permanent residence and they worked as a team. She tricked on the cot and took care of the bootlegging while he cleaned up with the dice. All the money that came in the house stayed there, one way or another. They became the talk of the streets. The top whore in town hooked up with the beautiful black stallion. All the whores envied her for nabbing the number one hustler; the men envied him for having won over the cream of the crop.

  Emma realized that Allen was making more than she was and much quicker. However, many times after he’d won all the money in the game at her house, he left and went somewhere else to gamble, only to lose. When he got broke at the other places, he sent his hat by a runner for identification and she sent money back to him. He wouldn’t quit until he used up all of her money too.

  Being in the hole was tampering with the bootlegging business. With both of them broke, she had to accelerate her tricking to come up with the money to pay for the loads of whiskey. It was becoming increasingly apparent to her that he was blowing it faster than she could make it. They began to argue about it more and more. “Hell,” she told him, “I don’t need nobody to help me fuck it off! I kin do that by myself.”

  It was late morning when he finally made it home. Clothes rumpled and his eyes bloodshot, he’d been up all night gambling. She noticed it right off; it had looked so good on him. “Where’s yo hat?” she asked as he headed into the kitchen.

  Stalling for time, he hated to face her, “Whut’d you say Emma?” in between swallows from the dipper.

  “You heard me. I said, where’s yo hat?” She had paid sixty-five dollars for that Borsalino.

  “I hocked it last nite.”

  “To who?”

  “Aw, I let Pinch hold it for twenny dollars. I’ll git it back this evenin.” Walking toward the bed, he stretched his arms, yawned and told her, “Baby, yo man is beat.”

  She’d been up and down all night herself, waiting on customers who dropped by for bootleg whiskey and getting up to send him money. Irritable and in no mood to cut him any slack, “You don’t look real tired to me,” she countered, testy. Wheeling out of the bed, “I’m gon git the crap blanket an spread it down on the flo. You gon teach me how to gamble an shoot dice, right now. I’m sick uv this shit!” She spread the army blanket out and got down on her knees at its edge. “C’mon, you got some dice in yo pocket, gitcha no-gamblin ass down here,” she taunted.

  He whined and hem hawed around awhile but, in hopes of soothing ruffled feelings, agreed reluctantly. “Oh, awright. First off,” picking up the blanket, “you don’t want it spread all the way out lak this, it’s too thin,” folding it into a four-by-four square and lying it back on the floor. He took the dice out of his pocket and got down on his knees next to her. “The softer the surface, the easier it is to control the dice when you roll ‘em, lak this,” demonstrating. “You don’t want ‘em bouncin roun lak this,” as he precariously threw them out on the blanket. “You want to hold ‘em wit yo fingers lak this, an jes rollll ‘em easy lak this. Jes sorta push ‘em ‘cross the blanket so they stay together an tumble side by side. You hafta learn how to control the way they roll wit yo fingers. You wanna keep ‘em rollin side by side an not let whutever you got locked in th’ middle cum up.”

  Taking the dice, one in each hand, he showed her what he meant. “Look, I got a three an a two in th’ middle,” joining the two together. “I’m gon roll ‘em so they stays where I put ‘em.” He “rolllled” them time and time again and the three and two never showed up. “Anutha thang, they’s forty-two dots on a pair uv dice, three sevens on each one.” Rotating them in his hand, “
See, all the dots equal seven. You got five-deuce seven, four-trey seven, an six-ace seven. So—”

  “So,” she interrupted, “if you know alla that an kin do it so good, how cum you git broke all th’ time?”

  “Cuz Emma, you know well as I do, most uv th’ whitefolks an nigguhs that hang aroun over here don’t know shit bout gamblin. They be jes havin fun an don’t hardly know one dice frum anutha. I kin git away wit cold-blood murder in a game wit them.”

  “How cum you can’t do it when you be gamblin in them other games?”

  “Cuz they won’t letcha set ‘em an roll ‘em lak that. All uv them nigguhs know how to gamble, an all uv us know how to roll. So they serve ‘em to you. Every time you shoot ‘em out there, the houseman picks ‘em up, shakes ‘em an puts ‘em back in yo hand. You ain’ got a chance to set ‘em an you be goin on luck. Specially when we be shootin on a hard pool table cuz them dice be tumblin every whichaway.”

  “Well, if they won’t letcha do whut you showin me, whut the hell do you keep goin over there for an luckin off all our money?”

  He looked at her for a moment, “I guess for the same reason you keep on trickin. C’mon, les git back to whut I wuz tellin you. The best way to learn bout the bets is to watch the game. You bet the straight-make on six an eight, an you bet the bar on four, five, nine, an ten. When you throw seven …”

  Emma went to Shivers Drugstore and bought several pairs of dice. All during the day when she wasn’t busy, she devoted her time to playing with the pair she carried in her hand, squeezing them, matching them, fitting them and learning to hold them the “right way.” When the crap game at the house started, she got down on her knees and watched. When the game ended, she practiced on the blanket by herself. She had emulated the roll down pat, and could “rollll” them across the blanket so close together they looked like they had been stuck with glue.

  Emma added the third dimension to her repertoire. No longer was she a mere observer, she had served her apprenticeship. Now when she got down on her knees at the blanket’s edge, she got down there to gamble and “run” the game. Allen’s managing steadily diminished and she took over. She loved it and gambling became her life’s blood. Dedicating herself to the perfection of her talents, she became a whiz with the craps and was “lucky as a shithouse rat” in the eyes of the other gamblers.