swiftly through the mottled[Pg 34] shrubs, entertain them in interior splendor, and rush them out under cover of darkness. The paint-store owner delivered gallons of paint one Saturday morning, and then, when Stern raised his brush to deliver the first dab, the owner hollered, "Don't paint." Stern lowered the brush and the man continued to shout: "Never paint. Lay your brushes aside and, for Christ's sake, don't paint. You paint and you're a fool. Uh-uh. No painting, don't paint, never paint." And then he lowered his voice to a whisper and added, "Until you're ready to paint." He then imposed a long list of conditions which would have to be met before it would be all right for Stern to paint. "Scrape your walls, scrape your floors, paper your halls, drape your dainty pieces, test your tones, check your temp, dress properly. But, for Christ's sake, don't paint. That is, until you're ready to paint." [Pg 34] Stern and his wife set all the paint in the corner of the room and waited until the ideal day came along, but it never did, and they gradually lost interest in painting. It was decided they would get rolling by laying tile, and Stern's father sent Crib, an ageless Negro with great strength in his wrists, to help them lay it, his services a moving-in gift. Stern's father, a small, round-shouldered man who always wore slipovers, had worked most of his life in a shoulder pad concern for his brother, Uncle Henny, expecting to be made a partner or to take over when Henny, a coronary patient, passed on. When Henny did expire, however, the business went instead to a distant nephew who had always worked in civil service positions, and Stern's father had to continue in a subordinate position, his life more or less gone up in smoke. Crib, a sweeper and handyman, had supported Stern's father for head of the business, almost as though it had been an election, and now, years later, remained a faithful supporter of his. [Pg 35] [Pg 35] "He a fair man," Crib once said to Stern. "And nobody cut a pad like him. No waste." And Stern's dad, in turn, spoke with admiration of Crib's great strength. "He must be about ninety, but he's some strong guy. You ought to see what he can lift." Crib appeared early one morning, wide nose parched with cold, slapping himself as though he had come all forty miles on foot, and Stern, who had a special feeling for all Negroes, hugged him in a show of brotherhood. He raced upstairs to rouse his wife and bring her downstairs, long-nosed and cranky, so she could fix some bacon and eggs for the
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