Coleridge Jackson

Coleridge Jackson had nothing to fear. He weighed sixty pounds more than his sons and one hundred pounds more than his wife. His neighbors knew he wouldn't take tea for the fever. The gents at the poolroom walked gently in his presence. So everyone used to wonder why, when his puny boss, a little white bag of bones and squinty eyes, when he frowned at Coleridge, sneered at the way Coleridge shifted a ton of canned goods from the east wall of the warehouse all the way to the west, when that skimpy piece of man-meat called Coleridge a sorry nigger, Coleridge kept his lips closed, sealed, jammed tight. Wouldn't raise his eyes, held his head at a slant, looking way off somewhere else. Everybody in the neighborhood wondered why Coleridge would come home, pull off his jacket, take off his shoes, and beat the water and the will out of his puny little family. Everybody, even Coleridge, wondered (the next day, or even later that same night). Everybody. But the weasly little sack-of-bones boss with his envious little eyes, he knew. He always knew. And when people told him about Coleridge's family, about the black eyes and the bruised faces, the broken bones, Lord, how that scrawny man grinned. And the next day, for a few hours, he treated Coleridge nice. Like Coleridge had just done him the biggest old favor. Then, right after lunch, he'd start on Coleridge again. “Here, Sambo, come here. Can't you move any faster than that? Who on earth needs a lazy nigger?” And Coleridge would just stand there. His eyes sliding away, lurking at something else.