been halted in the hall by a classmate he knew only by sight.
‘Excuse me, brother,’ the other had said. ‘My name is Roy Dean, but people here call me Lawman. I was wondering if I could talk to you for a minute.’
‘Sure,’ Earl had replied, caught off guard. ‘I’m Earl Thomas.’
‘I know,’ Lawman said as they started walking. ‘I couldn’t help but know you after all the hell you raise in Poli Sci.’
‘The man bugs me.’
‘Me, too … where were you goin’? You got a class?… how ’bout a cup of coffee in the SUB on me?’
‘All right,’ Earl said a bit hesitantly.
‘Poli Sci is my major,’ Lawman said, going on. ‘Everybody calls me Lawman because I’m thinking seriously of going into law … we used to have a thing called ‘The Courtroom’ when we were freshmen. If somebody on our wing of the dorm did something questionable, like trying to steal another cat’s woman or something like that, we would have a mock trial. I was a laywer for the defense.’
‘You win a lot of cases?’
‘It was just a joke, but I pulled a lot of fast ones on the jury. Most of law is just semantics anyway. You can say a thing one way and make it sound entirely different from the way it appears if you rearrange a few words.’
‘I guess so,’ Earl agreed.
‘But what I wanted to talk to you about was your political thing,’ Lawman continued.
‘My political thing?’ Earl laughed. ‘I don’t really guess I have one. Just trying to be Black, I guess.’
The two of them walked on toward the Student Union Building, leaving Washington Hall where liberal arts classes were taught, Carver Hall, the science building, Adler Annex, and the mini-square referred to by students as the ‘quadrangle,’ where students sat and studied and talked on the benches.
‘Sutton is fucked up,’ Lawman began as they entered the crowded Student Union Building. ‘A lotta in quotes Black schools are fucked up, but they seem to be gettin’ something done about their problems. If Sutton is doing anythin’ it’s digressin’, you know what I mean?’
Earl nodded.
‘This school was founded in eighteen eighty-three and for all intents and purposes it’s still eighteen eighty-three here, because there hasn’t been much progress.’
‘What about the things the Student Government president, Peabody, planned to do?’ Earl asked as they left the service area with their coffee.
‘Peabody ain’ nuthin’ but a lot of mouth,’ Lawman snorted. ‘What I mean is that the man is disorganized. He’s spent the whole year havin’ Calhoun twist his mind around like a rubber band … he goes to Calhoun and sez: “The students want this and that.” Calhoun laughs and sez: “So what?” You dig?’
Earl nodded for Lawman to continue.
‘So next month ther’s gonna be another Student Government election and something needs to be done …’
‘What are you planning to do?’ Earl cut in.
Lawman laughed uneasily. He wasn’t sure how to handle Earl, how to handle the question he was fed.
‘I personally can’t do very much. I can’t dedicate the kind of time you need to give to the Student Government job to run for office ’cause I have an outside job that pays for my schooling. The point of this conversation is to find whether or not you’d like to run.’
‘What?’
‘You care, don’choo?’
‘Yeah. I do, but…’
‘But what?’
‘But I’m a transfer student. This is just my second semester here. I don’t think I know enough about the place to…’
‘You mean,’ Lawman cut in, ‘that until I mentioned it you hadn’t had one thought about the kinda things that might be happ’ning if you had anything to do with it?’
‘I suppose I had some thoughts …’
‘What did you decide you would do?’
‘It didn’t matter since I wasn’t the president,’ Earl said.
‘Give it some thought,’ Lawman suggested. ‘You’ve got a good political mind. Anybody who can hold his own with old man Mills has to have a good political mind.’
‘What about the two guys I’ve seen listed as candidates already?’
‘Worthless,’ Lawman spat out. ‘Hall is a “egghead” dude from Boston or somewhere. He spends about thirty hours a day in the library reading Emily Dickinson and shit like that. He’s a brown-nosed jackass as far as I’m concerned. I go to the SGA meetings sometimes and see him rapping. He’s a junior class senator. Calls himself filibusterin’ when he gets up with a little Robert’s rule book on parliamentary procedure and starts hangin’ everything up with points of order … thass what democracy has done for niggers. They lay in that idealistic crap all day and smell like shit all night.’
‘What about Baker, the football player? He’s runnin’.’
‘Yeah. So what? He’s a maniac as far as I’m concerned, although he’ll prob’bly win unless you or someone like you goes against him. I never heard a sound political thought come from his direction. Him and King go through political issues like they’re runnin’ an off-tackle play. Everything that they don’t like is wrong. I can’t…’
‘I understand,’ Earl said thoughtfully.
‘Good!’ Lawman said as he got up. ‘You give it some thought, brother, and I’ll be talkin’ to you.’
That was the beginning. Earl and Lawman talked about it again the next day. Earl admitted that he had often thought about things that would be done differently if he were president. Somehow it had never gone any further than that. Together, the two men constructed a platform for Earl to run on. Odds, Earl’s best friend, was drafted as a campaign manager. They were on their way.
The memory of all the things he had been through with Odds and Lawman brought still another question to the surface. Why hadn’t either one of them called to say anything about the meeting with MJUMBE and the students?
Earl came out of his bedroom and locked the door behind him. He checked his pocket for the keys he needed. Door key and car keys were there. It was then that his light sweater and slacks almost collided with Zeke’s khakis and T-shirt.
‘You got troubles?’ Zeke asked.
‘No,’ Earl lied. ‘Why?’
‘You in such a durn hurry yo’ leavin’ shavin’ cream stuck behin’ yo’ ear,’ Zeke pointed out.
Earl
