Tobacco Road Part 9

"I'm going," Dude said. "Can't n.o.body make me stay here. I'm going to drive the car."

He had thrown the top back and was trying to tie it down. Most of it had been folded up, but some of it hung down as far as the rear axle. He could not find any means for making it stay folded, so he allowed it to hang down behind.

"I sure ain't going to miss going," Jeeter said. "It's my wood I'm taking to sell. I'm going to be the first one to go."

The scrub oak had been cut into carrying lengths the past week when Jeeter and Dude had spent a day in the grove getting a load ready to sell. Some of it was a foot in length, but most of it was anywhere from three to six feet long. The length in which it had been cut was the length of the stunted trees after they had been hacked off with an axe at the stump. As soon as a tree was hacked down, Jeeter had taken the axe and broken the limbs off, and then the wood was ready to haul. The blackjack never grew much taller than a man's head; it was a stunted variety of oak that used its sap in toughening the fibres instead of growing new layers and expanding the old, as other trees did. The blackjack sticks were about two or three inches in diameter, and wiry and tough as heavy pieces of wire or small iron water-pipes.

It took them about half an hour to pile on as much wood as the back seat would hold. After that, Jeeter began binding it to the body with baling wire so none of it would drop off along the road while they were riding to Augusta. The ends of the blackjack protruded in all directions, sticking out several feet on each side and behind. Others had been jabbed straight into the upholstery, and they appeared to be the only ones that did not need fastening. The rusty baling wire broke nearly every time Jeeter attempted to fasten it to the door-handles, and he would have to stop and splice the ends, twisting them until they would hold. The task of loading the blackjack and tying it on to the car took nearly two hours, and even then several pieces of wood fell off when one of them touched the car or leaned against it.

With the wood in place, Dude drove back across the field towards the house, going no faster than a man's walk, but even then the wood persisted in falling off. Jeeter and Bessie came behind, picking up the sticks and carrying them to the house.

Ada and Ellie May were in the yard when they got there. The grandmother waited behind a chinaberry tree to see what they were going to do. Ada stood squarely in front of the car, waiting to find out where she was going to sit. The grandmother went to the corner of the house and stood there, all except her face hidden from view.

"Where is I going to sit and ride?" Ada said. "I don't see no sitting place for n.o.body much, with all that wood you got loaded."

Jeeter waited several minutes, hoping that Bessie would undertake to answer Ada. When she did not, Jeeter got in and sat down beside Dude.

"There ain't no room for you," he said.

"Why ain't there no room for me, if there's room for you and Dude and that hussy, there?"

"Sister Bessie ain't no hussy," Jeeter said. "She ain't nothing like that. She's a woman preacher."

"Being a woman preacher don't keep her from being a hussy. That. could help to make her a bigger one. Something acts that way, because she is a big old hussy."

"What makes you say that about Bessie?" he said.

"Last night she was walking all around the room with none of her clothes on. If I hadn't made you put on your overalls when I did, there ain't no telling what she might have done. She's a hussy."

"Now, Ada," he said, "you ought not to talk like that about Bessie. She's a woman preacher, and she's married to Dude, too."

"That don't make no difference. She's a hussy, all the same. She always fools around with the men-folks. She don't never stay in the house and help clean it up like I has to do. She's taking after the men-folks because she's a hussy. When she goes preaching, she always does the preaching to the men-folks and don't pay no attention to the women-folks at all."

"I ain't got nothing to say against Sister Bessie. She's a woman preacher, and what she does is the Lord's doings. He instructs her what to do."

"Ada is peeved because I married Dude and came here to stay," Bessie said to Jeeter. "She don't like it because I'm going to stay in the room."

"You shut your mouth now, Ada," Jeeter said, "and let us be going. I got to sell this load of wood in Augusta today."

Dude started the car, and Bessie got in and sat on the edge of the seat beside Jeeter. There was barely enough room for all three of them.

Ada ran towards them, trying to jump on the running board, but Dude speeded up the car and she could not get on. When he suddenly cut the wheels and turned out of the yard into the tobacco road, the rear wheel barely missed running over Ada's feet. She shouted after them, but the car was going so fast by that time that it was useless to run after them and try to stop them. She went back into the yard and, with Ellie May, stood looking at the cloud of dust that hid the car from view. The grandmother came from behind the corner of the house and, picking up the old croker sack, started to the thicket for dead twigs. She was already hungry again, although she had had a cup of chickory only two or three hours before.

Dude slowed down when they approached the crossroad where they were to turn off the tobacco road and enter the State highway to Augusta. He did not slow down enough, however, because the momentum swung the load of blackjack to the offside, and the entire top of the pile fell in the road.

Jeeter and Dude worked half an hour getting the wood in place again, and with Bessie helping the little that she could, it was then ready to be tied down again. Jeeter went across the field to a negro cabin and borrowed two plow-lines. He came back and threw them over the wood and tied the ends down tightly.

"Now, that will hold it, durn that blackjack," he said. "There ain't nothing else in the world like plow-lines and baling wire. The two together is the best in the world to do anything with. Give me a little of both and I can do any kind of job."

They were off again, speeding down the highway towards Augusta. The city was now only twelve miles away.

Dude was a good driver, all right; he swung out of the tracks just at the right moment every time he met another automobile. Only two or three times did he almost run head-on into other cars. He was so busy blowing the horn that he forgot to drive on the righthand side of the road until the last minute. Most of the cars they met gave them plenty of road when they heard the horn blowing.

Jeeter could not talk, because he was holding his breath most of the time. The swiftness of the car frightened him so badly he could not answer Bessie's questions. She looked grimly ahead most of the time, proud of her automobile and hoping that the negroes and farmers they pa.s.sed in the fields beside the road would know it belonged to her instead of thinking it was Jeeter's or Dude's.

It was between noon and one o'clock when they reached the half-way point. Augusta was then only a little over seven miles away, and when they got to the top of the last hill they would be able to see the city down in the valley beside the big muddy river.

The last hill they had to climb before reaching that point was a long one. It was a mile and a half from the creek at the bottom to the filling-station on top, and they were about half way up, when suddenly the car slowed down to a few miles an hour. The water was boiling in the engine and radiator, and steam shot higher than the top of the wind-s.h.i.+eld. The engine was making a great noise. It sounded as if it were knocking in the same way that Jeeter's old car had, only a little harder and a little louder.

"What's the matter with us?" Bessie said, leaning over the door and looking around outside.

"It must have got hot climbing the bill," Dude said. "I don't know what else is wrong with it."

They went a hundred yards and the car stopped. The engine choked down, and steam whistled out of the pipes like pistons on a freight train at the coal chute.

Jeeter jumped out and shoved a big rock under the rear wheel before Dude could put on the brake. The car stopped rolling backward.

"What's the matter with it, Dude?" Bessie said again. "Is something gone wrong?"

"I reckon it just got hot," he said.

He made no effort to get out. He sat under the steering-wheel, grasping it tightly and jerking it from side to side as far as it would go. Presently he began blowing the horn again.

"That won't help it none, Dude," Jeeter said. "You'll wear out that durn horn before you know it, if you keeping doing that all the time. Why don't you get out and try to do something?"

Several automobiles pa.s.sed them at high speed, going up the hill and coming down, but none of them slowed up or stopped to offer help.

Another car was coming slowly up the hill behind them. It was coming very slowly in low gear, and it was steaming like Bessie's new car. As it chugged slowly past them, some of the negroes leaned out and looked at the stalled automobile.

One of them called to Jeeter.

"What's the matter with your automobile, white-folks? It looks like it ain't going to run no more."

"By G.o.d and by Jesus!" Jeeter said, angrily. "What's your name, n.i.g.g.e.r? Where you from?"

"We come from Burke County," he said. "What you want to know that for, white-folks?"

Before Jeeter could say anything more, the negroes' car was a hundred yards up the hill, and gaining speed. Jeeter had been going to make them pull Bessie's car up the hill, if he could have stopped them.

Dude cranked up the engine and put the car into gear. Jeeter and Bessie hopped on the running-board just in time, because Dude soon had the car going fast. The engine had cooled, and they were going faster than the negroes' car. They gained on the car ahead and were getting ready to pa.s.s it, when suddenly the engine began knocking louder than ever, and they came to a stop.

"This is the durndest automobile I ever saw," Jeeter said. "It don't do the same thing long enough to make me accustomed."

They had stopped this time on top of the hill. Dude was getting ready to let it roll down, when Jeeter saw the filling-station, and he told Dude to wait a minute.

"I'll bring some water and put it in," he said.

He crossed the road and went into the filling-station. He was back in a few minutes carrying a bucket of water. The man who ran the station came out with him.

While Jeeter was uns.c.r.e.w.i.n.g the radiator cap, the other man was raising the hood to measure the oil.

"The trouble with you people, brother," he said, "is you ain't got a drop of oil in your car. Your bearings is burned out. How far did you come from?"

Jeeter told him they lived near Fuller on the old tobacco road.

"You've already ruined your new car," he said. "That's a shame. I hate to see people who don't know no better ruining automobiles."

"What's wrong with it now?" Bessie said.

"Your new car is ruined, sister. It'll take a gallon and a half of oil to put enough in it to run on. Do you want me to fill it up for you?"

"How much does it cost?" Bessie said.

"A dollar and a half."

"I didn't aim to pay out money on it."

"Well, it won't run no more unless you put oil in it. It looks to me like you didn't have enough in it to start with."

"I ain't got but two dollars," she said. "I was going to buy gasoline with most of that."

"Me and Dude ain't got none," Jeeter said. "But when I sell this load of wood, I'll have a dollar and a half, maybe."

"You pour the oil into it," Bessie said. "I don't want to ruin my new automobile. I bought it brand new in Fuller yesterday."

"It's already ruined, sister," the man said, "but you'll have to put oil in it if you're going in to Augusta and back to Fuller again."

They waited while he poured the oil in, and then Bessie gave him the money. She had the bills tied in a handkerchief, and it took her several minutes to untie the hard knots.

Dude started the engine, and they moved slowly off the hill-top and rolled down the long grade to Augusta. The car was like new again by the time they reached the bottom of the hill, but the engine made more noise than the one in Jeeter's car. The bearings and connecting rods were so loose they made a jingling sound when the car was going more than fifteen miles an hour down hill.

Sixteen.

Three hours had already been spent in trying to sell the load of blackjack. Apparently there was not a man in Augusta who wanted to buy it. At some of the houses Jeeter went to, the people at first said they needed wood, but after they had asked him how much he wanted for it they were suspicious. Jeeter told them he was asking only a dollar, and then they asked him if he were selling split pine at that small price. He had to explain that it was blackjack, and not even sawn into stove lengths. The next thing he knew the door was slammed in his face, and he had to go to the next house and try again.

At a little after six o'clock the wood was stifi piled on the back seat of the car, and no buyer was in sight. Jeeter began stopping people on the streets in a final and desperate effort to dispose of the wood at fifty cents; but the men and women he approached took one look at the blackjack piled on the car and walked off, evidently thinking it was a joke of some kind. n.o.body was foolish enough to buy blackjack when pine wood burned better and was less trouble to use.

"I don't know what we're going to do," Jeeter told Bessie. "It's getting almost too late to go back home, and n.o.body wants to buy wood no more. I used to sell it with no effort any time I brought a load up here."

Dude said he was hungry, and that he wanted to go Somewhere and eat. Sister Bessie had half a dollar; Jeeter had nothing. Dude, of course, had nothing.

Jeeter had planned to sell the wood for a dollar, and then to buy some meat and meal to take home to eat; but he did not know what to do now. He turned to Bessie questioningly.

"Maybe we better start back toward Fuller," she said. "I can buy two gallons of gasoline, and that ought to be enough,"

"Ain't we going to eat nothing?" Dude said. "My poor belly is as dry as the drought."

"Maybe we could sell something else," Jeeter said, looking at the automobile. "I don't know what we has to sell, though."

"We ain't going to sell my new auto automobile," Bessie said quickly. "It was brand new only yesteday. That's one thing n.o.body ain't going to sell."

Jeeter looked the car over from front to back.

"No, I wouldn't think of doing nothing like that. But you know, Bessie, maybe we could sell a wee biddy piece of it, sort of."

He walked around the car and grasped the spare tire and wheel in his hands. He shook it violently.

"It's near about loose, anyhow," he said. "It wouldn't hurt the new car none, Bessie."

"Well, I reckon we got to," she said slowly. "That tire and wheel ain't doing us no good, noway. We can't ride on but four of them at a time, and five is a big waste."

They drove around the block until they found a garage. Jeeter went in and made inquiry. A man came out, took the tire and wheel off, and rolled it through the garage door.

Jeeter came walking briskly across the street, holding out several green notes. He counted them one by one before Bessie and Dude. "Ain't we lucky folks, though?" he said.

"How much money did it bring?" she asked.

"He said three dollars was more than enough, but that much sounded like a heap of money to me. And here it is! Ain't they pretty and new, though? Out there at Fuller all the money I ever saw was just about ready to fall apart, it was that worn out. Up here in Augusta the people has got good money."

The next stop was a small grocery store. Jeeter got out and bought a large sack of soda crackers and two pounds of yellow cheese. He came back to the car and offered the food to Dude and Bessie. They all broke off chunks of cheese and stuffed their mouths full of crackers.

"Just help yourself, Bessie," he said. "Take all you want. Run your hand in the poke and eat until you is full. Dude, there, might hog it all if you don't take care of your own wants."

Jeeter was feeling fine. It was the first time since he could remember that he had been to Augusta and could get something to eat when he wanted it. He smiled at Bessie and Dude, and waved to people pa.s.sing along the street. When a woman pa.s.sed, he took off his hat and bowed.

"Augusta is a fine place," he said. "All these people here is just like us. They is rich, but that don't make no difference to me. I like everybody now."

"Where is we going now?" Bessie said.

"There's a place to sleep right above the store," Jeeter said. "Supposing we sleep in there to-night, and then tomorrow morning sell the wood--ain't that what we ought to do?"

Dude liked the suggestion, but Bessie hesitated. It looked to her as if it might cost a lot of money to spend the night in the hotel.

"Maybe it will cost too much," she said. "You go upstairs and see how much it costs."

Jeeter stuffed another handful of crackers and cheese in his mouth, and went up the flight of stairs where the hotel was. There was a small sign over the door, dimly lighted, which said it was a hotel.

"They'll let us stay for fifty cents apiece," he said. "They is pretty much crowded, and there ain't but one room vacant, but we can stay if we wants to. I sure do, don't you, Bessie? I ain't never stayed all night in a hotel before."

Bessie by that time had set her heart on spending a night in a hotel in the city, and she was ready to go up the stairs when Jeeter said it would cost fifty cents for each of them.

"Now you hold on tight to that money, Jeeter," she said. "That's a heap of money to lose. You don't want to let it get away from you."