Of Love and Dust

  I stopped when I got to the end and looked back, and he already had the sack hanging on his shoulder. It had happened like this. I wasn’t there, now, I was here on the tractor; but I had seen it happen before and I knew what had taken place.

  “All right,” Bonbon had said. “Your arm getting tired. Here, try this.”

  He had untied the sack and thrown it down on the ground before Marcus. Marcus had picked it up and looked at it, but he didn’t know what he was supposed to do.

  “Look it over good,” Bonbon had probably said. “It be part of you ’fore that sun go down there.”

  Marcus had probably stood there fumbling with it a minute, while all the time Bonbon had leaned a little on the pommel of the saddle, looking down at him. The horse had stood there sweating a little and hoping that Marcus would hurry up and find out what the sack was about so he could start moving again. He didn’t mind carrying Bonbon (he was born to carry man), but he would rather move with Bonbon or two like Bonbon than stand with one Bonbon in that hot sun.

  Marcus finally understood what the sack was about and slipped it over his shoulder. Now he started pulling corn and putting it in the sack. He was so weak now he had to jerk on an ear of corn sometimes three times before he could break it off. A dozen ears of corn in the sack, and already the sack felt like it weighed a hundred pounds. Already the rope had started to eat through that green shirt at his shoulder. Five more ears of corn, and the sack felt twice as heavy. Five more, and poor Marcus could hardly move. And Bonbon never saying a word, just leaning a little on the pommel of the saddle like he had all the time in the world.

  Marcus staggered when he tried to swing the sack on his back, so he dropped it on the ground and dragged it toward the tractor. I had parked the tractor on the headland, John and Freddie had moved up against the trailer in the shade, and the three of us watched Marcus dragging the sack toward the end. When he came up to the tractor he rested about ten seconds, then he swung the sack up on the trailer. He climbed up and dumped it, then he jumped back down and went back down the row. Bonbon hadn’t moved—I ought to say the horse hadn’t moved—Bonbon had straightened up in the saddle and he was watching a hawk flying in the sky just to his right. There was a little pecan tree fifty or sixty yards farther down the headland, and the hawk flew there and rested on one of the top limbs. Bonbon let him rest a minute, like he wanted to give him a fair shake; then I saw him pulling the Winchester slowly out of the sling and raising it to his shoulder. The first shot chipped off piece of the limb, just close enough to make the hawk fly away. The hawk broke from the tree and flew across the field. I saw Bonbon moving the rifle slowly and I saw the sun on the barrel (blue-like) and my eyes went to the hawk. I heard the pi-yow-yow of the Winchester, and I saw two or three feathers busting away from the hawk, and I saw the hawk coming down over the field like a wet shirt that somebody had thrown up in the air.

  “Chicken there, Freddie,” Bonbon called to the headland.

  “Yassuh,” Freddie said, already running over to where the hawk had come down.

  Bonbon put the rifle back and touched the horse lightly to make him move. By the time Freddie got back with the hawk, Marcus and Bonbon had got to the end and Marcus had climbed up on the trailer to dump his sack.

  “Where I get him?” Bonbon asked Freddie.

  “Poor little thing ain’t got no more heart,” Freddie said.

  All of us looked at Freddie holding the hawk up in the air. The hawk was mostly gray and brown, but there were some red and black feathers across its wings and its back. When I said all of us were looking at the hawk, I should have said all of us were looking at the hawk except Marcus. Marcus was looking at Bonbon. He had probably glanced at the hawk once, but he started looking at Bonbon after. But I didn’t know it then. It wasn’t until later I knew he had been looking at Bonbon a long time.

  “Had the pistol I could get him with that,” Bonbon said.

  “Pistol go that far, Mr. Sidney?” Freddie asked. He was still holding the hawk up so everybody could see it.

  “Pistol can go, you just got to know how to shoot it,” Bonbon said.

  “If anybody can, you can, Mr. Sidney,” Freddie said.

  “I do all right,” Bonbon said.

  Then I saw him turning and looking at Marcus. He didn’t look straight at him, he looked at him from the side. And from the way Marcus stood there looking back at Bonbon, I could tell he had been looking at him a long time. So it was Bonbon who let me know Marcus had been looking at him and not at the hawk. And it was the look in Marcus’s face that let me know Bonbon hadn’t given the hawk a break when he didn’t shoot him on the limb; he had shot twice because he wanted to show Marcus how good he was.

  Bonbon turned from Marcus and looked across the field at the sun. I could hear the sagg-sagg of the saddle when he shifted his weight from one side to the other.

  “Move her, Geam,” he said.

  Freddie tied his hawk on the back of the trailer with a piece of twine, and Marcus tied his sack on the back of the trailer by the rope. We started back down the field, and Marcus kept up with them about halfway down. Then he fell back and had to get the sack again. Bonbon and the horse were right behind him all the way.

  9

  When we got to the front it was dark already. Everybody else had come out the field, and you could see the smoke flying out the kitchen chimleys where the women were cooking supper, and you could see the men sitting or laying down on the gallery, waiting for the food to get done so they could eat. I dropped Marcus off at the house; then I went up to Freddie’s house and let him and his girlfriend off; then I went on up to the yard. My other two trailers had been emptied and pulled to the side, so now I parked the two full trailers before the crib. That’s how it went. You brought two trailerfuls at noon and the boys emptied them that evening. Then you brought two trailerfuls that night and the boys emptied them the next morning. It went on like that until you got through; then you went into hay. But hay was out of the question for at least another month.

  After I had unhooked Red Hannah from the two trailers, I parked her over by the toolshop and went over to the store to get something for supper. The store was packed full of people. Old Godeau (with his clubfoot) and his son Ferdinand moved from one counter to the other. I knew I couldn’t get waited on right then, so I went around the other side and had myself a couple beers. You could buy soft drinks in the store or if you were a white man you could drink a beer in there, but if you were colored you had to go to the little side room—“the nigger room.” I kept telling myself, “One of these days I’m going to stop this, I’m going to stop this; I’m a man like any other man and one of these days I’m going to stop this.” But I never did. Either I was too thirsty to do it, or after I had been working in the field all day I was just too tired and just didn’t care. So I went around there and had a beer with Burl, Snuke, and a couple others from the quarter. They asked me about Marcus and how he made out with Bonbon today. I told them all right. They looked at me, waiting to hear more, but I didn’t have any more to say. Then Tick-Tock came in and I bought her a beer. Tick-Tock was a single gal in the quarter and she would give you a piece if you treated her right. I had gotten couple pieces from her myself. But we didn’t have anything going for us; it was just friendly. I needed a piece at the time and I asked her for it and she said yes. I didn’t give her any money because she didn’t want any money. But any time I caught her out somewhere I would buy her a drink, or if I saw her at one of the house fairs I would buy her a bowl of gumbo or a fish dinner. Now I bought her a beer, and we leaned on the counter drinking and talking. She hadn’t been home since leaving the cotton field, and I could see sweat marks down the side of her face. Somebody put a nickel in the jukebox and asked her to dance. She danced with him and came back where I was. I bought her another beer and left.

  When I came home I saw Marcus laying on the gallery. He looked like somebody had beat him with an eight-plait whip and left him there to die
.

  “Hey,” I called to him. “Hey, there.”

  He raised up slowly and looked at me.

  “Brought you a beer,” I said. “Come on in.”

  He got up real slowly and followed me inside. I turned on the light and opened the bottle of beer for him. He took it and sat down at the table. I could see how that rope had ate through the shoulder of that green shirt.

  “Why don’t you take a bath,” I said. “You’ll feel better.”

  “You a freak or something?” he said.

  I went up to him and snatched the beer out of his hand and threw it out the window.

  “Now, get the fuck out of here,” I said. “Get out.”

  “I’m sorry,” he said.

  “You’re not sorry, you rotten sonofabitch. You think somebody got to kiss your ass to get along with you.”

  “What you expect?” he said. “Don’t get mad? Look at me. Look at the blisters in my hands. I been working like a mule all day.”

  “You should have thought about that before you killed that boy.”

  “He was go’n kill me,” Marcus said, his voice getting a little higher than it ought to be. “Ain’t I done said a thousand times he was go’n kill me? What I was suppose to do, stand there and let him kill me first?”

  “Then you should have kept your ass in Bayonne,” I said. “I’m getting tired of this shit.”

  “I said I was sorry. What you want a man to say?”

  I stood there looking at him. I was sorry I had hollered at him now.

  “I’ll get out,” he said. But he was getting up slowly, hoping I would tell him to stay.

  “Sit down,” I said. “You got another beer there. You can either drink it now or with your food.”

  “Can I have it now?”

  I opened it and gave it to him; then I started cooking. I had bought a pound of sausage, and I already had tomatoes and onions at the house; so I threw all that together and put on a pot of rice to go with it. I usually ate before I bathed, but since he was there to watch the pot, I went on and took my bath. The food was ready by the time I got out the tub and put on my clothes.

  “I ain’t cut out for this kind of life, Jim,” Marcus said.

  “No?” I said.

  “Look at me,” he said, looking down at his clothes. “This ain’t me.”

  “It’s you,” I said.

  “I can’t go on like this,” he said, looking up at me again.

  “You can,” I said. “Others do.”

  “Not me,” he said.

  “Well, you should have thought about that before you pulled that knife,” I said.

  “How many times I done told you he pulled his knife first?” Marcus said, his voice getting high again. He had a nice voice until he got excited, then it got high. “How many times I done told you that, Jim?” he said.

  “Yeah, you told me,” I said. “How’s the food?”

  “It’s good.”

  “It keeps me going,” I said.

  “You all right, Jim,” Marcus said. “I’m sorry what I say. Don’t pay me no mind.”

  “Forget it,” I said.

  “Look at me,” he said, holding out his hands. “I can’t even hold a fork right.”

  I looked at his hands. Both of them were blistered and raw.

  “Soak them in some warm salt water,” I said.

  “That help?”

  “Help some.”

  “How ’bout my shoulders?”

  “Bathe it in some salt water. I’ll give you a towel. And tomorrow wear another piece of rag over your shoulder. Keep you from bruising it.”

  “Jesus, have mercy,” Marcus said. “Did he have to put that rope on the sack? Couldn’t he put a strap or something?”

  “It won’t kill you,” I said.

  “No, I ain’t go’n die, that’s for sure.”

  “You going to run?” I asked him.

  “Yeah; one day.”

  “Don’t try it,” I said.

  “I ain’t go’n put up with this, Jim. I wasn’t cut out for it.”

  “Nobody was,” I said. “He wasn’t either.”

  “Him?” Marcus said, dropping the fork in his plate and looking at me like he wanted to come over there at me. “Him?” he said.

  “Him,” I said.

  Marcus still wanted to come across that table at me, but tired and bruised as he was he knew he would have got the worst of it.

  “I don’t know ’bout you, Jim,” he said. “You ain’t no whitemouth—I don’t think so—but I don’t know ’bout you.”

  “I know,” I said. “You better finish eating there and take yourself a good bath and get yourself some rest. Tomorrow is another day, and it won’t be any better.”

  10

  After I had washed the dishes, I got my guitar from against the wall and went out on the gallery. It was pitch-black out there. The moon had risen but it was still behind the trees. Somebody passed by the gate, going toward the church. I looked up the quarter and I could see the light in the four church windows. Prayer meeting was going on now. It had been going on about a month and it probably would go on another month. The last I heard, they had five candidates for baptism.

  I sat on the steps and started playing my guitar. I thought about Billie Jean and played softly at first, then I tried to forget her and played something fast and hard. But I thought about her again and went back to the soft thing, then I tried to forget her and went back on the hard. After a while Jobbo came up there with his harp. Jobbo lived on the place and he was very good with a harp. He should have gone up North and made his living blowing harp, but he was the kind of nigger who was born to live and die in the South.

  Marcus came out there and sat down with us. He had bathed and changed clothes, and now he looked a little better.

  “Play?” I said.

  “Little bit,” he said.

  “Want try it?”

  “With these hands?”

  “Hands messed up, hunh?” Jobbo said.

  “Yeah,” Marcus said.

  “Soak them in some warm salt water,” Jobbo said.

  “I did that.”

  “They be okay in a week.”

  “Man, this place is black,” Marcus said. “Good Lord.”

  “Yeah, it’s pretty black, all right,” Jobbo said, looking around like he hadn’t seen it dark like this before.

  “That’s a church up there?” Marcus asked.

  “Yeah, that’s one,” Jobbo said.

  “Got any single women hanging round up there?”

  “Couple, I guess,” Jobbo said.

  “I mean selling pussy?” Marcus said.

  “That, I don’t know,” Jobbo said.

  “Think I’ll go up there,” Marcus said.

  “Again, huh?” I said.

  “That hot bath,” Marcus said. “Always happen when I take a hot bath. Can’t keep this thing down.”

  We watched him go out of the yard. After he turned from the gate we couldn’t see him any more for the picket fence.

  “Trying to kill hisself, huh?” Jobbo said.

  “Bonbon won’t let that happen,” I said.

  “No, Bonbon go’n keep him ’live a while,” Jobbo said. “You know, they buried that other boy today.”

  “Did they?”

  “Yeah, they buried him. Jack Claiborn went to Port Allen. Said he heard people talking ’bout it. I feel sorry for people like Marcus.”

  “He doesn’t,” I said.

  “I can see that,” Jobbo said. “It don’t mean a thing to him.”

  Just about then we saw the car lights coming down the quarter. When it went by the gate we saw it wasn’t a car, it was Bonbon in the truck. He was going down to Pauline.

  “Guess he need little piece tonight, too,” Jobbo said.

  “Guess so,” I said.

  “Guess what?” Jobbo said.

  “What?”

  “Bonbon wife looked at Bo today.”

  “Bonbon’s wife’s
been looking at niggers ever since I’ve been here,” I said.

  “Look at you, too?”

  “Ain’t she looked at you?”

  “Yeah, but I ain’t crazy,” Jobbo said. “But that might be some pretty good little old stuff, though.”

  “Try it any time you want to,” I told him.

  “No, thanks,” Jobbo said. “I ain’t ready to die yet.”

  I thought about Bonbon’s little yellow-head wife sitting on that gallery looking up every time somebody went by the gate. I tried to vision what it would be like to bounce between those little skinny thighs. I tried to vision what it would be like to even see her smiling. I had been on that plantation over three years and all that time I had never seen her smile once. I had never heard her say anything either—but Aunt Margaret, who worked up there for them, did say she knew how to talk. Aunt Margaret said she would say something softly to her every now and then; or something to little Tite Bonbon, her little girl, every now and then; or something to Bonbon when he was there. But that wasn’t too often. Because when Bonbon wasn’t in the field or hunting in the woods, he was either in Bayonne selling something he had stole from Marshall Hebert or he was down the quarter in Pauline’s bed. So she never said too much to him. And I guess that’s why she never said too much to anyone else either. She just sat there on that gallery and looked at you when you went by, like she wished you would come in there, like she was waiting for you to try.

  “Let’s get Key to the Highway,” I said.

  I started plucking it real slow and sad, because now I had forgot about Bonbon or Pauline or Bonbon’s little suffering wife. I was thinking about my own baby now and I wondered where she was and what she was doing. Jobbo picked up the tune after I had gone a couple bars, and if there’s any man can play a sad tune sadder than Jobbo, Lord knows, I never heard him. We went on like that a few minutes—me sad, Jobbo sadder—then I told Jobbo to stop. I couldn’t take it any more.