The Road to Memphis

by Mildred D. Taylor

  Moe’s eyes met mine. “It’s not the fan belt we’re talking ’bout, Cassie. Take a look at the car.”

  I looked from him to Stacey and turned. It was then that I saw the ring that gouged the car. The beautiful, wine-colored finish was now marred by a deep, ugly scratch that ringed the car and festered like a sore under the rising sun. I glanced at Stacey, and what had been fear in me now was pure rage. This is what those men had done to my brother’s fine new car. “Those men at the gas station, they did this.”

  “Good guess,” said Willie.

  “They did it when I left the car. They did it when I was gone and Clarence was sleeping. I should’ve stayed there.”

  “Best you weren’t there,” said Moe. “‘Sides, none of this would’ve happened we hadn’t been on the road in the first place.”

  “What y’all doing laying blame on yourselves for?” asked Little Willie. “Y’all don’t hear Stacey laying no blame!”

  “Good,” said Clarence. “’cause I was sitting right up in that car all the time myself and ain’t heard nothing.”

  “Yeah, sleeping!” admonished Little Willie. “What’s the matter with you, anyway, boy? ’round here sleeping all the time?”

  Clarence shrugged. “Sorry, Stace. I shoulda heard ’em. Don’t know what’s the matter with me. Maybe it’s this here B.C. I been taking . . .”

  “Like Willie said, I’m not laying blame. Leastways to nobody here.”

  I studied the car closely. “Maybe . . . maybe like Willie said, you can fix it, Stacey. You can’t fix it, maybe you can find somebody—”

  “Said I don’t want it fixed, Cassie! I don’t want to fix it, and I don’t want anybody else to fix it either!” He stepped away. “We get in this war and I have to go fight, this here car can just remind me ’bout what all Mississippi done for me. I go to fight, I don’t want to forget I’ll probably be shooting at the wrong white folks.” With that said he abruptly turned and started for the road.

  “Where you going now?” I called.

  “Up to see if maybe I can’t find something open so we can get that fan belt and get out of here. There ought to be a town not far from here.”

  “Well, I’ll be walking on with you, then,” decided Little Willie. “Maybe we’ll even meet up with Aunt Hannah Mays and get some more of them pies of hers. Them pies are good!”

  “You going too?” I asked Moe as he started after them.

  “Just as far as the road. Need to stretch my legs.”

  I watched them walk off, then I took off for the bushes. When I got back, Clarence was stretched out again, this time on the backseat of the car. I stuck my head inside. “That headache still bothering you? Don’t you feel any better?”

  He gave me a dull look. “Can’t seem to get rid of it, Cassie.”

  “You got any more BCs?”

  “Took my last one in the night.” He was speaking softly, as if it pained him to talk. I spoke softly too.

  “Anything I can do for you?”

  “Naw,” he said and closed his eyes.

  I slid into the front seat, curled my legs under me, then turned to face him. “You know, Clarence, I’ve been thinking about Sissy.”

  “I been thinking ’bout her, too, for all the good that’s doing,” he confided, his eyes still closed, his voice still soft. “She ain’t nothing but a misery.”

  “Now, you know that’s not so,” I contested. “That child’s crazy about you.”

  Clarence grunted.

  “I’ve been thinking I shouldn’t’ve told you what I did about Sissy. I’ve been thinking maybe I shouldn’t’ve broken my promise to her, especially since you went right back and told her I told you—”

  “Sorry ’bout that, Cassie.”

  “Found out you can’t be trusted with anything.”

  “Look who’s talking.”

  “Yeah, well . . . forget all that. Time for you to be thinking about making things up to Sissy.”

  He opened his eyes now. “Ah, Cassie, come on, now! Said I’m through with that girl, and I mean that thing!”

  “You through with that baby too? Tell me you haven’t been thinking about that child. Tell me you haven’t been thinking about how much you care about Sissy.”

  “You worrying me, Cassie.” His eyes closed again, and he was quiet for some time. I didn’t bother him. I just stared at him until he had to look at me again. “Cassie, look,” he said, raising his arm behind his head and resting against it, “even if I was in a mind to make it up to Sissy, she won’t listen.”

  “You talk, she will. She just wants you to make her listen. Why you think she came all the way to Strawberry to talk to you?”

  “Well, don’t matter no way. I ain’t likely to get me a pass to go home again till Christmas. She be stubborn as a mule by then.”

  “Don’t you know how to write?”

  He stared at me as if the thought were foreign to him. “What?”

  “Write her, Clarence!”

  “Lord, Cassie, my head is splitting—”

  “Well, maybe writing Sissy’ll take your mind off your head.”

  “Don’t have no paper.”

  “I can fix that,” I said and opened the glove compartment. As I rummaged through it I found a brush and comb as well as a black ribbon and pulled them out. I found a note pad and a pencil and gave them to Clarence. “It doesn’t have to be a long letter now, just a few words telling her how you feel about her and the baby. You can mail it in Memphis.”

  Clarence looked at the paper. “I ain’t much on writin’ letters, Cassie. I can’t half spell.”

  “Don’t you ever write Sissy from that base?”

  He looked at me with a shamefaced grin.

  I let him have it. “Boy, you ought to be ashamed of yourself! Here this girl just crazy to death about you—don’t ask me why! Talking about your love is blessed and all that kind of thing, and about how proud she is to be carrying your baby, and here you haven’t even been writing that child all these weeks you’ve been away. Can’t even find a few words to tell her on a piece of paper not much bigger than a postage stamp, and then you got the nerve to be calling yourself mad because Sissy was trying to keep her pride and not force you into anything! Negro, I’d let you go!”

  “Well, that’s what Sissy done.”

  “Well, maybe she was right, then.” Clarence studied the blank note pad and didn’t say anything. I watched him, then, disgusted with the whole mess, got out of the car. “Well, I’m through with it. You write the letter or not, it’s up to you. I just know one thing. I sure am glad I’m not in love.”

  Clarence glanced up as if to speak, but there wasn’t anything else I wanted to hear from him. I took the comb and brush, left the car, and went over and sat on a stump. I undid my hair, combed it out and brushed it, then tied it back with the ribbon. As I finished I saw Moe coming and went to meet him. “See anybody on the road?”

  “Couple of cars passed, that’s all,” he said

  I folded my arms across my chest and shivered. “Well, I’m hoping it won’t take too long for Stacey and Willie to get back here. I don’t feel none too comfortable in this place.”

  “You cold?”

  “I’m okay. Kind of hungry, though.”

  “Well, what ’bout some of that food Oliver packed? Or maybe some of them store-bought pies? Willie said they was mighty good.”

  I cocked my head toward two stumps. “We can sit there and eat. Be like a picnic.”

  “All right. You go ’head and sit down. I’ll get the food.”

  I gave Moe the comb and brush to take back, and he went to the car. Soon he returned, carrying one of Oliver’s bags in his hands. “What was Clarence doing?” I asked as he settled beside me.

  “Sleeping.”

  “Already? Again?”

  Moe shrugged and served the food. We each took a chunk of pie and a piece of chicken. We ate hungrily, then split a third piece of pie and a chicken breast. As I finished off my fi
rst bite of this second helping, I studied Moe. He hadn’t said much of anything since we had started eating. “Moe? You all right?” I asked after a while. “You been so quiet.”

  Moe took another bite of pie, swallowed, then looked at me. “I near to killed them boys, Cassie. How can I be all right?” I waited for him to tell me. He looked at me and away again. His shoulders bent as he settled an elbow on each knee and stared out at the glade. The slice of pie seemed forgotten in his hand. “I don’t know what come over me, Cassie, to go hit Statler and Leon and Troy like that. I been through a lot worse with these white folks down here, and I know how they are. I wasn’t ’tending to hit nobody, hurt nobody. Maybe I should’ve stood what Statler done. Remember that time Josie Wallace spat right in my face? Didn’t use a crowbar then.”

  “Maybe you should’ve.”

  “You know . . . one of them boys could be dead. Maybe I killed one of ’em.” He looked at me, his eyes full of hurt and pain. “Cassie . . . Cassie, what if any of them boys die? What if any of them already dead? I could be a murderer and not even know it. Maybe . . . maybe I done took a life, Cassie . . . .”

  I searched for words to comfort him. “Well . . . you were talking about becoming a soldier. You’d’ve been killing folks you were in a war.”

  He shook his head. “Not the same thing. Not the same . . . .”

  “In a way . . . it is . . . .”

  “I can’t go back, Cassie, I can’t never go back.”

  “Maybe one day.”

  He seemed not to hear me. “I know I shouldn’t’ve done it, but it’s just that I figure no man got a right to be laying his hands on another man that way and laughing at him about it. Just don’t figure nobody got that right, and then Statler said what he done ’bout you. Well . . . a man don’t like to hear that kinda talk ’bout his womenfolks.”

  I smiled. “His womenfolks?” I teased. “Since when did I become one of your womenfolks?”

  He ventured a look at me. “Guess you think I’m a fool, huh?”

  “Now, what would I be thinking that for, Moe? I’m glad you hit them.”

  He shrugged and looked at the ground. “I was so scared, Cassie. All that time Statler was talking to me I was so scared . . . then he knocked me on the head like that. Like I wasn’t nothing. Like I wasn’t no man at all! Right in front of you too! I—I ain’t wanted you to think me less’n a man, Cassie. Couldn’t’ve stood it, for you to think that.”

  “I wouldn’t’ve thought that,” I said quietly. I wanted to tell him about what had happened at the gas station so he would know that I understood, I mean, that I really understood. But I knew that, like Stacey, if he knew, if any of them knew what had happened to me and they went back, they could possibly be killed or imprisoned, so I did not tell him. Instead all I said was “I know what you feeling, Moe. I do. Really.”

  He shook his head. “How could ya?” He was silent for a long time. He ate the rest of his pie. I ate mine too. When he was finished, he spoke again, “I’m kinda glad I’m on my way to Chicago, Cassie. Ain’t glad ’bout how come, but ya know how sometimes a body talks and talks ’bout doing a thing but can’t make up his mind to go ’head? How sometimes your mind just gotta get made up for ya? Well, that’s what’s happened with me. I can get me a good job there in Chicago—”

  “Job? Thought you were going in the Army so fast.”

  “Don’t figure I can now. Army get to checking on me, they’ll send me back.”

  “Well, anyway, maybe some good’ll be coming out of all this.”

  “Guess you right.” He smiled. “Chicago. Be making plenty of money up there. Maybe I’ll even find myself two jobs. Maybe I’ll get to making so much money I can send you something back for your schooling.”

  “How come you always worrying so much about me?” I questioned. “Like I told you before, you get yourself some money, you best be seeing to your own schooling.”

  “Yeah . . . I know you told me that. But you going places, Cassie, and I wanna help you—anyway I can.” He looked away shyly; then suddenly he turned back, leaned over, and kissed me, flat on my mouth. It was a quick kiss, a mere brush of his lips against mine, but it surprised me. Moe had never kissed me before.

  “What you do that for?” I asked, as if it were a puzzle I was trying to solve. I didn’t feel uncomfortable about the kiss. I just wanted to understand it.

  He shrugged. “Oh, I don’t know. Just got moved to do it, I s’pose. What?” he asked, his eyes smiling. “Am I crazy?”

  “You’re the one said it.”

  “Yeah,” he admitted with a laugh. “Yeah . . . guess so. That’s what some folks keep telling me, anyway: I’m crazy.” He looked away from me. “Cassie . . . Cassie, there’s something I been wanting to ask you—”

  He didn’t get the chance. Two white men carrying shotguns emerged abruptly from the forest and came toward us. We got up from the stumps. The men eyed us, then the older of them said good day and asked what we were doing there. Being quicker with my mouth than Moe, I answered. “Had car trouble.”

  The man glanced over at the Ford. “That car yonder?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  The man looked at Moe. “That your car, boy?”

  Moe cleared his throat. “No, sir.”

  “Whose is it, then?”

  “This here girl’s brother’s.”

  “Well, where he at?”

  Moe again cleared his throat. “Gone to see if maybe he couldn’t fine a place where he can buy us a fan belt for it. Fan belt on it’s shot.”

  “Ain’t gonna find no place ’round here open on a Sunday mornin’ ’less’n he go back a ways to that highway truckstop. That where he gone?”

  “’Fraid I don’t know,” answered Moe. “He just took off walking.”

  The man squinted, then went over to the car and walked slowly around it. He saw Clarence sleeping in back and stopped. “What y’all doin’ this far off the road?”

  Moe hesitated; I didn’t. “Pulled in here to sleep.”

  “This far off the road?”

  “Yes, sir. Couldn’t park on the highway and didn’t want to park on that road leading in. Just wanted to sleep. But then when we woke up and tried to get this car started, it just wouldn’t start. Found that fan belt busted.”

  The man grunted, seeming to think that tale plausible, and walked to the front of the Ford. “Let me see that fan belt ya talkin’ ’bout.”

  “Her brother, he took it with him,” said Moe.

  “Well, let me see under here anyway.” He gave the hood a slap.

  Moe and I looked at each other, then Moe went over and put up the hood. The man stooped down to look. After a few moments he straightened. “My boy here and me, we maybe have what ya need. Y’all goin’ a spell, it won’t last ya long, but it oughta do ya till ya get to a city. Can pick another one up there.” He motioned to Moe. “You, boy, come on with us. Keep us a lotta old parts up at the house. You can find what you need, you can have it.”

  Moe glanced at me, then back at the man. “Thank you kindly, sir, but we don’t wanna cause you no trouble—”

  “Ain’t no trouble,” said the man, then he turned and started back into the woods with his son.

  “I best go with them,” Moe told me.

  “Are you crazy?” I hissed. “You can’t go with them!”

  “I gotta, Cassie, else they be wonderin’ why—”

  “Let them wonder—”

  “Look, Cassie, they might just have what we need, and could be Stacey and Little Willie won’t be finding a fan belt in that town. They don’t, then what do we do?”

  The man stopped and looked back. “’Ey, boy! You comin’?”

  Moe nodded and moved off. I caught his arm. “I’m going to wake Clarence so we can go with you.”

  “No! Y’all wait here for Stacey.”

  “But, Moe—”

  “Got no time, Cassie,” he said and pulled away. “Got no time.” As he turned I saw his fear. I
think he saw mine, too, but he left me anyway.

  I returned to the car, figuring to wake Clarence; but I didn’t. There was nothing that Clarence could do except go after Moe, and maybe that would just make things worse. Maybe all three of us should have gone with the men, and just left a note for Stacey and Little Willie, but the men might have wondered about that too. Anyway, the decision was made. Moe was gone. I leaned against a tree and waited. I felt all alone.

  Finally Stacey and Little Willie returned. “What’s the matter?” Stacey asked when I ran to meet them. He glanced around the glade. “Where’s Moe and Clarence?”

  I told them.

  “That fool, he done what?” exclaimed Willie.

  “How long ago Moe leave?” asked Stacey.

  “About an hour. Think we ought to try and find him?”

  “You got any idea where to look?”

  “Just know which way they went,” I said, pointing to the east.

  Stacey stared out at the forest and heaved a heavy sigh.

  “Well, anyway,” said Little Willie, “look on the bright side. Leastways maybe he’ll come back with the fan belt we need.”

  “You didn’t get one?”

  “Couldn’t find any place open.” Stacey took a few steps, then stopped and gazed out at the trees.

  “Moe don’t bring one back,” said Willie, “we gonna hafta wait here till morning, or one of us gonna hafta hitch to Memphis and get the thing. Man we met said that’d be the closest place we can find something open on a Sunday.”

  “Moe doesn’t get back,” I said, “I don’t suppose it much matters about the fan belt.”

  Stacey noted my pessimism with a glance. Little Willie looked at me, too, and shook his head. Then we heard someone coming on the forest trail. We waited, hoping it would be Moe. It was. He stepped grinning from the forest, holding the much needed fan belt in his hand. As he held it up for us all to see, I ran to him and gave him a hug, fussing all the while. “Don’t you be coming out here grinning!” I warned. “We’ve been worried to death about you!”

  Moe grinned down at me, and his eyes danced.