Across the Fruited Plain

by Florence Crannell Means

  3: SHUCKING OYSTERS

  This picnic way of living had one advantage; it made moving easy.One day the Beechams were picking; the next day they had joinedwith two other families and hired a truck to take them and theirbelongings to Oystershell, on the inlet of the bay near by.

  Pauline Isabel's family were going to a Negro oystershuckingvillage almost in sight of Oystershell. "It's sure nice there!"Pauline assured them happily. "I belong to a girls' club thatmeets every day after school; in the Meth'dis' church. We got asure good school, too, good as any white school, up the road apiece."

  The Beechams said good-by to Pauline's family, who had becometheir friends. Then they said good-by to Miss Abbott. That washard for Jimmie. He butted his shaven little head against Herand then limped away as fast as he could.

  The ride to Oystershell was exciting. Autumn had changed thelook of the land. "God has taken all the red and yellow he'sgot, and just splashed it on in gobs," said Rose-Ellen as theytraveled toward the seashore.

  "What I like," Dick broke in, "is to see the men getting in thesalt hay with their horses on sleds."

  The marshes were too soft to hold up anything so small as a hoof,so when farmers used horses there, they fastened broad woodenshoes on the horses' feet. Nowadays, though, horses were givingplace to tractors.

  The air had an increasingly queer smell, like iodized salt inboiling potatoes. The Beechams were nearing the salt-waterinlets of the bay, where the tides rose and fell like theocean-of which the inlets were part.

  The tide was high when they drove down from Phillipsville to thesettlement of Oystershell. The rows of wooden houses, theoyster-sheds and the company store seemed to be wading on stilts,and most people wore rubber boots.

  Grandma said, "If the bog was bad for my rheumatiz, what's thisgoing to be?"

  A man showed the Beechams a vacant house in the long rows. "Notmuch to look at," he acknowledged, "but the rent ain't much,either. The roofs are tight and a few have running water, caseyou want it bad enough to pay extra."

  "To think a rusty pipe and one faucet in my kitchen would ever bea luxury!" Grandma muttered. "But, my land, even the humpywall-paper looks good now."

  It was gay, clean paper, though pasted directly on the boards.The house had a kitchen-dining-sitting room and one bedroom, withwalls so thin they let through every word of the next-door radio.

  "That's going to be a peekaneeka, sure," Grandma said grimly.

  Children were not allowed to work in the oysters, but Grandma wasgoing to try. The children could tell she was nervous about it,by the way her foot jerked up and down when she gave Sally herbottle that night; but she said she expected she wasn't too dumbto do what other folks could.

  The children were still asleep when the grown-ups went to work inthe six o'clock darkness of that November Saturday. When theywoke, mush simmered on the cookstove and a bottle of milk stoodon the table. It took time to feed Sally and wash dishes andmake beds; and then Dick and Rose-Ellen ran over to the nearestlong oyster-house and peeked through a hole in the wall.

  Down each side, raised above the fishy wet floor, ran a row ofbooths, each with a desk and step, made of rough boards. On eachstep stood a man or woman, in boots and heavy clothes, facing thedesk. Only instead of pen and paper, these people had buckets,oysters, knives. As fast as they could, they were opening thebig, horny oyster shells and emptying the oysters into thebuckets.

  Next time, Dick stayed with Sally, and Rose-Ellen and Jimmiepeeked. They were startled when a big hand dropped on each oftheir heads.

  "You kids skedaddle," ordered a big man. "If you want to seethings, come back at four."

  By four o'clock the grown folks were home, tired and smelling offish; Dick and Rose-Ellen were prancing on tiptoe to go, andeven Jimmie was ready.

  "This is what he is like," said Rose-Ellen, "the man who saidwe could." She stuck in her chin and threw out her chest andtried to stride.

  "That's the Big Boss, all right," Daddy said, laughing. "Guessit's O.K. But mind your _p_'s and _q_'s."

  "And stick together. Specially in a strange place." Grandmawearily picked up the baby.

  The Big Boss saw them as soon as they tiptoed into theoyster-house. "Ez," he called, "here's some nice kids. Show 'emaround, will you?"

  Ez was opening clams with a penknife, and spilling them into hismouth. "Want some?" he asked.

  The children shook their heads vigorously.

  He closed his knife and dropped it into his pocket.

  "Well, now first you want to see the dredges come in from thebay." He took them through the open front of the shed to thedocks outside. The boats had gone out at three o'clock in themorning, he said, in the deep dark. They were coming in nowheavily, loaded high with horny oysters, and Ez pointed out therake-set iron nets with which the shellfish were dragged fromtheir beds. "Got 'em out of bed good and early!"

  "I'd hate to have to eat 'em all," Jimmie said suddenly in hishusky little voice.

  Everyone laughed, for the big rough shells were traveling intothe oyster-house by thousands, on moving belts. Some shellslooked as if they were carrying sponges in their mouths, but Ezsaid it was a kind of moss that grew there. Already the pile ofunopened oysters in the shed was higher than a man. The shuckersneeded a million to work on next day, Ez said.

  Watching the dredges]

  When the children had watched awhile, and the boatmen had askedtheir names, and how old they were and where they came from, Eztook them inside the shed to show them the handling of the newlyshucked oysters. First the oysters were dumped into somethingthat looked like Mrs. Albi's electric washer, and washed andwashed. Then they were emptied into a flume, a narrow troughalong which they were swept into bright cans that held almost agallon each. The cans were stored in ice-packed barrels, andearly next morning would go out in trains and trucks to all partsof the country.

  "How many pearls have they found in all these oysters?" Dickdemanded in a businesslike voice. "Not any!" Ez said.

  "Why can't you eat oysters in months that don't have R in them?"asked Rose-Ellen.

  "You could, if there wasn't a law against selling them. It'sonly a notion, like not turning your dress if you put it on wrongside out. Summer's when oysters lay eggs. You don't stop eatinghens because they lay eggs, do you? But now scram, kids. I gotwork to do."

  They left, skipping past the mountains of empty shells outside.

  Next day the children went to church school alone. The grownfolks were too tired. And on Monday Dick and Rose-Ellen went upthe road to the school in the little village.

  It was strange to be in school again, and with new schoolmatesand teachers and even new books, since this was a differentstate. Rose-Ellen's grade, the fifth, had got farther in longdivision than her class at home, and she couldn't understand whatthey were doing. Dick had trouble, too, for the seventh gradewas well started on United States history, and he couldn't catchup. But that was not the worst of it. The two children couldnot seem to fit in with their schoolmates. The village girlsgathered in groups by themselves and acted as if the oyster-shuckers'children were not there at all; and the boys did not give Dick evena chance to show what a good pitcher he was. Both Rose-Ellenand Dick had been leaders in the city school, and now they feltso lonesome that Rose-Ellen often cried when she got home.

  It was too long a walk for Jimmie, who begged not to go anyway.Besides, he was needed at home to mind Sally.

  Of course the grown folks wanted to earn all they could. The paywas thirty cents a gallon; and just as it took a lot ofcranberries to make a peck, it took a lot of these middle-sizedoysters to make a gallon. To keep the oysters fresh, the shedswere left so cold that the workers must often dip their numbhands into pails of hot water. All this was hard on Grandma'srheumatism; but painful as the work was, she did not give it upuntil something happened that forced her to.

  It was late November, and the fire in the shack must be keptgoing all day to make the rooms warm enough for
Sally. She wascreeping now, and during the long hours when the grown folks wereworking and the older children at school, she had to stay in achair with a gate across the front which her father had fixed outof an old kitchen armchair. Grandma cushioned it with rags, butit grew hard and tiresome, and sometimes Jimmie could not keepher contented there.

  One day Sally cried until he wriggled her out of her nest andspread a quilt for her in a corner of the room as Grandma did.There he sat, fencing her in with his legs while he drew picturesof oyster-houses. He was so busy drawing roofs that he hadforgot all about Sally until he was startled by her scream. Hejerked around in terror. Sally had clambered over the fence ofhis legs and crept under the stove after her ball. Perhaps aspark had snapped through the half-open slide in the stove door;however it had happened, the flames were running up her littlecotton dress.

  Poor Baby Sally! Jimmie had never felt so helpless. Hardlyknowing why he did it, he dragged the wool quilt off Grandma'sbed and scooted across the floor in a flash. While Sallyscreamed with fright, he wrapped the thick folds tightly aroundher and hugged her close.

  Jimmie saving Sally]

  When the grown folks came from work, just ahead of the schoolchildren, they found Jimmie and Sally white and shaky but safe.The woolen quilt had smothered out the flames before Sally washurt at all; and Jimmie had only a pair of blistered hands.

  "If I hadn't put a wool petticoat on her, and wool stockings,"Grandma kept saying, while she sat and rocked the whimperingbaby. "And if our Jimmie hadn't been so smart as to think of thebedclothes. . . .

  "Not all children have been so lucky," Daddy said in ashaky voice, crouching beside Grandma and touching Sally's downyhead.

  "But I hadn't ought to have left her with poor Jimmie,"Grandma mourned. "If only they had a Center, like at the bogs. Idon't believe I can bear it to stay here any longer after this.Maybe we best go back to the city and put them in a Home."

  Daddy objected. "We'll not leave the kids alone again, ofcourse; but we're making a fair living and the Boss says there'llbe work through April, and then Pa and I can go out and plantseed oysters if we want."

  "Where's the good of a fair living if it's the death of you?"Grandma's tone was tart. "No, sir, I ain't going to stay, tiedin bowknots with rheumatiz, and these poor young-ones. . . ."

  Grandpa made a last effort, though he knew it was of little usewhen Grandma was set. "I bet we could go to work on one of thesetruck farms, come summer."

  Grandma only rocked her straight chair, jerking one foot up anddown.

  "One of these _padrones_," Daddy said slowly, "is trying to getfamilies to work in Florida. In winter fruits."

  Grandma brightened. "Floridy might do us a sight of good, and Ialways did hanker after palm trees. But how could we get there?"

  "They send you down in a truck," said Daddy. "Charge you so mucha head and feed and lodge you into the bargain. I figure we'vegot just about enough to make it."

  South into summer!

  "That really would be a peekaneeka!" crowed Rose-Ellen.