Of Love and Dust

by Ernest J. Gaines

I went to the door and looked back at him again. He was still watching me.

  “Clothes and food round the other side—and you be waiting at that gate,” I said. “If I leave you in the quarter and he bring you back there in that truck, you’ll cuss the day your mon brought you in this world. And you might do that before all this is over with.”

  He was still watching me when I left the room.

  5

  By the time I had lubed Red Hannah and given her enough fuel and water, that sun was slipping up behind the trees. When I came back down the quarter, I saw John and Freddie waiting for me in front of John’s house. John and Freddie were two punks. John was the big punk, Freddie was the little one. Together they pulled more corn than any other two men I had ever seen; in church on Sunday they shouted more than any two women. The funny thing about it, John and Freddie were ushers in church and they were supposed to look after the women when the women started shouting. But it always ended up with everybody else looking after John and Freddie. A couple of good-size women could hold down Freddie when he started shouting, but it always took seven or eight men to hold down big John.

  John and Freddie hopped in the trailer before the tractor had stopped good. Then, as I came farther down the quarter, I saw Playboy Marcus coming out the yard. He had on a short-sleeve green shirt and a pair of brown pants. No hat—not even a handkerchief round his neck. He had on a pair of brown and white dress shoes.

  “Where the hell you think you’re going in that?” I asked him.

  He didn’t answer me; he didn’t even glance my way. He got in the front trailer because John and Freddie were in the other one. John and Freddie, in their big straw hats and khakis, were looking at him. They wanted to laugh (they were the laughing-est two you ever saw), but you could see they were afraid of him.

  “You better get back in there, boy, and put something else on,” I told Marcus.

  He didn’t move.

  “There’s a hat in my room on that armoire, Marcus,” I said.

  He still didn’t move. I jumped off the tractor and ran inside to get the straw hat because I was already late. While I was in there I got a khaki shirt too and brought it out and threw it in the trailer where he was. He didn’t pick up either one; he didn’t even glance down at them; he just stood there with his arms folded and his back against the side of the trailer.

  I put Red Hannah in gear and started out for the field. The whole quarter was up now. The people who didn’t have to go in the field for Marshall Hebert were getting ready to go out in their own little patches. Besides corn-pulling time, this was the cotton-picking season, too. And most of the women you saw now wore old dresses and big yellow straw hats with a piece of rag or handkerchief under the hat.

  The plantation (or what was left of the plantation now) had all its crop far back in the field. The front land was for the sharecroppers. The Cajuns had the front-est and best land, and the colored people (those who were still hanging on) had the middle and worst land. The plantation land was farther back still, almost to the swamps. We had to pass through three different gates, through a cow pasture (in the early morning the cows were lazy and didn’t want to move out your way), before we got to the patch of corn where we were working today.

  I parked the end-trailer up the headland, then I swung Red Hannah down a set of rows. John and Freddie took the two side rows and gave Marcus the flat row in the middle. That was the easiest row because the corn was already down and all you had to do was walk there and jerk it off the stalk. But even giving Marcus the easiest row, they knew they could kill him off any time they wanted to. They started slow, just talking and giggling between the two of them. “Child, you know this; child, you know that—” and then all of a sudden they would bust out laughing at something that only they knew about. But Marcus, back of the trailer in his short-sleeve green shirt and brown pants, wasn’t saying a thing. The hat and the long-sleeve khaki shirt I had brought out the house were still in the trailer where I had thrown them.

  “Just wait,” I thought. “Just wait. Before this day is over—hah …”

  Marcus stuck pretty close with John and Freddie on the first trailer, but soon as we had loaded it and started on the second one, I could see them picking up speed. They weren’t going fast—no, that was coming later this evening when Bonbon was out there. Right now they were going about three-fourths, the way a good pitcher go in the sixth or seventh inning when he’s leading by a comfortable amount of runs. But even that three-fourths speed was starting to tell on Marcus. Already he was starting to jerk on one ear of corn two or three times before he broke it from the stalk. Couple times there he dropped so far back, he couldn’t even reach the trailer throwing the corn overhand.

  The best way to pull corn is snatch it with one jerk and flip it underhand into the trailer or the wagon. But when you get so far back where you can’t go underhand, then you got to go overhand, and that’s when it start telling on you. Because to draw that corn back over your shoulder and throw it like that, you use twice the energy. And I don’t care how good you are, how strong you are, by the time you go a day like that it’s going to be telling on you. So it was like that with Marcus. Each time he threw it from over his shoulder, it took just a little bit more from what he was going to need the rest of the day. And that whiskey he had drunk last night and that pussy he had wallowed in last night, and that no-sleeping and that no-eating and that short-sleeve green shirt and them thin, brown pants and that white, hot bitch way up in the sky were all working together against him to make matters worse. Every now and then I stopped when he got too far back. While I’d be waiting for him to catch up, John and Freddie would get together on the shady side of the trailer and talk and giggle and slap each other on the back like they hadn’t seen each other in about ten years. Then soon as he had caught up, they would move back on their rows, never giving him one second of rest. By the time we had finished that second load, Marcus was so tired I thought he was going to drop before he got up on the trailer. But he made it, and we hooked up the other trailer and started toward the front for dinner.

  6

  When we came up to the house, I told Marcus to go in and eat and rest himself. He hopped off the tractor and staggered toward the gate. I went up the quarter and let John and Freddie off; then I took the two loads of corn up to the yard. The other two trailers were empty as usual. After I had parked the loaded ones in front of the crib and had fueled and watered Red Hannah for this evening, I hooked up the two empty ones and started on back down the quarter. Marcus was sitting on the gallery when I came to the house.

  “You ate?” I asked him.

  “I ain’t got nothing in there.”

  “I got enough,” I said.

  “I don’t want nothing for free.”

  “It’s not free,” I said. “You can pay me back later.”

  I went in and washed my face and hands and warmed up some beans and rice I had in the icebox. Then I dished up two platefuls and set one plate on the table, and I sat in the back door, eating. After a while, Marcus came back there. I nodded toward the plate. He washed his hands and sat down at the table.

  “Gave you a pretty rough time, huh?” I said.

  “Shit,” he said. “I got news for all of them. That overseer and Marshall Hebert, too.”

  “Yes?” I said.

  “They think I’m go’n stay on this fucking place any five years, they got another thought coming.”

  “They figure it’ll be about seven years,” I said. “After you get through charging at the store, it might be more than that.”

  “Shit,” he said. “Seven years from now I won’t even remember the name Hebert.”

  “When you figuring on running?” I said.

  “You won’t know the day or the hour,” he said.

  “I might tell, huh?”

  “Just ’cause I’m eating your food don’t say I trust you,” he said.

  I ate and looked out in the yard. It was a good ninety degrees out ther
e. The grass that was bent over with dew this morning was standing straight up now.

  “Soon as they have that little fifteen cents trial, I’m picking my chance,” Marcus said.

  “Why don’t you run now?” I said.

  “Uh-uh, they looking for that. I’ll wait till they forget all about it.”

  I looked up at him.

  “You got it all figured out?”

  “I had it all figured out when I walked out of jail,” he said. “Shit, you don’t think I come here to stay, do you?”

  “Yes, I think you come here to stay,” I said. “I know you come here to stay.”

  “Shit,” he said. “They don’t nut this kid like they done nut all the rest of y’all round here.”

  “I still have mine,” I said.

  He didn’t say anything, but I could see he didn’t believe me.

  “That boy you killed don’t mean a thing, does it?”

  “Nigger come on you with a knife, what you suppose to do, just stand there? Get him ’fore he get you.”

  “You got a lot to learn in this world,” I told him.

  “I done forgot more than plenty people’ll ever know,” he said.

  “Sure,” I said.

  “Don’t worry,” he said. “I’ll pay you back your food.”

  “Anytime,” I said. “I’m not going anywhere.”

  He ate.

  “How much they go’n pay me for working?” he asked.

  “They don’t pay ‘bond people’ anything,” I said. “They feed you, they clothe you. If you want anything else, you can charge it at the store out there. That adds to your time.”

  “And they think I’m go’n stay here? Shit,” he said.

  “If I was you, I’d pick up some clothes at the store this evening,” I said.

  “You mean that shit I see y’all wearing round here?” he asked.

  “Yes, that’s the shit I’m talking about,” I said.

  “I’ll never put that convict shit on my back,” he said. “I’m used to silk.”

  When I got through eating I got up and put my plate in the dishpan on the stove.

  “Well, I’m going to take myself a good nap,” I said. “Round two we’ll hit it again.”

  He sat there eating and looking out in the yard. I wanted to feel sorry for Marcus, but God knows he didn’t help you.

  “You better get yourself some rest, too,” I said. “John and Freddie were playing this morning. They won’t be playing this evening when Bonbon come out there.”

  “Them two freaks and Bonbon can all kiss my ass,” he said.

  “Just thought I’d mention it, buddy,” I said. “See you in a couple hours.”

  It was too hot to lay down on the bed, so I went out on the gallery. Ten minutes after I laid down I was sound to sleep. Round two, maybe a couple minutes before two, I was up again.

  7

  It was hot, it was burning up. You could see little monkeys dancing out there in front of you.

  I got myself a cold drink of water and filled up that gallon jug and took it out to the tractor. By the time I had cranked up Red Hannah, I saw John and Freddie coming down the quarter. They were walking close together and just giggling. I didn’t see how any two people, punks or no punks, could find anything to giggle about in all this heat; but there they were in their khakis and big straw hats and brogans, just giggling. You would have thought they were two little perfumed gals going to the dance.

  Marcus slid off the gallery and came out of the yard. I had climbed up on the tractor and John and Freddie had got in that end-trailer, and we watched Marcus coming toward us. He wore the same short-sleeve green shirt and brown pants; the same low-top shoes, and not a thing on his head.

  “Where’s that hat?” he asked me.

  “You going to need more than a hat, boy,” I said.

  “Where’s the hat?” he asked again.

  “Under that load of corn at the front,” I said.

  “You got another one?”

  “I got an old felt hat hanging on the chair in there, you want that?”

  “No,” he said.

  “I got this red handkerchief in my pocket.”

  “I don’t want no fucking red handkerchief,” he said.

  “Hop in,” I said. “We’re wasting time.”

  He got into the front trailer and we started for the field. I drove slowly through the quarter—I didn’t want dust flying all over the place; but after I crossed the railroad tracks, I threw Red Hannah into high gear and let her take us to the back.

  Lord, it was hot out there; Lord, it was hot. But I had something going for me. I had the big umbrella and I had something to dream about and forget the heat. I knew Red Hannah would stay in the road for me even if I slept a whole minute, so every now and then, to forget the sun and the dust, I thought back to the good times with Billie Jean. I thought about the tub, and I thought about us dancing, then I thought about us hurrying back to that bed. Sometimes we didn’t make it back to the house; sometimes it happened right there in the car, sometimes in the open field. Once when it was over, we just kept on laying out there. Must have been a billion stars in the sky, and that big moon, like a tub of clean water, hung over our heads like it was there just for me and her. We laid there and laid there, and the next thing we knew it was morning and the people were coming in the field. Everybody bust out laughing when they saw us, and all we could do was laugh with them.

  Then it was New Orleans, then it was over.

  Freddie opened the first gate; John opened the second gate; Freddie opened the third one. Marcus didn’t get down once until we reached the patch of corn.

  “Here,” I said, giving him my straw hat. “You better put that on.”

  He took the hat; no thanks, no nothing; he just took it. I got out my red handkerchief and tied it round my head. After all, I had the big umbrella, too.

  So we started on down, Marcus in the middle and John and Freddie on the sides. They still weren’t working too fast—fast enough to keep a step or two ahead of him—but still not fast as they could if they wanted to. But that was part of the plan. They were going to work him down gradually on the first load, and the last load, when Bonbon was there, they were going to really pour it on. I moved the tractor down the field slowly as I could—for his sake—but at the same time I had to go fast enough to get the work done. Three men were supposed to pull two loads of corn in the morning and two loads in the evening, and if they didn’t get it done, Bonbon knew it was the driver who was stalling. So I had to keep up a pretty good speed, and at the same time not too fast so he would never fall too far back.

  Somewhere between four and quarter after, we had the first trailer done. When I took it to the headland to unhook it and hook up the empty one, I looked across the patch of corn and saw Bonbon on the stallion.

  8

  By the time I had set the tractor down the field, Bonbon was there. His khaki shirt was wringing wet with sweat. His white straw hat was turned up at the sides like a cowboy hat; he even wore cowboy boots. His Winchester hung on the left side of the saddle; a crocker sack was tied on the right side of the saddle. A piece of grass rope was tied on the end of the sack, and I knew what to expect later.

  Nobody said anything. Usually he spoke when he came out in the field like this, but this time he didn’t. I set the tractor down the row; John and Freddie got on both sides of the trailer, Marcus got right behind it on the center row, and Bonbon got right behind Marcus on the stallion. The horse was so close to Marcus, I’m sure Marcus could feel the horse’s hot breath on the back of his neck. So now it had started. Now they were going to give him a taste of what it meant to kill and then let yourself be bonded out of jail. They were going to let him know (not that they cared a hoot for the other boy) that he wasn’t tough as he thought he was.

  So now it had started. I set the tractor at the speed she’s supposed to run when she has three men pulling corn behind her. John and Freddie started pitching corn like they
had come into this world to do just that. And poor Marcus, with that black stallion only a step behind him, tried to keep up with them. He did for a while. He did for a row, a row and a half, then two. But soon as we started down the third set, I could see that that whiskey and that pussy from last night had caught up with him. And seeing that he was falling back, the two punks really poured it on.

  “Move up,” Freddie called.

  Before I had gone fifty feet down the row, Marcus had dropped back fifteen; and before I had gone fifty more, he had dropped back that much farther. Now he was throwing that corn overhand, and with that trailer just a little over half full, I knew that was the end of him.

  “Move up,” Freddie called.

  And I set Red Hannah at a little faster speed. Well, I had done all I could do for him. I had tried to bring him back here last night, I had fed him, I had given him a straw hat and even offered him khakis to wear. I had done everything a good Christian (one who had once believed) could do.

  I glanced back now, and there were John and Freddie only about five feet behind the trailer. And back about thirty or thirty-five feet was Marcus. That short-sleeve shirt was wringing wet; that straw hat looked like it was wringing wet, too, though I’m not too sure I’ve ever seen a wringing wet straw hat from sweat alone. And there was Bonbon leaning on the pommel of the saddle, looking down at Marcus. And there was that black stallion about six inches behind Marcus—and poor Marcus feeling the horse’s hot breath on the back of his neck.

  “Move up,” Freddie called.

  I looked toward the front again. Old Hannah kept up her putt-putt-putting on down the row like nothing was happening. And those hot, burning, yellow stalks of corn stood before us and all around us like nothing was happening. And that old sun to my right—white, small, and still strong—shone down on us like nothing was happening. Man, man, man, I thought; only you worry about what’s happening to you, because nothing or anybody else cares. And you, Billie, you care? Do you care at all, my little chicken? And how about the one he laid with last night, and how about the ones he bought drinks for on Saturday before he killed that boy? Do they care? And how about You, do You care? I don’t think so—because if You did, it looks to me like You would send us a little breeze, wouldn’t You? Now, mind you, I’m not asking You that for myself. Not at all, not at all. I figure a man with an eight-grade education, with a sitting-down job, shouldn’t go round complaining about anything. But it’s for the others I want it. Especially for the one ’way back there.