Of Love and Dust

by Ernest J. Gaines

  “That beer better be cold,” Josie said.

  “No, it’s—”

  Josie started trembling like she wanted to hit Snuke with her fist. I could see her mouth trembling.

  “You rotten sonofabitch,” she said. “You rotten—where the hell you been, Snuke Johnson?”

  “I didn’t know—”

  “You just a lying sonofabitch,” Josie said. She still wanted to hit him with her fist. “I told you I was low on beer. I told you I wanted that beer back before sundown. I told you that.”

  “I’m—”

  Then she moved closer to Snuke Johnson and started sniffing. She was sniffing like a dog on a hot trail—going, “Sniff, sniff, sniff.”

  “What’s that I smell?” she said. But she didn’t wait for Snuke to answer. She moved right up to me and started sniffing, then she moved right up to Jack and started sniffing at him. She looked at Burl but she didn’t go to him; she went back to Snuke.

  “So that’s it,” she said. “That’s why you couldn’t get back—”

  “I don’t know what you talking ’bout,” Snuke said. “You ain’t smelling no more than that gumbo—”

  “What you say?” she said real quickly. She wanted to hit Snuke so bad she was trembling. I supposed the only reason she didn’t hit him, she didn’t want him dropping that case of beer. “What you say, Snuke Johnson? What you say?” she said.

  “Nothing,” Snuke said. Snuke was sweating now.

  “Yeah, you said something,” Josie said. “What you say ’bout my food?”

  Snuke didn’t answer her. She stood there looking at him, still trembling. Her mouth was trembling.

  “Give me that goddamn beer here,” she said, jerking the case out of Snuke’s hands and rattling the bottles. “You can go back and find that whore again if you want. You, you put that case on here,” she said to me.

  “I’ll take it in the kitchen, Josie,” I said.

  “Put it on here,” she said.

  “I’ll take it for you, Josie.”

  “Put it on here,” she hollered at me.

  “All right,” I said, setting it on the other case in her hands.

  She went to Jack Claiborn.

  “Give me that case of beer,” she said.

  “Go on, Josie,” Jack said. “You got ’nough. You want a rupture?”

  “Put that goddamn beer on here,” she said, “before I set the rest of these cases down and kick your ass.”

  “Here,” Jack said, dropping the case real hard on the others.

  Josie turned with the three cases of beer and staggered a little, but she was able to make it back into the kitchen. I went back there a couple minutes later. The kitchen was blazing hot. You could smell nothing but fried fish and gumbo back there. Josie was on her knees, putting the last few bottles of beer in a tub of ice. I offered to help her but she wouldn’t let me. So I went over to the window to stand in the fresh air.

  “I woulda thought you knowed better,” she said. “You starting to act just like the rest of them round here.”

  “It probably slipped his mind, Josie,” I said. “You ran completely out?”

  “I been out since eight o’clock and people been begging and begging for beer,” Josie said. “I told him I was go’n run out. I told him hurry back. Hell, if he didn’t want do it he ought to been said it.”

  “He just forgot, Josie,” I said.

  “Forgot hell,” she said, getting up off her knees. “I can smell him a mile. You, too.”

  “All right,” I said. “How about some gumbo. And how about a beer—a Coke to go with it.”

  Josie was near the stove when I mentioned the word “beer.” She stopped and looked at me, trembling a little.

  “Don’t play with me, no, James,” she said. “Don’t play with me now.”

  “I’m sorry, Josie,” I said. “I meant Coke.”

  “I’m warning you,” she said, still trembling a little. “I ain’t in no playing mood.”

  “I’m sorry, Josie,” I said.

  She went on and dished me up a big bowl of gumbo and rice, and I stood at the window, eating. The gumbo was so hot with pepper it set the roots of your hair on fire. I drank two bottles of Coke, but the Coke didn’t do any good. It made that gumbo even hotter.

  When I got through eating I paid Josie and went in the front room where everybody was dancing. But it was too crowded in there and I pushed my way in the other room where the gambling was going on. There must have been a dozen people in there. Jocko Thompson was the house-man. Jocko was short, heavy-set, with a big head and real kinky hair. His white shirt was unbuttoned and you could see the kinky hairs on his sweaty chest.

  Black Ned was sitting on Jocko’s left side. Black Ned was black as his name. He was about twenty-five but he looked fifteen. He was one of those black people who was going to look fifteen until he was forty, then he was going to look twenty-one. Sun Brown was sitting next to Black Ned. Sun Brown wasn’t brown, he was yellow. He was tall, skinny and yellow. He wore a yellow straw hat that had a red and green band that had a little red feather stuck in it. Sun always kept his cards close to his face when he was gambling. The Aguillard brothers were there, too. Two of them were sitting at the table, three more were standing around. They were the five biggest cowards in Louisiana. Together they would gang you; catch one by himself, you could make him crawl a mile. Murphy Bacheron was the other man at the table. Murphy didn’t live on the plantation but he came there to gamble. Murphy was a big, barrel-chested, broad-shouldered, thick-necked, gravel-voice, derby-wearing man. He had been in so many fights, he had scars all over his face and neck. I supposed he had them all over his body, too. He was somewhere between fifty and sixty, but he was as much man as anybody thirty. You couldn’t make that whole Aguillard gang jump on Murphy.

  “Johnson got back with that fucking beer?” Black Ned asked me.

  “Yeah, but it’s hot.”

  “Hot? What the fuck it’s hot for?”

  “Because it’s not cold,” I said.

  “Yeah?” Black Ned said, nodding his head. “You think you funny, don’t you, Kelly?”

  “You want a card, boy?” Jocko Thompson asked him.

  “Boy?” Black Ned said, looking from me to Jocko. “How big do men grow on this fucking plantation?”

  “You want a card, boy?” Jocko said, looking at him like he hadn’t even heard him.

  “What kind of fucking place is this, a man can’t even have a cold beer when he’s gambling? Black Ned said, ignoring Jocko Thompson because Jocko called him a boy. He let everybody wait on him a while before he looked at his cards. He rapped his knuckles on the table. “Hit me,” he said.

  Jocko threw him a nine. That busted him. He threw his cards on the table and cursed again.

  “Hit me,” Sun Brown said, real quiet-like.

  Jocko Thompson threw him a four. Sun Brown brought the cards real close to his face.

  “Play these,” he said.

  Then he peeped around the cards at Jocko Thompson, then he peeped over the cards at me, then he looked closely at them again. I had to laugh to myself.

  “Playing what I got,” the first Aguillard boy said.

  “Hit me,” the other one said.

  Jocko threw him a five.

  “Play this,” he said, after he had looked at his cards again.

  “Murphy?” Jocko asked.

  “Play what I got,” Murphy said in his graveled voice.

  “Seventeen,” Sun Brown said, showing his cards.

  “I got seventeen,” the Aguillard boy said, showing his.

  “Nineteen,” the other one said, spreading his cards out.

  Murphy turned over two kings and raked in the money. He threw Jocko Thompson a quarter.

  “You keep winning, don’t you, Murphy?” one of the standing Aguillard brothers said.

  “Yeah,” Murphy said in his graveled voice. “You think you can change my luck?”

  That was Tram who had spoke. He wa
s the oldest; he was the leader of the gang. Murphy just sat there looking up at Tram. Murphy’s shirt was unbuttoned, too, and you could see that kinky hair on that big sweaty chest like a bunch of flies on a rain-drenched pecan tree.

  “That fucking beer ain’t cold yet?” Black Ned said. “What the fuck Josie doing, setting on them bottles herself?”

  “You want in?” Jocko Thompson asked me.

  “No,” I said.

  “Nobody go’n bite you, Kelly,” one of the sitting-down Aguillards said to me.

  “I’m not scared of that, either,” I said.

  “Where your convict friend at?” the other one asked me.

  “Marcus?”

  “Yeah. He the one.”

  “He’s around,” I said.

  “You mean round that crib up there, don’t you?”

  Then all five of the Aguillards laughed. They thought it was the funniest thing they had ever heard of.

  “Anybody in that back room?” Black Ned said. “A man can’t have a cold beer, he might as well fuck.”

  “What, your fist?” one of the Aguillard brothers said.

  “That’s your habit?” Black Ned said to him.

  “Don’t get smart, boy,” one of the standing Aguillards said.

  Black Ned took out his little snub-nosed thirty-eight and laid it on the table.

  “Put that shit back in your pocket,” Jocko told him.

  “Just want people round here to know I back up my word,” Black Ned said, putting the gun back.

  “Somebody go’n make you eat that goddamn popgun one day,” one of the standing Aguillards said.

  “Sure,” Black Ned said. “Kelly, go get me a beer, huh.”

  “Get it yourself,” I said. “I’m no waiter.”

  “Well, fuck you, nigger,” he said.

  “Sure,” I said.

  Jocko Thompson was dealing out the cards. Sun Brown was holding his close up to his face.

  I stood there about half an hour, then I went out. Maybe I would get in the game later when it quieted down some, but I didn’t want any part of it now.

  21

  The other room was still hot and crowded, but no matter where you turned people were dancing. The music was blaring all over the place. I stood in there a while talking to Jack Claiborn who was leaning on the mantelpiece; then I went in the kitchen. The kitchen wasn’t so crowded but it was twice as hot. Josie was dishing up a bowl of gumbo for a man standing at the window.

  “How’s the beer?” I asked Josie.

  “They been drinking it hot,” she said.

  “I better get one,” I said.

  “Get him one, Tick,” Josie said to Tick-Tock.

  “Get yourself one, too,” I said to Tick-Tock.

  Tick-Tock opened the bottles on an opener against the wall and gave me mine. It was cool but it was long ways from cold.

  “Your boy Marcus got through unloading that corn,” Tick-Tock said to me. “He came down the quarter few minutes ago. Jim, why don’t you make him leave Pauline alone. Not that nobody go’n tell Mr. Sidney, but he might catch him hisself.”

  “I’ve talked to him already,” I said, “and he won’t listen. If Bonbon catch him, it’ll just be his hard luck.”

  A few minutes later Pauline came in. She stopped in the front room to talk a while; then as she started into the kitchen one of the Aguillard brothers came out of the other room and asked her to dance. She danced with him to a couple records, then she came on back where we were.

  “Oh, it’s hot,” she said. She was fanning with a little white handkerchief. “Hi, Jim.”

  “How’s it going?”

  “It’s burning up.”

  “Beer?” I said.

  “I don’t mind.”

  “Not cold.”

  “I’ll take anything. Then I have to go. Left the children by themself.”

  “Let Aunt Ca’line look after them.”

  “Who’ll look after Aunt Ca’line?” Pauline said.

  I smiled at her and she smiled back. I looked at her a long time to let her know how much I liked her. But she already knew how much I liked her, and she also knew I knew that there was somebody else in her life.

  I bought her another beer; then she bought two pralines for the twins and left. Tick-Tock had told her she ought to get somebody to walk home with her, but she told Tick-Tock that she had left the gallery light on and she would be all right.

  Just after Pauline walked out of the house a squabble broke out in the room where the men were gambling. It sounded like somebody had overturned the gambling table. Then it sounded like somebody picked up somebody else and slammed him against the wall. There was a lot of tussling in there a while, then everybody came out. They were still arguing but nobody was throwing any punches. That is, nobody threw a punch until Marcus came in there and hit Murphy Bacheron up ’side the head.

  But I’m getting a little ahead of myself here. I was talking about Pauline. As she went out of the yard, who should she see coming down the quarter but Marcus. I wasn’t there, I didn’t see it, but Aunt Ca’line and Pa Bully were still on the gallery, and Aunt Ca’line talked about it later. Josie’s gallery light was on and Pauline’s gallery light was on, so Aunt Ca’line could see the two people coming toward each other. They came closer and closer, and Aunt Ca’line could see how Pauline was moving toward the ditch to get out of his way. But Marcus moved there, too. Then they stopped. Pauline wanted to pass by but Marcus wouldn’t let her. They were standing just outside the fence, and Aunt Ca’line could hear them talking.

  “Let me pass, Marcus,” Pauline was saying. “I’m telling you, now.”

  “What he got on you?” Marcus said. “What’s the matter with you, woman?”

  “I’m telling you, let me pass,” Pauline said.

  “What’s the matter with you?” he said. “I been working up there all night like a slave, like a dog—and all on ’count of him. What’s the matter with you?”

  “I’m telling you,” she said. “Let me pass.”

  He moved closer.

  “Don’t you put your hands on me,” she said. “I mean it, don’t you put your hands on me, you killer.”

  He hit her and knocked her down. She got up.

  “If I tell him, he’ll kill you for this. He’ll kill you.”

  “You white man bitch,” he said. He hit her again. She fell again.

  “Leave that woman ’lone, boy,” Pa Bully hollered at him.

  “Mr. Grant,” Aunt Ca’line said, warningly.

  “You hear me out there, boy?” Pa Bully called.

  Pauline was up again.

  “You bitch,” Marcus said to her. “You bloody whore.”

  She was running toward the gate now.

  “You whore,” he called to her.

  She was running in the yard now. She ran in the house and locked the door. He stood there a while looking at the house; then he went on.

  When Marcus came into Josie’s house, everything stopped. Everybody stopped dancing, everybody stopped talking—they stopped everything to look at him. They hadn’t heard the noise outside, but they had heard about him. And now here he was in person.

  Marcus pushed his way back into the kitchen. He wore a pair of white pants and a blue silk shirt. He wore a brown plaited-cloth belt round his waist. He had on black and white shoes.

  “What you know, buddy?” I said to him.

  “Give me a beer,” he said to Josie.

  “I’m out,” Josie said.

  He didn’t believe she was out. He thought she didn’t want to sell him any.

  “She’s out,” I said.

  “What you got?” Marcus said. “Give me some whiskey. You want anything?” he asked me.

  “I’ll take a shot,” I said.

  “Give me some whiskey,” he told Josie.

  Josie got the bottle out of the safe and poured me and him a shot.

  “Fifty cents,” she said.

  Marcus paid her. Then he downed
his drink quickly and asked for another one.

  “You want another one?” he asked me.

  “No,” I said. “This is good.”

  “Just took that for old buddy sake, huh?” he said.

  “Take it easy, boy,” I said.

  “Fuck it,” he said.

  “I don’t like that kind of talk in here,” Josie said.

  “No?” Marcus said.

  “No,” Josie said, looking hard at him and meaning it. And she had that bottle in her hand to back her up.

  “Pour,” Marcus said.

  She poured. He paid her and drunk it down.

  “Give me another one,” he said.

  “You had enough, Marcus,” I said.

  “Yeah?” he said. “Pour,” he told Josie.

  “This your last one,” Josie said. “I don’t want your money.”

  “What’s the matter with my money?” he said.

  “Nothing,” I said. “Come on, let’s—”

  “Take your fucking hands off me,” he said, knocking my hand away.

  “All right, buddy,” I said.

  He downed the drink Josie had poured him; then he just stood there breathing deep and hard. I thought he had drunk that whiskey too fast and it had shot up to his brains. I asked him what was the matter, but he turned away from me. He started toward the front like he was definitely going somewhere; then all of a sudden, like he had just remembered he didn’t have any place in the world to go, he stopped, looked quickly each way, then slammed Murphy Bacheron up ’side the head. I supposed he hit Murphy because Murphy was closest to him, but he couldn’t have picked a worse choice.

  22

  For about five seconds—it looked more like five minutes—nobody moved. Because nobody thought Murphy had been hit, and that included Murphy. Nobody who knew Murphy was crazy enough to hit him, so it took about five seconds for everybody to realize what had happened. Then it started—Murphy screamed. Not from pain—no, Marcus hadn’t hurt him that much; he screamed because all of a sudden he realized he hadn’t had a good fight in about a year. So he screamed and hit Black Ned. He didn’t hit Marcus—he wanted to save Marcus for later; he hit Black Ned. When Black Ned got up, he hit Jocko Thompson. Jocko didn’t go down, and he rammed his fist into one of the Aguillard boys’s stomach. One of the other brothers saw what Jocko did and hit Jocko in the back.