They looked at the ground. Pa cleaned his thick nails with his pocket knife. Uncle John picked at a splinter on the box he sat on. Tom pinched his lower lip and pulled it away from his teeth.
He released his lip and said softly, “We been a-lookin’, Ma. Been walkin’ out sence we can’t use the gas no more. Been goin’ in ever’ gate, walkin’ up to ever’ house, even when we knowed they wasn’t gonna be nothin’. Puts a weight on ya. Goin’ out lookin’ for somepin you know you ain’t gonna find.”
Ma said fiercely, “You ain’t got the right to get discouraged. This here fambly’s goin’ under. You jus’ ain’t got the right.”
Pa inspected his scraped nail. “We gotta go,” he said. “We didn’ wanta go. It’s nice here, an’ folks is nice here. We’re feared we’ll have to go live in one a them Hoovervilles.”
“Well, if we got to, we got to. First thing is, we got to eat.”
Al broke in. “I got a tankful a gas in the truck. I didn’ let nobody get into that.”
Tom smiled. “This here Al got a lot of sense along with he’s randypandy.”
“Now you figger,” Ma said. “I ain’t watchin’ this here fambly starve no more. One day’ more grease. That’s what we got. Come time for Rosasharn to lay in, she got to be fed up. You figger!”
“This here hot water an’ toilets —” Pa began.
“Well, we can’t eat no toilets.”
Tom said, “They was a fella come by today lookin’ for men to go to Marysville. Pickin’ fruit.”
“Well, why don’ we go to Marysville?” Ma demanded.
“I dunno,” said Tom. “Didn’ seem right, somehow. He was so anxious. Wouldn’ say how much the pay was. Said he didn’ know exactly.”
Ma said, “We’re a-goin’ to Marysville. I don’ care what the pay is. We’re a-goin’.”
“It’s too far,” said Tom. “We ain’t got the money for gasoline. We couldn’ get there. Ma, you say we got to figger. I ain’t done nothin’ but figger the whole time.”
Uncle John said, “Feller says they’s cotton a-comin’ in up north, near a place called Tulare. That ain’t very far, the feller says.”
“Well, we got to git goin’, an’ goin’ quick. I ain’t a-settin’ here no longer, no matter how nice.” Ma took up her bucket and walked toward the sanitary unit for hot water.
“Ma gets tough,” Tom said. “I seen her a-gettin’ mad quite a piece now. She jus’ boils up.”
Pa said with relief, “Well, she brang it into the open, anyways. I been layin’ at night a-burnin’ my brains up. Now we can talk her out, anyways.”
Ma came back with her bucket of steaming water. “Well,” she demanded, “figger anything out?”
“Jus’ workin’ her over,” said Tom. “Now s’pose we jus’ move up north where that cotton’s at. We been over this here country. We know they ain’t nothin’ here. S’pose we pack up an’ shove north. Then when the cotton’s ready, we’ll be there. I kinda like to get my han’s aroun’ some cotton. You got a full tank, Al?”
“Almos’—’bout two inches down.”
“Should get us up to that place.”
Ma poised a dish over the bucket. “Well?” she demanded.
Tom said, “You win. We’ll move on, I guess. Huh, Pa?”
“Guess we got to,” Pa said.
Ma glanced at him. “When?”
“Well—no need waitin’. Might’s well go in the mornin’.”
“We got to go in the mornin’. I tol’ you what’s lef’.”
“Now, Ma, don’ think I don’ wanta go. I ain’t had a good gutful to eat in two weeks. ’Course I filled up, but I didn’ take no good from it.”
Ma plunged the dish into the bucket. “We’ll go in the mornin’,” she said.
Pa sniffled. “Seems like times is changed,” he said sarcastically. “Time was when a man said what we’d do. Seems like women is tellin’ now. Seems like it’s purty near time to get out a stick.”
Ma put the clean dripping tin dish out on a box. She smiled down at her work. “You get your stick, Pa,” she said. “Times when they’s food an’ a place to set, then maybe you can use your stick an’ keep your skin whole. But you ain’t a-doin’ your job, either a-thinkin’ or a-workin’. If you was, why, you could use your stick, an’ women folks’d sniffle their nose an’ creep-mouse aroun’. But you jus’ get you a stick now an’ you ain’t lickin’ no woman; you’re a-fightin’, ’cause I got a stick all laid out too.”