One called, “Go on, go on. What the hell are you waiting for?” The six cars moved ahead, turned a bend and came suddenly on the peach camp.
There were fifty little square, flat-roofed boxes, each with a door and a window, and the whole group in a square. A water tank stood high on one edge of the camp. And a little grocery store stood on the other side. At the end of each row of square houses stood two men armed with shotguns and wearing big silver stars pinned to their shirts.
The six cars stopped. Two bookkeepers moved from car to car. “Want to work?”
Tom answered, “Sure, but what is this?”
“That’s not your affair. Want to work?”
“Sure we do.”
“Name?”
“Joad.”
“How many men?”
“Four.”
“Women?”
“Two.”
“Kids?”
“Two.”
“Can all of you work?”
“Why—I guess so.”
“O.K. Find house sixty-three. Wages five cents a box. No bruised fruit. All right, move along now. Go to work right away.”
The cars moved on. On the door of each square red house a number was painted. “Sixty,” Tom said. “There’s sixty. Must be down that way. There, sixty-one, sixty-two—There she is.”
Al parked the truck close to the door of the little house. The family came down from the top of the truck and looked about in bewilderment. Two deputies approached. They looked closely into each face.
“Name?”
“Joad,” Tom said impatiently. “Say, what is this here?”
One of the deputies took out a long list. “Not here. Ever see these here? Look at the license. Nope. Ain’t got it. Guess they’re O.K.”
“Now you look here. We don’t want no trouble with you. Jes’ do your work and mind your own business and you’ll be all right.” The two turned abruptly and walked away. At the end of the dusty street they sat down on two boxes and their position commanded the length of the street.
Tom stared after them. “They sure do wanta make us feel at home.”
Ma opened the door of the house and stepped inside. The floor was splashed with grease. In the one room stood a rusty tin stove and nothing more. The tin stove rested on four bricks and its rusty stovepipe went up through the roof. The room smelled of sweat and grease. Rose of Sharon stood beside Ma. “We gonna live here?”
Ma was silent for a moment. “Why, sure,” she said at last. “It ain’t so bad once we wash it out. Get her mopped.”
“I like the tent better,” the girl said.
“This got a floor,” Ma suggested. “This here wouldn’ leak when it rains.” She turned to the door. “Might as well unload,” she said.
The men unloaded the truck silently. A fear had fallen on them. The great square of boxes was silent. A woman went by in the street, but she did not look at them. Her head was sunk and her dirty gingham dress was frayed at the bottom in little flags.
The pall had fallen on Ruthie and Winfield. They did not dash away to inspect the place. They stayed close to the truck, close to the family. They looked forlornly up and down the dusty street. Winfield found a piece of baling wire and he bent it back and forth until it broke. He made a little crank of the shortest piece and turned it around and around in his hands.
Tom and Pa were carrying the mattresses into the house when a clerk appeared. He wore khaki trousers and a blue shirt and a black necktie. He wore silver-bound eyeglasses, and his eyes, through the thick lenses, were weak and red, and the pupils were staring little bull’s eyes. He leaned forward to look at Tom.
“I want to get you checked down,” he said. “How many of you going to work?”
Tom said, “They’s four men. Is this here hard work?”
“Picking peaches,” the clerk said. “Piece work. Give five cents a box.”
“Ain’t no reason why the little fellas can’t help?”
“Sure not, if they’re careful.”
Ma stood in the doorway. “Soon’s I get settled down I’ll come out an’ help. We got nothin’ to eat, mister. Do we get paid right off ?”
“Well, no, not money right off. But you can get credit at the store for what you got coming.”
“Come on, let’s hurry,” Tom said. “I want ta get some meat an’ bread in me tonight. Where do we go, mister?”
“I’m going out there now. Come with me.”
Tom and Pa and Al and Uncle John walked with him down the dusty street and into the orchard, in among the peach trees. The narrow leaves were beginning to turn a pale yellow. The peaches were little globes of gold and red on the branches. Among the trees were piles of empty boxes. The pickers scurried about, filling their buckets from the branches, putting the peaches in the boxes, carrying the boxes to the checking station; and at the stations, where the piles of filled boxes waited for the trucks, clerks waited to check against the names of the pickers.