“Winfiel’!” Ma demanded. “You tell now.” She looked back nervously at the curtain. “Rosasharn, you go over talk to Mis’ Wainwright so she don’ listen.”
“How ’bout these here potatoes?”
“I’ll watch ’em. Now you go. I don’ want her listenin’ at that curtain.” The girl shuffled heavily down the car and went around the side of the hung tarpaulin.
Ma said, “Now, Winfiel’, you tell.”
“Like I said, she et jus’ one little piece at a time, an’ she bust some in two so it’d las’ longer.”
“Go on, hurry up.”
“Well, some kids come aroun’, an’ ’course they tried to get some, but Ruthie, she jus’ nibbled an’ nibbled, an’ wouldn’ give ’em none. So they got mad. An’ one kid grabbed her Cracker Jack box.”
“Winfiel’, you tell quick about the other.”
“I am,” he said. “So Ruthie got mad an’ chased ’em, an’ she fit one, an’ then she fit another, an’ then one big girl up an’ licked her. Hit ’er a good one. So then Ruthie cried, an’ she said she’d git her big brother, an’ he’d kill that big girl. An’ that big girl said, Oh, yeah? Well, she got a big brother too.” Winfield was breathless in his telling. “So then they fit, an’ that big girl hit Ruthie a good one, an’ Ruthie said her brother’d kill that big girl’s brother. An’ that big girl said how about if her brother kil’t our brother. An’ then—an’ then, Ruthie said our brother already kil’t two fellas. An’—an’—that big girl said, ‘Oh, yeah! You’re jus’ a little smarty liar.’ An’ Ruthie said, Oh, yeah? Well, our brother’s a-hidin’ right now from killin’ a fella, an’ he can kill that big girl’s brother too. An’ then they called names an’ Ruthie throwed a rock, an’ that big girl chased her, an’ I come home.”
“Oh, my!” Ma said wearily. “Oh! My dear sweet Lord Jesus asleep in a manger! What we goin’ to do now?” She put her forehead in her hand and rubbed her eyes. “What we gonna do now?” A smell of burning potatoes came from the roaring stove. Ma moved automatically and turned them.
“Rosasharn!” Ma called. The girl appeared around the curtain. “Come watch this here supper. Winfiel’, you go out an’ you fin’ Ruthie an’ bring her back here.”
“Gonna whup her, Ma?” he asked hopefully.
“No. This here you couldn’ do nothin’ about. Why, I wonder, did she haf’ to do it? No. It won’t do no good to whup her. Run now, an’find her an’ bring her back.”
Winfield ran for the car door, and he met the three men tramping up the cat-walk, and he stood aside while they came in.
Ma said softly, “Pa, I got to talk to you. Ruthie tol’ some kids how Tom’s a-hidin’.”
“What?”
“She tol’. Got in a fight an’ tol’.”
“Why, the little bitch!”
“No, she didn’ know what she was a-doin’. Now look, Pa. I want you to stay here. I’m goin’ out an’ try to fin’ Tom an’ tell him. I got to tell ’im to be careful. You stick here, Pa, an’ kinda watch out for things. I’ll take ’im some dinner.”
“Awright,” Pa agreed.
“Don’ you even mention to Ruthie what she done. I’ll tell her.”
At that moment Ruthie came in, with Winfield behind her. The little girl was dirtied. Her mouth was sticky, and her nose still dripped a little blood from her fight. She looked shamed and frightened. Winfield triumphantly followed her. Ruthie looked fiercely about, but she went to a corner of the car and put her back in the corner. Her shame and fierceness were blended.
“I tol’ her what she done,” Winfield said.
Ma was putting two chops and some fried potatoes on a tin plate. “Hush, Winfiel’,” she said. “They ain’t no need to hurt her feelings no more’n what they’re hurt.”
Ruthie’s body hurtled across the car. She grabbed Ma around the middle and buried her head in Ma’s stomach, and her strangled sobs shook her whole body. Ma tried to loosen her, but the grubby fingers clung tight. Ma brushed the hair on the back of her head gently, and she patted her shoulders. “Hush,” she said. “You didn’ know.”
Ruthie raised her dirty, tear-stained, bloody face. “They stoled my Cracker Jack!” she cried. “That big son-of-a-bitch of a girl, she belted me —” She went off into hard crying again.