A Good Man Is Hard to Find and Other Stories

“Your face is certainly familiar,” she murmured, scrutinizing him. “Now let’s see…”

“My daddy used to work here,” he hinted.

“Boyd?” she said. “Your father was Mr. Boyd and you’re J. C.?”

“Nome, I’m Powell, the secont one, only I’ve growed some since then and my daddy he’s daid now. Done died.”

“Dead. Well I declare,” Mrs. Cope said as if death were always an unusual thing. “What was Mr. Boyd’s trouble?”

One of Powell’s eyes seemed to be making a circle of the place, examining the house and the white water tower behind it and the chicken houses and the pastures that rolled away on either side until they met the first line of woods. The other eye looked at her. “Died in Florda,” he said and began kicking the valise.

“Well I declare,” she murmured. After a second she said, “And how is your mother?”

“Mah’d again.” He kept watching his foot kick the suitcase. The other two boys stared at her impatiently.

“And where do you all live now?” she asked.

“Atlanta,” he said. “You know, out to one of them developments.”

“Well I see,” she said, “I see.” After a second she said it again. Finally she asked, “And who are these other boys?” and smiled at them.

“Garfield Smith him, and W. T. Harper him,” he said, nodding his head backward first in the direction of the large boy and then the small one.

“How do you boys do?” Mrs. Cope said. “This is Mrs. Pritchard. Mr. and Mrs. Pritchard work here now.”

They ignored Mrs. Pritchard who watched them with steady beady eyes. The three seemed to hang there, waiting, watching Mrs. Cope.

“Well well,” she said, glancing at the suitcase, “it’s nice of you to stop and see me. I think that was real sweet of you.”

Powell’s stare seemed to pinch her like a pair of tongs. “Come back to see how you was doing,” he said hoarsely.

“Listen here,” the smallest boy said, “all the time we been knowing him he’s been telling us about this here place. Said it was everything here. Said it was horses here. Said he had the best time of his entire life right here on this here place. Talks about it all the time.”

“Never shuts his trap about this place,” the big boy grunted, drawing his arm across his nose as if to muffle his words.

“Always talking about them horses he rid here,” the small one continued, “and said he would let us ride them too. Said it was one name Gene.”

Mrs. Cope was always afraid someone would get hurt on her place and sue her for everything she had. “They aren’t shod,” she said quickly. “There was one named Gene but he’s dead now but I’m afraid you boys can’t ride the horses because you might get hurt. They’re dangerous,” she said, speaking very fast.

The large boy sat down on the ground with a noise of disgust and began to finger rocks out of his tennis shoe. The small one darted looks here and there and Powell fixed her with his stare and didn’t say anything.

After a minute the little boy said, “Say, lady, you know what he said one time? He said when he died he wanted to come here!”

For a second Mrs. Cope looked blank; then she blushed; then a peculiar look of pain came over her face as she realized that these children were hungry. They were staring because they were hungry! She almost gasped in their faces and then she asked them quickly if they would have something to eat. They said they would but their expressions, composed and unsatisfied, didn’t lighten any. They looked as if they were used to being hungry and it was no business of hers.

The child upstairs had grown red in the face with excitement. She was kneeling down by the window so that only her eyes and forehead showed over the sill. Mrs. Cope told the boys to come around on the other side of the house where the lawn chairs were and she led the way and Mrs. Pritchard followed. The child moved from the right bedroom across the hall and over into the left bedroom and looked down on the other side of the house where there were three white lawn chairs and a red hammock strung between two hazelnut trees. She was a pale fat girl of twelve with a frowning squint and a large mouth full of silver bands. She knelt down at the window.

The three boys came around the corner of the house and the large one threw himself into the hammock and lit a stub of cigarette. The small boy tumbled down on the grass next to the black suitcase and rested his head on it and Powell sat down on the edge of one of the chairs and looked as if he were trying to enclose the whole place in one encircling stare. The child heard her mother and Mrs. Pritchard in a muted conference in the kitchen. She got up and went out into the hall and leaned over the banisters.

Mrs. Cope’s and Mrs. Pritchard’s legs were facing each other in the back hall. “Those poor children are hungry,” Mrs. Cope said in a dead voice.

“You seen that suitcase?” Mrs. Pritchard asked. “What if they intend to spend the night with you?”

Mrs. Cope gave a slight shriek. “I can’t have three boys in here with only me and Sally Virginia,” she said. “I’m sure they’ll go when I feed them.”