The Grapes of Wrath

These folks is our folks— is our folks. An’ that manager, he come an’ set an’ drank coffee, an’ he says, ’Mrs. Joad’ this, an’ ’Mrs. Joad’ that— an’ ’How you gettin’ on, Mrs. Joad?’” She stopped and sighed, “Why, I feel like people again.” She stacked the last dish. She went into the tent and dug through the clothes box for her shoes and a clean dress. And she found a little paper package with her earrings in it. As she went past Rose of Sharon, she said, “If them ladies comes, you tell ’em I’ll be right back.” She disappeared around the side of the sanitary unit.

Rose of Sharon sat down heavily on a box and regarded her wedding shoes, black patent leather and tailored black bows. She wiped the toes with her finger and wiped her finger on the inside of her skirt. Leaning down put a pressure on her growing abdomen. She sat up straight and touched herself with exploring fingers, and she smiled a little as she did it.

Along the road a stocky woman walked, carrying an apple box of dirty clothes toward the wash tubs. Her face was brown with sun, and her eyes were black and intense. She wore a great apron, made from a cotton bag, over her gingham dress, and men’s brown oxfords were on her feet. She saw that Rose of Sharon caressed herself, and she saw the little smile on the girl’s face.

“So!” she cried, and she laughed with pleasure. “What you think it’s gonna be?”

Rose of Sharon blushed and looked down at the ground, and then peeked up, and the little shiny black eyes of the woman took her in. “I don’t know,” she mumbled.

The woman plopped the apple box on the ground. “Got a live tumor,” she said, and she cackled like a happy hen. “Which’d you ruther?” she demanded.

“I dunno— boy, I guess. Sure— boy.”

“You jus’ come in, didn’ ya?”

“Las’ night— late.”

“Gonna stay?”

“I don’ know. ’F we can get work, guess we will.”

A shadow crossed the woman’s face, and the little black eyes grew fierce. “’F you can git work. That’s what we all say.”

“My brother got a job already this mornin’.”

“Did, huh? Maybe you’re lucky. Look out for luck. You can’t trus’ luck.” She stepped close. “You can only git one kind a luck. Cain’t have more. You be a good girl,” she said fiercely. “You be good. If you got sin on you— you better watch out for that there baby.” She squatted down in front of Rose of Sharon. “They’s scandalous things goes on in this here camp,” she said darkly. “Ever’ Sat’dy night they’s dancin’, an’ not only squar’ dancin’, neither. They’s some does clutch-an’-hug dancin’! I seen’ em.”

Rose of Sharon said guardedly, “I like dancin’, squar’ dancin’.” And she added virtuously, “I never done that other kind.”

The brown woman nodded her head dismally, “Well, some does. An’ the Lord ain’t lettin’ it get by, neither; an’ don’ you think He is.”

“No, ma’am,” the girl said softly.

The woman put one brown wrinkled hand on Rose of Sharon’s knee, and the girl flinched under the touch. “You let me warn you now. They ain’t but a few deep down Jesus-lovers lef’. Ever’ Sat’dy night when that there strang ban’ starts up an’ should be a-playin’ hymnody, they’re a-reelin’— yes, sir, a-reelin’. I seen ’em. Won’t go near, myself, nor I don’ let my kin go near. They’s clutch-an’-hug, I tell ya.” She paused for emphasis and then said, in a hoarse whisper, “They do more. They give a stage play.” She backed away and cocked her head to see how Rose of Sharon would take such a revelation.

“Actors?” the girl said in awe.

“No, sir!” the woman exploded. “Not actors, not them already damn’ people. Our own kinda folks. Our own people. An’ they was little children didn’ know no better, in it, an’ they was pretendin’ to be stuff they wasn’t. I didn’ go near. But I hearn ’em talkin’ what they was a-doin’. The devil was jus’ a-struttin’ through this here camp.”

Rose of Sharon listened, her eyes and mouth open. “Oncet in school we give a Chris’ chile play— Christmus.”

“Well— I ain’t sayin’ that’s bad or good. They’s good folks thinks a Chris’ chile is awright. But— well, I wouldn’ care to come right out flat an’ say so. But this here wasn’ no Chris’ chile. This here was sin an’ delusion an’ devil stuff. Struttin’ an’ paradin’ an’ speakin’ like they’re somebody they ain’t. An’ dancin’ an’ clutchin’ an’ a-huggin’.”

Rose of Sharon sighed.

“An’ not jus’ a few, neither,” the brown woman went on. “Gettin’ so’s you can almos’ count the deep-down lamb-blood folks on your toes. An’ don’ you think them sinners is puttin’ nothin’ over on God, neither. No, sir, He’s a-chalkin’ ’em up sin by sin, an’ He’s drawin’ His line an’ addin’ ’em up sin by sin. God’s a-watchin’, an’ I’m a-watchin’. He’s awready smoked two of ’em out.”

Rose of Sharon panted, “Has?”

The brown woman’s voice was rising in intensity. “I seen it. Girl a-carryin’ a little one, jes’ like you. An’ she play-acted, an’ she hug-danced. And”— the voice grew bleak and ominous— “she thinned out and she skinnied out, an’— she dropped that baby, dead.”

“Oh, my!” The girl was pale.