The Grapes of Wrath

“Well, it souns’ awright,” Huston said worriedly. “But don’t you let nothing happen, Willie. You’re responsible. Don’ you hurt them fellas. Don’ you use no stick nor no knife or arn, or nothing like that.”

“No, sir,” said Willie. “We won’t mark ’em.”

Huston was suspicious. “I wisht I knowed I could trus’ you, Willie. If you got to sock ’em, sock ’em where they won’t bleed.”

“Yes, sir!” said Willie.

“You sure of the fellas you picked?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Awright. An’ if she gits outa han’, I’ll be in the righthan’ corner, this way on the dance floor.”

Willie saluted in mockery and went out.

Huston said, “I dunno. I jes’ hope Willie’s boys don’t kill nobody. What the hell the deputies want to hurt the camp for? Why can’t they let us be?”

The sad boy from Unit Two said, “I lived out at Sunlan’ Lan’ an’ Cattle Company’s place. Honest to God, they got a cop for ever’ ten people. Got one water faucet for ’bout two hundred people.”

The tubby man said, “Jesus, God, Jeremy. You ain’t got to tell me. I was there. They got a block of shacks— thirty-five of ’em in a row, an’ fifteen deep. An’ they got ten crappers for the whole shebang. An’, Christ, you could smell ’em a mile. One of them deputies give me the lowdown. We was settin’ aroun’, an’ he says, ’Them goddamn gov’ment camps,’ he says. ’Give people hot water, an’ they gonna want hot water. Give ’em flush toilets, an’ they gonna want ’em.’ He says, ’You give them goddamn Okies stuff like that an’ they’ll want ’em.’ An’ he says, ’They hol’ red meetin’s in them gov’ment camps. All figgerin’ how to git on relief,’ he says.”

Huston asked. “Didn’ nobody sock him?”

“No. They was a little fella, an’ he says, ‘What you mean, relief?’

“‘I mean relief— what us taxpayers puts in an’ you goddamn Okies takes out.’

“‘We pay sales tax an’ gas tax an’ tobacco tax,’ this little guy says. An’ he say, ’Farmers get four cents a cotton poun’ from the gov’ment— ain’t that relief?’ An’ he says, ’Railroads an’ shippin’ companies draw subsidies— ain’t that relief?’

“‘They’re doin’ stuff got to be done,’ this deputy says.

“‘Well,’ the little guy says, ‘how’d your goddamn crops get picked if it wasn’t for us?’” The tubby man looked around.

“What’d the deputy say?” Huston asked.

“Well, the deputy got mad. An’ he says, ‘You goddamn reds is all the time stirrin’ up trouble,’ he says. ‘You better come along with me.’ So he takes this little guy in, an’ they give him sixty days in jail for vagrancy.”

“How’d they do that if he had a job?” asked Timothy Wallace.

The tubby man laughed. “You know better’n that,” he said. “You know a vagrant is anybody a cop don’t like. An’ that’s why they hate this here camp. No cops can get in. This here’s United States, not California.”

Huston sighed. “Wisht we could stay here. Got to be goin’ ’fore long. I like this here. Folks gits along nice; an’, God Awmighty, why can’t they let us do it ’stead of keepin’ us miserable an’ puttin’ us in jail? I swear to God they gonna push us into fightin’ if they don’t quit a-worryin’ us.” Then he calmed his voice. “We jes’ got to keep peaceful,” he reminded himself. “The committee got no right to fly off’n the handle.”

The tubby man from Unit Three said, “Anybody that thinks this committee got all cheese an’ crackers ought to jes’ try her. They was a fight in my unit today— women. Got to callin’ names, an’ then got to throwin’ garbage. Ladies’ Committee couldn’ handle it, an’ they come to me. Want me to bring the fight in this here committee. I tol’ ’em they got to handle women trouble theirselves. This here committee ain’t gonna mess with no garbage fights.”

Huston nodded. “You done good,” he said.

And now the dusk was falling, and as the darkness deepened the practicing of the string band seemed to grow louder. The lights flashed on and two men inspected the patched wire to the dance floor. The children crowded thickly about the musicians. A boy with a guitar sang the “Down Home Blues,” chording delicately for himself, and on his second chorus three harmonicas and a fiddle joined him. From the tents the people streamed toward the platform, men in their clean blue denim and women in their ginghams. They came near to the platform and then stood quietly waiting, their faces bright and intent under the light.

Around the reservation there was a high wire fence, and along the fence, at intervals of fifty feet, the guards sat in the grass and waited.

Now the cars of the guests began to arrive, small farmers and their families, migrants from other camps. And as each guest came through the gate he mentioned the name of the camper who had invited him.

The string band took a reel tune up and played loudly, for they were not practicing any more. In front of their tents the Jesus-lovers sat and watched, their faces hard and contemptuous. They did not speak to one another, they watched for sin, and their faces condemned the whole proceeding.