The Grapes of Wrath

The hitch-hiker flopped down out of sight and clung to the door handle. The motor roared up for a moment, the gears clicked in, and the great truck moved away, first gear, second gear, third gear, and then a high whining pick-up and fourth gear. Under the clinging man the highway blurred dizzily by. It was a mile to the first turn in the road, then the truck slowed down. The hitch-hiker stood up, eased the door open, and slipped into the seat. The driver looked over at him, slitting his eyes, and he chewed as though thoughts and impressions were being sorted and arranged by his jaws before they were finally filed away in his brain. His eyes began at the new cap, moved down the new clothes to the new shoes. The hitch-hiker squirmed his back against the seat in comfort, took off his cap, and swabbed his sweating forehead and chin with it. “Thanks, buddy,” he said. “My dogs was pooped out.”

“New shoes,” said the driver. His voice had the same quality of secrecy and insinuation his eyes had. “You oughtn’ to take no walk in new shoes— hot weather.”

The hiker looked down at the dusty yellow shoes. “Didn’t have no other shoes,” he said. “Guy got to wear ’em if he got no others.” The driver squinted judiciously ahead and built up the speed of the truck a little. “Goin’ far?”

“Uh-uh! I’d a walked her if my dogs wasn’t pooped out.” The questions of the driver had the tone of a subtle examination. He seemed to spread nets, to set traps, with his questions. “Lookin’ for a job?” he asked.

“No, my old man got a place, forty acres. He’s a cropper, but we been there a long time.”

The driver looked significantly at the fields along the road where the corn was fallen sideways and the dust was piled on it. Little flints shoved through the dusty soil. The driver said, as though to himself, “A forty-acre cropper and he ain’t been dusted out and he ain’t been tractored out?”

“’Course I ain’t heard lately,” said the hitch-hiker.

“Long time,” said the driver. A bee flew into the cab and buzzed in back of the windshield. The driver put out his hand and carefully drove the bee into an air stream that blew it out of the window. “Croppers going fast now,” he said. “One cat’ takes and shoves ten families out. Cat’s all over hell now. Tear in and shove the croppers out. How’s your old man hold on?” His tongue and his jaws became busy with the neglected gum, turned it and chewed it. With each opening of his mouth his tongue could be seen flipping the gum over.

“Well, I ain’t heard lately. I never was no hand to write, nor my old man neither.” He added quickly, “But the both of us can, if we want.”

“Been doing a job?” Again the secret investigating casualness. He looked out over the fields, at the shimmering air, and gathering his gum into his cheek, out of the way, he spat out the window.

“Sure have,” said the hitch-hiker.

“Thought so. I seen your hands. Been swingin’ a pick or an ax or a sledge. That shines up your hands. I notice all stuff like that. Take a pride in it.”

The hitch-hiker stared at him. The truck tires sang on the road.

“Like to know anything else? I’ll tell you. You ain’t got to guess.”

“Now don’t get sore. I wasn’t gettin’ nosy.”

“I’ll tell you anything. I ain’t hidin’ nothin’.”

“Now don’t get sore. I just like to notice things. Makes the time pass.”

“I’ll tell you anything. Name’s Joad, Tom Joad. Old man is ol’ Tom Joad.” His eyes rested broodingly on the driver.

“Don’t get sore. I didn’t mean nothin’.”

“I don’t mean nothin’ neither,” said Joad. “I’m just tryin’ to get along without shovin’ nobody around.” He stopped and looked out at the dry fields, at the starved tree clumps hanging uneasily in the heated distance. From his side pocket he brought out his tobacco and papers. He rolled his cigarette down between his knees, where the wind could not get at it.

The driver chewed as rhythmically, as thoughtfully, as a cow. He waited to let the whole emphasis of the preceding passage disappear and be forgotten. At last, when the air seemed neutral again, he said, “A guy that never been a truck skinner don’t know nothin’ what it’s like. Owners don’t want us to pick up nobody. So we got to set here an’ just skin her along ’less we want to take a chance of gettin’ fired like I just done with you.”

“’Preciate it,” said Joad.