Gone. "Did you know? the Government sold
us their stored-up wheat
At one-sixty-five a bushel. We could've
got it for half or less-thirty-five
some places.>" "For cash,"
I said. We both laughed, but the sound
spun a flatness in the room
That unscarred laughter never leaves
behind. "I see you already know.
Who don't?" she said to my nod. "It's plain enough."
In us clearly the picture
complete as if she'd run
And fetched some ragged roll of paper with
the legend in print:
How the farms were good farms, and the land,
and the stock. But the loans were late,
like long-held rain dropped
Thinly. Then the drought's thick dust-
and black rust brushing its foxtail
Through the starved grain. Many farmers
left sections uncut: binding twine
cost so much, and the wheat
Hardly heavy enough to shock, barely fit
to be flung to the hogs.
"D'you blame us for binning what little we
could? That or the gravel pits for him
This winter if we"re to skin through.
'Dollar for Dollar!'
We can't even
pay back 'Bushel for Bushell'
That man here ye~terday, training his
snout on every corner
As if something smelled and he'd find it,
he said the Government'd loan us ... "
I'd turned without moving toward a small
Whistling lifted up like a bird somewhere
outside, and I thought
Maybe he, maybe Jesfr-
" .•.
minus the first
seed and feed loans and interest!
Plus mortgage ...
so hog-tied now we can't
never lap water when it rains. I told
Jess talking's no use.
He's got to fight like Marsh and them others
of us is doing,
H'e's got •.. "
Marsh had the lean face of his
brother~f
Jess. The bones went
the same way, jutting so the eyes
Seemed very deep, their brightness like the
peering of an animal from its hole.
"Sam Calkin ... "
"Listen," I said, "what
time's the eviction? You and I, if we--"
"I
Thought of that," she answered. "We'll have to
walk, no gas in the car, and it's a good
three mile. But we've
Plenty of--Why,
it's stopped!" with her eyes
narrowed on the clock
Sitting quiet as a tame cat waiting to be touched
and it would purr again. "Jess!" from
PARTISAN
REVIEW AND ANVIL
the door-sill yelling,
"What time you got?" He popped up from some-
where near, his mouth
Stopped round on a whistle or maybe fixed new
with astonishment,
a whittled stick shining
like wheatstraw in one hand
And the knife in the other. His face seemed
brighter. "Ma," he said.
She: "The time, what time is it?"
It was then
that the telephone signaled--
A hollow weak sound before the real ring trilled--
and our noses were full of the sinell
of his movement,
With sweat with sun with the odor of dust on
a man's farm clothes,
And he now tense to a mouse-squeak in the
wall that told sharp news. By his voice
too much was happening and
His mind balked the way a full bucket
refuses more water.
With the receiver stumbled onto its hook, he
swung, staring, looking as if morning
had come too soon
And he still lifting sleep's weight with his
eyelids. She probably
Bruised on the table squeezing past to reach him
where he sat. Terror had pressed graywhite
On his mouth but fury now burned his ears red,
and his dogtooth showed its clean fang
where the lip Curled.
"By God
I"
he said. "The bastards
I
They
got him!" "Who?"
"Marsh! They say Marsh just killed the sheriff!"
"What?"
and our babel swam
in the room:
"They're crazy
I"
"Marsh always warned against
force, he never carries
A gun!" One thought reared free, "We got to get
there fast
I"
Jerked up at
remembering the car,
No gas. "Jess, I'll call--"
"No!" he
said. "Here, grab this!"
Shoving the night lamp to me, the jarred
mantles shaking clay-colored
Ash on my wrists as I ran carrying, hearing
the soft slup of liquid between my
two hands,
And them coming after with other things--
likely a funnel
Or a measuring cup with a spout, and
the unused lamp from the storage hole.
that might have a splatter
In it to get us to Marsh waiting
with the bars black
On the shape of the sun, and the gathered
farmers coming with fists up, strong as an army of bulls.
CLARA WEATHERWAX
