Memories Of Another Day Part 25

I looked at her. "I can't. Not just yet."

"Why?"

"You keep asking me that and I keep giving you the same answer. I don't know why."

She pa.s.sed me the joint. I took a few more tokes, then lay back and watch the dark cover the sky like a blanket. She finished the joint and pinched it out carefully, burying it in the ground. She moved over and put her head on my shoulder. "I'll miss you."

I didn't answer.

"You know where to find me. I'll be sitting on the back porch, looking over at your house."

"I know," I said.

"Don't be too long," she said. "I'd like to be young with you just a little while longer. We all grow up too fast."

I stood in front of the shack and watched the pickup make its way down the dirt road. I saw Anne's face in the rear window, looking back at me. She held up her hand in a gesture of farewell. I held up mine. Then they were gone, and I picked up my backpack and slipped it over my shoulders. It was almost eleven o'clock, and the sun was already hot. The twelve-thirty bus would put her in New York at five; if she could catch the five-fifty out of Grand Central, she could be home by seven.

I started up the hill. The path to the highway led me past the cemetery knoll. I paused there for a moment, looking down at the freshly turned earth, the neat rows of seeds planted around the graves.

*'Don' you worry, Jonathan," Betty May promised. 'Til see to it they git water ever' day. There'll be flowers there almost afore you kin turn aroun'."

I looked down at the shack and wondered if I ever really would come back. Maybe I would be somewhere else.

**Don't wonder, my son. You will come back.''

'*Are you sure, Father? You never came back."

**/ did once, Jonathan. The sheriff told you about that."

*'But you didn't stay."

* 'Neither will you.''

**Then what is the purpose? I might as well not come back."

"You'll have to. For the same reason that I came back. To make yourself whole again."

* 7 don't understand, Father.''

**You will, Jonathan. When the time comes. You will come back for your child."

''My child. Father?"

"Yes, my son. The child you never made."

Bill at the Carpenters, Murray and Green at A.F.L. headquarters. Even Hillman and Dubinsky, who hated each other, would be just as happy if he did not exist.

''You go out to K.C.," they had said. "If anyone could get the meat packers together, you're the man to doit."

Like going to Siberia. Of the last four organizers they'd sent out there, according to his count, he was the only one still alive. And for how long was a matter of conjecture. No truck stop, four out of four. They could just as well have hung him on a meat hook in a freezer locker the way they had poor Sam Masters.

Three days in a car with the Eyeties. Three of them with accents as big as the guns and knives they packed. Three days eating garlic-sausage sandwiches until the stink could have run the car better than the gas they put in it. Three days s.h.i.tting at the side of the road with your a.s.s freezing in the wind, wondering whether they were going to come up behind you and put a bullet through your head or up your a.s.s. Three days of waiting outside phone booths while they telephoned back for instructions. Then, last night, when they got back into the car, he had known the waiting was over. They suddenly stopped talking. Even to each other. The car began to go west along 66. At midnight they slipped through St. Louis. Twenty minutes later they stopped the car on an enipty stretch of highway.

The door opened, a heavy shoe kicked him in the side and he went flying out onto the icy road. He landed on his back, flat on the ground, his hands outstretched. He saw the man lean out the door over him, the pistol looming like a cannon in his hand. Reflex-ively he curled himself into a ball, trying to become as small a target as possible. He heard the roar of the gun as the automatic emptied. He could almost feel the bullets tearing through him. Then the gun was silent. Nothing. He couldn't believe it. He turned, staring up at the gunman.

The Italian was grinning broadly. "You s.h.i.t in your pants. I can smell it."

"Yeah," he said.

"You lucky," the gunman said. "Don't come back to Kansas City or the next-a time you won't smell your own s.h.i.t. You'll be dead."

The car door slammed, the motor roared and the car made a U-turn and sped back on the road toward Kansas City, Suddenly it stopped, reversed abruptly and backed up toward him. By now, he was standing up.

The driver stopped opposite him. He reached out, pointing his hand in the opposite direction from the one in which the car was going. "You go that-a way. Two miles. There's a truck stop." Then the car took off again and its rear lights vanished down the highway.

He moved off the side of the road and cleaned himself as best as he could with snow he melted in his hand, dried himself on pieces of cold, brittle newspaper the wind had blown there, then began to walk. Two hours. Then he saw the lights. It took him another half-hour of running and walking to get there.

The white and red bulbs shone like the sign over the gateway to heaven. TRUCK STOP. GAS. EATS. BUNKS. BATHS. Six big trucks were parked on the far side of the station, their tarpaulins tied down in gray-shrouded silence against the elements. Carefully he walked around behind the trucks before he entered the building. There were no cars parked. No point in taking any chances in case the Eyeties changed their minds and doubled back on him. Then again, it might have been a setup. Someone could be waiting there for him.

Quietly he went to a side window and peered in. The restaurant was empty except for one waitress, busy setting up the tables for breakfast, and a counterman, leaning his heavy belly against the cash register while reading the newspaper. After a last glance around to rea.s.sure himself, he went to the front door and opened it.

He did not go inside. Stood in the open doorway. The wind blew into the restaurant, and they looked up at him.

''Shut the f.u.c.kin' door," the counterman said. "It's freezin'."

''Come in," called the waitress.

"I need a bath first," he said. In spite of himself, his teeth began to chatter.

The waitress looked at him. "You need soniething hot inside you more. I'll get a cup of coffee."

"Where's the bath?" he asked. "Bring the coffee there." He looked at the counterman. "Got an extra pair of pants to sell me?"

The counterman stared at him. "You all right?"

"Some Wops beat the s.h.i.t out of me and dumped me up the road a piece," he said. "And I'm toting a couple of lumps of ice around with me."

The counterman was silent for a moment. "I got a pair of work pants that might do you. It'll cost you two dollars, though. They're almost new."

The man stuck his hand in his jacket pocket and came up with a bill. He held it out toward the waitress. "There's five dollars. Bring the coffee and the pants over to the bath. And a razor too, if you can spare it."

The waitress took the bill from his hand. "The bath is over in the building on your left, next to the bunk-house."

"Thank you, ma'am," he said politely.

The door closed behind him, and they saw him walk past the windows around the side of the building. The waitress took the five-dollar bill over to the register and gave it to the counterman.

"Those pants ain't wu'th more'n a dollar an' you know it," she said reproachfully."

"Mebbe to you an' mebbe to me. But to him, it's wu'th two dollars." The counterman rang up twenty- five cents on the register, took out the change, pocketed two dollars and gave her the rest. *'I took out fer the bath and razor."

''Okay."

"The pants are hangin' in the locker behind the' door."

"I know where they are,'* she said, walking around him into the kitchen.

He slapped her fiill b.u.t.tocks as she pa.s.sed. "If n yer smart," he laughed, "you kin make it so he gits no change at all."

She shot him a baleful look. "He's not you, stupid," she said sarcastically. "He kin have it for free."

He was soaking in the hot tub when she came into the bathhouse, his head leaning against the back, his eyes closed. The first thing she noticed was the black-and-blue bruises on his body. Then she remarked the puffed, swollen eye, cheekbone and jaw.

"They really worked you over," she said in a hushed voice.

He opened his eyes. "I'm lucky they didn't kill me," he said matter-of-factly. He gestured to the floor near the tub. His pants lay there crumpled up. His jacket and shirt were hung neatly across the back of a chair in front of the heater, drying out. "Throw the pants into the garbage. I already washed the shirt."

"Okay," she said, bending to pick them up."

"Better get some newspaper first," he said. "I wasn't kidding."

She went into the other room and came back with paper. Carefully she picked up the pants without touching them and wrapped the paper around them. She put the razor and his change on the chair where his jacket was hanging. "I'll git rid of this. Then I'll come back and he'p you."

"Thank you, ma'am, but I think I can manage."

"Don't be a fool," she said sharply. "I been brought up with five brothers an' I been married twice an' I know when a man needs help an' when he don't."

He turned to look at her. Despite the swollen eye and cheek, she felt the strength in his face. "And you think I need help?"

"I know," she said.

He nodded. "Then I thank you kindly, ma'am, and I'm grateful to accept your offer."

When she came back, she pulled a chair over to the tub and with a small towel soaked in water and soaped began to wash him gently. There were bruises all over his body, and despite himself he winced whenever she touched him. She changed the water in the tub twice, finally washing his face and his hair, then carefully shaving him. Blood had begun to flow from a cut over his heavy eyebrow. "That's a bad 'un," she said. "We better git the doctor in the momin' to come an' st.i.tch it up. Otherwise there'll be a big scar." She tore a strip from a clean cloth and pressed it to the cut. "You hoi' that while I git some adhesive to keep it together."

She was back in a moment with a wide roll of Johnson & Johnson. Expertly she tore it down the middle and made a neat cross patch over his eye. "Okay, you kin git up now an' dry yourse'f."

Wincing, he got to his feet, taking the towel she held out to him and wrapping it around himself. She held out a hand to steady him as he stepped out of the tub.

"You okay?" she asked.

He nodded.

"Mebbe you ought to lie down fer a while. I kin bring you somethin' to eat."

"I'll be all right," he said,.drying himself. "Is there a telephone in the restaurant?"

She nodded.

"I have to make a phone call first." He ran his finger over his cheek, looked in a mirror, then turned to her. "You know," he said, almost shyly, "that's the first time a lady ever gave me a shave."

*'Is it all right?"

He smiled at her, and suddenly he seemed almost young. ''Real good. A guy can get spoiled by something like that."

She laughed. "I'll go back an' git yer breakfast ready. Wheat cakes, sausages and eggs all right?"

"Right perfect," he said. "Just give me ten minutes to get there."

counter, where the counterman was leaning against the register. She placed the dishes in the wash rack. Another half-hour and the pearl diver would come in. He could clean them.

She came back to the counterman. "I'm whupped," she said. "I cain't wait to git home."

''I don' know what fer," he replied. ''You didn' do nothin'. There was no business tonight."

'Those are the worst nights of all. At least if you're busy the time doesn't drag."

"Another half-hour, that's all." They heard the coin tinkle down into the telephone box and looked up.

His voice was low, but it carried. "Long distance, please. Station collect to Washington, D.C. The number is Capitol 2437."

The coin jingled back into the return chute. He fished it out and stood there, puffing at his cigar, waiting. After a moment, he spoke again. "Just keep on ringing. Operator. There's someone there. They'll answer."

He puffed patiently on the cigar. The operator came on again. A sudden authority came into his voice. "You just keep ringing, young lady. The phone is downstairs in the hall and they're upstairs sleeping. Ring long enough and they'll hear it.

A moment later someone answered. His voice lowered. "Moses, it's Daniel B. . . . No, I ain't dead. They don't make phone calls from h.e.l.l. . . . Yeah, they went back to work in K.C. I know that. Tell John L. and Phil that we went in there like a bunch of amateurs. The packers had everything set up. The cops and the Wops. We didn't have a chance. I spent the last three days riding around in a car with a bunch of garlic eaters. I knew the minute they dumped me the strike was over. I wouldn't be alive now if it was still on. They dumped me outside St. Louis on 66. I'm calling from a truck stop. The office owes me a new suit."

He was silent, puffing on the cigar, while the voice on the other end of the line spoke. His voice was slightly hoa.r.s.e when he began to speak again. '^Fm okay. Just banged up a little; I've had worse. . . . No, I'm not coming back for a while. I've been four years without a vacation or a rest. It's time I took one. I want to do some thinking on my own. I'm tired of doing everybody else's bidding.''

Again the voice on the other end of the line spoke while he listened. This time his voice was de&iite. '*No more. ... I don't give a d.a.m.n what they got lined up for me. Probably another suicide job. ... California, I guess. I'm halfway there now. Maybe I can pick a few oranges off the trees an' eat them fresh and sweet from the sun. . . . Yeah, I'll keep in touch. . . . No, I got money. ... I ain't hangin' around here for John L. to call me back. For all I know the garlic eaters might have changed their minds. I'm moving on while the gettin' is still good. . . . Yeah. I know. Things'11 get better-but I don't know what good that will do us. John L. is pushing for Landon, and Roosevelt won't take him too kindly for that. . . . You can bet your a.s.s that F.D.R. is gonna win a second term. . . .Okay. I'll call you when I get to California."

He put down the telephone and went back to his table. He held up his hand, and the waitress brought him another cup of coffee. "Is there any hotel around here where I can rent a room?" he asked.

'The nearest is back in St. Louis," she said.

He shook his head. *'Wrong direction. I'm going west, not east." He took a sip of his coffee. "Think I can get a hitch on one of those trucks out there going west?"

"You kin ask," she said. "They'll be gittin' up soon."

"I wiU, thank you."

She started back to the counter. Halfway, she turned and came back to him. "You mean what you said? Goin' to California?"

He nodded.

*'I never been there either," she said. ''I hear it's real pretty out there. The sun shines all the time an' it's never cold."

He looked up at her without speaking.