"About that corn," I say.
I tell him again I will help him out if he gets into a tight, with her sick and all.
Like most folks around here, I done holp him so much already I cant quit now.
"I aimed to get to it today," he says.
"Seems like I cant get my mind on nothing."
"Maybe she'll hold out till you are laid-by," I say.
"If God wills it," he says.
"Let Him comfort you," Cora says.
If Cash just works that careful on my barn.
He looks up when we pass.
"Dont reckon I'll get to you this week," he says.
"’Taint no rush," I say.
"Whenever you get around to it."
We get into the wagon.
Cora sets the cake box on her lap. It's fixing to rain, sho.
"I dont know what he'll do," Cora says.
"I just dont know."
"Poor Anse," I say.
"She kept him at work for thirty-odd years.
I reckon she is tired."
"And I reckon she'll be behind him for thirty years more," Kate says.
"Or if it aint her, he’ll get another one before cotton-picking."
"I reckon Cash and Darl can get married now," Eula says.
"That poor boy," Cora says.
"The poor little tyke."
"What about Jewel?" Kate says.
"He can, too," Eula says.
"Hmph," Kate says.
"I reckon he will.
I reckon so.
I reckon there's more gals than one around here that dont want to see Jewel tied down.
Well, they needn't to worry."
"Why, Kate!" Cora says.
The wagon begins to rattle.
"The poor little tyke," Cora says.
It's fixing to rain this night.
Yes, sir.
A rattling wagon is mighty dry weather, for a Birdsell.
But that'll be cured.
It will for a fact.
"She ought to taken them cakes after she said she would," Kate says.
Anse
Durn that road.
And it fixing to rain, too.
I can stand here and same as see it with second-sight, a-shutting down behind them like a wall, shutting down betwixt them and my given promise.
I do the best I can, much as I can get my mind on anything, but durn them boys.
A-laying there, right tip to my door, where every bad luck that comes and goes is bound to find it.
I told Addie it want any luck living on a road when it come by here, and she said, for the world like a woman,
"Get up and move, then."
But I told her it want no luck in it, because the Lord put roads for travelling: why He laid them down flat on the earth.