A Southern Place (8 page)

“About the only thing you’re fit for, son. You like to drive don’t you?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Starting today, you will be delivering the payroll checks to all six of our businesses. Because it’s the smallest and quietest place, I print them here at Nolan Manufacturing. In Dumas County are the factory and the farm, then we have the mills in Forsyth and Columbus, with two more in Albany.”

“I just ride around and take people their checks?” It seemed easy enough.

“No, son, there’s more to it than that. You take them in, follow the ledger you’ll keep with you. Mark off every check you issue, and the manager in each office will verify the same in their own ledgers. If anything comes up missing, you will cover it or be fired.”

“But I don’t have any money. How can I cover people’s mistakes if—”

“That’s the point, son, don’t make any mistakes. This is serious business.”

“Yes, sir.”

“This afternoon, we’ll go over the routes. Payroll goes out every two weeks. You’ll collect here on Monday and go to Columbus. Back here on Tuesday, then to Forsyth. Wednesday you come here, then the Albany mills. Thursdays you’ll come here, then go out to the farm.”

“But you said every other week. What’ll I do on Friday, and then the rest of the next week?”

“The second week you’ll stay at the farm.”

“But, why—”

“Because I said so, son. Hard work will do you good.”

“And Fridays?” Phil didn’t like the sound of this.

“Every other Friday and the following weekend you’ll spend at the farm, where I have a number of projects for you.”

Every other weekend!

“And you may spend one weekend per month doing what you want to do, within reason.”

Phil was speechless. The last nine months had been fun, the happiest he’d felt since the early days of King’s Academy.

“Your first farm weekend starts today,” his father said. “Shall we adjourn to the farm?” It was more a command than a question. He stood, took his coat from the back of his chair, and ushered his son outside. The tour of Phil’s new prison was about to begin.

The farm was just a damned farm, so it seemed to Phil. There were fields of cotton. Fields of corn. Fields of peanuts, and fields of something else he didn’t recognize. There were barns where equipment was stored, and a few old colored men plus a few young, dirty white men that drove tractors and “did stuff” to the various crops.

Whatever they do to crops. What the hell is my part in this? What a waste of time.
Then the picture became crystal clear.

“Since driving is the thing you do best, and you definitely need to learn some kind of a skill you can use, I figure this is the best place for you,” his father said. “During the week, you will drive your car, the one that was supposed to last through college, and deliver payroll. But every other week you will work here, learning farm labor. You can sleep in our lodge at night, but every other waking minute you work for these men. Whatever they say, you do.”

Phil knew he’d pay for his sins, but this was beyond belief.

“These men, you mean, these white trash and old colored men? I work for them? Are you insane? You wouldn’t tell Laura or Fran to work for Thelma, cleaning toilets and mopping floors! I can’t work for these men. They’re, they’re countrified, and stupid, and uneducated. I can’t do this, it’s disgusting.”

“These men wear the dirt with the sweat of their brows,” Phil’s father said, running a liver-spotted hand over his own brow, his voice becoming gentle. Phil heard an air of respectfulness in his father’s tone that he’d never used when speaking of the factory workers. “There is nothing disgusting about an honest day’s work. You can’t judge a man’s intellect on his outward appearance. These men might surprise you.”

The whole lecture was making him retch. Then his father laid a hand on his shoulder; his tired, steely-gray eyes looked directly into Phil’s. “And unfortunately, son, as far as being uneducated, so are you.”

That was about it for explanations. He introduced Phil to the workers; Phil couldn’t believe his father knew all their names. Walking out to the barn with Calvin, the most vocal of the filthy men, Phil listened as he explained the difference in insecticides and herbicides and some other “’cides.” Phil figured the guy was wasting his breath; there was simply no way he would be doing this stuff.

Phil looked up, and his father’s car was pulling out of the driveway, then back on the main road.
He’s left me!
Out in the middle of nowhere, with Calvin, Buford, Ezekial, and some other geezer Bible name.

“Okay, it’s time to get back to the fields,” Calvin said. “I’m on the Allis-Chalmers, but you can follow me on the little Oliver.”

Phil’s face must have given away his incoherence, so Calvin added, “They’re tractors. Two different brands of farming tractors. You know, like a Ford and a Chevy, or in your case, a Lincoln and a Cadillac. Get it?”

Phil managed to crank the damned tractor, and he pretty much did whatever Calvin did the rest of the day. It seemed that once Phil caught on, Calvin left him alone. They worked until it was dark. Phil had never been as tired, or as dirty. The men left for wherever they went. Phil stayed in the lodge. Alone. Stranded.

What a hell of a bad day
. The bitchy women at the factory entrance. His new job. Now this. He took a shower, fell across the couch, and beat its weathered surface with his fists. As soon as he closed his eyes, it was morning.

Time to do it all over again.

Chapter 5: 1953

Calvin

From his perch on the tractor, Cal saw Mr. Danner’s car pull into the driveway. Being at the far end of the plowing row, he knew it would be twenty minutes before he reached the other end, nearest the house, and he hoped the county extension agent would hang around long enough for him to reach there.

When he climbed off the tractor, the sun was beginning to soften with the faintest hint of a mid-afternoon breeze. The rich smell of green peanut plants in the freshly turned soil filled his lungs and gave him hope of a good harvest. He stopped at the backyard spigot and cupped his hands for a quick drink and to splash some of the grime off. The cool water mixed with earth and sweat. He ducked to wipe his face against his shirtsleeve, shook his head and ambled around the side of the house.

In an ancient rocker on the wide, sagging porch of the Mullinax farmhouse sat Cal’s mother. She shelled butterbeans and threw the hulls in a paper sack.

“Good to see ya, son.” The ancient chain of the porch swing groaned as T.W. Danner stood to shake Cal’s hand. He wore his standard “uniform,” a short-sleeved plaid shirt and khaki pants. Cal shook his mentor’s hand, glad his own lack of hygiene wouldn’t be considered offensive, just a sign of a farmer’s livelihood.

Mr. Danner patted Cal on the back and returned to his seat. Cal sat in the other rocker, seldom used in the two years since his father had passed. “Almost halfway through,” Cal said. “The Hortons are supposed to finish up with their crop Saturday, and they’re bringing their picker soon as they’re done.”

“Just hope the rain holds out til then.” His mother wiped her hands on the faded apron covering her thin floral housedress.

“The reports say the atmospheric conditions are on our side,” Mr. Danner said. “But we all know how far we can trust the weatherman.” They laughed at the lifelong joke. “Nonetheless,” continued Mr. Danner, “Cal looks to be doing an excellent job with your crop this year. Your daddy would be mighty proud, son.”

“Thank the Lord, if he keeps up like he’s been doing, we just might be able to hold onto these eighty acres, after all,” his mother said. “He’s done right good for a boy that ain’t even got a driver’s license yet.”

“Three more months, and I will.” Cal grinned. “December 1st comes on a Tuesday, and it’s first Tuesdays that the state patrol comes to give driving tests. I can go up to the courthouse right after school.”

“Better be studyin’ up, I reckon,” his mother said with a smile.

Mr. Danner chuckled. “That’s right. Driving a car down Main Street in Nolan may be a little different from operating tractors, combines, threshers and peanut pickers.”

“And how ’bout that Grand Champion pig Cal turned out this year?” Mr. Danner asked. “The finest in three counties. Makes me kinda glad I only raise cattle, don’t know if I could handle the competition here.”

“I was real proud of him,” his mother said. “Even if I did get tired a that pig rootin’ out of his pen ever chance he got. And the money, from the contest and from sellin’ the hog, couldn’t a come at a better time. Got the tractor fixed in time to harvest, without having to borry any more. And Cal got to go to camp, after all.”

“Where he won even more awards,” Mr. Danner said. “You need to keep up with your 4-H, Cal. Ag colleges are quite fond of boys who excel in 4-H and FFA.”

Cal beamed. His mother stared blankly into the bag of hulls. “Delores likes the 4-H, too,” she said, “and swears next year she’ll be going to Rock Eagle with y’all.”

“I hope so,” said Mr. Danner. “She’s a precious little girl, or should I say young lady? They grow up so fast, these days.”

“Don’t I know it,” she said. “Having to let her hems out every few months, it seems.”

“I better get back to the field.” Cal stood. “It won’t plow itself.”

Mr. Danner stood with him. “I’d like to step out and take a look at what you’ve plowed up. Check out the competition, so to speak.”

Mr. Danner had a peanut allotment of a hundred acres or more, with cotton and corn as well. “Sure, Mr. Danner. Come on out,” Cal said.

“It was good talking to you, Mr. Danner,” Cal’s mother called. “Come back to see us.”

“And likewise to you, ma’am,” he said as he followed Cal around the corner.

Seeing Mr. Danner was always a treat for Cal. In many ways, the man was nothing like Cal’s father, a working class, uneducated dirt farmer simply keeping up the small family farm the same as his own father and grandfather before him, yet each visit from the local extension agent made Cal feel a little closer to the man he missed so much.
Guess it’s their love of the land
, Cal thought,
or how they both understood the simple pleasure of watching things grow and feeling like you’re a part of what made it happen.
Whatever the reason, Cal looked forward to Mr. Danner’s visits, and a compliment from him was like a loving pat on the shoulder from his daddy, or the closest he’d have to that, from now on.

Working the farm was Cal’s greatest joy, but becoming its sole caretaker, manager, and laborer had been a huge and frightening undertaking. His father’s sudden death had happened in early harvesting season, just days after he’d overheard the only serious parental argument he’d ever known of. Even years later, just remembering those harsh tones and cruel accusations made his face flush as he ground his teeth.

“You mortgaged the
house
, too? For now on twenty years I’ve lived through this borryin’ from Peter to pay Paul ever spring, seeing you sign over seventy-nine acres that you’ve more or less just give away if there comes a bad drought, a flood, a plague of some new crop-eatin’ varmit or some other act of God. But heaven forbid, come fall, it all works out, though some years better than others. You pay it back in the fall, and in good years, there’s a little something for the rest of us, too. And though I grew up in a family that always said if you need to borry to get it, then you don’t
need
it—”

“Now, baby, I done told you, every
year
I tell you, that’s how farming operates, been that way my whole life and my daddy’s before me and—”

“I know, I know, and through the years, I’ve got where I accept it. Don’t like it, but just know that’s the way it’s gotta be. You’re a good man, Hershel, and a good provider for me and the younguns—”

“Mary Pearl, I told you from the start it was a hard life, but you’ve always had food on the table and a roof over your head. And—”

“That’s what the hell I’m talking about!” she screamed. Calvin had never heard his mother curse, or scream at his father. He’d heard both profanity and yelling in plenty of other places, but this was an evil, foreign sound in the little wooden farmhouse he knew as home. Standing silently in the hallway outside his parents’ door, Cal felt a cramp in his stomach and wondered if he should go to the bathroom, but he couldn’t. His feet were cemented to the floor, forcing him to remain statue-still and find out the origin of this unwanted intruder filling the atmosphere.

“Why the damned house, Hershel, why?” his mother continued. “For nineteen years the farm has been enough. I’ve always worried about losing the farm, but I got to where I could live with it. After all, if we lost the farm, you could just get a job—a normal job, with a steady paycheck and benefits. Like other people. Start to put some money back, so maybe the children could go on to school, do better than what they came from. We could—”

“What the hell do you mean, woman, ‘do better than what they come from’?” Cal’s daddy was raising his voice as well. And the way he’d said “woman” sounded worse than cursing. For no reason he could understand, Cal fought back an urge to cry.

“So that’s how you really feel, do you?” his father asked. “So all along you’ve been hoping we’d lose the farm, so I could get a real
job, with no dirt on my hands, like the one your mama wanted
you to marry? Fine time to tell me. So—you done anything else to help it along—putting poison in my fertilizer or pouring out insecticide and putting in water? What else, Mary Pearl? What else have you done to make sure I go down in flames?”

They weren’t making any sense. Cal knew his mother would never do anything to sabotage the farm, and he knew his dad knew it, too. But he could imagine how hurt Daddy was, just hearing her say that she’d thought about losing the farm without being upset about it. It hurt him, too. The farm was their life, the farm was like another member of the family, a big, all-encompassing one who held them all together, from the great-grandparents he’d never known to the children and grandchildren he and Delores would bring there someday. A family that lasted, like history, continuing chapters of the never-ending book that was the farm. How could she not know that? Calvin had always assumed that they all felt that way, and to even think that it might not be so was way more than frightening.

“I haven’t done anything like that, Hershel, and you know it,” his mother said. “I have loved this farm since the first day you brought me here to meet your folks. I’ve loved it more each year, because you love it so, and because it’s where our children were born and grew up, and it’s where
we
came to be
us
. I’ve tried to help out in any way I could, whether it be canning vegetables or keeping you fed at daybreak or scrimping and saving through spring and summer or keeping the kids out of the way so you could work. I know you didn’t want me to go to work at the factory, but having that little steady money between planting and harvesting has been good to keep us going without having to worry so much. We’ve made a good life here, Hershel, and I do love this farm.”

“We take out a mortgage every year, Mary Pearl.”

“I know. But never before with the house included as collateral. The possibility of taking away my babies’ home is different from taking the farm. I know it’s a slim possibility, but what would we do if they took the house? What would it do to our family? I’d sell myself as a damned whore if I had to, if it meant I could take care of my children.”

They were quiet for a moment. The pain eased in Calvin’s gut.

“I know that, baby,” Cal’s father said. “And I love you and the young’uns more than the farm, too, but it’s a different kind of love. Loving y’all is like something I do for me—y’all are the best thing that ever happened to me, and I thank God every day for the blessing you are.”

“So do I, Hershel, so do I,” his mother said, sniffling in a loud, wet sound that reaffirmed Cal’s knowledge of her tears. He heard the bedsprings squeak and pictured them sitting down on the edge of the bed, his father’s arms wrapped around her as she lay her face against his white, sleeveless undershirt.

“To take care of my family is my responsibility, and one I do with joy. But times is hard—seed, fertilizer, herbicides—they’s all went up since last year, and I had to have more money just to get by. They wouldn’t go over my last year’s loan limit without more collateral, and adding on the house was all I could do. It’s just words, baby. Words on a piece of paper. They ain’t never tried to take the farm, and they won’t be taking the house, either. It’s just words, legal stuff.”

“I know,” Cal’s mother agreed, “but it scares me. What if they did take it?”

“They won’t. And if it come to that, we’d sell a piece of the farm to keep the house. My granddaddy had to back in the Depression, and if it comes to that, I’ll do the same. A man does what he has to do to take care of his family. You know I love you, Mary Pearl.”

Calvin heard a murmur, but couldn’t make out his mother’s answer. His father spoke again.

“You know, in all these years, I’ve never quite got used to the fact that all this is mine—you and Cal and Delores. I don’t know what I ever done to deserve anything so perfect. If anybody’d a-told me when I was Cal’s age I’d have a family like ours, I’d a said they was making fun. Telling something out of a book or something. I never believed I’d ever have anything like this.”

Despite being alone, Calvin was a little embarrassed. He could move his feet now, and knew he should go back to his room, but this was too good to miss. He’d endured the bad part, didn’t he deserve a little reward for being scared out of his drawers just moments ago?

“But Hershel, you always knew you’d be here, running the farm, living on the home place. And a farmer needs a wife. And the act of having a wife usually brings on children. What’s such a surprise about it?”

“I wasn’t much of a lady killer as a boy—too busy working to learn much of the social graces, I guess. I figured if I did get me a wife, she’d be one of those stringy, hard women that plow a mule good as a man, but even the mule might look better than her in a nice dress.”

His mother giggled. Cal heard the covers rustling as they both lay down.

“And I never dreamed I’d have a boy that could work as hard as me, topped off by a little girl as smart and pretty as her mama,” his daddy said.

“Hershel,” his mother’s voice grew serious. “Do you ever think about—him?” Cal knew they were talking about their first child, a boy who came early and lived only a few hours.

“Now, baby,” he said softly. “Of course I do, but I don’t dwell on it. It was a long time ago, we were young, and it just wasn’t meant to be. We don’t question the Lord—and look what come two years later—there won’t never be no better son than Calvin. I reckon the Lord didn’t want little Hershel to feel threatened, so he took him on up to be with Him, and my folks, and yours, too. And we’ll all be together again, one day. Watchin’ ol Cal carry on the work we all had a little hand in.”

The bedsprings were slowly squeaking again, and Cal moved lightly and quickly back to his room. He was sure he didn’t want to be around for whatever came next. Strange that this was the only argument he could ever remember. And knowing the feeling it gave him to realize the farm was not viewed unanimously, he seldom revisited the memory.

On a hot September Tuesday, Cal stepped off the school bus, swallowed down some sweet tea and cornbread, and ran out to the field to relieve his dad on the tractor. Standing at the gate, he heard the faint churn of the old diesel engine, their Allis Chalmers WD, a good little machine who had seen better days. Calvin trotted forward squinting into the full sun and following his ears. In only a few seconds he saw the tractor, in the top of the row and sitting still in the far north corner. He picked up speed into a quick jog; Daddy was probably adjusting the row widths for the PTO and plow, and could use some help.

Hershel Mullinax was known for using every square inch possible for cultivation. Cal knew the north corner, planted in peanuts this year, was the field’s most difficult point to navigate. The rows were shorter, barely long enough to allow the tractor to turn around. Since the less-than-two-acre plot would call for slower, special attention anyway, Hershel decided to make the task more profitable by changing these short rows to be closer together, allowing more plants from a smaller area. Before working this section, Hershel would have to stop, reset the power shift rear wheels closer to the tractor, then adjust the row width of the plow.

The tractor’s 30 horsepower allowed it to pull three plows, but only one could make it through the narrow plot, so the other two used in the larger part of the field had to be removed and set aside. The power shift worked by engaging spiral rails on the axel and was wonderful in its first decade, but time had taken its toll, and Hershel had “Hawkins-rigged” it in every way possible just to keep it going another season. The north corner was usually saved until the last part of the day to work, since it generally wore a man out.