The two men were brothers, Henry and William Sherrod. The blind man was
stout, his sandy hair thin on his round head. William was slim in build
and the bones of his face prominent. His hair was thick and the color
of Henry’s. His eyes were blue and quick with impatience. Henry’s were
blue and flat with the vacancy of blindness.
Will leaned forward and took another fish from the heaped plate in
front of him.
“Got in purtty late las’ night, didn’t you, Will?” Henry had finished
his breakfast, and sat leaning back in his chair, his pale eyes staring
in the direction of his brother.
Will did not lift his head from his plate. “Uh-huh,” he said.
“Who’d you see up town?” Henry went on.
“Nobody much. I--” he cleared his mouth of the fish bones--“I went to
the movin’ picher place.”
“Oh, you did, did you?” There was an eager interest in Henry’s voice.
He leaned forward and waited for Will to go on. Then he prompted
him: “Ain’t you goin’ to tell us what you saw? Annie here wants to
know--don’t you, Annie?”
Annie roused herself from the stupor she had fallen into. “I ain’t
pertikler,” she said.
Will suddenly scowled at the blind man. He paid no attention to Annie.
“It warn’t so much. Jest one o’ them regler pichers. L’s see--” he ran
his hand through his thick hair in the effort to think. “Thar was a
woman an’ two men--an’--an’ she liked purtty things an’--an’ all. An’
one man was poor an’ tother was rich--so she runned away with him--an’
then he did something crooked--bet on a horse or sumpin like that--an’
so her husban’ come an’ got her. It was like that!”
Henry sighed when Will had finished. “It must er been a real good
picher. Minds me er one I saw onct over to Adamton.”
“Yeah! Everything ’minds you er somethin’ you seen over to Adamton.
It’s right bad you cain’t go back over there.” Henry dropped his head
at the sound of Will’s voice.
Annie had not looked up from her plate or seemed to listen to Will’s
recital, but now she stared straight at him, and under the scorn in her
gaze he hesitated. “You lay off’n Henry,” she said.
“What you got to do with it? You better dry up yerself!” But as she
still stared at him, his eyes wavered and he returned to his breakfast.
Almost paralyzed by this exchange between husband and wife, not because
it was new or the first time he had heard it, but because he so keenly
realized his helplessness, Henry’s hands fumbled with his knife and
fork. They made outlandish noises against his empty plate.
“Have some more fish, Henry?” Annie lowered her voice as she spoke to
him.
“Believe I had a plenty, Annie.”
“Gimme ’nother cup er coffee.” Will held his cup back toward the
stove without turning. Annie filled it for him. She had finished her
breakfast and she went slowly about the kitchen, testing the water in
the iron kettle and scraping the dishes clean. She gathered them into a
pile and carried them to a table nearer the stove.
Henry tilted back his chair and lighted a pipe. Will sucked noisily
at his second cup of coffee, his arms propped on the table, one hand
supporting his head.
“Going to do Four Acre?” Henry asked presently in a voice he meant to
be conciliating.
“Yeah.”
“It sure is goin’ to be a hot day.”
“You’re dam’ right!”
“Can’t yer put it off?” Henry went on.
“Naw!” Will got up and stood with his hands on the back of his chair,
looking down at him. “You got a purtty sof’ snap sittin’ ’round all day
doin’ nothin’.”
“Trade you!” Henry said quickly.
“Like hell, you would!” He gave the chair a sudden push that sent it
against the table. “Whar’s them milk buckets?”
Annie pointed to them and he took the two empty pails and went out.
There was a little space of silence as Annie poured the greasy dish
water out through the open window on the ground, where it ran off in a
rainbow streak down the slope of the yard. “Will oughter milk before
brekfast,” she said to Henry as she hung the pan on its nail.
“Well, it’s purtty hard on him, doing all the work for bothen us.”
Henry shook his head solemnly.
“You can’t help it!” Annie said fiercely. She went through the door
carrying a bucket of scraps--more food for the pigs. When she came
back she swept the kitchen, took the ashes from the cooling stove
and covered the table with a cloth, then she darkened the room and
went out. She swept the two bedrooms, beat the knobs out of the shuck
mattresses and spread them with yellow sheets, yellow from having been
washed in river water. When all this was done she returned to the
kitchen, strained and set away the milk Will had left for her on the
table. She carried it out to the wire-covered box nailed high up on the
porch, to keep away the swarming flies. Then she put on a slat bonnet,
took a knife and basket and went out into the garden.