God's Little Acre by Erskine Caldwell
“Oh, Pa!” Griselda begged, covering her face and trying to hide from sight. “Please don’t say any more, Pa. Please don’t!”
“Now you just sit and be quiet while I praise you mightily, Griselda. I know what I’m doing. I’m proud to discuss you, too. Jim Leslie has never seen the likes of what I’m talking about. His wife don’t appear to be in the running at all. She looks like she’s all mashed down on the chest and can’t rise up. It’s a shame and a pity, I’ll be dog-gone if it ain’t, that he had to marry a girl with her awful looks. It’s a wonder he can stand it, on top of the disease. Now, don’t try to stop me while I’m praising you, Griselda. I’m mighty proud of you, and I aim to praise you sky-high.”
Griselda was already beginning to cry a little. Her shoulders shook in jerks and she had to hold the handkerchief tight against her eyes so the tears would not fall on her lap,
“Son,” Ty Ty said, “ain’t she the prettiest little girl you ever did see? When I was a young man, I used to think that all girls were alike, more or less, after allowing for a little natural difference, and I reckon maybe you’ve thought the same up till now; but when you’ve got an eyeful of Griselda, there, you know durn well you’ve been missing a heap thinking such foolishness all your life. Son, I reckon you know what I mean. You sit there and look at her and you get to feeling something trying to stand up on the inside of you. That’s it. I ain’t been around much outside of Georgia, and so I can’t speak for the other parts of the world, but I’ve sure-God seen a heap in my time in Georgia and I’m here to tell you that it ain’t no use to go no further away when it comes to looking for such prettiness. Man alive! Griselda totes around with her so much prettiness that it’s a shame to look sometimes.”
Griselda cried brokenly.
Ty Ty felt in his pocket for a quarter, finally picking it out of a handful of nails, harness brads, and loose change. He gave it to Griselda.
“Now, ain’t I right, Jim Leslie?”
Jim Leslie glanced at his father and back again at Griselda. He appeared to be far less angry with his father than he had been earlier in the evening. He wished he could say something to Griselda, or to Ty Ty about her.
“Maybe that wasn’t a fair question,” Ty Ty said. “I reckon I’d best take that back, son. You ain’t had a chance to see Griselda like I have, and you can’t be expected to take my word for what you ain’t seen. When the time comes to see her, though, you’ll remember that I didn’t lie about it, not one word. She’s got all the prettiness I said she has, and then some. If you’ll just sit there and look at her, you’ll get to feeling it in no time. Her prettiness comes right through everything if you’re there to see it.”
Jim Leslie suddenly sat up and listened. There was the distinct sound of a person walking somewhere in the house. He jumped to his feet, nodding almost imperceptibly at Darling Jill and Griselda, and ran from the room.
Darling Jill got up and walked across the room and stood by the mantelpiece looking at the bric-a-brac. She turned and called Griselda.
“Did you ever see such beautiful things in all your life, Griselda?”
“But we shouldn’t touch anything, Darling Jill. None of it is ours. It belongs to them.”
“Jim Leslie is my brother, so why shouldn’t we do what we like in his house?”
“It’s her house, too.”
Darling Jill turned up her nose and made a face that both Griselda and Ty Ty could plainly see.
“Jim Leslie lives in fine style all right,” Ty Ty said. “Just look at all the fine furniture in this room. To look at him now, a man wouldn’t think that he came from out near Marion when he was a boy. I don’t reckon he’s got all the way used to such things, though. I’ll bet a pretty he wishes sometimes he was out at home with Buck and Shaw and the rest of us helping dig in the holes. Jim Leslie ain’t no different from the whole of us, Griselda. Don’t let a fine suit of clothes try to tell you different. I wouldn’t be scared in his house if I was you.”
Darling Jill put her hand on the mahogany end-table and felt the smooth beauty of it. She called Griselda to admire it with her.
“There is a picture as big as a window sash,” Ty Ty remarked, getting up and going to the wall to inspect it more closely. “Now, it took a lot of time and patience to do a job like that. I’ll bet there was two months’ work put into that. Just look at all the trees with red leaves.”
They looked for a moment at the landscape Ty Ty admired so much, and went to the windows to look at the curtains. Ty Ty was left to himself, puzzled over the oil painting. He stood back and looked at it with his head to one side, and then he walked closer to study the texture of it. He liked the picture best of anything he had noticed in the house.
“The man who painted that knew what he was doing, all right,” Ty Ty said. “He didn’t put in all the limbs on the trees, but I’ll be dog-goned if he didn’t make the picture more like a real woods than woods really are. I’ve never seen a grove of trees like that in all my life, but dog-gone if it ain’t better than the real thing. I sure would like to have a picture like that out at Marion. Those old Black-Draught calendars ain’t nothing once you have seen a picture like this. Even those Coca-Cola signs they put up around Marion look pretty sick up beside something fine like this. I sure wish I could persuade Jim Leslie to part with it and let me take it home with me tonight.”
“Pa, please don’t ask for anything,” Griselda begged in haste. “All this belongs to her, too.”
“If Jim Leslie wants to give me something out of the bounty of his heart, I’ll take it. And if she tries to stop me, then I’ll just be compelled to ride right over her. What do I care for her!”
Ty Ty turned about, and in turning he knocked a china vase from a little table he had not known was in existence. He looked quickly at Darling Jill and Griselda.
“Now I’ve gone and done it,” he said meekly. “What will Jim Leslie say to that!”
“Quick,” Griselda said, “we must pick up every piece before she comes into the room.”
She and Ty Ty got down on the floor and swept the chips of thin china into a pile. Darling Jill would not help. She acted as though she did not care whether the pieces were picked up or left lying on the floor for everyone to see. Ty Ty trembled all over when he thought of what Jim Leslie’s wife would say if she saw what he had so carelessly done.
“Where in the world can we put the pieces?” Griselda asked excitedly.
Ty Ty looked wildly around the room. He did not know what he was looking for, but the windows were closed and he saw the fireplace held no ashes to bury them in.
“Here,” he said, holding out both hands. “Put everything in here.”
“But what are we going to do with them?”
Ty Ty slipped the broken china into his pocket, smiling up at both of them. He walked away holding the pocket with his hand.
“That’s the finest place in the world. When we get on the outside of town, I’ll just cast them away and won’t nobody ever know the difference.”
Darling Jill looked into the next room through the wide glass doors. She could see nothing in the darkness, but she imagined it was the dining-room. Both she and Griselda wished to see everything they could during the short time they would be there.
Ty Ty sat down in a chair to wait for Jim Leslie’s return. He had been gone for ten or fifteen minutes, and Ty Ty was anxious for him to come back. He felt lost in the big house.
Jim Leslie came to the door. Ty Ty got up and walked toward his son.
“What did you wish to see me about?”
“Well, I’m hard up, son. Black Sam and Uncle Felix didn’t get much cotton planted this year, what with taking time off every day or so to dig some for the lode on their own account, and when September comes, I won’t hardly have a red penny to my name. I’m aiming to strike that lode out there any day now, but I can’t say when it will be. And I need a little money to tide me over.”
“I can’t be lending you money, Pa. All
“Your wife has got some.”
“Well, I suppose she has, but it’s not mine.”
Jim Leslie turned and looked down the hail as though he expected to see Gussie. She was still in another part of the house.
“How much do you think you’ve got to have?”
“Two or three hundred dollars would see me through the fall and winter. Next spring we’ll be able to get a big crop of cotton planted. All I need now is enough to see us through the fall and winter.”
“I don’t know if I can let you have that much. I tell you, I’m hard up myself right now. I’ve got some tenements downtown, but I can’t collect much rent these days. I’ve had to put out seven or eight families already, and vacant rooms don’t bring in a cent.”
“Ask you wife for it then, son.”
“When do you have to have it?”
“Right now. I need it to buy feed for the mules and rations for the household and two share-croppers. It takes a lot of money to run a farm these days when it’s all going out and durn little coming in.”
“I wish you could see me later. I’d be better fixed in another month. I’ve attached some furniture that ought to bring me in some money when it’s sold. You don’t know how hard up I am when I can’t collect rent.”
“I’m sorry to hear that you’re selling poor people’s household goods, son. That would make me ashamed of myself if I was you. I don’t reckon I could bring myself to be so hard on my fellow-creatures.”
“I thought you came here to borrow money. I can’t stand here all night listening to your talk.”
“Well, I’ve got to have some money, son,” Ty Ty said. “Mules and share-croppers and my own household can’t wait. We’ve got to eat, and eat quick.”
Jim Leslie took out his pocketbook and counted an amount in ten- and twenty-dollar bills. He folded the money once and handed it to his father.
“That’s a great help, son,” Ty Ty said gratefully. “I sure do thank you from the bottom of my heart for helping me out at a time like this. When the nuggets come in, there won’t be any need for borrowing more.”
“That’s all I can let you have. And don’t come up to me on the street and ask for more. I can’t let you have any more. You ought to stop trying to find gold out there and raise cotton and something to eat. There’s no sense in a man with a hundred acres and two mules having to run to town every time he needs a bunch of beets. Raise it on the land out there. That’s good land. It’s been lying fallow, most of it, for twelve or fifteen years. Make those two share-croppers raise enough vegetables to feed themselves.”
Ty Ty nodded his head at everything Jim Leslie said. He felt good now. The flat roll of money in his pocket raised him to a level with any man. Three hundred dollars was all he had wished for, and he had not expected to get any.
“I reckon we’ll be going on home now,” Ty Ty said.
Ty Ty went to the library and called Darling Jill and Griselda. They came into the hall and moved toward the door.
Jim Leslie was the last to leave the house. He followed them across the wide porch and down the steps to the walk. After they had seated themselves in Ty Ty’s automobile, Jim Leslie came to the side where Griselda was and laid his hand on the door. He leaned against the car, looking at Griselda.
“Sometime when you’re in town, come to see me,” he said slowly, writing something on a card with his fountain pen and handing it to her. “I’m going to expect you, Griselda.”
Griselda lowered her head to escape his eyes.
“I couldn’t do that,” she said.
“Why not?”
“Buck wouldn’t like it.”
“To hell with Buck,” Jim Leslie said. “Come anyway. I’d like to talk to you.”
“You’d better leave her alone and attend to your wife,” Darling Jill said.
“I don’t give a damn about her,” he replied heatedly. “I’m going to look for you, Griselda.”
“I can’t do that,” Griselda said again, shaking her head. “It wouldn’t be fair to Buck. I’m his wife.”
“I said to hell with Buck. I’m going to get you, Griselda. If you don’t come to see me in my office the next time you’re in town, I’m coming out there after you. Do you hear? I’m coming out there and bring you back here.”
“Buck would shoot you, too,” Darling Jill said. “He’s had enough trouble with Will already.”
“Will who? Who in hell is Will? What’s he got to do with her?”
“You know Will Thompson.”
“That lint-head? Good God, Griselda, you wouldn’t let Will Thompson have anything to do with you, would you? That damn Horse Creek Valley lint-head?”
“What if he does live in a company town?” Darling Jill asked quickly. “He’s a lot better than some of the people who live in these fine houses.”
Jim Leslie put his arm over the back of the seat and dropped it closely around Griselda. She tried to move away from him, but he pulled her back. When she was still again, he leaned forward and tried to kiss her.
“You leave her alone, son, and let us be going home before trouble starts,” Ty Ty said, standing up. “This here now pulling at her has got to stop.”
“I’ll drag her out of this damn automobile,” he answered. “I know what I want.”
Darling Jill started the car and it moved rapidly away. After it had gone several yards, Jim Leslie found that he could not remain there much longer. He knew Darling Jill might intentionally drive close to one of the trees along the curb and he would be knocked to the ground. He made one more effort to reach Griselda before he was forced from the runningboard. He reached for her, catching the open collar of her floral print frock in his fingers. He could feel the cloth suddenly give away, and he looked down at her and tried to see in the semidarkness. Before he could lean closer, Darling Jill swerved the car to the other side of the street, hurling him to the pavement.
He landed heavily on his hands and knees, but he was not so badly hurt as he thought he would be. The force of his fall made his hands and knees sting with pain, but he got to his feet immediately, brushing his clothes and watching the fast disappearing car in the distance.
At the next corner they all looked back and saw Jim Leslie standing under the street light dusting the dirt from his suit. There was a tear in the knee of one of his trousers legs, but he had not yet discovered it.
“I reckon you did the right thing,” Ty Ty said, speaking to Darling Jill. “Jim Leslie didn’t mean no harm to Griselda, but anything in God’s world might have happened if he had kept on. He said something about dragging her out of the car, and he’s man enough to do it, too. I’d hate, though, to have to leave here without her and have to face Buck downtown when he asked where she was.”
“Oh, Jim Leslie is all right, Pa,” Griselda said. “He didn’t hurt me a bit. He didn’t even scare me. He’s too nice to be ugly.”
“Well, it’s mighty white of you to say that about him, but I don’t know. Jim Leslie is a Walden, and the Walden men ain’t so well known for their timidness as they are for their getting what they’re after. Maybe I’m wrong about that, though. Maybe I’m the only one with the name who’s that Way.”
Coasting down the long steep grade to the brightly lighted city on the flood plain below, Ty Ty leaned forward to see what made Griselda’s shoulders jerk so much. He could hear her trying to hold back sobs, but there were no tears in her eyes that he could see.
“Maybe Jim Leslie would have dragged her out, after all,” he said to himself. “I don’t know what else could be wrong with her, unless it is that. It takes a Walden to make the girls all wrought up.”
He leaned fur
After a while he sat back on the seat, stretching his legs against the footrest, and clutched more tightly in his moist palm the roll of three hundred dollars Jim Leslie had let him have.
Chapter XIII
Rosamond, Buck, and Shaw were waiting on the downtown corner when they arrived. Will, though, was not in sight. They rode up to the curb and stopped, shutting off the motor. The second-storey windows behind the iron-grilled balconies were still open and lights were burning in most of them. Ty Ty tried not to look higher than the plate glass windows on the street level.
“Did you get it, Pa?” Rosamond asked, the first to reach the car.
“I reckon I did,” he said proudly. “Just look at this big wad of greenbacks!”
Buck and Shaw were drawn to the side of the car to see it. Everyone looked pleased.
“I need a new raincoat,” Shaw said.
“Son,” Ty Ty said, shaking his head and pushing the roll of money back into his pocket out of sight, “son, when it rains, just peel off your clothes and let your skin take care of the rest. God never made a finer raincoat than a man’s skin, anyhow.”
“What are you going to do with all that money, Pa?” Buck said next. “You can spare a little of it, can’t you? I haven’t had any spending-money since a month ago Sunday.”