We stood by the loaded wagon while Father nailed the windows down and spat into the keyholes to make the locks turn. We waited, restless as the harnessed mare, anxious to hasten beyond staring eyes. Hardstay mine was closed for all time and idle men had gathered to watch us leave. They hung over the fence; they crowded where last year’s dogtick stalks clutched their brown leaf-hands into fists.
I saw the boys glance at our windowpanes, their pockets bulging with rocks. I spied into their faces and homesickness grew large inside of me. I hungered for a word, a nod of farewell. But only a witty was sad at my going, only a child of a man who valued strings and tobacco tags, a chap in a man’s clothes who was bound forever to speak things backwards. Hig Sommers stood beg-eyed, and fellows were picking at him. One knelt and jerked loose the eel-strings of his brogans.
Though women watched from their porches only a widow-woman came to say a good-bye to Mother. Sula Basham came walking, tall as a butterweed, and with a yellow locket swinging from her neck like a clockweight.
Loss Tramble spoke, grinning, “If I had a woman that tall, I’d string her with gourds and use her for a martin pole. I would, now.” A dry chuckle rattled in the crowd. Loss stepped back, knowing the muscle frogs of her arms were the size of any man’s.
Sula towered over Mother. The locket dropped like a plum. Mother was barely five feet tall and she had to look upward as into the sky; and her eyes set on the locket, for never had she owned a grain of gold, never a locket, or a ring, or bighead pin. Sula spoke loudly to Mother, glancing at the men with scorn: “You ought to be proud that your man’s not satisfied to rot in Hardstay camp, a-setting on his chine-bone. Before long all’s got to move, all’s got to roust or starve. This mine hain’t opening agin. Hit’s too nigh dug out.”
The men stirred uneasily. Sill Lovelock lifted his arms, spreading them like a preacher’s. “These folks air moving to nowheres,” he said. “Thar’s no camps along the Kentucky River a-taking on hands; they’s no work anywheres. Hit’s mortal sin to make gypsies of a family. I say as long’s a body has got a rooftree, let him roost under it.”
Men grunted, doddering their heads, and the boys lifted their rock-heavy pockets and sidled toward the wagon. Cece Goodloe snatched Hig Sommers’s hat as he passed, clapping it onto his own head. The hat rested upon his ears. The boys placed their hands on the wagon wheels; they fingered the mare’s harness; they raised the lid of the toolbox to see what was in it. Cece crawled under the wagon, back hound to front hound, shaking the swingletree. I watched out of the tail of my eye, thinking a rusty might be pulled.
Father came into the yard with the key, and now the house was shut against our turning back. I looked at the empty hull of our dwelling; I looked at the lost town, yearning to stay in this place where I was born, among the people I knew. Father lifted the key on a finger. “If a body here would drap this key by the commissary,” he said, “I’d be obliged.”
Hig Sommers lumbered toward Father, his shirttail flying. Someone had shagged his shirt out. “I’ll fotch it,” Hig cried, stretching both hands for the key as a babe would reach.
“I’m not a-wanting it fotched,” Father said. He’d not trust the key to a fellow who wasn’t bright. “You’ve got it back’ards, Hig. I’m wanting it tuk.”
Sill Lovelock stepped forward, though he didn’t offer to carry the key. “They’s Scripture agin’ a feller hauling off the innocent,” he vowed gravely. “I say, stay where there’s a floor underfoot and joists overhead.”
Father said testily, “There ought to be a statute telling a feller to salt his own steers. Ruther to drown o’ sweat hunting for work than die o’ dry rot in Hardstay.”
Loss Tramble edged near Father, his eyes burning and the corners of his mouth curled. He nodded his head toward Sula Basham. “I’ll deliver that key willing if you’ll take this beanpole widow-woman along some’eres and git her a man. She’s wore the black bonnet long enough.”
Laughter sprang forth, gulping in throats, wheezing noses. Sula whirled, her face lit with anger. “If I was a-mind to marry,” she said, grudging her words, “it’s certain I’d have to go where there’s a man fittin. I’d be bound—”
Sill Lovelock broke in, thinking Sula’s talk of no account. He asked Father, “What air you to use for bread along the way? There’s no manna falling from Heaven this day and time.”
Father was grinning at Sula. He saw the muscle knots clench on her arms, and he saw Loss inch away. He turned toward Sill in good humor. “Why, there’s a gum o’ honey dew on the leaves of a morning. We kin wake early and eat it off.”
“The Devil take ’em,” Mother said, calming Sula. “Menfolks are heathens. Let them crawl their own dirt.” She was studying the locket, studying it to remember, to take away in her mind. I thought of Mother’s unpierced ear lobes where never a bob had hung, the worn stems of her fingers never circled by gold, her plain bosom no pin-pretty had ever hooked. She was looking at the locket, not covetously, but in wonder.
“I’ll take the key,” Sula told Father. “Nobody else seems anxious to neighbor you.”
Loss opened his hands, his face as grave as Sill Lovelock’s, mocking. He pointed an arm at Sula, the other appealing to the crowd. “I allus did pity a widow-woman,” he said. He spanned Sula’s height with his eyes. “In this gethering there ought to be one single man willing to marry the Way Up Yonder Woman.”
Sula’s mouth hardened. “I want none o’ your pity pie,” she blurted. She took a step toward Loss, the sinews of her long arms quickening. When Loss retreated she turned to Mother, who had just climbed onto the wagon. Sula and Mother were now at an eye level. “You were a help when my chaps died,” Sula said. “You were a comfort when my man lay in his box. I hain’t forgetting. Wish I had a keepsake to give you, showing I’ll allus remember.”
“I’ll keep you in my head,” Mother assured.
“I’ll be proud to know it.”
We were ready to go. “Climb on, Son,” Father called. I swung up from the hindgate to the top of the load. Over the heads of the men I could see the whole of the camp, the shotgun houses in the flat, the smoke rising above the burning gob heaps. The pain of leaving rose in my chest. Father clucked his tongue, and the mare started off. She walked clear out of the wagon shafts. Loose trace chains swung free and pole-ends of the shafts bounded to the ground.
“Whoa ho!” Father shouted, jumping down. A squall of joy sounded behind us. Cece Goodloe had pulled this rusty; he’d done the unfastening. Father smiled while adjusting the harness. Oh he didn’t mind a clever trick. And he sprang back onto the wagon again.
Loss Tramble spooled his hands, calling through them, “If you don’t aim to take this widow along, we’ll have to marry her to a born fool. We’ll have to match her with Hig Sommers.”
We drove away, the wheels taking the groove of ruts, the load swaying; we drove away with Sill Lovelock’s last warning ringing our ears. “You’re making your bed in Hell!” he had shouted. Then it was I saw the gold locket about Mother’s neck, beating her bosom like a heart.
I looked back, seeing the first rocks thrown, hearing our windows shatter; I looked back upon the camp as upon the face of the dead. I saw the crowd fall back from Sula Basham, tripping over each other. She had struck Loss Tramble with her fist, and he knelt before her, fearing to rise. And only Hig Sommers was watching us move away. He stood holding up his breeches, for someone had cut his galluses with a knife. He thrust one arm into the air, crying, “Hello, hello!”