“THE SOMEBODY BACK WAS HERMAN RANDOLPH, the son of the man who had rented our acreage and the mill after my father died. Herman and I had been in school together, but like so many other boys he had failed to catch my attention. However, he had traveled from home and been more or less molded by his experiences with the W.P.A., as would any young man given the task of dredging out the Great Dismal Swamp. But then in the fall of 1939 his father called Herman back to Milk Farm Road, thus putting an end to his twenty-five-dollar-a-week bonanza.
Herman and I always enjoyed remembering the morning he came home. I was helping my mother, his mother, named Mary Jo, and Amanda Bethune grade tobacco. This was the one farming task my mother would do, as it was clean and could be done sitting down while talking. We’d started out the morning arguing over insignificance, but by lunchtime we were onto whether or not America should become wrapped up in the foreign problem.
I mentioned something about Hitler, and Herman’s mother said, We ought to’ve killed him in the last war. Amanda and my mother both agreed, saying we’d have to go over and straighten out Europe again. We’ll root him out this time.
I was amazed to have to tell them that Hitler was not held over from the World War, that they apparently had Hitler mixed up with the Kaiser.
They shot back that they were not confused, that I was. Then my mother reminded me how much she and Polly Deal listened to the radio. They did! But as soon as the news came on they’d get in a huff and flip through looking for singing.
They all thrashed the Hitler problem around some more and then Herman appeared at the door, fresh from the W.P.A. He was wearing pincheck britches and a tweed cap, and when he took off his cap his hair was dirty, which cast my mind to Luther Miracle. Herman still looked better than Luther, though. He had a thoughtful face.
Mary Jo looked up at the door and laid her leaves down and spoke to Herman in anything but a motherly fashion. She said, Well, I see you got home. Then she told him his hat was ugly, and he folded it into his pocket.
Of course, he wanted to know why his mother wasn’t more pleased to see him, and I explained the controversy. And of course, he told them I was right, which pleased me. Then I grabbed my sweater and excused myself, wondering if he’d follow me outside. He did.
He kept pace beside me and said, Listen, when are you planning to bring back my gramophone? His sister had written to tell him that he’d be returning home to no gramophone.
I said, That machine was given to me by your mother and father for my graduation. Had he graduated? I asked.
No, he said. He told me that while I was enjoying an illegal gramophone, he was out making a contribution.
I lacked the nerve to comment on the matter of his twenty-five-dollar-a-week take-home. But I did realize at this point that Herman viewed himself as somewhat more than he was, having the gift of gab and so forth, and that I’d have to check this in his nature. Having suffered under this reputation for quite some time myself, I knew Herman’s mind well, though he believed I was more or less duped.
I said to him, Listen, if you want that machine you’ll have to come get it.
He came to my house that evening meaning to cart it away, but he said he’d let me keep it if I’d go with him to the picture. I thought this was very cute, if transparent. But I let him take me. And then I kept letting him. Trudy had my mother watch her children some nights and we all three went out together. She remarked once that Herman wasn’t as bright as I was, and I thought, oh gosh, to do better I’d have to fly off again and I just don’t have it in me.
Nobody, the least of which my mother, was surprised by the amount of time Herman and I began to spend with each other. Never having taken real company with anyone except Stanton, I swung headlong into this indeed.
Herman and I had a daily routine. He would work with his father until dark, eat one supper at home and then come over here and pretend he hadn’t eaten so he could eat another supper with me. My mother brought this to my attention. I’d assumed he was passing up his mother’s table for me. Honey, every night when he gets here he smells like food. Haven’t you noticed? I know his mother served cabbage five nights running. She fries a great deal of fish as well.
We did everything a typical couple does falling in love. We sat around, went to the picture, listened to the gramophone, which I had drawn a hard line over. I used to sing like a sheer bird for Herman. He had such a kind way of showing how impressed he was by me. Even after I’d stripped off his layers of gab, I could tell he was moved. I’d sing and clap:
Where did you get that pretty dress,
All so bright and gay?
I got it from my loving man on the W.P. and A.
On W.P. and A., on W.P. and A.,
I got it from my loving man on W.P. and A.
And then it would go on and on and he’d sing:
Way down beneath the clay.
And tell them all I killed myself
On W.P. and A.
Polly Deal at one point brought something up, noticing as she had that I was in love. She asked me what I was doing to guard myself.
I said, Nothing! which she interpreted as risking all and playing with danger. But I actually meant that I had no call for anything, so thus I used nothing. As with Stanton, I’d kept my two feet in my two shoes flat on the ground, although with Herman I’d not been given the chance to test my will. He’d been a gentleman. But I knew this could change at any moment.
Polly went to the spice cabinet and came back with a jar of alum, saying I could use it in combination with tansy tea or simply by itself, though it’d work best teamed with the tea. But remember, she told me, stay away from black haw roots, which makes the little ones hold on even tighter.
I of course distrusted the idea of guarding myself with a stinging pickling spice, and the only other information I had on the matter dealt with the dasher. When I asked my mother about all this, she set her face and told me, You’d better not have a baby. She wouldn’t tell me the best way to go about not having one, but I got the message that I’d better use the true common sense way to avoid such luck. Thus, when Herman finally did whisper his wants in my ear, I whispered back, Honey, in that case there’ll have to be a ring on my finger.