NEITHER JARED, Kristy nor Bennie did much better the remainder of the week than they had done the first day, but they were becoming more accustomed to the work. Jared knew he would improve as time went on, and that he would eventually pick as many tomatoes as anyone in the field. He had doubts only about Kristy, and he wished she did not have to go into the fields at all. He felt pity for the black women who worked each day, although he knew they had probably done this all of their lives.
By the end of Saturday, Jared figured their four-day total at six hundred and two buckets. This was not as high as he had hoped, but he knew it was not bad for their first effort. He believed they could reach a goal of two hundred buckets per day.
The bus went straight back to the camp and did not stop at the store. A half-hour after they had arrived, Creedy drove into the camp in the Mark IV. He had a gray metal cash box with him, and he sat in a chair behind a small table as a line formed.
When Jared finally reached the table, Creedy examined a ledger and then said to him, “Way I got it figured, your total is three hundred, seventy-two dollars and fifty cents.”
Jared was surprised. He said, “Mr. Creedy, we didn’t earn that much, did we? Not unless the pay was more than the twenty-five cents a bucket as you said it would be.”
“I didn’t say how much you earned,” Creedy said. “The amount is what you owe me.”
Jared was dumbfounded by the words. For a moment he couldn’t speak. He finally said, “What did you say, Mr. Creedy?”
“You heard me!” Creedy snapped impatiently. “You owe me three hundred and seventy-two dollars and fifty cents.”
Jared said, “There ain’t no way I could do that! No way!”
Creedy glanced at the ledger and said, “Well, let’s see. There’s a fee of one hundred dollars for being put to work, and ev’rybody that stays in the camp pays this whether they works or not. That’s four hundred dollars for you and your bunch. That’s only a one-time charge. You don’t have to pay it no more. Then there’s ten dollars each per week for rent. That’s forty bucks. And five dollars a week for electricity. The supper is two dollars each, so that’s thirty-six bucks for the four days this week. The bus is two dollars a day each to the fields, and I give each one of you a one-dollar advance ev’ry day for food. The wine is a buck-fifty a bottle. That all figures out to five hundred and twenty-three dollars. You earned a hundred and fifty dollars and fifty cents picking, so you’re into me for three hundred and seventy-two dollars and fifty cents. You understand now?”
Jared did not understand. His mind was completely addled by Creedy’s rapid flow of figures, and to him the whole situation seemed to be unreal. He said, “How come you didn’t tell me ’bout all them charges before we came in here? How come you didn’t tell me?”
“Well, I’m sure I did. You just don’t remember, or else you wasn’t paying attention like you should.” Creedy then pushed the ledger aside and looked directly at Jared. “You want to settle this up now with cash, or do you want to work it out?” he asked, knowing that Jared probably did not have the money.
“I don’t have that much,” Jared replied, still unable to believe that what was happening was real. “We had some bad luck with the van comin’ down here.”
“Well,” Creedy said condescendingly as he reached for the cash box, “it won’t take you no time at all to clear the debt and then start making some real money. You’ll see. So don’t worry about it. I’m going to advance five dollars for you and two-fifty each for your younguns. Here’s ten bucks.” He handed Jared a ten-dollar bill.
Jared took the money and stepped out of the line. He turned it over and over in his hands, staring at it. Then he watched as each person came up to the table. Everyone was handed only a five-dollar bill for the week’s work.
Cloma knew immediately that something was wrong when Jared came into the room. His face was drawn and white. He sat on the bunk and slumped forward, not speaking. She asked anxiously, “Jared? What is it, Jared?”
He tried to explain, but she did not understand the various figures Creedy had quoted any better than Jared did. She said worriedly, “What will we do, Jared?” She always called him Jared when they were discussing something serious or when something frightened her.
He said, “I don’t know. I’ve only got around a hundred and fifty dollars left from the trip. We can’t pay off the debt except by workin’ it out. We’ll just have to pick harder, I guess. I’m sorry I got all of you into such a mess as this.”
Jared blinked as Jabbo stepped into the room and handed him the bottle of wine. He put it against the wall with the other bottles. There was no time for him to take a shower before the supper bell rang.
Soon after supper, everyone went to the buses for the usual Saturday trip to the store. Jared walked up to the giant black man and said, “We’ll go in the van. I need to run it some to keep the battery up.”
“You go in the bus,” Jabbo said. “Ev’rybody goes in the bus.”
Some of the people seemed almost happy as they reached the store with their five dollars in cash. Others were as grim as Jared. Some made food purchases, while others spent the money for a quart-bottle of whiskey.
Cloma found a small electric fan priced at eight dollars. She said to Jared, “Can we afford to buy this?”
“Yes. But I don’t see any chairs at all.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Cloma said. “There’s some empty bean hampers behind the cook shed. I’ll make myself a chair.”
Jared purchased more canned food and a carton of eggs. Kristy and Bennie each spent twenty-five cents for candy, and then they went back to the bus.
Creedy drove up and parked in front of the store, and Jared went over to him. He said, “Mr. Creedy, are we allowed to go outside the camp on Sunday?”
“What for?” Creedy asked.
“Me and my folks are used to services on Sunday. I was a deacon back home.”
Creedy chuckled and said, “Well, maybe you can get Jabbo or Clug to say a few words, and get that ding-bat cook to play the fiddle. Some of them niggers can probably sing, too.”
“Are you sayin’ we can’t go?” Jared asked, not amused by Creedy’s remarks.
“I got business to take care of,” Creedy said impatiently. He turned and walked away briskly.
It was almost dark when the buses pulled back into the camp. Some of the people were already drunk as they headed for their rooms. Shrill laughter broke the usual silence of the compound, and the sound of scuffling came from some of the rooms.
Jared put his packages in the room, came back outside and sat on the ground. Cy was leaning back against the wall, drinking from a bottle of whiskey. He turned to Jared and said, “You want some?”
“No,” Jared said. “But thanks anyway.” He did not want to let his depression make him speak rudely.
Cy took another drink and said, “I worked a week in them fields fo’ this bottle of whuskey, an’ they won’t be nothin’ left of it by tomorrow but dried piss in the dust. A whole week’s work shot right through my pecker an’ down in the dust.”
Jared picked up a stick and scratched absently at the ground. Cy watched for a moment, then he said, “Creedy’s a fine man, ain’t he? I tried to tell you.”
“It won’t take long,” Jared said. “We’ll work it out and be gone from here in no time.”
Cy said, “I been here two years an’ I ain’t worked it out yet. I never seen nobody leave Angel City that didn’t leave feet first. Excepin’ for two Cubans. That’s the only thing Creedy won’t bring in here no mo’. Cubans.”
“How’s that?” Jared asked, mildly interested.
“He brought two of them Cubans in here ’bout six months ago, an’ he worked ’em fo’ a week an’ wouldn’t pay ’em. They couldn’t hardly speak no English at all, but they was shoutin’ all kinds of stuff at Creedy. Then they pulled out them long pig-stickers that Cubans carry. One of ’em held Jabbo an’ Clug ’gainst the fence, an’ the other one commences to carve his name on ole Creedy’s fat belly. Then they took a whole sack o’ money from that big Mark IV an’ hightailed it out o’ here. Creedy couldn’t say nothin’ ’bout it to the police, an’ he knew that if he went over to Miami lookin’ fo’ them two Cubans, they’d be a hundred more jus’ like ’em out lookin’ fo’ him with them long pig-stickers. So he jus’ lets it be, an’ then he comes back in here an’ beats the hell outen six of us niggers.”
“Where do all these people in here come from?” Jared asked.
“Ev’rywhere,” Cy said, drinking again. “Creedy even goes up to the Carolinas an’ brings folks down here. Promises ’em good jobs. One time I seen him bring a drunk nigger in here who was wearin’ one of them red monkey suits like men wear in front of a hotel to open doors an’ unload baggage. When he sobered up, he started raisin’ hell. They beat that nigger like I ain’t never seen befo’, but he wouldn’t shet up. They finally took him fo’ a ride in the pickup.”
“How did you get in here?” Jared asked, absorbed by Cy’s tales.
The more Cy drank, the freer he seemed willing to talk. He said, “He got me in Belle Glade. He come by this camp where I was livin’ an’ got me drunk. The next thing I knowed, I was here in Angel City.”
Jared said, “Well, if you’ve been here two years now, you couldn’t possibly be still in debt to Creedy.”
“You be’s in debt if’n you stays here ten,” Cy said.
Jared thought that most of the things Cy was saying was just whiskey talk. He said skeptically, “I don’t believe that nobody has to stay here if they don’t want to, no matter how much Creedy says they owe. If nothin’ else, they could just break and run in the field.”
“That’s been tried befo’, an’ they always come after you. You ever been pistol-whupped?”
“No.”
“It ain’t a pretty sight, but it’s even worse if’n you on the receivin’ end of it.”
Jared became silent for a moment, trying to digest all the things Cy was saying. Although he had never really known a black person, Jared had always heard that they always either exaggerate all that they say or outright lie. He could not determine if he should believe this black man or not, but he was interested in the things he was saying. He then said to Cy, “Are all the camps like this one?”
“No, they ain’t all like Angel City.” He took another drink, then he continued, “They’s a few more like this where you can’t get out if’n you want to, but it don’t make no matter. You can’t really get out of none of ’em, an’ the livin’ is just as bad if they’s a gate or not. They all ’bout the same, an’ I seen ’em all. I been a picker all my life, movin’ from one place to another. I don’t even know where I was born. It could ’a been in a tomato patch.”
“If you’re not bein’ paid fer your work here after you’ve cleared your debt, I still don’t see why you don’t leave,” Jared said stubbornly.
Cy took another deep drink from the bottle. He wiped his mouth and said, “I tried to get away two or three times. They whupped me good, but that just made me madder. But the last time I tried it, Creedy took my boy.”
“What?” Jared asked, completely puzzled by this statement. “He did what?”
“He took my boy to stay at his place. He brings him out here ev’ry Sunday afternoon fo’ a visit. He’s got them white folks’ little girl, too, an’ five or six more younguns. You ain’t goin’ to run off with that over yo’ head.”
Jared couldn’t bring himself to believe Cy’s words. He said, “Nobody can do something like that to someone else. You could tell the police.”
“I tell the police, they’ll take my boy out in the swamp, in that pickup truck. They’ll kill him an’ dump him in a sinkhole, an’ that’ll be the end o’ that. Me an’ my woman, we made that baby right in the middle of a bean field at noon one day, an’ later, when he was born, he was born right in the middle of a bean field. There wasn’t no papers or records or nothin’, so there ain’t no way I could prove that I ever even had a boy.”
Jared was again shocked by the words, but he still could not face the reality of what this black man was saying. He then said to Cy, “Where’s your wife now? Is she with the boy?”
“She died eight years ago, when the boy was born. We was in the Carolinas, pickin’ beans. Migrant folk can’t afford one of them sto’-bought funerals, so I buried her out in the woods.”
Suddenly Jared did believe. He knew that the black man was incapable of fabricating such a story. For a moment he gazed beyond the fence and across the darkness of the fields; then he turned to Cy and said, “Is this the way it’s always been for people like you?”
“You mean nigger field hands?” Cy asked.
“Yes. I guess that’s what I mean.”
“It’s always been the same, an’ it goin’ always be the same.”
Jared said, “I’m sorry, Cy . . . I never knowed. I thought I’d seen all the hard times they was back on that ridge in West Virginny, but I guess I was just a dumb hillbilly. I never knowed what it was really like out here. I’m sorry.” Then he got up and walked away quickly into the darkness.