The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck Page B

moment and then got slowly to his feet and retrieved him and wrapped him in the coat again. “I ain’t got no present for the kids,” he said. “Nothin’ but this ol’ turtle.”
    “It’s a funny thing,” the preacher said. “I was thinkin’ about ol’ Tom Joad when you come along. Thinkin’ I’d call in on him. I used to think he was a godless man. How is Tom?”
    “I don’ know how he is. I ain’t been home in four years.”
    “Didn’t he write to you?”
    Joad was embarrassed. “Well, Pa wasn’t no hand to write for pretty, or to write for writin’. He’d sign up his name as nice as anybody, an’ lick his pencil. But Pa never did write no letters. He always says what he couldn’tell a fella with his mouth wasn’tworth leanin’on no pencil about.”
    “Been out travelin’ around?” Casy asked.
    Joad regarded him suspiciously. “Didn’ you hear about me? I was in all the papers.”
    “No—I never. What?” He jerked one leg over the other and settled lower against the tree. The afternoon was advancing rapidly, and a richer tone was growing on the sun.
    Joad said pleasantly, “Might’s well tell you now an’ get it over with. But if you was still preachin’ I wouldn’t tell, fear you get prayin’ over me.” He drained the last of the pint and flung it from him, and the flat brown bottle skidded lightly over the dust. “I been in McAlester them four years.”
    Casy swung around to him, and his brows lowered so that his tall forehead seemed even taller. “Ain’t wantin’ to talk about it, huh? I won’t ask you no questions, if you done something bad——”
    “I’d do what I done—again,” said Joad. “I killed a guy in a fight. We was drunk at a dance. He got a knife in me, an’ I killed him with a shovel that was layin’ there. Knocked his head plumb to squash.”
    Casy’s eyebrows resumed their normal level. “You ain’t ashamed of nothin’ then?”
    “No,” said Joad, “I ain’t. I got seven years, account of he had a knife in me. Got out in four—parole.”
    “Then you ain’t heard nothin’ about your folks for four years?”
    “Oh, I heard. Ma sent me a card two years ago, an’ las’ Christmus Granma sent a card. Jesus, the guys in the cell block laughed! Had a tree an’ shiny stuff looks like snow. It says in po’try:
    “‘Merry Christmus, purty child,
Jesus meek an’ Jesus mild,
Underneath the Christmus tree
There’s a gif ’ for you from me.’
    I guess Granma never read it. Prob’ly got it from a drummer an’ picked out the one with the mos’ shiny stuff on it. The guys in my cell block goddamn near died laughin’. Jesus Meek they called me after that. Granma never meant it funny; she jus’ figgered it was so purty she wouldn’ bother to read it. She lost her glasses the year I went up. Maybe she never did find ’em.”
    “How they treat you in McAlester?” Casy asked.
    “Oh, awright. You eat regular, an’ get clean clothes, and there’s places to take a bath. It’s pretty nice some ways. Makes it hard not havin’ no women.” Suddenly he laughed. “They was a guy paroled,” he said. “’Bout a month he’s back for breakin’ parole. A guy ast him why he bust his parole. ‘Well, hell,’ he says. ‘They got no conveniences at my old man’s place. Got no ’lectric lights, got no shower baths. There ain’t no books, an’ the food’s lousy.’ Says he come back where they got a few conveniences an’ he eats regular. He says it makes him feel lonesome out there in the open havin’ to think what to do next. So he stole a car an’ come back.” Joad got out his tobacco and blew a brown paper freeof the pack and rolled a cigarette. “The guy’s right, too,” he said. “Las’ night, thinkin’ where I’m gonna sleep, I got scared. An’ I got thinkin’ about my bunk, an’ I wonder what the stir-bug I got for a cell mate is doin’. Me an’ some guys had a strang band goin’. Good one. Guy said we ought to go on