“Yes’m,” said Sandy, keeping his eyes closed to the bright stream of morning sunlight entering the window. But half an hour later, when Jimboy kicked him and said: “Hey, bo! You wanta go fishin’?” he got up at once, slid into his pants; and together they went out in the garden to dig worms. It was seldom that his father took him anywhere, and, of course, he wanted to go. Sandy adored Jimboy, but Jimboy, amiable and indulgent though he was, did not often care to be bothered with his ten-year-old son on his fishing expeditions.
Harriett had gone to her job, and Hager had long been at the tubs under the apple-tree when the two males emerged from the kitchen-door. “Huh! You ain’t workin’ this mawnin’, is you?” the old woman grunted, bending steadily down, then up, over the washboard.
“Nope,” her tall son-in-law answered. “Donahoe laid me off yesterday on account o’ the white bricklayers said they couldn’t lay bricks with a nigger.”
“Always something to keep you from workin’,” panted Hager.
“Sure is,” agreed Jimboy pleasantly. “But don’t worry, me and Sandy’s gonna catch you a mess o’ fish for supper today. How’s that, ma?”
“Don’t need no fish,” the old woman answered. “An’ don’t come ma-in’ me! Layin’ round here fishin’ when you ought to be out makin’ money to take care o’ this house an’ that chile o’ your’n.” The suds rose foamy white about her black arms as the clothes plushed up and down on the zinc washboard. “Lawd deliver me from a lazy darky!”
But Jimboy and Sandy were already behind the tall corn, digging for bait near the back fence.
“Don’t never let no one woman worry you,” said the boy’s father softly, picking the moist wriggling worms from the upturned loam. “Treat ’em like chickens, son. Throw ’em a little corn and they’ll run after you, but don’t give ’em too much. If you do, they’ll stop layin’ and expect you to wait on ’em.”
“Will they?” asked Sandy.
The warm afternoon sun made the river a languid sheet of muddy gold, glittering away towards the bridge and the flour-mills a mile and a half off. Here in the quiet, on the end of a rotting jetty among the reeds, Jimboy and his son sat silently. A long string of small silver fish hung down into the water, keeping fresh, and the fishing-lines were flung far out in the stream, waiting for more bites. Not a breeze on the flat brown-gold river, not a ripple, not a sound. But once the train came by behind them, pouring out a great cloud of smoke and cinders and shaking the jetty.
“That’s Number Five,” said Jimboy. “Sure is flyin’,” as the train disappeared between rows of empty boxcars far down the track, sending back a hollow clatter as it shot past the flour-mills, whose stacks could be dimly seen through the heat haze. Once the engine’s whistle moaned shrilly.
“She’s gone now,” said Jimboy, as the last click of the wheels died away. And, except for the drone of a green fly about the can of bait, there was again no sound to disturb the two fishermen.
Jimboy gazed at his lines. Across the river Sandy could make out, in the brilliant sunlight, the gold of wheat-fields and the green of trees on the hills. He wondered if it would be nice to live over there in the country.
“Man alive!” his father cried suddenly, hauling vigorously at one of the lines. “Sure got a real bite now. … Look at this catfish.” From the water he pulled a large flopping lead-colored creature, with a fierce white mouth bleeding and gaping over the hook.
“He’s on my line!” yelled Sandy. “I caught him!”
“Pshaw!” laughed Jimboy. “You was setting there dreaming.”
“No, I wasn’t!”
But just then, at the mills, the five-o’clock whistles blew. “Oh, gee, dad!” cried the boy, frightened. “I was s’posed to go to Mis’ Rice’s to help mama, and I come near forgetting it. She wants to get through early this evenin’ to go to lodge meeting. I gotta hurry and go help her.”
“Well, you better beat it then, and I’ll look out for your line like I been doing and bring the fishes home.”
So the little fellow balanced himself across the jetty, scrambled up the bank, and ran down the railroad track towards town. He was quite out of breath when he reached the foot of Penrose Street, with Mrs. Rice’s house still ten blocks away, so he walked awhile, then ran again, down the long residential street, with its large houses sitting in green shady lawns far back from the sidewalk. Sometimes a sprinkler, attached to a long rubber hose, sprayed fountain-like jets of cold water on the thirsty grass. In one yard three golden-haired little girls were playing under an elm-tree, and in another a man and some children were having a leisurely game of croquet.
Finally Sandy turned into a big yard. The delicious scent of frying beefsteak greeted the sweating youngster as he reached the screen of the white lady’s kitchen-door. Inside, Annjee was standing over the hot stove seasoning something in a saucepan, beads of perspiration on her dark face, and large damp spots under the arms of her dress.
“You better get here!” she said. “And me waiting for you for the last hour. Here, take this pick and break some ice for the tea.” Sandy climbed up on a stool and raised the icebox lid while his mother opened the oven and pulled out a pan of golden-brown biscuits. “Made these for your father,” she remarked. “The white folks ain’t asked for ’em, but they like ’em, too, so they can serve for both. … Jimboy’s crazy about biscuits. … Did he work today?”
“No’m,” said Sandy, jabbing at the ice. “We went fishing.”
At that moment Mrs. Rice came into the kitchen, tall and blond, in
