37
Sitting in the barracks, our backs against the wall, we talked some, all except Jane. She just kept staring at the crack in the wall, and at the little bit of moonlight and starlight coming in through it.
Eventually the talk died down, and we were getting ready to settle in, when Jane said, “I saw that boat. I don’t think it’s such a good idea. They’d shoot your head off before you got to it, and if you did get to it, they could still wade out to you faster than you could push it off. And if there aren’t any paddles in the boat, you couldn’t make any real time. You’d be better off just trying to slosh through the water. And you know what I saw out there?”
“What?” Gasper said. “A snake?”
“I saw a couple of them too, but what I meant was I saw an alligator. I don’t like alligators, and I can say that without ever having any kind of personal relationship with one. And I don’t want my first visit with them to be about lunch, and me being the lunch.”
“An alligator?” Tony said.
“Yes, sir,” Jane said. “An alligator.”
“Count me out on that plan,” Tony said. “I’d rather pick peas.”
“What I’m wondering,” Jane says, “is what happens to us when all the peas are picked. He says no one would believe us, but I think maybe he might think someone would.”
“You mean he might hurt us?” I said.
“I was thinking something a little beyond hurt,” she said. “Obviously, he’s not what one would call a fine and upstanding representative of the law. I think he would shoot us, and I think if he didn’t, his men would. Gasper already said they killed a man, and we have no way of knowing if there are others. Dead is easier than having to deal with us telling what happened to us, even if it is hard to believe.”
“I figure we got a couple weeks of pea picking just in this field,” Gasper said. “I think he’s got other fields.”
“I hear you,” Jane said, “but I’m not that fond of pea picking, and I don’t want to keep eating beans.”
“It’s better than eating dirt,” Gasper said.
“It is,” Jane said, “but if I’m dead I won’t taste the dirt. Those beans I got to taste, and I tell you, I’m really tired of them. And let me tell you another thing. I don’t like going to the bathroom, then having to eat beans with my fingers. You see where I’m going with this?”
“I just didn’t think about that part,” said Gasper. “I didn’t want to. I wish you hadn’t brought it up.”
“Yes, but I have,” Jane said. “I’ve thought on the second plan, Tony’s plan.”
“And?” Tony said.
“I’m going to say this, Gasper,” Jane said, “and don’t take offense, but it’s a better plan than yours.”
“I ain’t offended,” Gasper said.
“That said,” Jane said, “it isn’t any good either.”
“So what now?” I said.
“You see that crack where the light is coming in?” she asked.
We all agreed that we did.
“It’s wide enough to get fingers through,” she said.
“So,” Gasper said.
“So, nothing for sure,” Jane said, “but you see that dust on the floor there, piled up on the dirt? That’s termite work. They’ve been working on that spot, maybe a lot of other spots. But this spot I can see, and the way I figure it, Jack here, who is a strapping young man, or you, Gasper, might be able to get their fingers through the crack and pull on it, see if the boards will loosen any.”
“If I pull,” I said, “I’m just going with the way the nails are driven in.”
“Let me say that different,” Jane said. “See if you can get a handhold of some sort, and push.”
Sometimes you hear an idea, and you think, that’s not much of an idea, it’s too simple. You been thinking about splashing through water, stealing a boat, or maybe trying to take the truck and run, fight off a bloodhound and dodge shotgun pellets, and then someone says something simple, and you think, that can’t work, there ain’t nothing to it. But another part of you says, you know, maybe you been overthinking this thing.
I stuck my fingers through. I could only get two through it, the two closest to my thumb. I did that and grabbed with them and pushed with my palm. It was kind of like trying to turn a car over.
“That isn’t working so good,” I said.
“Here,” Gasper said. “Let me try with you.”
He got a lower place in the crack, which ran from the top of the building to the bottom, and pushed. That didn’t move anything either.
Tony laid on his back and put his feet against the board and we all pushed. There was a squeak of nails.
“I think it loosened a bit,” Gasper said.
We all stopped and waited, thinking that squeak might bring someone running, but it didn’t. Way we felt right then, it was a chance worth taking. The sheriff thought he had us locked in good, and that might be to our advantage. He might not have too swell an eye on things right then, and if that was the case, we had a chance at getting away. Wasn’t but one way to find out.
Jane got up and came over and put her palms on the board, and we pulled our fingers out of the crack and we all leaned against it, with Tony pushing with his feet. It didn’t squeak again. Then I felt something in the dark. It was the other folk in there. They had come over to stand by us.
“We can all push,” said one of the two women. “We ain’t got much strength by ourselves, but together we might be able to do something.”
They scrambled about, finding a place for their hands, trying not to step on Tony as he pushed with his legs.
So we all pushed.
The nails squeaked.
That made us pause. But only for a moment. No one came to stop us. We were desperate, and we were committed. So we pushed some more. One of the boards loosened near the bottom. It was too narrow for anyone to get out there, and it was still hooked solid at the top, but we kept pushing at it, and pretty soon it popped out. We stopped then, listened.
No one came running around to shoot us.
A dog didn’t bark.
“They figure we’re so good and locked-in,” said one of the men, “they don’t even keep a close guard.”
“Yeah,” said the woman who had spoken before. “We all just give up. But we weren’t all together on things.”
“Don’t talk it to death,” Jane said. “Push.”
We did, and this time the next board popped off and we could wiggle through. Tony was first, and then the women and the men, followed by Jane, with me and Gasper bringing up the rear.
When I looked out at the others, they were running into the woods like deer. All that togetherness hadn’t lasted long, which is pretty much the way of things. People only come together when there’s no other choice; the rest of the time they think they’re free birds and don’t need anybody. Until next time.
The four of us started out toward the woods, and when we did, suddenly headlights hit us, and then we heard Big Bill Brady yell, “Stop, or I’ll shoot!”
38
I didn’t know where he came from, or why he hadn’t heard us before, unless he was sleeping sound in his truck, but when we came out from the back of the house and our group scattered to the woods, the truck lights came on, and Big Bill opened the door and stepped out.
He had a shotgun, and he jerked it to his shoulder and fired. The blast went by us and the shot rattled around in the woods back there, but it didn’t hit us.
“He ain’t playing none,” Gasper said. “Run for it!”
We broke away from where he was shooting, but that carried me and Jane and Tony and Gasper into a
