Stories of Erskine Caldwell Read online

  “Swedes are a little queer, sometimes,” I said. “But Finns and Portuguese are too, Jim. And Americans sometimes —”

  “A little queer!” Jim said. “Why! Good God, Stan, the Swedes are the queerest people on the earth, if that’s the right word for them. You don’t know Swedes, Stan. This is the first time you’ve ever seen those Swedes across the road, and that’s why you don’t know what they’re like after being shut up in a pulpwood mill over to Waterville for four-five years. They’re purely wild, I tell you, Stan. They don’t stop for anything they set their heads on. If you was to walk out there now and tell them to move their autos and trucks off of the town road so the travelers could get past without having to drive around through the brush, they’d tear you apart, they’re that wild, after being shut up in the pulp mill over to Waterville these three-four, maybe four-five, years.”

  “Finns get that way, too,” I tried to tell Jim. “After Finns have been shut up in a woods camp all winter, they make a lot of noise when they get out. Everybody who has to stay close to the job for three-four years likes to act free when he gets out from under the job. Now, Jim, you take the Portuguese —”

  “Don’t you sit there, Jim, and let Stanley keep you from putting the tools away,” Mrs. Frost said. “Stanley doesn’t know the Swedes like we do. He’s lived up in the Back Kingdom most of his life, tucked away in the intervale, and he’s never seen Swedes —”

  “Good God, Stan,” Jim said, standing up, he was that nervous and upset, “the Swedes are overrunning the whole country. I’ll bet there are more Swedes in the town of East Joloppi than there are in the rest of the country. Everybody knows there’s more Swedes in the State of Maine than there are in the old country. Why! Jim, they take to this state like potato bugs take to —”

  “Don’t you sit there and let Stanley keep you back, Jim,” Mrs. Frost put in again. “Stanley doesn’t know the Swedes like we do. Stanley’s lived up there in the Back Kingdom most of his life.”

  Just then one of the big Swedes started yelling at some of the little Swedes and women Swedes. I’ll swear, those big Swedes sounded like a pastureful of hoarse bulls, near the end of May, mad about the black flies. God-helping, they yelled like they were fixing to kill all the little Swedes and women Swedes they could get their hands on. It didn’t amount to anything, though; because the little Swedes and the women Swedes yelled right back at them just like they had been big Swedes too. The little Swedes and women Swedes couldn’t yell hoarse bull bass, but it was close enough to it to make a man who’s lived most of his life up in the Back Kingdom, in the intervale, think that the whole town of East Joloppi was full of big Swedes.

  Jim was all for getting out after the tools and stock right away, but I pulled him back to the table. I wasn’t going to let Jim and Mrs. Frost set me to doing tasks and chores before breakfast and the regular time. Forty dollars a month isn’t much to pay a man for ten-eleven hours’ work a day, including Sundays, when the stock has to be attended to like any other day, and I set myself that I wasn’t going to work twelve-thirteen hours a day by them, even if I was practically one of the Frosts myself, except in name, by that time.

  “Now, hold on awhile, Jim,” I said. “Let’s just sit here by the window and watch them carry their furniture and household goods inside while Mrs. Frost’s getting the cooking ready to eat. If they start taking off any of you and Mrs. Frost’s things, we can see them just as good from here by the window as we could out there in the yard and road.”

  “Now, Jim, I’m telling you,” Mrs. Frost said, shaking all over, and not even trying to cook us a meal, “don’t you sit there and let Stanley keep you from saving the stock and tools. Stanley doesn’t know the Swedes like we do. He thinks they’re like everybody else.”

  Jim wasn’t for staying in the house when all of his tools were lying around in the yard, and while his cows were in the pasture unprotected, but he saw how it would be better to wait where we could hurry up Mrs. Frost with the cooking, if we were ever going to eat breakfast that forenoon. She was so excited and nervous about the Swedes moving back to East Joloppi from the pulp mill in Waterville that she hadn’t got the beans and brown bread fully heated from the night before, and we had to sit and eat them cold.

  We were sitting there by the window eating the cold beans and brown bread, and watching the Swedes, when two of the little Swedes started running across Jim and Mrs. Frost’s lawn. They were chasing one of their big yellow tomcats they had brought with them from Waterville. The yellow tom was as large as an eight-months collie puppy, and he ran like he was on fire and didn’t know how to put it out. His great big bushy tail stuck straight up in the air behind him, like a flag, and he was leaping over the lawn like a devilish calf, newborn.

  Jim and Mrs. Frost saw the little Swedes and the big yellow tomcat at the same time I did.

  “Good God,” Jim shouted, raising himself part out of the chair. “Here they come now!”

  “Hold on now, Jim,” I said, pulling him back to the table. “They’re only chasing one of their tomcats. They’re not after taking anything that belongs to you and Mrs. Frost. Let’s just sit here and finish eating the beans, and watch them out the window.”

  “My crown in heaven!” Mrs. Frost cried out, running to the window and looking through. “Those Swedes are going to kill every plant on the place. They’ll dig up all the bulbs and pull up all the vines in the flower bed.”

  “Now you just sit and calm yourself, Mrs. Frost,” I told her. “Those little Swedes are just chasing a tomcat. They’re not after doing hurt to your flowers.”

  The big Swedes were unloading the autos and trucks and carrying the furniture and household goods into their three-story yellow clapboarded house. None of them was paying any attention to the little Swedes chasing the yellow tom over Jim and Mrs. Frost’s lawn.

  Just then the kitchen door burst open, and the two little Swedes stood there looking at us, panting and blowing their heads off.

  Mrs. Frost took one look at them, and then she let out a yell, but the kids didn’t notice her at all. “Hey,” one of them shouted, “come out here and help us get the cat. He climbed up in one of your trees.”

  By that time, Mrs. Frost was all for slamming the door in their faces, but I pushed in front of her and went out into the yard with them. Jim came right behind me, after he had finished calming Mrs. Frost, and telling her we wouldn’t let the Swedes come and carry out her furniture and household goods.

  The yellow tom was all the way up in one of Jim’s young maple shade trees. The maple wasn’t strong enough to support even the smallest of the little Swedes, if he should take it into his head to climb to the top after the cat, and neither Jim nor me was hurting ourselves trying to think of a way to get the feline down. We were all for letting the cat stay where he was, till he got ready to come down of his own free will, but the little Swedes couldn’t wait for anything. They wanted the tom right away, then and there, and no wasting of time in getting him.

  “You boys go home and wait for the cat to come down,” Jim told them. “There’s no way to make him come down now, till he gets ready to come down of his own mind.”

  But no, those two boys were little Swedes. They weren’t thinking of going back home till they got the yellow tom down from the maple. One of them ran to the tree, before Jim or me could head him off, and started shinnying up it like a popeyed squirrel. In no time, it seemed to me like, he was up amongst the limbs, jumping around up there from one limb to another like he had been brought up in just such a tree.

  “Good God, Stan,” Jim said, “can’t you keep them out of the trees?”

  There was no answer for that, and Jim knew there wasn’t. There’s no way of stopping a Swede from doing what he has set his head on doing.

  The boy got almost to the top branch, where the yellow tom was clinging and spitting, when the tree began to bend towards the house. I knew what was coming, if something wasn’t done about it pretty quick, and so did Jim. Jim s
aw his young maple shade tree begin to bend, and he almost had a fit looking at it. He ran to the lumber stack and came back dragging two lengths of two-by-fours. He got them set up against the tree before it had time to do any splitting, and then we stood there, like two damn fools, shoring up the tree and yelling at the little Swede to come down out of there before we broke his neck for being up in it.

  The big Swedes across the road heard the fuss we were making, and they came running out of that three-story, six-room house like it had been on fire inside.

  “Good God, Stan,” Jim shouted at me, “here comes the Swedes!”

  “Don’t turn and run off, Jim,” I cautioned him, yanking him back by his coattail. “They’re not wild beasts; we’re not scared of them. Hold on where you are, Jim.”

  I could see Mrs. Frost’s head almost breaking through the window glass in the kitchen. She was all for coming out and driving the Swedes off her lawn and out of her flowers, but she was too scared to unlock the kitchen door and open it.

  Jim was getting ready to run again, when he saw the Swedes coming towards us like a nest of yellow-headed bumblebees, but I wasn’t scared of them, and I held on to Jim’s coattail and told him I wasn’t. Jim and me were shoring up the young maple, and I knew if one of us let go, the tree would bend to the ground right away and split wide open right up the middle. There was no sense in ruining a young maple shade tree like that, and I told Jim there wasn’t.

  “Hey,” one of the big Swedes shouted at the little Swede up in the top of the maple, “come down out of that tree and go home to your mother.”

  “Aw, to hell with the Old Lady,” the little Swede shouted down. “I’m getting the cat by the tail,”

  The big Swede looked at Jim and me. Jim was almost ready to run again by that time, but I wasn’t, and I held him and told him I wasn’t. There was no sense in letting the Swedes scare the daylights out of us.

  “What in hell can you do with kids when they get that age?” he asked Jim and me.

  Jim was all for telling him to make the boy come down out of the maple before it bent over and split wide open, but I knew there was no sense in trying to make him come down out of there until he got good and ready to come, or else got the yellow tom by the tail.

  Just then another big Swede came running out of that three-story, six-room house across the road, holding a double-bladed ax out in front of him, like it was a red-hot poker, and yelling for all he was worth at the other Swedes.

  “Good God, Stan,” Jim said, “don’t let those Swedes cut down my young maple!”

  I had lots better sense than to try to make the Swedes stop doing what they had set their heads on doing. A man would be purely a fool to try to stop it from raining from above when it got ready to, even if he was trying to get his corn crop planted,

  I looked around again, and there was Mrs. Frost all but popping through the window glass. I could see what she was thinking, but I couldn’t hear a word she was saying. It was good and plenty though, whatever it was.

  “Come down out of that tree!” the Swede yelled at the boy up in Jim’s maple.

  Instead of starting to climb down, the little Swede reached up for the big yellow tom cat’s tail. The tom reached out a big fat paw and harried the boy five-six times, just like that, quicker than the eye could follow. The kid let out a yell and a shout that must have been heard all the way to the other side of town, sounding like a whole houseful of Swedes up in the maple.

  The big Swede covered the distance to the tree in one stride, pushing everything behind him.

  “Good God, Stan,” Jim shouted at me, “we’ve got to do something!”

  There wasn’t anything a man could do, unless he was either a Swede himself, or a man of prayer. Americans like Jim and me had no business getting in a Swede’s way, especially when he was swinging a big double-bladed ax, and he just out of a pulp mill after being shut up making paper four-five years.

  The big Swede grabbed the ax and let go at the trunk of the maple with it. There was no stopping him then, because he had the ax going, and it was whipping around his shoulders like a cow’s tail in a swarm of black flies. The little maple shook all over every time the ax blade struck it, like wind blowing a cornstalk, and then it began to bend on the other side from Jim and me where we were shoring it up with the two-by-fours. Chips as big as dinner plates were flying across the lawn and pelting the house like a gang of boys stoning telephone insulators. One of those big dinner-plate chips crashed through the window where Mrs. Frost was, about that time. Both Jim and me thought at first she had fallen through the window, but when we looked again, we could see that she was still on the inside, and madder than ever at the Swedes.

  The two-by-fours weren’t any good any longer, because it was too late to get to the other side of the maple in time to keep it from bending in that direction. The Swede with the double-bladed ax took one more swing, and the tree began to bend towards the ground.

  The tree came down, the little Swede came down, and the big yellow tom came down on top of everything, holding for all he was worth to the top of the little Swede’s head. Long before the tree and the boy struck the ground, the big yellow tom had sprung what looked like thirty feet, and landed in the middle of Mrs. Frost’s flowers and bulbs. The little Swede let out a yell and a whoop when he hit the ground that brought out six-seven more Swedes from that three-story, six-room house, piling out into the road like it was the first time they had ever heard a kid bawl. The women Swedes and the little Swedes and the big Swedes piled out on Jim and Mrs. Frost’s front lawn like they had been dropped out of a dump truck and didn’t know which was straight up from straight down.

  I thought Mrs. Frost was going to have a fit right then and there in the kitchen window. When she saw that swarm of Swedes coming across her lawn, and the big yellow tomcat in her flower bed among the tender plants and bulbs, digging up the things she had planted, and the Swedes with their No. 12 heels squashing the green shoots she had been nursing along — well, I guess she just sort of caved in, and fell out of sight for the time being. I didn’t have time to run to see what was wrong with her, because Jim and me had to tear out behind the tom and the Swedes to try to save as much as we could.

  “Good God, Stan,” Jim shouted at me, “go run in the house and ring up all the neighbors on the line, and tell them to hurry over here and help us before the Swedes wreck my farm and buildings. There’s no telling what they’ll do next. They’ll be setting fire to the house and barn the next thing, maybe. Hurry, Stan!”

  I didn’t have time to waste talking to the neighbors on the telephone line. I was right behind Jim and the Swedes to see what they were going to do next.

  “I pay you good pay, Stan,” Jim said, “and I want my money’s worth. Now, you go ring up the neighbors and tell them to hurry.”

  The big yellow tom made one more spring when he hit the flower bed, and that leap landed him over the stone wall. He struck out for the deep woods with every Swede on the place behind him. When Jim and me got to the stone wall, I pulled up short and held Jim back.

  “Well, Jim,” I said, “if you want me to, I’ll go down in the woods and raise hell with every Swede on the place for cutting down your young maple and tearing up Mrs. Frost’s flower bed.”

  We turned around and there was Mrs. Frost, right behind us. There was no knowing how she got there so quick after the Swedes had left for the woods.

  “My crown in heaven,” Mrs. Frost said, running up to Jim and holding on to him. “Jim, don’t let Stanley make the Swedes mad. This is the only place we have got to live in, and they’ll be here a year now this time, maybe two-three, if the hard times don’t get better soon.”

  “That’s right, Stan,” he said. “You don’t know the Swedes like we do. You would have to be a Swede yourself to know what to tell them. Don’t go over there doing anything like that.”

  “God-helping, Jim,” I said, “you and Mrs. Frost ain’t scared of the Swedes, are you?”

&nb
sp; “Good God, no,” he said, his eyes popping out; “but don’t go making them mad.”

  (First published in the Yale Review)

  Man and Woman

  THEY CAME SLOWLY up the road through the colorless dawn like shadows left behind by the night. There was no motion in their bodies, and yet their feet scuffed up dust that settled behind them as quickly as it was raised. They lifted their eyes with each step they took, peering toward the horizon for the first red rays of the sun.