There was the scratch of a match, and a candle flared, dimly lighting the rear of the store. Travis stood among the displays and watched the clerk pen the receipt and record the sale in his ledger.
“It’s good that you’ve bought now,” the man called to him. “My supply man says that there’s not enough cotton this year, that they’re having to ship it in from as far away as Texas. Can you imagine that? Next shipment, they’re going to go up to a dollar and a half.”
Travis frowned. “For overalls? They come with a man inside?”
The clerk laughed politely.
“How much are they now?”
“Dollar twenty.”
“Christ,” Travis muttered. He’d figured on no more than a dollar. He picked his way through the displays back to the counter, where the clerk had laid a pair beside the ledger for wrapping. “These here from Texas?”
The clerk was lost in his calculations. After a moment he lifted his head. Travis repeated himself.
“They’re all sewn together in Wisconsin, I believe.” The clerk turned the overalls over, held a tag up to the candle. “It doesn’t say. I suppose that they use cotton from wherever.”
“It’s a funny thing. I’ve never been to Texas or Wisconsin, but my trousers have.”
The clerk smiled, continued tallying figures in his book. Travis looked over the rows of numbers, bore the small man some grudging respect. The clerk wrapped the overalls in paper, tied the parcel with twine.
“Is that hard, doing all that?” Travis asked, nodding towards the ledger, but the clerk handed him the package, set to locking the cash drawer again, and Travis gathered his parcel. “I suppose I’d better be going,” he said.
The clerk led him back to the door and locked it behind him. The stars were beginning to show in the eastern sky.
Travis carried his bundle down the walk, peering into the stores for prices. After the grocery, there was a shop with a businessman’s suit displayed on a mannequin with a painted face. The knot on the dummy’s tie was smaller than the ham-fisted one that Travis’ pap had taught him. He shuffled a step to the side, trying to get at how the knot was done.
Two men came out of the bank, talking, and walked in his direction. Travis peered at the knots on their ties, trying to gauge if they were larger than the mannequin’s. They guardedly stepped into the street.
“Say,” Travis began, and cleared his throat.
“Travis! Hey, Travis!” a voice called, and Travis forgot the two men and their ties.
A truck was parked alongside the courthouse, a display of vegetables in the back. A man in a straw hat stood beside it, grinning.
“Hey, Jim,” Travis said, and crossed to shake the man’s hand. “You peddling vegetables?”
“Got more than we can eat,” Jim said. “Figured I gotta make all I can. These fellas like you, working regular at the dam, might not have time to tend their gardens.” The two men stood while Travis looked over the vegetables.
Jim lowered his voice. ”That right what I’m hearing about you and Claire?”
Travis eyed the man, turned back to the vegetables again.
“She ain’t living with me no more,” he said.
“I’m just as sorry as can be, Travis,” Jim said, and pursed his lips sympathetically. “Take a couple of those tomatoes. You ought to be eating right.”
“Think a grown man can’t handle himself?”
“I was just saying, Travis.”
“How much are you asking for those collards?”
“Three cents.”
“Well, give me some of them and the tomatoes, and I’ll pay you for them. I don’t need no handouts.” He took the money from his pocket and gave it to Jim.
Jim put the produce in a small crate and handed it to Travis, who took it under his arm along with the overalls.
“What’s that you got there?” Jim asked. “You been doing some shopping?”
Travis looked anew at his parcel, then put a hand to the strap on the worn overalls he was wearing. They had another year in them at the least.
“You know they’re asking a dollar twenty for overalls at Clemson’s now?”
Jim pushed his straw hat back on his head.
“Oh, I know, I know. The world’s gone crazy, Travis.”
The street was nearly dark.
“I’ll see you, Jim,” Travis said, turning away, and made his way through the gloom back to where he’d left the car.
WHEN CLAIRE FELT WELL ENOUGH, SHE JOINED IRMA and the other boarders at the table for dinner. The first of the season’s tomatoes were coming in, and Irma stewed them with okra and onions and served them with ham steak and biscuits. She began to bring the food in heaped on large crockery that the men passed hand to hand down to Claire, not taking anything for themselves until she had had her portion. One man grumbled at this, complaining that he’d had to skip his lunch, but his neighbors ignored him and passed the bowl just the same. They were a serious-looking lot, Claire thought, with their knotted ties and suspenders. A few still had their jackets on despite the evening’s heat. When she had come in, they had been introduced to her, one by one, and shaking their hands she was amazed to feel how soft, how clean and free of calluses they were. Office hands, she thought.
Claire spooned tomatoes onto her plate and sent the bowl back the way it had come. More serving dishes came around and slowly the clanking of silverware on plates began to fill the room. She still didn’t have her full appetite and ate slowly, cutting her food up into small bites. This made her miss her children sorely, and she wondered what they would be eating at her mother’s.
She noticed the man sitting across from her, Smithson, had a large bruise running along one side of his jaw and was making a pained expression while he ate. When he caught Claire watching him, he gave her an embarrassed smile.
“I expect I look pretty bad,” Smithson said. “That husband of yours, he’s quite a scrapper.”
“Travis do that to you?” she asked.
“It’s nothing, ma’am,” he said.
“As hard-headed as Charlie is, I imagine it was your man’s foot that most likely came away the worse for it,” said Pugh, and there was laughter around the table. Smithson grinned weakly.
“So, what do you think of this dam?” asked a man on her left. Claire turned to him, remembering his name was Hull. He had a strong jaw and sharp nose, his brown hair oiled and combed back from his forehead.
“How do you mean?”
“What do you think about it?”
Hull had a northern accent, clipping his words off like he didn’t like the taste of them. Claire posed the question to herself and was surprised when she had an answer.
“Well, it’s keeping a lot of the boys in work, isn’t it? That’s got to be good for something.”
“Yeah, that’s true. That’s true. But what about the electricity here in Dawsonville? Aren’t you ready to have an electric oven?”
Claire thought of her house, her life with Travis, and considered all that she would be willing to go without for things to be how they once were.
“It sounds nice. Would it cook like