The men in gang five followed Evans to the line shack where the tools were handed out. Two trusties stood at the door of the shack to check out the tools. Each man could ask for either a shovel or a pick. Those who got there first took all the shovels. It was harder work with a pick.
Billy Jo stepped forward in the line.
“Shovel.”
“Ain’t no more. Claxton got the last,” the trusty said.
“My goddamn luck.”
“Move along,” Evans said.
It was Jeffry’s turn.
“Hey Evans, can’t I get a shovel? I was sick again last night.”
“You should have got at the head of the line.”
“I’ll pull my guts loose with a pick.”
“You’re slowing up the line.”
Jeffry lifted the pick on his shoulder with both hands and walked over to the irrigation canal.
“What’s your name?” the trusty said to Avery.
“Broussard.”
“There’s supposed to be another guy here — LeBlanc.”
“Scratch him off. He’s in the hospital at Angola,” Evans said.
“I ain’t supposed to scratch nobody off till I get an order.”
“I’m giving you the order. He won’t be here for three weeks.”
“Why don’t somebody at the office get things straight and stop screwing up my list?” the trusty said. “What are you doing here, Boudreaux? I got you marked down in detention.”
“I’m out.”
“I can see that.”
“Give me a pick and I won’t take up any more of your valuable time.”
“How am I supposed to keep my list straight when half the guys in your gang is someplace they shouldn’t be?” the trusty said to Evans.
“You can bitch to the warden and maybe he’ll give you another job. We need more people on the line,” Evans said.
The trusty wrote in his book. “Boudreaux — one pick,” he said.
Evans turned to Toussaint.
“What are you staring at?”
“Nothing.” He shouldered his pick with one hand, the point sharp and shiny in the sun. His hand was tight on the smooth wood handle. Evans looked at him, his face pink and peeling from sunburn. Toussaint stared back.
“Don’t ever think you could get away with it,” Evans said. “You wouldn’t no more get the pick over your head and I would have my pistol out.”
“A man that’s been on the gang can swing pretty fast. Even with one hand and from the shoulder.”
Evans started to step back and checked himself.
“Talk like that can send you to detention,” he said.
“I been there before.”
“One of these days you ain’t coming back. You’ll go crazy in there and start mumbling and pissing on yourself like the loonies.”
Toussaint let the pick drop to his side and swing loosely by one arm. Evans’ hand jerked to his holster involuntarily and then relaxed. The Negro walked past him to the ditch.
“What was Evans on your ass about this time?” Jeffry said.
“He said I might make trusty this year.”
The men were working at the end of the canal with the picks. They thudded them into the wall of dirt and pulled the broken tree roots loose with their fingers. The sweat rolled down their bare backs, and their faces were already filmed with dust. Jeffry rested his pick and looked over at Evans.
“Somebody should kill that sonofabitch,” he said.
“He’s a mean one,” Daddy Claxton said.
“I’d like to pop his head open like you break a matchbox,” Billy Jo said.
“He’s going to make me pull my guts out,” Jeffry said.
“You ain’t the only guy in camp with the runs,” Billy Jo said.
“I got to go thirsty all the time,” Jeffry said. “I can’t never drink a sip of water without puking it right up again. When I get out I’m going down home and stick my head in a well we got and drink till there ain’t any fever left in my insides.”
“I ain’t seen a woman in four years,” Billy Jo said. “I’m going to hire the two best-looking whores in Memphis and jazz them till they’re bleeding. I ain’t done any belly-rubbing in so long I forgot what it is.”
“It ain’t but a month now,” Jeffry said.
“Why don’t you guys write it on a piece of paper and tack it on the warden’s bulletin board,” a man working next to Billy Jo said. “Jeffry and Billy Jo is breaking out in one month.”
“I remember in Folsom a guy stooled on a break,” Billy Jo said. “Somebody used a razor on him like you slice up a ham.”
“That didn’t do no good to the guys that got their butts shot off,” the man said.
Billy Jo swung his pick down hard into the wall of dirt.
“I don’t reckon you’re aiming to make trusty by turning us in?” he said.
“I got no truck with fellows like that.”
“You’re a good boy.” Billy Jo swung his pick down again.
“What are you going to do when you get out, Toussaint?” Jeffry said.
“I don’t think that far ahead.”
“That’s the best way to do it. You go nuts when you start counting time.”
Two men moved the wheelbarrows up to the front of the ditch and shoveled in the loose dirt.
“It don’t do you no good to count time,” Jeffry said. “It makes you feel like shitting in your britches when you think of what’s out there and you can’t get to none of it.”
“There’s pussy out there,” Billy Jo said. “Christ, I’m going to bathe in it when I get out.”
“This is the worst goddamn camp they got in the state,” Jeffry said. “Them goddamn Carolina chain gangs ain’t any worse off than we got it.”
“This place ain’t tough,” Billy Jo said. “I was in five pens before they sent me here.”
“You had a real successful career,” a man said. It was the same man who had baited him in the truck.
“Someday I’ll sent you a postcard and you can play with yourself while you think about me climbing between some girl’s legs.”
“How did you get that scar on your face?”
“In the Tennessee pen,” Billy Jo said.
“I heard you was cut for rutting over a nigger girl.”
“You sonofabitch.”
“Your scar is turning red, Billy.”
“I’ll drive this pick through your goddamn chest.”
“Your bleeding ass.”
“I done warned you.”
“Hack watching,” Brother Samuel said.
They looked up. Evans stood in the shade by the trees.
“He ain’t watching us. He’s thinking about what he’s going to do to his old lady when he gets home,” Billy Jo said. “Why’d you say he was watching us?”
“I don’t reckon I see too good,” Brother Samuel said.
“Don’t go getting in no fights,” Jeffry said. “They’ll put you in detention and we’ll be out in another month.”
“You boys better keep quiet about it,” Brother Samuel said.
“We’ll make it out,” Jeffry said.
“I ain’t saying you won’t. It’s just that it don’t hurt none to keep it to yourself.”
“You ever been in a break, Daddy?” Billy Jo said. The man whom he had almost fought had moved to the other side of the ditch and was working by himself.
“No. I seen one, though. I was in Angola when they lined the guards up along the block and was going to set fire to them with torches.”
“Too bad Evans wasn’t there,” Billy Jo said. “I’d give up the best piece of ass I ever had to see him get caught in a riot. And that pop-off bastard over there. I’d like to see him get his tail burned, too.” He looked towards the man working on the other side of the canal.
“Why don’t you quit talking about women?” Jeffry said.