John Steinbeck - The Grapes of Wrath

All right, Joe. You soften ’em up an’ shoot ’em in here. I’ll close ’em, I’ll deal ’em or I’ll kill ’em. Don’t send in no bums. I want deals.

Yes, sir, step in. You got a buy there. Yes, sir! At eighty bucks you got a buy.

I can’t go no higher than fifty. The fella outside says fifty.

Fifty. Fifty? He’s nuts. Paid seventy-eight fifty for that little number. Joe, you crazy fool, you tryin’ to bust us? Have to can that guy. I might take sixty. Now look here, mister, I ain’t got all day. I’m a business man but I ain’t out to stick nobody. Got anything to trade?

Got a pair of mules I’ll trade.

Mules! Hey, Joe, hear this? This guys wants to trade mules. Didn’t nobody tell you this is the machine age? They don’t use mules for nothing but glue no more.

Fine big mules—five and seven years old. Maybe we better look around. Look around! You come in when we’re busy, an’ take up our time an’ then walk out! Joe, did you know you was talkin’ to pikers? I ain’t a piker. I got to get a car. We’re goin’ to California. I got to get a car.

Well, I’m a sucker. Joe says I’m a sucker. Says if I don’t quit givin’ my shirt away I’ll starve to death. Tell you what I’ll do—I can get five bucks apiece for them mules for dog feed.

I wouldn’t want them to go for dog feed.

Well, maybe I can get ten or seven maybe. Tell you what we’ll do. We’ll take your mules for twenty. Wagon goes with ’em, don’t it? An’ you put up fifty, an’ you can sign a contract to send the rest at ten dollars a month.

But you said eighty.

Didn’t you never hear about carrying charges and insurance? That just boosts her a little. You’ll get her all paid up in four-five months. Sign your name right here. We’ll take care of ever’thing.

Well, I don’t know

Now, look here. I’m givin’ you my shirt, an’ you took all this time. I might a made three sales while I been talkin’ to you. I’m disgusted. Yeah, sign right there. All right, sir. Joe, fill up the tank for this gentleman. We’ll give him gas.

Jesus, Joe, that was a hot one! What’d we give for that jalopy? Thirty bucks—thirty-five, wasn’t it? I got that team, an’ if I can’t get seventy-five for that team, I ain’t a business man. An’ I got fifty cash an’ a contract for forty more. Oh, I know they’re not all honest, but it’ll surprise you how many kick through with the rest. One guy come through with a hundred two years after I wrote him off. I bet you this guy sends the money. Christ, if I could only get five hundred jalopies! Roll up your sleeves, Joe. Go out an’ soften ’em, an’ send ’em in to me. You get twenty on that last deal. You ain’t doing bad.

Limp flags in the afternoon sun. Today’s Bargain. ’29 Ford pickup, runs good.

What do you want for fifty bucks—a Zephyr?

Horsehair curling out of seat cushions, fenders battered and hammered back. Bumpers torn loose and hanging. Fancy Ford roadster with little colored lights at fender guide, at radiator cap, and three behind. Mud aprons, and a big die on the gear-shift lever. Pretty girl on tire cover, painted in color and named Cora. Afternoon sun on the dusty windshields.

Christ, I ain’t had time to go out an’ eat! Joe, send a kid for a hamburger.

Spattering roar of ancient engines.

There’s a dumb-bunny lookin’ at the Chrysler. Find out if he got any jack in his jeans. Some a these farm boys is sneaky. Soften ’em up an’ roll ’em in to me, Joe. You’re doin’ good.

Sure, we sold it. Guarantee? We guaranteed it to be an automobile. We didn’t guarantee to wet-nurse it. Now listen here, you—you bought a car, an’ now you’re squawkin’. I don’t give a damn if you don’t make payments. We ain’t got your paper. We turn that over to the finance company. They’ll get after you, not us. We don’t hold no paper. Yeah? Well, you jus’ get tough an’ I’ll call a cop. No, we did not switch the tires. Run ’im outa here, Joe. He bought a car, an’ now he ain’t satisfied. How’d you think if I bought a steak an’ et half an’ try to bring it back? We’re runnin’ a business, not a charity ward. Can ya imagine that guy, Joe? Say—looka there! Got a Elk’s tooth! Run over there. Let ’em glance over that ’36 Pontiac. Yeah.

Square noses, round noses, rusty noses, shovel noses, and the long curves of streamlines, and the flat surfaces before streamlining. Bargains Today. Old monsters with deep upholstery—you can cut her into a truck easy. Two-wheel trailers, axles rusty in the hard afternoon sun. Used Cars. Good Used Cars. Clean, runs good. Don’t pump oil.

Christ, look at ’er! Somebody took nice care of ’er.

Cadillacs, La Salles, Buicks, Plymouths, Packards, Chevvies, Fords, Pontiacs. Row on row, headlights glinting in the afternoon sun. Good Used Cars.

Soften ’em up, Joe. Jesus, I wisht I had a thousand jalopies! Get ’em ready to deal, an’ I’ll close ’em.

Goin’ to California? Here’s jus’ what you need. Looks shot, but they’s thousan’s of miles in her.

Lined up side by side. Good Used Cars. Bargains. Clean, runs good.

THE SKY GRAYED among the stars, and the pale, late quarter-moon was insubstantial and thin. Tom Joad and the preacher walked quickly along a road that was only wheel tracks and beaten caterpillar tracks through a cotton field. Only the unbalanced sky showed the approach of dawn, no horizon to the west, and a line to the east. The two men walked in silence and smelled the dust their feet kicked into the air.

“I hope you’re dead sure of the way,” Jim Casy said. “I’d hate to have the dawn come and us be way to hell an’ gone somewhere.” The cotton field scurried with waking life, the quick flutter of morning birds feeding on the ground, the scamper over the clods of disturbed rabbits. The quiet thudding of the men’s feet in the dust, the squeak of crushed clods under their shoes, sounded against the secret noises of the dawn.

Tom said, “I could shut my eyes an’ walk right there. On’y way I can go wrong is think about her. Jus’ forget about her, an’ I’ll go right there. Hell, man, I was born right aroun’ in here. I ran aroun’ here when I was a kid. They’s a tree over there—look, you can jus’ make it out. Well, once my old man hung up a dead coyote in that tree. Hung there till it was all sort of melted, an’ then dropped off. Dried up, like. Jesus, I hope Ma’s cookin’ somepin. My belly’s caved.”

“Me too,” said Casy. “Like a little eatin’ tobacca? Keeps ya from gettin’ too hungry. Been better if we didn’t start so damn early. Better if it was light.” He paused to gnaw off a piece of plug. “I was sleepin’ nice.”

“That crazy Muley done it,” said Tom. “He got me clear jumpy. Wakes me up an’ says, ’’By, Tom. I’m goin’ on. I got places to go.’ An’ he says, ’Better get goin’ too, so’s you’ll be offa this lan’ when the light comes.’ He’s gettin’ screwy as a gopher, livin’ like he does. You’d think Injuns was after him. Think he’s nuts?”

“Well, I dunno. You seen that car come las’ night when we had a little fire. You seen how the house was smashed. They’s somepin purty mean goin’ on. ’Course Muley’s crazy, all right. Creepin’ aroun’ like a coyote; that’s boun’ to make him crazy. He’ll kill somebody purty soon an’ they’ll run him down with dogs. I can see it like a prophecy. He’ll get worse an’ worse. Wouldn’ come along with us, you say?”

“No,” said Joad. “I think he’s scared to see people now. Wonder he come up to us. We’ll be at Uncle John’s place by sunrise.” They walked along in silence for a time, and the late owls flew over toward the barns, the hollow trees, the tank houses, where they hid from daylight. The eastern sky grew fairer and it was possible to see the cotton plants and the graying earth. “Damn’ if I know how they’re all sleepin’ at Uncle John’s. He on’y got one room an’ a cookin’ leanto, an’ a little bit of a barn. Must be a mob there now.”