Joe Lansdale - All the Earth, Thrown to the Sky

“If the train bulls don’t get you,” I said.

“Yeah,” Floyd said, “and if you don’t fall between the cars and get run over and lose a leg or an arm or get mashed altogether. And if someone isn’t already in the boxcar that’s got a bad attitude.”

“We can ride with you, can’t we?” Jane asked.

“If we manage to get on the same car,” Floyd said. “But that might not happen. You get what you get in this kind of business.”

“I still say you’re well dressed for a train jumper,” Jane said.

We heard the train coming from a distance. It blew its whistle.

Jane moved forward. Floyd caught her by the shoulder. “Not yet. Too soon, a bull might see you.”

“I don’t see any bulls,” Jane said.

“That don’t mean they ain’t there,” Floyd said.

“Then why catch the train here?” Jane asked.

“Because this is where it slows down to make the curve. Out there,” Floyd said, waving a hand toward where the tracks disappeared into some woods, “it’s running top speed, or a good speed, anyway. This is the spot. Now, I’m going to point you to the train that goes to Fort Worth, but after that, it’s every man for himself. And woman. I didn’t take you kids in to raise.”

“We’re perfectly fine at raising ourselves,” Jane said. Then she added: “Of course, any tips that might get us on the train without being killed are very much appreciated.”

Floyd grinned.

“All right, tell you what. I’m going to get you on that train. I’ll do that much.”

“Thanks, mister,” Tony said.

“Don’t thank me now,” Floyd said. “You ain’t on the train yet.”

Soon as I saw the train my stomach started to flutter. Thinking about jumping on a train is one thing, but actually doing it while it’s moving, slowing down or not, is another thing altogether.

We started running. Down near the station, coming out from behind a parked boxcar, we saw a man dressed in black. He had on a black cap, and he had a nightstick in his hand. I don’t know if it was a uniform or if he just liked to dress that way.

He saw us and yelled something.

Floyd hollered out, “Run like hell!”

We took off running for the train. It was slowing, but I didn’t think it was slowing enough. The sacks we were carrying were heavy and weighed us down.

I looked back, and the man with the nightstick was gaining on us. As we got near the train, Floyd yelled, “Grab on and climb in!”

Easier said than done, but it did seem as if the train was slowing even more. We picked out an open boxcar and went for it. Jane slung her sack in the open door, and she jumped first. She was nimble as a deer. She hit the floor of the open boxcar with her palms and she was up and in. I had to keep running. Finally I was close enough to throw my bag inside and grab and swing myself up. Jane got hold of me and helped pull me in.

When we looked back, Floyd had Tony on his shoulders and was running alongside the car as if Tony weighed no more than his hat.

Floyd flung his hat into the open boxcar, snatched Tony off his shoulders while he was running, and sort of stuck him at the car. Me and Jane grabbed him and pulled him on board. Tony had lost his sack of goods.

We could hear Floyd breathing loudly as he ran. In the next moment, he was grabbing at it and climbing on board and we were helping him.

The bull hadn’t given up. He was winded too, and he sounded like a busted accordion when he ran, but he was closing in.

Floyd was almost inside when the bull hit his leg with the nightstick. Floyd let out a groan and turned so that he was facing out of the car. As the bull came closer again, huffing and puffing and having lost his hat, Floyd kicked out and caught him in the face and the bull tumbled backwards and did a flip.

“Eat them apples!” Floyd yelled.

The train began to pick up speed. It had been slowing all the while this was going on, but now it was starting to go faster and faster, and there wasn’t any way that bull could catch up, even if he’d been on a bicycle, or a horse. We was hauling now; the wind blowing by like we was in a little tornado.

We looked back and the bull was getting up and yelling at us and shaking his nightstick.

“That don’t get nothing done,” Floyd yelled at him. “We’re already gone.”

The bull turned into a little dot.

Tony said, “Look there.”

We turned to look at the back end of the boxcar. An old man was lying inside with his back up against the corner. He was looking at us, but he didn’t look as if he thought we were really there. He looked completely tuckered out. His cheeks was dirty and had fell into themselves like sinkholes. His hair was thin, and the pieces of it that was left looked like they had been drawn on his head with a pencil.

I went over to him and the others followed. I said, “Are you okay?”

He opened his watery eyes and looked up at me. “I’m just about gone. That’s what I am.” When he spoke, his tongue came out of his mouth, it was so thick and dry. When it did it touched the few bottom teeth he had left and wiggled them around like loose fence posts in a high wind.

Floyd was there now. He bent down and said, “What’s wrong with you, pops?”

“I done got old. Worn out.”

“What you look like to me is hungry,” Floyd said. “When did you eat last?”

“I don’t know,” the old man said. “I can’t remember.”

“If you can’t remember when you ate last,” Floyd said, “then that’s too long. Jack, you mind giving him something from your sack?”

I nodded and started digging in it. I came up with my can opener and a couple of cans. One was soup and the other was meat. I opened them and gave them to him with a spoon.

The old man started to eat.

Floyd grabbed his hand, said, “You eat, but you got to slow it down, or you’ll just puke it all up. Take a bite, chew a long time. Drink the soup slow.”

“I ain’t got nothing much left to chew with,” the old man said.

Jane had come up with a couple more cans, but Floyd shook his head and she put them back in her bag.

The man ate slowly like he was told. He closed his eyes sometimes while he chewed. He ate like it was the first time he had ever tasted food. I was glad I had given him soup, and that the meat was some kind of ham that was easy to chew.

We just stayed where we were and listened to the train chug and clank along and watched the old man eat. He ate the meat and drank the soup like it was water.

After a while, he paused and looked up at us.

“I feel a little better,” he said.

“See there,” Floyd said. “You ain’t done for. You’re just hungry.”

The old man smiled at us. “Oh, I’m done, all right. But at least I won’t go away hungry.”

“You’ll be all right,” Floyd said. “You just take it easy. Here, stretch out.”

Floyd got the old man under the shoulders and helped him stretch out. Then Floyd crushed his nice hat up and put it under the old man’s head and covered him with his suit coat.

The old man went straight to sleep.

“I miss my old man,” Floyd said. “He reminds me some of him.”

“That was an awfully nice thing to do,” Jane said.

“It wasn’t nothing,” Floyd said. “It ain’t nothing at all. Something like that,” he said, straightening his coat over the old man so that it covered him better, “is like the little boy who stuck his finger in a hole in the dike. It don’t really work, and it don’t hold back nothing for long. It’s just another moment he’s got.”

“Well,” Jane said. “It’s another moment, then.”

“Yeah,” Floyd said. “It’s that, all right. But it ain’t nothing else.”

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