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right,” Bonbon said.
    Then I saw him turning and looking at Marcus. He didn’t look straight at him, he looked at him from the side. Andfrom the way Marcus stood there looking back at Bonbon, I could tell he had been looking at him a long time. So it was Bonbon who let me know Marcus had been looking at him and not at the hawk. And it was the look in Marcus’s face that let me know Bonbon hadn’t given the hawk a break when he didn’t shoot him on the limb; he had shot twice because he wanted to show Marcus how good he was.
    Bonbon turned from Marcus and looked across the field at the sun. I could hear the
sagg-sagg
of the saddle when he shifted his weight from one side to the other.
    “Move her, Geam,” he said.
    Freddie tied his hawk on the back of the trailer with a piece of twine, and Marcus tied his sack on the back of the trailer by the rope. We started back down the field, and Marcus kept up with them about halfway down. Then he fell back and had to get the sack again. Bonbon and the horse were right behind him all the way.

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    When we got to the front it was dark already. Everybody else had come out the field, and you could see the smoke flying out the kitchen chimleys where the women were cooking supper, and you could see the men sitting or laying down on the gallery, waiting for the food to get done so they could eat. I dropped Marcus off at the house; then I went up to Freddie’s house and let him and his girlfriend off; then I went on up to the yard. My other two trailers had been emptied and pulled to the side, so now I parked the two full trailers before the crib. That’s how it went. You brought two trailerfuls at noon and the boys emptied them that evening. Then you brought two trailerfuls that night and the boys emptied them the next morning. It went on like that until you got through; then you went into hay. But hay was out of the question for at least another month.
    After I had unhooked Red Hannah from the two trailers, I parked her over by the toolshop and went over to the store to get something for supper. The store was packed full of people. Old Godeau (with his clubfoot) and his son Ferdinand moved from one counter to the other. I knew I couldn’t get waited on right then, so I went around the other side and had myself a couple beers. You could buy softdrinks in the store or if you were a white man you could drink a beer in there, but if you were colored you had to go to the little side room—“the nigger room.” I kept telling myself, “One of these days I’m going to stop this, I’m going to stop this; I’m a man like any other man and one of these days I’m going to stop this.” But I never did. Either I was too thirsty to do it, or after I had been working in the field all day I was just too tired and just didn’t care. So I went around there and had a beer with Burl, Snuke, and a couple others from the quarter. They asked me about Marcus and how he made out with Bonbon today. I told them all right. They looked at me, waiting to hear more, but I didn’t have any more to say. Then Tick-Tock came in and I bought her a beer. Tick-Tock was a single gal in the quarter and she would give you a piece if you treated her right. I had gotten couple pieces from her myself. But we didn’t have anything going for us; it was just friendly. I needed a piece at the time and I asked her for it and she said yes. I didn’t give her any money because she didn’t want any money. But any time I caught her out somewhere I would buy her a drink, or if I saw her at one of the house fairs I would buy her a bowl of gumbo or a fish dinner. Now I bought her a beer, and we leaned on the counter drinking and talking. She hadn’t been home since leaving the cotton field, and I could see sweat marks down the side of her face. Somebody put a nickel in the jukebox and asked her to dance. She danced with him and came back where I was. I bought her another beer and left.
    When I came home I saw Marcus