Georgia Boy by Erskine Caldwell Read Free Book Online Page B

handy when it rains. I wish I owned them, because I’d be mighty proud.”
    Pa got out and went to the water bucket for another drink. Then he came back and laid his hand on the cart.
    “Where’s the can of worms, son?” he asked.
    I ran and got the worms, and all of us climbed in. Pa picked up the reins and was about to slap Ida on the back when Mrs. Fuller came running in through the alley gate. Mrs. Fuller was a widow who lived down on the next street at the end of the alley and took in boarders for a living. She was about fifty or sixty years old, and was always complaining about something.
    “Just a minute there, Morris Stroup!” Mrs. Fuller said, running up to the cart and jerking the reins from Pa’s hands.
    Pa tried to get out of the cart, but she stood in his way.
    “Where’s the things you took off my back porch, Morris Stroup?” she said. “There ain’t a drop of water in my house, and I can’t get none, because you walked off with my pump handle!”
    “There must be some sort of mix-up,” Pa said. “You know I’m not the sort of neighbor who’d take a pump handle.”
    “One of my boarders saw you sneak in my backyard and make off with a lot of my things, including my pump handle, Morris Stroup,” she said, shaking her finger at Pa. “You took my sadirons, my tongs and poker, and goodness knows what else. Now I want them back right away, or I’ll call the town marshal!”
    Handsome slipped off the cart and backed toward the woodshed. He was just opening the woodshed door when my old man turned around and saw him.
    “Come back here, Handsome Brown,” Pa said.
    Handsome stopped backing away.
    “I sure owe you an apology, Mrs. Fuller,” Pa said. “All that was the purest kind of accident. I happened to be walking through the alley this morning and I saw some old rusty iron laying on the ground. I thought you was trying to get shed of it, and so I just kicked it along out of the way. I thought I was doing you a favor. I remembered that the boys was cleaning up around our house and in the alley, and that’s why your things got mixed up with ours.”
    “You’d better think about doing yourself a favor,” Mrs. Fuller said, “if you don’t want to go to jail.”
    While my old man was calling Handsome, Mrs. Fuller turned around and walked out through the alley gate.
    “Handsome,” Pa said, “bring me them rubber boots.”
    Handsome went to the porch and brought the boots.
    “Now, let this be a lesson to you,” Pa said. “You ought to know better than to pick up just anything you find laying around. It may belong to somebody.”
    “Me?” Handsome said, shaking all over. “Is you talking to me, Mr. Morris?”
    Pa handed him back the rubber boots. Handsome took them, but he let them fall to the ground.
    “Take them boots down to Mr. Frank Dunn’s store and tell him they didn’t fit you,” Pa said. “Then ask him to give you your money back.”
    “Me?” Handsome said, backing off. “You mean me, Mr. Morris?”
    Pa nodded.
    “Then when you get your money back for the boots,” my old man said, “take the money and go over where the man is buying the scrap iron and tell him you’ve changed your mind and want the pieces back. Hand him the four dollars and then start digging in the pile and pick out all the pieces you sold him. When you get everything picked out, especially the pump handle, load them in the cart and bring them straight home. As soon as you get back you can take Mrs. Fuller the things she wants.”
    “You don’t mean me, do you, Mr. Morris?” Handsome said. “Ain’t you kind of mixed up a little? Them rubber boots ain’t mine, and I—”
    Pa picked up the boots and put them in Handsome’s arms.
    “You made me feel so ashamed of myself for buying rubber boots when it wouldn’t be muddy enough to need them that I gave them to you.”
    “You did?” Handsome said. “When did you do all that, Mr. Morris?”
    “Just a little while ago,” Pa said.
    “I