The Path Was Steep (22 page)

“Met him comin’ after me. Had the same idea.” Papa nodded drowsily. “Never passed such a night. We looked into every fill, expecting to see the car down there.”

“Well,” Kaiser reached to turn off the light, “if you two won’t lie down, I will.”

Papa didn’t answer. His head had lowered until his chin rested on his chest, and I heard a soft snore. I climbed into bed, and the next thing I heard was David pounding on the door. Sunlight shone through a window. There was no fire in the kitchen and no hot water for David’s bath. Papa’s chair was empty. I saw a movement on the floor. There he lay, his tow sacks spread over cracks in the floor just before the fireplace. Almost in the ashes, he lay between Kaiser and the low fire, and part of the blanket covered him. He stirred, mumbled, and slept on.

“What is the matter?” David looked at the cold stove when I let him in the kitchen. I pointed to the bedroom. Through the door, we saw Kaiser sit up, look around, and then grin. “Best bed I ever saw,” he said.

David didn’t really need a fire—he had been so hot on not finding warmth and breakfast all ready. But a look at Papa, still sleeping, and Kaiser’s explanation cooled him off. A dash to the coal pile finished the job, and by the time breakfast was served, we were all laughing as we swigged coffee.

A thaw set in that day. January passed, slowly as always. President Hoover, helpless to do anything about the continuing Depression, held back by the lame-duck Congress, lived his last agonized days as president of the United States. He was a good man, an honest man; he didn’t take from the government but turned back every penny of his salary to the Treasury. Such a good man, and yet there was little sympathy for him in Piper or in the rest of America. The coal miners, helped by that accusing, persuasive voice, thought that Hoover was an ogre. Half of our sufferings were attributed directly to him. His very name was a bitter word on our tongues.

Roosevelt was the new god. This winter had brought better times to Piper, but with the approach of summer, we would have bogged down in despair again, only—only—there was that vibrant voice, that promise sent from God, we thought.

And surely God protected Roosevelt. The innocent must die for the guilty, this we know. But sometimes one innocent dies for another, as in the chilling, dread affair in Miami when Guiseppe Zangara fired again and again at our new hope, Roosevelt. Surely, he was spared by God’s grace. But an innocent, Mayor Anton Cermack of Chicago, who stood beside Roosevelt, died of wounds received at that time.

We grieved for the mayor, yet grief was mingled with wild joy. What if the bullet had hit its intended victim? Or—could it be that Chicago gangsters had really meant to kill Cermack? The answer to this died with Zangara, who was executed shortly after the black deed.

February passed, and March came into Piper with all of its usual beauty. Green fronds were beside the Cahaba and the small creeks that ran into the river. Green leaves and grass and gold of daffodils. Green and golden were our hopes now. “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself,” that golden voice promised.

He was in our room, speaking intimately to us. Persuasive, magnetic. Voice of hope, voice of promise. You would follow him to the ends of the earth, and jump if he told you to jump; such was your faith. When the warm voice said “My friends,” you shivered with happiness. No longer were you one of the little people, for a great man, the highest in the land, was your own personal friend.

Radio commentators, newspaper writers, everyone went wild over Roosevelt—at first. He had given us an original idea, along with such hope as we had thought dead and buried. Over and over, he was quoted and lauded. “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” Who had ever thought such before?

Blackmore, for one. Someone had loaned me a copy of
Lorna Doone
. I had an almost-photographic memory then and knew that John Ridd had said, “Then I bestowed my fish around my neck more tightly, and not stopping to look much, for fear of fear, crawled along over the fork of rocks . . .” Even the Jewish writer Josephus had used this idea of “fear of fear” almost two thousand years ago. But who read
Lorna Doone
? And certainly few read Josephus. I was too loyal to my new friend to call this to the attention of anyone. If America wished to credit him with originating this thought, then let them. He deserved the credit, for surely he had given the thought new application. So the “fear of fear” remained his own original idea to most people. Perhaps a few scholars and voracious readers knew better.

Inauguration day came—March 4th—and kept us glued to our radios. The next day brought excitement and slight panic. That great man up there had started off with a resounding “Boom!” At the commissary, everyone was talking about it and about money. “I don’t even have a dollar!” was a common expression. Except for the small change in your pocket, there was no money anywhere. Every bank in America had been closed. We had our own bank holiday, or moratorium. Gold could no longer be hoarded. Every person must turn in whatever gold he possessed: the price, $32 an ounce.

Murry Langston, the store manager, was broke. Miss Florence Fancher, who worked in the store office, and who certainly had a very respectable bank account, was stranded with only a little change. She had her own small, private loan business and made perhaps more money from it than from her job at the store. When a person needed instant money, Miss Florence would cash company scrip at a discount. She resold the scrip for a small profit. Now she, too, was broke, having deposited her money the day before the inauguration—you could deposit money to Birmingham Trust Bank at the company office. Mr. Henly, the bank president, was the owner of Piper and Coleanor, spent time there, and offered this service. Everyone, it seemed, was almost flat broke now. No one had thought to cash a check.

Hourly, the radio brought stories. Millionaires didn’t even have a dime to buy a paper. What gold you possessed couldn’t be spent. You would be prosecuted. All—all of it must be turned into the Treasury of the United States.

I reveled in the excitement, and for a few days I felt quite rich simply by being as broke as the former millionaires.

The moratorium ended, and now even the most ignorant person listened avidly to the news. For there was news from Washington hourly. The first hundred days after the inauguration, more legislation was enacted—more new, strange laws—than anyone in the history of America could have believed. Congress was ready to vote almost before Roosevelt asked for something new.

Everyone learned a new alphabet. There was PWA, Public Works Administration, to provide direct relief with a fund of more than $3 billion to finance national, state, and local projects. And even a million dollars was real money in those days. Roosevelt, a scholar, knew of course of Pericles, who built the Parthenon and other works of lasting beauty in Athens, in the same manner: as public works to give employment to the unemployed. But who since then had thought of such an idea?

There was FERA, Federal Emergency Relief Administration, to distribute $500 million among the states for direct relief to the unemployed. A million dollars was big money then, even for government spending. But billions to provide jobs! Here was hope. Here was a kind father in Washington who cared.

The CCC, Civilian Conservation Corps, took over reforestation and flood control, thereby employing 300,000 young men. Before a year had passed, four million more had been given employment through the CWA, Civil Works Administration.

Oh, yes, we learned a new alphabet, especially the letters NRA, National Recovery Administration, and more especially, NLB, National Labor Board. Through NLB, men at last were guaranteed freedom to protect themselves from oppression by employers.

Piper blossomed with hope. But under the hope was a determination to exact vengeance, to never again be brought into a condition close to slavery. That remark, “Let them eat hickory nuts . . .,” could never, never be forgotten. Men had been made lower than men. They had come in faith; helpless, they had asked, not for charity, but for credit that their families might eat, and this had been their answer.

Forgotten was much of the good of the past. For years, there had been a sort of benevolent, paternal feeling from those in power. There had been friendship, unity, love. There had once been peace and joy. But the wounds left by the Great Depression did not heal quickly. In fact, not at all. Men now had a small amount of money on payday, and some (an almost unheard-of thing before this) began to buy groceries at one of the chain stores in Bessemer.

The local commissary had always provided almost all of our needs. Prices were far higher than those of stores in other places. But when one didn’t have transportation, nor even money to pay cash, where else could he buy groceries? Company scrip was issued and taken from your paycheck. Usually, there was almost nothing left when payday came. For those with good credit, who still traded at the commissary, books were issued in five, ten, or twenty-dollar amounts, with nickels, dimes, or quarters for change. On payday, you paid for these books. Others, without credit, drew scrip at the company office. You could always draw out as much as you had to your credit. Paying for this was not voluntary; the amount was deducted from your pay envelope.

David and I began to have a little money left over when we paid for our books. So did our neighbors, the Hendons.

“Sue,” Mrs. Hendon said one day in April. “Hap will buy the gas if you and Dave will take us to Bessemer to buy groceries.”

David didn’t have to work Saturday nights, so one Saturday, we thundered away. Sharon and Davene were with us. Mildred Jones would stay with Edith, Fay, and Betty Hendon. Thunderbolt was growing feeble. He choked, rattled, groaned, and balked now when we took a trip. Because of these problems, he usually sat under a tree at the side of our house, dreaming, no doubt, of the days when he was “King of the Road” back in West Virginia.

As we drove down the winding road and crossed the river, I exclaimed over and over at the beauty surrounding us, as if I myself had created it. Grass was so green in the sunlight that it sparkled like the ocean. Honeysuckle bushes (wild azaleas) and late dogwood brightened the hills. Blue violets, purple spiderwort, red snakeroot, wild sweet williams made a tapestry of the hills. Laurel was beginning to show pink. Birds darted from tree to tree, singing extravagant arias as we bolted down hills; with the help of our angels, no doubt, we arrived safely in Bessemer.

We took the children window-shopping and walked through a department store now and then. As a special treat, we let the girls ride the elevator at Erlick and Lefkovich’s store. Davene, eyes bright, cheeks pink with excitement, held David’s hand. Sharon sucked in her breath as we descended.

“I want to ride again,” Davene said.

“Daddy,” Sharon whispered, “does it cost anything?” God bless her little heart. Children learned early in those days. You had few pleasures if they cost anything. For her sweetness, Sharon was allowed three rides. Davene went along for the fun, eyes bright with happiness. People gathered to enjoy with them, the third time.

“Why don’t you ride?” Davene asked the crowd. “It don’t cost anything.”

Next we went to the A&P store and reveled in masses of food at unheard-of prices. Vic and Hap bought a month’s groceries. I bought all that our treasury would allow. Thunderbolt was well-loaded as we heaped purchases together on the floor and in every available space. The car didn’t have a trunk.

Dear, faithful Thunderbolt, I thought with such affection it must have warmed his whole interior. But even the warmth of my thoughts didn’t have strength to bring alive a dead battery; for dear, faithful Thunderbolt didn’t make a sound when David mashed the starter.

Dusk had settled. We had no lights without a battery, and the car wouldn’t start. We were broke. Night was falling, and we were far from home.

22

Is This a Deathwatch?

David must have been bored with our recent uneventful life. Instead of anger, his reaction to the dead battery was excitement. It brightened his eyes, and even his hair curled energetically. He and Hap did the usual things—peered under the hood, then jiggled wires. Hap kicked the tires, but even that didn’t bring the battery to life. I did my usual automatic wince. A too-energetic kick could mean disaster to a tire in its present state.

“It must be the battery,” David observed with profound wisdom.

“We could push,” Hap came up with a brilliant idea.

David approved the idea. “Sue, you steer,” he said.

The street was slightly downhill, and there was little traffic on 20th Street where we had parked. Coal-mining muscles came in handy now. Half a block and we were almost speeding. I let out the clutch, and Thunderbolt sputtered gallantly.

Rain, April-like, had descended steadily the past quarter hour. Not a shower, but a businesslike downpour that clearly meant to keep up its work all night. The dead battery gave no light, and street lights were dimmed by the rain. The brakes had practically given up their job of stopping the car, but David had an answer for that. Mash the brake pedal, grind into low gear, and with the special aid of Providence you were able to stop. Providence, low gear, and brakes, aided by the curb at which I aimed, were successful. “Well,” Vic laughed. “We made it.”

“But we can’t drive to Piper without lights.”

“Dave,” Hap said, “we are in trouble.” His brown hair was much curlier than David’s. It bushed up on his head in the rain. His forehead was wrinkled, and his round gray eyes stared.

“We will have to have the battery charged,” David said.

I had parked before a small, grease-stained, cluttered building that was clearly a garage-service station. Davene had not forgotten the chief use for service stations and loudly vociferated her needs. She clung to me. Vic took Sharon’s hand, and we found the ladies’ restroom. Needs attended to, we ran through the rain to stand inside the garage where David was shaking his head.