by Jeff Egerton
"Uh-oh, he's got a rod, Gene." The guy on his right quickly grabbed him by the crotch and laughed, "Where you got that rod boy? You got it hidden down here by your little pecker?"
Curly threw a forearm into the one who'd grabbed him and tried to scramble to the other side of the boxcar. The guy with the knife grabbed his collar and threw him to the floor, slamming his face into the wood.
Curly felt blood on his cheek, and the tip of the knife sticking him below his ear. A threatening voice said, "Don't make a move, kid."
"You ain't gonna to be throwing anybody anywhere." The one who'd grabbed his crotch was fumbling with Curly's belt buckle. When it was undone, he tugged Curly's pants down.
Curly shouted, "You God damned queer bastards. If I get my hands on you, you're dead!"
A fist to the side of his head, then, "Shut up, kid."
Curly grit his teeth, steeling himself. His urge was to struggle, but the knife point in his neck stilled him. He was prepared for the worst, when he heard Luke’s voice bellow above the din of the train. “You two, leave him alone."
As his assailant turned toward the voice, the pressure from the knife let up. The guy on his knees had also looked toward the voice. Curly rolled and drove both feet into the guy’s crotch. A loud scream told him he’d connected. He scrambled away, pulling up his pants.
The one with the knife spun toward him and yelled, "Com'ere kid, I ain't done with you."
Luke stepped out of the shadows. The guy with the knife turned toward him and attacked, slashing wildly. "Get outta here! This ain't none o' your business."
With astonishing quickness, Luke grabbed the guy's wrist and wrapped an arm around his neck. The hobo struggled, but Luke twisted his arm until a bone cracked. The hobo roared in pain and dropped the knife. Curly grabbed it.
Luke threw the guy out the door. A scream followed the hobo then faded into the distance. He pointed to the second guy and said, "You want to take care of this one?"
"Yeah." Curly knelt over the cowering man, laid the knife across his throat and screamed, "You queer son of a bitch. I ought to dress you out right here."
The man cried, "Look kid, we was jes' havin' a little fun. I wasn't gonna stick it in ya'." Wide, terrified eyes searched Curly's face to see how much hatred was in the boy. He muttered, "Wha-what're ya' gonna do?"
"I’ll fix you so you won't be able to fuck anybody ever again."
The man cried, "No, no, wait a second, kid!"
Luke said, "You better not cut him or he'll die for sure."
"You just broke a guy's arm and threw him off the train."
"Yeah, because they were gonna hurt you. This guy ain't so dangerous now."
The trembling hobo picked up on the reasoning, "Yeah, kid, listen to him. I ain't gonna do nothin' now. There ain't no use for you to hurt me, we can jest forget about this."
Curly kept the pressure on the knife and told the man, "Mister, you've got ten seconds to get off this train or I'm gonna cut you long and deep."
"Wait, I gotta get my pants on."
Curly threw the guy’s pants to the end of the boxcar, "Move it!"
"But wait, kid, I can't….”
Curly jabbed at him, backing the guy up until he teetered in the doorway. One slash with the knife and hobo jumped, bare-legged, to join his friend.
With his heart racing, Curly stood in the doorway of the rocking boxcar, looking into the fresh morning light. He felt several years older than a few minutes ago. Turning to his new friend, he said, "Thanks for the help."
"That’s O.K. Now that we got rid of them, we better drop off, quick."
"Why?" Curly didn't understand the urgency.
"'Cause, if either of them two live, they're going to be screaming about a white man and a Negro that threw 'em off the train. Word's gonna go down the line and the law will be waitin' for us at the next stop. They'll just throw you in jail, but they'll sure as shootin' lynch me."
Curly leaned against the swaying wall of the boxcar and said, "Are you serious?"
Luke asked, "Curly, how long you been on the road?"
"A month or so. Why?"
"Well, you sure ain't learned much. I'm surprised you lived this long."
"Wha'dya mean?” Curly shot back. “I can take care of myself!"
Luke snickered. "You sure got a short memory."
Curly reacted, defensive, "Yeah, well that guy had a knife."
"We’re slowing for a grade. Let’s ditch this westbound and catch out on an eastbound. They'll be looking for us at the stops west of here. Our best bet is to head back east for a few hours.”
“Do you mean the law will be looking for us?”
“They might be. We’d best avoid them.”
“That means we can’t show our faces around here, right?”
“That’s right.”
“Shit!” Curly yelled. “If we can’t show our faces, how the hell are we going to get anything to eat?”
“I don’t know, Curly. I guess we don’t eat.”
CHAPTER THREE
As the train slowed Luke heard the telltale banging of the couplings slamming together. From experience he knew it would take a minute or so before the train was slow enough for them to jump from the boxcar without being mortally injured.
Once the train reached walking speed the boys jumped onto the cinder siding and rolled into the tall grass. They walked along the tracks for an hour or so until a water tank appeared in the distance. Approaching it cautiously, they made sure there were no other hoboes waiting for the next train near the tank.
Luke cautioned, "Go way back in this field. Some of the railroad bulls in these parts carry shotguns. If they think someone is waiting to hop a train, they've been known to fire a few rounds of buckshot into the field."
Seeing no one, they ran into the field and laid down. Curly asked, "What if the bulls kill someone by shooting into a field like that?"
Luke answered, matter-of-fact, "Someone gets killed, most likely they dig a hole and throw him in it. Since I been ridin' the rails, I’ve seen hundreds of guys die out here."
"All of 'em shot by the bulls?"
"No, most of 'em are killed getting on or off trains. Guys make the mistake of ridin' the blinds between passenger cars, or they ride the rods below boxcars. They’re both dangerous. Saw a kid last week, sittin' the doorway of boxcar swinging' his feet when the train went by a switch. The switch caught his feet and took him clean out of the car. 'Nuther guy tried to catch out, but the train was goin' too fast. It threw him right under the wheels—cut 'im in half."
"Holy shit." Curly said, thinking how lucky he'd been so far. They turned toward the mournful whistle and unmistakable chugging of an approaching train. Knowing the brakeman would be looking for hobos, they waited in the field. After the train took on water, they heard the two short whistle blasts that signaled the engineer was about to blow down the boiler. Once the tall driving wheels started to turn, they sprinted for the train. Luke saw Curly heading for the front ladder on a closed boxcar. He grabbed the rear ladder and climbed to the top of the same boxcar.
Once on top, Curly slowly walked the catwalk toward Luke.
Halfway there he saw Luke waving and shouting, "Get down, Curly, get down!"
Curly lay down. Luke ran toward him and said, "Don't you know nothin'?"
"Wha'dya mean?"
"Don't walk a boxcar with your back to the engine until you’ve taken a good look ahead; that's a good way to get killed." As Luke said this, an over-hanging signal arm whizzed by, barely four feet over their heads.
Luke continued, "See that? If you're standing with your back to the engine and one of them, or a bridge comes along, you're dead. You always walk a catwalk facing the engine until you’ve taken a good look down the line."
Curly said, “O.K. I got ‘cha.”
Luke handed Curly his belt. "Here, we’ll sleep in shifts. Tie yourself on and get some sleep, I'll enjoy the scenery."
"OK. Thanks, Luke." Curly
wrapped the belt around the catwalk and laid his head on his bindle. He said, "Hey Luke, I just thought of a nickname for you."
"What's that, Curly?"
"After seeing you run down that boxcar, I'm gonna call you, Catwalk. Catwalk Jackson. How do you like it?"
Luke grinned and said, "Yeah, I kinda' like it. Curly and Catwalk—ain't we a pair?"
The second hobo who'd been thrown off the train, struck a crossing signal that inflicted severe internal injuries. Before he died he told his story to a citizen who had been waiting for the train to pass. "Me an' my friend was riding in a boxcar, going out to California to look for work. These two young guys jumped us, a tall black guy with a burn mark on his left cheek an’ a stocky white guy with real curly hair. The darkie had a big knife. They beat my partner bad an' did all sorts of perverted things to him before they threw him off. When they took my pants off, I knew they was goin' to rape me too, but I made it to the door an' jumped. Ya' gotta tell someone about these guys. They ain't very old, probably in their teens, but they're meaner than hell."
The motorist drove to the nearest police station and reported the incident. He then told everyone he saw about the meanest desperadoes since the James gang.
Watching the clouds drift by, Catwalk thought of his family back on the farm in Mississippi. He worried about his Momma trying to feed eight kids when only three of them were old enough to work the fields. She always made do and never complained, but it was hard on her. More than anything else, he wished he could find work and send her some money.
Since he left home there had been occasional work, but he wasn't sure if the money he'd given to people to send home ever reached her. Most likely it had been stolen. Even though there were many more people looking for work, than there were jobs, Luke knew he had to be patient because one day he and Curly would find work and then their lives would change for the better. The thought of working steady and sending money home regular to his Momma brought a momentary smile to his face. His smile disappeared, however, when he thought of the trouble they were in. While they were looking for work they had to travel and while they were on the move, they had to avoid the police and the railroad bulls. Not an easy task when both factions were taking hard looks at the homeless men who’d been known to steal and commit other crimes just to survive. He didn’t know if the hoboes they’d thrown off the train had talked, but Luke knew how life worked on the road. If the hoboes had talked, it would be remembered that a black man threw a white man off a train. That was grounds for hanging—period.
If they were successful at avoiding the police and the bulls, they still had to find work, and that was almost impossible. Now, more than ever, he was glad he had a friend with him.
Catwalk saw the terrain rising. He nudged Curly. "Comin' to a grade, time to drop off."
“You think we're far enough away yet?"
"I hope so. Anyway, we better get off before some other 'boes see us."
Ten minutes later their worn brogans shuffled through the hot gravel as they walked down a Texas farm road. The midday sun was blistering, white hot and hard as steel, but the boys, toughened by life on the road seemed immune to discomfort.
Curly asked, "Catwalk, were you serious about them lynching you?"
"Sure was, Curly. Don't you believe me?"
"Well, why would they? They don't know for sure that it was you that threw him off the train?"
"Curly, where you from?"
"Norwich, New York. That's in upstate; we had a farm about ten miles outside Norwich."
"Are there any black folk up there?"
"A few. Old man Sachs had a couple worked for him. Why?"
"Curly, there's plenty o' places in this country where white men don't even think twice about hanging' black men. My Momma told me some of 'em do it jus' 'cause they’re mean."
"Holy shit," Curly said. "That don't make any sense."
"Well, they think 'cause they're white and we're black that they can do it. An' most people don't care about it, except they don't want to lose a good worker ‘cause good men are hard to find. Some people treat us real nice. We worked two seasons for Mister Slade an' he was a real kind man. He even brought a doctor out when Daddy took sick. When Daddy died they had a nice box with flowers for him and a preacher to read over him so he'd go right to heaven. There's other people who are just looking' for somewhere to use their hate. Like those two back in that boxcar, they'd just as soon stuck that knife in me as look at me. I can tell the ones that got the hate in them."
"There's some people who don't like Jews, but they don't hang 'em. At least I never heard of anyone doing it."
"Are you Jewish?"
"You kidding, with a name like Levitz?"
"I don't know what's a Jewish name, 'cause I never knew anyone Jewish. The only people I knew were the other workers on the farm where we lived."
"Didn't you ever go to school?"
"Just a couple years, but mostly I had to work since I was little. My Momma taught me numbers and reading letters some, but I’d like to learn more. I’d go back to school if I could."
"But you seem smart to me, and you talk like you're smart."
"My Momma used to spend hours teaching us kids to talk proper. She'd say, 'Luke, just ‘cause you work as a cropper, don’t mean you have to talk like a cropper. Some people might not like you 'cause you're black, but for the ones who don't hold that against you, if they hear you talk proper, they'll be more likely to take your side. And, that will help you get good jobs.'"
"Your Momma sounds like she's pretty smart."
Catwalk smiled with pride, "My Momma's the smartest lady in the world. She used to read to me, every night after work. She'd say, 'Luke, since we're poor and you can't travel, you can see other places through books.' I miss that most of all, hearing my Momma read to me."
Curly slapped his friend on the shoulder and said, "As soon as I find some books, I'll read to you, Catwalk."
"Do you know how to read letters, Curly?"
"Sure, I made it through the seventh grade, but then they closed our school. Why?"
"Well, I want you to teach me how to read and to write too, so I can write to my Momma. If we can find work, I'll send her a long letter, telling her about our jobs and even send her some money."
"Sure, I'll teach you."
Luke smiled, knowing how it would make her feel if she got a letter from him. He realized because she never heard from him and didn’t know where he was that she worried about him constantly.
Curly asked, "Is that why you're on the road, 'cause your Daddy died?"
"Yeah, my Momma just had too many mouths to feed. We decided it would be better if I went out and looked for work."
"How long you been out here?"
"Oh, I don't rightly know; I reckon it's eight or nine months now."
"You ever had anybody do anything to you, like those two back there?"
"No, but I'm real careful and good at staying out of sight. Nobody sees me unless I want them to. I don't go to no hobo jungles or Hoovervilles unless there's other black folk there."
Curly saw a dust cloud down the road, and said, "There's a car comin'."
"Get in this field, fast." They jumped a fence and ran into the corn field, not stopping until they were far into the field.
As they ran through the corn, Curly said, “Do you think the people in the car are looking for us?”
“They could be, Curly, but we don’t know for sure. We better stay out of sight just in case.” That was what he told Curly, but deep inside Luke felt certain that whoever was in the car was on the lookout for two young hoboes.
CHAPTER FOUR
"Did you see that, Sheriff?" Deputy Alton Jones asked Sheriff Wendell Tyler. "Two men. As soon as we made the turn, I seen two men walking down the road, but they seen us and ran into the field."
"So?" The sheriff said, "There ain't no law against running through a corn field."
"It could be the two killers we heard about in tha
t telegraph message."
"Are you sure you saw someone?" The sheriff hoped his deputy would get the hint that he enjoyed driving his new Nash police car more than chasing some damned hoboes.
The deputy wouldn't be put off, "Just as sure as I'm sittin' here, I saw two men duck into this field.”
The sheriff countered, "Nah, it couldn't a' been them killers. Hell, the message said they were searching for those guys over west of Bailey's Junction."
"Yeah, but they could've doubled back. Stop the car. I want to see something."
Begrudgingly the sheriff pulled over. Deputy Jones walked to the edge of the field and scanned the soil. "There's fresh foot prints of two men in the dirt. They're hiding in the field."
The sheriff said, "Jesus Christ, Alton, those prints could have been left there by anybody. Hell, they’re probably from the men working the field."
"Sheriff," the deputy pressed, "We had a hell of a rain two nights ago. Any prints that're visible have been made in the last day or so. Someone in that field is running from something."
The sheriff drove away. There was no getting out of this, but if it was the killers, he wanted more men. He said, "I'm going to stop by Chet's house to warn him. Then we'll go round up some help. If it's the same ones who threw them guys off the train, they're dangerous."
Excited about seeing some action, Jones said, "That's agreeable to me, Wendell. I know it's those two and we’re gonna nab ‘em."
Hiding behind a large oak tree in the middle of the corn field Curly and Catwalk heard the car stop. Catwalk carefully peeked around the tree and saw the white star on the door and whispered to Curly, "It's a po-lice car and one of them is looking around at the edge of the field."
"He's looking for foot prints." Curly whispered back.
"What if he sees our prints?" Catwalk asked. "Do you think he'll come after us?"
"I don't know, but we'd better head for the other side of this field. C'mon."
The boys quietly moved down the corn rows, then came to a dirt road. Curly said, "Let's head down the road. We’ll stay close to the field, so we can duck back in if we see someone."