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Bob Curtis, 2 m. N. of Talladega Springs, Alabama.
Jack Kytle, Editorial Department.
RIVER DRIFTER
Bob Curtis is the kind of man who can disappear from a job and never he missed.
H will live quietly in a textile or lumbering community while
work is fairly plentiful, hut when business slumps, he will he gone. He stays on the fringe of employment, obtaining work only when operations are speeded to a point where a laborer, unskilled and uneducated, may he given a "flunky" job that is never permanent. He represents a section of Southern life that the average urban resident seldom sees.
He, and the many others of his kind, are not known
to the welfare departments of cities.
When work stops for them they retreat
quietly to the rivers, and there they live isolated lives until jobs can he had again.
Hundreds are there now, and it has been more than ten years
since some of them left their shacks. Bob Curtis is typical of the hundreds.
He is a stocky, sallow-faced
little man with a black, wiry beard, and small eyes set deep beneath thick eyebrows.
His few teeth are stained a dull yellow by tobacco. He wears
tattered overalls and jumper, splashed with sticky lowland mud. A huge, blue-checkered handkerchief is knotted loosely at his throat.
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We sat there in the middle of the river, in a narrow, leaky boat, while he baited a trotline with red worms and minnows. It was barely daylight, and a steamy mist floated lazily over the water. At frequent intervals fish rose to the surface, turning over with loud splashes. Bob said without glancing up from his task, "I've tried time an' ag'in to git ahead a little, so I could do sump'un better fer my folks; but it looks like I neveer git nowhar. I ain't never had but one job that paid me mor'n $1.50 a day, an' that was at th' mill in Talladega. They paid me $12 a week up thar, but they laid me off, an' they wasn't nothin' else I knowed to do. I had to come back down hyar, fer it's better to eat a little bit than none-a-tall.
"I may jes' stay this time. It's 'bout as good a place as anywhar right now, fer ain't nobody got no work. Rent don't ost me nothin', an' long as they's fish in this river, we're go'nter eat a little. It mightn't be much but you see, we ain't never had no God's plenty.
"If I had all th' money I've spent movin', I'd be sittin' all right. My wife was fussin' jes' th' other day 'bout our little bit of house goods bein' broke up so bad, but thar ain't a way to he'p it. When a job gives out, a man can't jes' keep stayin' aroun' with no money. He's got to go some'rs, an' I think I'm lucky as hell to have this place hyar. It b'longs to Sam Winslett, but he don't charge me nothin' fer it. You know 'bout his trouble.
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Alabama - River Drifter 3 He built it fer a purpose, but when th' law got too nosey, he built hisself a place over in Shelby County crost th' river. They ain't no Tom Burkes a-sheriffin' over thar.
"I was right up thar at th' shack with Sam when he met up with Tom Burke. They's a sayin' that no matter how bad a man is, they's a man some'rs that's badder'n him. Well, this was durin' Chris'mus week, an' me an' Sam an' Ol' Man Bud Rylant was sittin' at th' table havin' a few drinks. Atter awhile we heard a automobile comin', an' Sam got hot an' bothered. He'd heard that Burke had a eye on him, an' he was purty mad about it.
"We heerd th' automobile, an' Sam got up from th' table an' went an' got his pistol. He was gittin' full, so me an' Bud knowed they might be hell to pay, an' that we'd be mixed up in it. We axed him to put th' gun down--that it was a good way to git in trouble; but he got mad at us an' told us to mind our own damned business. He says, 'If that bastard comes pokin' 'round hyar, I mean to kill him. They ain't nobody go'nter tell me what I can do 'round my own house.'
"Now, Sam ain't nobody to monkey with when he's dead sober, an' he's worse'n ever when he's had a few. He went to th' door an' stood thar spraddle-legged, like he was go'nter keep anybody from comin' in. Me an' Bud jes' sot thar quiet, fer they wasn't no use foolin' with Sam. He jes' as soon shoot his 317
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frien' when he's full as somebody he don't like.
"It was Burke in th ' automobile all right, an' he was lookin' fer Sam's stuff. I was sittin' back behin' th ' wall, so I couldn't see what he done when he seen th' gun, but I heerd all that was said. I heerd th' car door slam shut, an' then I heerd Burke say, 'What you doin' with that gun?' Sam says, 'Don't start up hyar, goddamn you, or I'll kill you 'fore you take a step!' Then Burke says, 'Don't be no fool; drap that gun!'
"Me an' Bud knowed then that they was go'nter be some shootin'. We crawled out'n our cheers an' got behin' th' stove. You coulda heerd a pin drap it was so quiet fer a second or two; but then Burke says, 'Sam, I'm warnin' you; if you pull that trigger, I'm go'nter take you with me!' Then it got quiet ag'in, an' I jes'scrouged thar behin' th' stove waitin' for th' shot. That was th' longest minute I'll ever live in my life.
"Well, sir, they wasn't no shootin' done. Next thing I knowed was Burke was in th' room, an' he was holdin' Sam's gun. He wasn't skeered no mor'n he'd a been if he'd took a toy gun away from somebody. He pushed Sam in a cheer, an ' he says, 'If you wasn't crazy drunk, I'd take you in fer this. You go'nter git killed at that sort of thing some day, an' if I's you, I'd throw that gun in th' river.'
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