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Show ob Chapter Two. Heating Early on a Saturday morning, the first Saturday of August, Karl walked the length of the back yard to get a trowel from the woodshed. His mother had asked him to weed the garden, which was choked with growth from heavy rains the week before. Trowel in hand, Karl knelt among rows of tomato plants, enjoying the heavy scent that clung to his fingers after he touched their leaves. A few of the tomatoes were ripening into orange globes, vivid against the soot-specked green leaves. Karl paused in his weeding to notice the activity in the Culley yard below, where one of the three little Marys unwound a ball of clothesline as she trailed after Jame, who was putting up the line. Bridey Culley came through the back door with a clothes basket full of clean white linens. "Haven't you got that clothesline all the way up yet, Jame?" Bridey called. "Stir your stumps, lad. I'm ready to hang." "Almost done, Ma," Jame answered. "I'll help you pin up the wash." Poor Jame, Karl thought, out of work a whole month, and no prospects for a job. The mills were running slow, in the usual summer slump. No one was being hired, and some of the steelworkers were getting laid off. Karl hadn't even tried to find another job -- if an experienced man like Jame couldn't get work, what hope was there for Karl? Setting down the basket and straightening to rub her back, |
