Tobacco Road - Erskine Caldwell [38]
“The automobile’s yours,” she was told. “Is the boy going to drive it home for you?”
“Wait a minute,” Bessie said. “I clear forgot about praying—let’s all kneel down on the floor and have a little prayer before the trade is made.”
“It’s all over with now,” one of them said.
“No it ain’t, neither,” Bessie insisted. “It ain’t over till the Lord sends his blessings on it.”
The two men laughed at her insistence, but Bessie had already knelt down on the floor and Dude was getting down on his knees beside the automobile. The two men stood behind her so they would not have to kneel on the floor.
“Dear God, we poor sinners kneel down in this garage to pray for a blessing on this new automobile trade, so You will like what me and Dude is doing. This new automobile is for me and Dude to ride around in and do the work You want done for You in this sinful country. You ought to make us not have wrecks with it, so we won’t get hurt none. You don’t want us to get killed, right when we’re starting out to preach the gospel for You, do You? And these two men here who sold the new car to us need your blessing, too, so they can sell automobiles for the best good. They is sinful men just like all the rest of us, but I know they don’t aim to be, and You ought to bless their work and show them how to sell people new automobiles for the best good, just like You would do if You was down here selling automobiles Yourself, in Fuller. That’s all. Save us from the devil and make a place for us in heaven. Amen.”
Dude was the first to get on his feet. He jumped up and blew the horn six or seven long blasts. The two men came around in front of Bessie, wiping the perspiration from their faces, and laughing at Dude and Bessie. They looked at her nose again until she put her hand over it.
Dude and Bessie got into the automobile and sat down. Dude blew the horn again several times.
“Wait a minute,” the salesman said. “We’ll have to roll it outside first and fill up the tank with gas. You can’t drive it like it is now.”
Bessie got out, but Dude refused to leave the horn and steering wheel. He sat where he was and guided the car through the door while the men pushed.
After the gasoline had been pumped into the tank, Dude started the engine and got ready to leave. Bessie got in again, sitting in the centre of the back seat.
“Where you going now?” the salesman asked Bessie. “To get married?”
“We’re going around to the courthouse to get leave of the county,” she said. “Then we’ll get married.”
The two men whispered to each other.
“Did you ever see a nose like that before, Harry?”
“Not when I was sober.”
“Look at them two big round holes running down into her face—how does she keep it from raining down in there, you reckon?”
“I’ll be damned if I know. Maybe she puts cork stoppers in them to keep the water out. She would have to do something like that in a hard shower.”
Bessie leaned over and prodded Dude.
“Drive off, Dude,” she said. “Ain’t no sense in staying here no more.”
Dude put the car into gear and turned the gasoline on. Being unaccustomed to the new model, he did not know how to gauge the amount of gasoline, and the car jerked off so quickly that it almost lifted itself off the ground. The two men jumped out of the way just in time to keep from being hit by the fender.
Bessie showed Dude which way to turn to find the courthouse. When they reached it, Dude got out reluctantly and followed Bessie inside. He wanted to stay in the car and blow the horn, but Bessie said he had to go with her to get the license.
The Clerk’s office was found at the end of the hall on the first floor, and they opened the door and went inside. There was a cardboard sign on the door that Bessie remembered seeing when she came there with her first husband.
“I want leave to get married to Dude,” she stated.
The Clerk looked at her and spread out a blank on the table. He gave her a pen and motioned to her to fill it in with answers to the questions.
“You’ll have to write it for me. I can’t write the