Tobacco Road - Erskine Caldwell [59]
Bessie put her dress over herself before she told him.
“Bessie,” she said. “What do you want to know that for?”
“That’s all right, Bessie,” he said. “That’s all I wanted to know.”
He went out and shut the door.
“These city folks has got the queerest ways,” Jeeter said. “You don’t never know what they is going to ask you next.”
Dude took off his shoes and coat and waited for Bessie to get into bed. She had sat down on the floor to take off her shoes and stockings.
Jeeter sat up in bed and waited for her to finish. A door nearby was slammed so hard that pieces of yellow plaster dropped off the ceiling to the bed and floor.
Suddenly some one knocked on the door again, and it was opened immediately. This time it was a man whom they had not seen before.
“Come on down the hall, Bessie,” he said.
He waited outside until Bessie got up from the floor and went to the door.
“Me?” she said. “What you want with me?”
“Come on down to this other room, Bessie. It’s too crowded up here.”
“They must have found another bed for us,” Jeeter said. “I reckon they found out that there was more beds empty than they thought there was.”
He and Dude watched Bessie gather up her clothes and leave the room. She carried her dress, shoes, and stockings in one hand, and her hat in the other. After the door was closed, the building became quiet again.
“These city people has queer ways, don’t they, Dude?” Jeeter said, turning over and closing his eyes. “They ain’t like us folks out around Fuller.”
“Why didn’t you go to the other bed?” Dude said. “Why did the man tell Bessie to go?”
“You never can tell about the queer ways of city folks, Dude. They do the durndest things sometimes.”
They both lay awake for the next half hour, but neither of them said anything. The light was still burning, but they did not try to turn it off.
A board in the hall floor squeaked, and Bessie came in carrying her clothes in her hands.
“Don’t you like the place they provided you with in the other room?” Jeeter asked, sitting up. “What made you come back, Bessie?”
“I reckon I must have got in the wrong bed by mistake or something,” she said. “Somebody else was in it.”
Dude rubbed his eyes in the glare of the electric light, and looked at Bessie.
“Bessie is sure a pretty woman preacher, ain’t she?” Jeeter said, looking at her.
“I didn’t have time to dress again,” she said. “I had to leave right away, and there wasn’t no time to put my clothes on.”
“That man ought to know what he was doing at the start. Ain’t no sense in making people change beds all night long. He ought to let folks stay in one bed all the time and let us sleep some.”
“Men sure is queer in a hotel,” Bessie said. “They say the queerest things and do the queerest things I ever saw. I’m sure glad we stayed here, because I been having a good time to-night. It ain’t like it is out on the tobacco road.”
There was a tapping on the door again, and a man opened it. He looked at Bessie, and beckoned her to the door.
“Come here, Bessie,” he said, “there’s a room down at the other end of the hall for you.”
He waited outside the partly opened door.
“I went to one room just a little while ago, and there was a man in the bed.”
“Well, that’s all right. Down at this other room is another bed for you. Come on, I’ll go with you and show you how to get there.”
“By God and by Jesus,” Jeeter said. “I never heard of the likes of it in all my life. The men here is going to wear Bessie out, running her from one bed to another all night long. I don’t reckon I’ll ever come to this kind of hotel again. I can’t get no peace and sleep.”
Bessie picked up her clothes and went out. The door was closed, and they heard her and the man walking down the hall.
“I reckon she’s fixed up this time so she won’t have to change beds again,” Jeeter said. “I can’t stay awake no longer to find out.”
Dude went to sleep, too, in a few minutes.
At daybreak, Jeeter was up and dressed, and Dude got up a few minutes later. They sat in the room for the next half hour waiting for Bessie. At last Jeeter