"No money, no time, no clo'es," said Polish Rose.
The truck-driver shouted to his people to pile in and the truck went on. By noon the Beechams were seeing their first palm trees and winter flowers. Grandpa and Daddy tried to tell the children about the things they were passing, but the children were too sleepy and sickish to care. Grandma's mouth was a thin line of pain and the baby wailed until people looked around crossly, though there were other crying babies.
The truck reached its destination late on the second evening and piled out its passengers at a grapefruit camp. Rose-Ellen had been picturing a village of huts like those at the bogs, or bright-papered shacks like the oystershuckers'. Though the featherbeds were gone, it would be delicious to lie on the floor, uncrowded, and sheltered from the night.
But no such shelter awaited them. Instead, they were pointed to a sort of hobo camp with lights glimmering through torn canvas. A heavy odor scented the darkness.
Grandpa said, "They can't expect decent folks . . . !"
Grandma said, "We've got to stretch out somewheres. Even under a tree. This baby. . . ."
Sally was crying a miserable little cry, and an Italian woman who reminded Rose-Ellen of Mrs. Albi peered out of a patched tent and said, "Iss a bambina! Oooh, the little so-white bambina! Look you here, quick! The people next door have leave these tent. You move in before some other bodies."
"These tent" was a top and three walls of dirty canvas. "If you'd told me a Beecham would lay down in a filthy place like this. . . ." Grandma declared. Rose-Ellen did not hear the end of the sentence. She was asleep on the earth floor.
Next day when the men and Dick were hired to pick grapefruit, Grandpa asked the boss about better living quarters.
"He said there wasn't any," Grandpa reported later.