“Look aroun’ then. Burn the goddamn place down, for all I care.”
“Looks like you don’t love your boss none.”
The man shambled close, his one eye flashing. “I hate ’im,” he said softly. “I hate the son-of-a-bitch! Gone home now. Gone home to his house.” The words fell stumbling out. “He got a way—he got a way a-pickin’ a fella an’ a-tearin’ a fella. He—the son-of-a-bitch. Got a girl nineteen, purty. Says to me, ’How’d ya like to marry her?’ Says that right to me. An’ tonight—says, ’They’s a dance; how’d ya like to go?’ Me, he says it to me!” Tears formed in his eyes and tears dripped from the corner of the red eye socket. “Some day, by God—some day I’m gonna have a pipe wrench in my pocket. When he says them things he looks at my eye. An’ I’m gonna, I’m gonna jus’ take his head right down off his neck with that wrench, little piece at a time.” He panted with his fury. “Little piece at a time, right down off’n his neck.”
The sun disappeared behind the mountains. Al looked into the lot at the wrecked cars. “Over there, look, Tom! That there looks like a ’25 or ’26.”
Tom turned to the one-eyed man. “Mind if we look?”
“Hell, no! Take any goddamn thing you want.”
They walked, threading their way among the dead automobiles, to a rusting sedan, resting on flat tires.
“Sure it’s a ’25,” Al cried. “Can we yank off the pan, mister?”
Tom kneeled down and looked under the car. “Pan’s off awready. One rod’s been took. Looks like one gone.” He wriggled under the car. “Get a crank an’ turn her over, Al.” He worked the rod against the shaft. “Purty much froze with grease.” Al turned the crank slowly. “Easy,” Tom called. He picked a splinter of wood from the ground and scraped the cake of grease from the bearing and the bearing bolts.
“How is she for tight?” Al asked.