Tom said, “I don’ know what’s got into Ma. She’s flighty as a dog with a flea in his ear. Wouldn’ a took long to look over the stuff. An’ she says Granma’s sick; an’ now she says Granma’s awright. I can’t figger her out. She ain’t right. S’pose she wore her brains out on the trip.”
Pa said, “Ma’s almost like she was when she was a girl. She was a wild one then. She wasn’ scairt of nothin’. I thought havin’ all the kids an’ workin’ took it out a her, but I guess it ain’t. Christ! When she got that jack handle back there, I tell you I wouldn’ wanna be the fella took it away from her.”
“I dunno what’s got into her,” Tom said. “Maybe she’s jus’ tar’d out.”
Al said, “I won’t be doin’ no weepin’ an’ a-moanin’ to get through. I got this goddamn car on my soul.”
Tom said, “Well, you done a damn good job a pickin’. We ain’t had hardly no trouble with her at all.”
All night they bored through the hot darkness, and jackrabbits scuttled into the lights and dashed away in long jolting leaps. And the dawn came up behind them when the lights of Mojave were ahead. And the dawn showed high mountains to the west. They filled with water and oil at Mojave and crawled into the mountains, and the dawn was about them.
Tom said, “Jesus, the desert’s past! Pa, Al, for Christ sakes! The desert’s past!”
“I’m too goddamned tired to care,” said Al.
“Want me to drive?”
“No, wait awhile.”