“Shoulda talked to the fellas in the camp,” Al said. “How you feelin’, Uncle John?”
“I ache,” said Uncle John. “I ache all over, an’ I got it comin’. I oughta go away where I won’t bring down punishment on my own folks.”
Pa put his hand on John’s knee. “Look here,” he said, “don’ you go away. We’re droppin’ folks all the time—Grampa an’ Granma dead, Noah an’ Connie—run out, an’ the preacher—in jail.”
“I got a hunch we’ll see that preacher agin,” John said. Al fingered the ball on the gear-shift lever. “You don’ feel good enough to have no hunches,” he said. “The hell with it. Le’s go back an’ talk, an’ find out where they’s some work. We’re jus’ huntin’ skunks under water.” He stopped the truck and leaned out the window and called back, “Hey! Lookie! We’re a-goin’ back to the camp an’ try an’ see where they’s work. They ain’t no use burnin’ gas like this.”
The man leaned over the truck side. “Suits me,” he said. “My dogs is wore clean up to the ankle. An’ I ain’t even got a nibble.”
Al turned around in the middle of the road and headed back.
Pa said, “Ma’s gonna be purty hurt, ’specially when Tom got work so easy.”
“Maybe he never got none,” Al said. “Maybe he jus’ went lookin’, too. I wisht I could get work in a garage. I’d learn that stuff quick, an’ I’d like it.”
Pa grunted, and they drove back toward the camp in silence.
When the committee left, Ma sat down on a box in front of the Joad tent, and she looked helplessly at Rose of Sharon. “Well—” she said, “well—I ain’t been so perked up in years. Wasn’t them ladies nice?”