They Don't Dance Much: A Novel by James Ross

bit,’ he complained to me.
    ‘Maybe she’s got a girdle on,’ I said.
    ‘What?’ he said.
    ‘Try some corn liquor,’ I told him. So he bought a pint of corn. But he must have been pretty dumb. Everybody in town had had that girl except me, and now him. Things looked bad for the boy if he couldn’t loosen up that girl.
    About eleven o’clock I got sleepy and went into the room where we slept. The game was still going on. I didn’t hear them talking any, but I could hear the cards. I sat down on Smut’s cot and was untying my shoes when Smut said, ‘That you in there, Jack?’
    ‘Yes,’ I said.
    ‘Come on back, Jack,’ he said. I could tell from the way his voice sounded that he was in a better humor. I retied my shoes and went back there.
    They were using the kitchen table to play on. Smut was sitting up straight in his chair; Wilbur was at ease, and Bert Ford was leaning over the table, with his chin resting in the palm of his left hand. I looked at the edges of the cards. I don’t think they were from one of the shaved decks. I guess Smut wouldn’t risk that with Bert and Wilbur.
    Smut looked up when I came in. ‘Jack, I’m hungry as a dog,’ he said. ‘You can beat me cooking. How about scrambling a few eggs and making a pot of coffee?’
    I lit the wicks on the stove and got out a frying-pan. I went to the box where we kept the eggs and Smut looked over his shoulder at me. ‘Get eight or ten eggs. Fix enough for all of us,’ he said.
    Wilbur Brannon held up his hand. I was standing behind him and he held a Jack and two treys. ‘No, thanks, don’t fix any for me,’ he said. ‘I’m going back to town in a minute.’
    Bert Ford leaned over to the side and spat in the slop bucket. ‘Don’t fry none for me,’ he said. ‘I’m quittin right now. I got to go home. Ain’t hungry noway.’ He sounded pretty glum and I knew he’d lost some. I took three eggs out of the box and broke them into the frying-pan.
    Bert Ford got up and pushed back his chair. He walked to the back door and opened it. ‘See you all again,’ he said, and went out. Wilbur said he believed he’d stay on and have a cup of coffee. As soon as I finished the cooking, I went back into the other room and lay down on my mattress bed.
    It wasn’t long before Smut came in and sat down on the foot of his cot.
    ‘Win anything?’ I asked him.
    ‘A little,’ he said, but he sounded pretty cheerful. ‘I won a little. Enough to make up for them lint heads running off before they lost all they’d won off the other lint heads this morning.’
    ‘You must be going good if you can win from those two birds,’ I said.
    ‘I had a feeling I could take them guys tonight,’ he said. ‘As a rule they’re poison. But hell’s bells, what I took off them tonight ain’t a drop in the bucket. They both got plenty money.’
    ‘Wonder how they got it,’ I said.
    Smut kicked his shoes against the wall. ‘God knows; I don’t,’ he said. ‘What I’d like to know is a way to separate them from it.’

5
    THE NEXT DAY SMUT took the pick-up and went to Charlotte. He left about nine o’clock and told me he’d be back sometime before night. He didn’t tell me his business in Charlotte.
    It was the usual Monday. Sold a little gas. Wiped a lot of windshields and filled up radiators with water. I listened to the radio awhile, but it wasn’t long before the only programs I could get were inspirational programs that told you how to get more out of life. I shut it off and went outside to my nail keg.
    I was sitting there smoking and thinking when Catfish came up. I was aggravated to see him because I had an idea he’d want to talk the rest of the morning. It was a warm day, but he had on a blue sweater underneath his overall jacket. He came up to where I was, and flopped down on the ground.
    ‘How you, Mr. Jack?’ he said.
    ‘I’m all right,’ I said. I tried to make it sound cold. But Cat was a mighty hard nigger to freeze out
    ‘Mr.