Free Air
Page 95As drivers will, she tried to exorcise the creeping fear by singing. She
made up what she called her driving-song. It was intended to echo the
hoofs of a fat old horse on a hard road: The old horse trots with a jog, jog, jog,
And a jog, jog, jog; and a jog, jog, jog.
And the old road makes a little jog, jog, jog,
To the west, jog, jog; and the north, jog, jog.
While the farmer drinks some cider from his jug, jug, jug,
From his coy jug, jug; from his joy jug, jug.
Till he accumulates a little jag, jag, jag,
And he jigs, jigs, jigs, with his jug, jug, jug---The song was a comfort, at first--then a torment. She drove to it, and
she steered to it, and when she tried to forget, it sang itself in her
Her father had had a chill. Miserable, weak as a small boy, he had
curled up on the bottom of the car, his head on the seat, and gone to
sleep. She was alone. The mile-posts went by slowly. The posts said
there was a town ahead called Pellago, but it never came---And when it did come she was too tired to care. In a thick dream she
drove through midnight streets of the town. In stupid paralysis she
kicked at the door of the galvanized-iron-covered garage. No answer. She
gave it up. She drove down the street and into the yard of a hotel
marked by a swing sign out over the plank sidewalk. She got out the
traveling bags, awakened her father, led him up on the porch.
The Pellago Tavern was a transformed dwelling house. The pillars of the
She hesitatingly opened the door. The hallway was dark and musty. A
sound like a moan filtered down the unlighted stairs.
There seemed to be light in the room on the right. Trying to assure
herself that her father was a protection, she pushed open the door. She
looked into an airless room, scattered with rubber boots, unsavory old
corduroy caps, tattered magazines. By the stove nodded a wry-mouthed,
squat old woman, and a tall, cheaply handsome man of forty. Tobacco
juice stained the front of his stiff-bosomed, collarless shirt. His
hands were white but huge.
The old woman started. "Well?"
The man smirked at her. The woman creaked, "Well, I don't know. Where d'
you come from, heh?"
"We're motoring through."
"Heh? Who's that man?"
"He's my father, madam."
"Needn't to be so hoity-toity about it, 'he's my father, madam!' F' that
matter, that thing there is my husband!"