The Four Winds(100)

What then?

She carried it into their cabin and closed the door.

“Hey,” Jack said, seated on one of the beds.

Elsa almost dropped the box in surprise.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean to scare you. It seems I couldn’t stay away.”

“I thought you weren’t supposed to be here.”

“I have a fondness for breaking rules.”

Elsa set the box on the floor and sat down beside him. “I don’t know how I’ll pay for this. I’m grateful. Truly. It’s just . . .”

“It costs money you don’t have.”

“Yes.” It felt good to say it out loud. “We lost everything in the flood.”

“I wish I had money to give you, but a job like mine doesn’t pay much.”

“I’m surprised it pays at all.” She looked at him. “What is your job, exactly?”

“I work for the Workers Alliance. The Popular Front. Whatever you want to call it.”

“The Communist Party.”

“Yes. There are about forty of us on the payroll across the state. Support in Hollywood is high right now, with what’s going on in Europe. I write for the Daily Worker, sign up new members, lead study groups, and organize strikes. Basically, I do whatever I can do to help people who are being taken advantage of by the capitalist system. And I spread the word that there’s a better way.” He met her gaze and returned it with a steady one of his own. “How did you end up living in that camp? As a single woman . . .”

She tucked her hair behind one ear. “You’ve heard my story before, believe me. We left bad times in Texas and found it worse in California.”

“Your husband?”

“Gone.”

“So, he’s a fool.”

Elsa smiled. She’d never quite thought of it that way, but she liked it. “That’s my position, yes. And you? Are you married?”

“Nope. Never been. Women tend to be scared of the trouble I bring. The big, bad Communist.”

“Everything is frightening these days. How much more trouble can there be?”

“I’ve been in prison,” he said quietly. “Does that scare you?”

“It would have. Once.” Elsa was unused to the way he stared at her. “I’m not going to get any prettier, you know.”

“You think that’s what I’m thinking when I look at you?”

“Why do you take the risk? Of communism, I mean. You must know it won’t work in America. And I see what it costs you.”

“For my mother,” he said. “She came here at sixteen because she was starving and had been disowned by her family because of me. I still don’t know who my father is. She worked like a dog to support us, doing whatever she had to do, but each night, at bedtime, she kissed me good night and told me I could be anything in America. It was the dream that had brought her here and she passed it on to me. But, it was a lie. For people like us, anyway. Folks who are from the wrong place, or have the wrong color skin, or speak the wrong language, or pray to the wrong God. She died in a factory fire. All of the doors were locked to keep the workers from taking cigarette breaks. This country used her up and spit her out and all she ever wanted was for me to have opportunities. A better life than she’d had.” He leaned toward her. “You understand. I know you do. Your people are starving, dying. Thousands are homeless. They can’t make enough money picking to survive. Help me convince them to strike for better wages. They’ll listen to you.”

Elsa laughed. “No one has ever listened to me.”

“They will. We need someone like you.”

Elsa’s smile faded. He was serious. “What good is a strike if you lose your job? I have children to feed.”

“Loreda is a firebrand. She would love—”

“She needs to be in school. Education is what will give her a better life, not joining the Communists.” Elsa got slowly to her feet. “I’m sorry, Jack. I’m not brave enough to help you. And please, please, keep your people away from my daughter.”

Jack rose. She could see the disappointment in his eyes. “I understand.”

“Do you?”

“Of course. Fear is smart until . . .” He headed for the door, paused as he reached for the knob.

“Until what?”

He looked back at her. “Until you realize you’re afraid of the wrong thing.”



THAT NIGHT, WHILE THE children slept, Elsa got her journal out of the box that had been in the truck. She turned through the pages. The children had been right that writing helped. Words jumped out at her: rain, baby in a lavender blanket, no work, waiting for cotton, the demoralizing rain. Tonight, later, she would write about her constant fear, how it strangled her all the time and the constant effort it took not to show it to her children. Writing about it would remind her that they had survived. As bad as the flood had been, they were still here.

Although this journal meant the world to her, now it was the only paper they had. She ripped a sheet out and wrote a letter to Tony and Rose.

Dear Tony and Rose:

We have an address!

We are—at last—out of our tent and into a home with real walls and a floor. The children are enrolled in a school that is a stone’s throw away from our own front door. We feel so blessed. That’s the good news. The not so good news is that a flood destroyed our tent and most of our belongings. Imagine that, a flood. I know you’d love a little of that water to come your way.