Half of Paradise

“Does he ride you like that all the time?”

“You said you were from Martinique parish.”

“Yes.”

“Talk about Martinique parish, then.”

They worked for a half hour in silence.

“What do you figure on doing when your time is up?” Toussaint said.

“I just got here. I haven’t thought about it.”

“You’ll start thinking about it soon. You won’t think about nothing else after a while.”

“I might go to New Orleans.”

“What for?”

“I’ve never been there.”

“Ain’t you got a home?”

“There’s nothing left of it now. My daddy was a cane p

lanter. We used to own twenty acres. The last I heard some man bought it at the sheriff’s tax sale to build a subdivision.”

“I lived in New Orleans. I worked on the docks.”

“What’s the chance of getting a job?”

“Fair. What kind of work you done?”

“Oil exploration.”

“I know a man down there might help you.”

“They say New Orleans is a good town.”

“You planning on staying out of the whiskey business?” Toussaint said.

“I’ll probably stay on the drinking end of it.”

“You can’t boil out the misery with corn.”

“You can make a good dent in it, though.”

“You’re too young to have a taste for whiskey.”

“I’m not too young to be digging a latrine with you, so let’s get off my age.”

“Whiskey can eat you up.”

“I’ve seen a lot more eaten up, and whiskey didn’t do it.”

Evans blew his whistle for the lunch break. The men climbed out of the ditch and formed a line behind a pickup truck parked in the shade. Toussaint and Avery dropped their tools in the unfinished trench and got in line with the others. The tin plates and spoons were handed out. The trusties served the food from the big aluminum containers placed on the bed of the truck. The men sat in the shade and ate.

“You told me we was having oranges,” Jeffry said.