(2 of 5)
"Well, Mr. Young," said Paw, "hit don't seem just right fer you to stand in the way of a man's bettering hisself."
In town, the migrants took over one of the huge vacant mansions in the town's ex-residential section. The WPA workers said: "Out of twenty-six dollars [a month] I can't afford to pay more than five dollars rent, so if I can get seven other families to move in with me we can take this big house to live in. ... Eight and nine and ten families in six and eight rooms. ..."
"Well, Maw, how do you like this?" said Paw. "Hit's right crowded," said Maw, "but . . . hit's right narce having neighbors so handy."
The merchants liked it too: "Hell, yes. Charge the stuff to 'em. They get one of them blue government checks every two weeks. All they got to do to get it is to get in a bunch and stand around leaning on a shovel for sixty-five hours. . . . Charge it to 'em. Add about half again onto everything they buy. ..."
"They were pretty nice about it," said Hub to Maw. "First place I went to fixed us up a credit. . . . They knowed we was on the WP & A. . . . Right nice folks."
"Well," said Maw, "it makes a body feel right good for folks to be friendly."
Virginia liked town too. After one long absence she returned with a slicked-up husband. He "followed along behind her, grinning sheepishly, fatuously, and she clicked across the floor on her high spike heels and flung herself on the bed and burst into tears." "We're married," said her husband. "Well, now," said Paw, his face clearing, "come right in." "I hate him," said Virginia, "I hate him. I'm going to have a b-b-ba-baby."
"Why," said Paw, "he done the handsome thing by you just like I did by your maw when Rinno was born. What are you so wrought up about? You'll make him feel he ain't welcome. You work on the WP & A?" Paw asked the boy. "Well this is like meeting an old friend. We're all just WP & A folks here. . . . You and Virginia kin have the bed in the corner all to yourselves. ..."
Virginia's husband looked the room over, paused when he got to Reno. "What's that?" he asked. "Why, that's your wife's oldest brother." "Good God," said Virginia's husband.
Town life raised the Taylors' standard of living. "I've got to git me a raddio," said Paw excitedly one day. "Here Congress has done passed a law to give us WP & A men a raise and I never knowed nothing about it till this morning and they done it yestiddy. Ever'body else on the job knowed it but me." So the radio dealers got out their oldest sets, the second-hand-car dealers got out their oldest junk. All jacked up the prices.