her stummick, an’ every time her stummick rumbles she pats herself on the mouth with three fingers an’ says, “Excuse me.” Well, something like this all day long is bad enough, but on top of that she’s got this damn gallstone.”
“Gallstone?” Pop asked.
“That’s right,” Uncle Sagamore says. “Six, eight years ago she had it takened out at the hospital, an’ this fool doctor didn’t have no better sense than to tell her it was the biggest one he ever seen, outside of one somebody takened out of a giraffe. Well, Viola was all set up about that, so she brought it home with her and put it in a little jar on the mantel an’ took to tellin’ people about it. One time, Vergil says, some people’s car got stuck in the mud in front of the house an’ they couldn’t get away, an’ Viola talked about that gallstone for thirteen hours and twenty minutes without stoppin’. Man finally give Vergil the keys to the car and said he’d be back for it in the summer when the roads dried out. People took to movin’ out of the community rather than havin’ to dodge her all the time, so when Bessie’d leave me an’ go down there Viola’d be all primed and loaded for her. If Bessie was real mad at me she could hold out for ten days.”
Uncle Sagamore stopped talking and looked at Booger and Otis. They was shifting around on the step like they couldn’t get comfortable anywhere.
“I ain’t borin’ you boys with all this, am I?” he asked.
“Why, no,” Booger says. “—uh—that is—” He looked kind of funny. Pale, sort of, and sweating pretty heavy. His face was all slick and white. Otis was the same way. It didn’t seem to be the smell that was bothering them, though, because they wasn’t fanning with their hats any more. They just seemed to be kind of restless.
“Sure wouldn’t want to get tiresome an’ bore you boys,” Uncle Sagamore says. “Especially after what you done, rushin’ down here to save us from that typhoid an’ all.”
“But how does it happen Bessie stays away three weeks now?” Pop asked. “Is Viola beginning to run down, or something?”
“Oh,” Uncle Sagamore says. He sailed out some more tobacco juice, and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “No. It was like this. Couple of years ago, I reckon it was, Vergil made a pretty good cotton crop, an’ they could see there was goin’ to be money ahead even after they paid off the store. But before Vergil could get in to town to buy another secondhand Buick with it, Viola sneaked off to the hospital an’ had about four hundred dollars worth of new stuff takened out on the credit. Mostly female stuff I reckon; she’d never used it much because she ain’t stopped talkin’ long enough since they got married for Vergil to get her in the family way. I don’t know why it is, but no matter how hard up a man is he ain’t goin’ to do his best with a woman that’s talkin’ five Quarts to the gallon about her goddam gallstone.
“But, anyhow, I reckon Cousin Viola really shot the wad. Four hundred dollars worth of stuff is a lot, especially since they already got you open an’ you’re gettin’ wholesale rates after they write off the first slice or two. So if Vergil never made another good crop, she was set for life. It wasn’t that she talked any less, but just that she had more to talk about now an’ could kind of spread out over more ground. That’s the reason Bessie’s been stayin’ three weeks lately, Viola don’t hardly have to start repeatin’ herself in less than that.”
Uncle Sagamore stopped again. You could see now that there was really something bothering Booger and Otis. Their eyes was big and kind of staring, like they hurt somewhere, and their faces was white as chalk, with big drops of sweat oozing out on their foreheads.
Uncle Sagamore looked round at Pop. “Well sir, by golly, I get to ramblin’ on like this, looks like I never know when to stop. I just remembered Billy asked me something while ago, an’ I never did take time to answer him. What was it, now?”
Well, I couldn’t remember anything like that, but I was beginning to learn about Uncle Sagamore. He wasn’t talking to me. He’d asked Pop, so I stayed shut up. That was safest.
“Hmmmmm,” Pop