“You all want anything?” Jimmy turned to Zeke and Ruth, looking with his phony, I’m-the-preacher-now look that his grandmother Jonnie Mae had taught him.

“Nooooo!” said Ruth, who sang it more than said it, looking out the window, impatiently shifting her weight. Zeke could tell they were in for one storm with that hussy today.

“No a thank you, Jim,” he said in his sunniest manner to counter his sister-in-law’s sour melancholy. His hands still ached from the cold, and he winced as a spasm clamped down on them.

Jimmy got out of the car and began to pump in unleaded gas. From within the car Zeke could hear the whuz and clip of the pump and the sputter and slosh of the petroleum. A grey pickup truck pulled up behind the Oldsmobile. Some white man Zeke didn’t recognize sat in the driver’s seat. Zeke craned his neck to see its city plates in the rearview mirror but failed to catch a glimpse. Ruth made another clicking, impatient sound.

“What you looking for?” she asked.

“Just trying to see who that is.”

“Why come you got to know every Tom, Dick, and Peter come along?”

“Ruth, you feeling all right today?”

“Yes, I’m all right. Why come you ask me if I’m all right? Don’t I look all right? Are you all right? Good God, I—”

“Ruth! Ruth, I’m sorry, I was just asking. I didn’t mean no harm.”

She tisked again, shifting her weight in her hen-sitting-on-an-egg fashion. He could see her face from the mirror, tight and knotted; evil—what makes that woman so dang evil? I reckon I’d a took to drink too if I was Jethro. Man can’t stand but so much ill temper. Commence to cutting out after a while . . . a pain shot through his hand again.