Chapter 5: Natural Born Driver

Leroy rolled out of bed at five in the morning, just like always. He slipped on his jeans and shirt, while he was still half asleep. He sat on the edge of the heavy chair across the room from the bed in order not to wake Cassie and the baby. He decided that those work boots got a little heavier, every time he put them on.

He splashed some water on his face and headed out the door. Leroy came fully awake about the time he left his front yard and began to walk the few short blocks to the Hot Spot Café. He looked forward to the usual breakfast of two stale day old cake doughnuts the usual two or three cups of coffee.

It was just over three miles to work and took him a little less than an hour to make the trip in his half walking, half jogging mile eating pace he once bragged he could "keep up all day."

This workday started different. When Leroy walked by to the office shack to grab up his work tools for the day, Milt called out, "Wait up a second there, Leroy. You know how to drive?"

"Drive what?" Leroy asked.

"A damned truck, what else? You see any teams of horses around here? I tell you, Leroy, if you weren't so ugly I'd fire you for being dumb. All the shovel work is about done and I'll lay off those two Mex laborers in a couple of days." Tendrils of fear shot through Leroy's stomach, as he heard Milt mention a possible lay off.

"Today we start to use the dragline to dig out the approaches. Now that all the holes are punched in the soft ground I'm supposed to let you go too, but I need a driver to make the runs into Woodman and back and go to Enid and pick up supplies there, too. You want the job or your final pay?"

Milt made a great show of not caring what Leroy decided. After five seconds he prompted, "Well, make up your mind. What's taking you so long to answer? Don't you know your own mind?"

"Oh hell yes, Milt, but I'm still trying to make up my mind what part of you to kiss first. I really need the job." He hesitated and asked diffidently, "Uh Milt, what's the pay?"

Milt stiffened his back and Leroy hastened to explain, "I don't mean to sound like one of them red com'nists an' their unions or nothing, but I just got me a new baby and I sort of need to plan out what I'm doing. I don't mean to be disrespectful or nothing, Milt."

Leroy chose each word with care. Usually, when a man was offered a job he already knew what the pay was, or waited till payday to find out. Leroy knew he was treading on thin ice. Some union agitators had been through that end of' the state a year before and stirred things up until "somebody disappeared them."

Milt's expression softened. "I got my daughter Susie and my old lady is real sick. I know how it is, Leroy, the pay is five dollars a day. Only the finish carpenters and the equipment operators and me will make more than you do.

"You'll drive that half ton Chevy pick up over there. You got to work on it and keep it going on your own time. You can work on it here at the dam site or at your house. It don't matter. Now you take it home with you so you can pick up the morning order of supplies from the lumberyard. Uh, you do know how to drive don't you?"

"Oh hell yeah I kin drive, Milt. I drove a tractor once." (and crashed it into the barn and got fired.) "I even rode a motorcycle." (for five minutes and ended up in the river). "Hell, I even had my own vee-hickle once." (and it quit running after Leroy forgot to put oil in it not long after he arrived in Woodman.) This ol' pickup truck will be a cinch to drive." To himself he thought, I hope.

"Okay," Milt told him. Settle down, if you was a puppy, right now you'd be pissing on my shoe. "Here's a list of what I want. You make sure you got plenty of gas in the gas tank. You ever run out of gas and you're fired on the spot."

"Yes sir, Milt."

"Here's the key. Go on and get out of here." He turned back into his office shack and Leroy went to the truck. He got in and started the engine. This part was simple enough, almost like the car he used to have and the Ford tractor he wrecked into the side of the barn.

He was in luck. Someone had scratched the gearshift pattern onto the dashboard in front of the shifter stick. He was real careful as he pushed in the clutch with his left foot and gently pulled the shifter back toward him and to the left. He raced the engine a little and slowly let out on the clutch and eased the truck forward. Well shoot, it moved just like a damned car.

He shifted the transmission into first gear and oh-so-carefully headed over to the fuel tanks, a series of fifty-gallon drums of gasoline. Leroy took the gas cap off and shoved the fuel hose in and began to turn the crank on the rotary hand pump. As soon as fuel began to splash out on the ground, he stopped pumping, replaced the hose nozzle with its end pointed up so gasoline wouldn't siphon out on the ground and got back in the truck.

The company's newest driver started the engine and again took care as he went through the gears. He didn't see that Milt watched his every move. Milt smiled to himself and nodded. Well, he decided, old Leroy was going to be all right. He surely tried hard enough.

Leroy was in ecstasy, as he drove away from the bridge site and headed into town. "Yahoo!" he yelled in exultation, "Ol Leroy done it again. I'm a winner. An' I am now a truck driver. I got me a profession. I got the world by the tail on a down hill pull. Hot damn!" When the road curved and Leroy didn't, the truck ended up in the bar pit alongside the road with the stalled.

"Well, shoot!" he exclaimed, and all his good humor was given over to panic. Milt would fire his sorry butt for sure if he broke the truck any. He mashed down on the starter switch on the floorboard and the engine caught at once and began to rough idle. With fearful caution, he shifted into low gear and eased out on the clutch, just a little as it started forward. He drove back up on the road and headed on toward Woodman. A very sober and careful Leroy Jones drove into town.

He parked in the lumberyard loading area and killed the engine. Inside, Leroy went up to the counter and presented his list to the man by the cash register. He strutted over to the ice cooler off to one side and pulled out a bottle of Nehi orange soda and laid a nickel on the counter. Leroy drank it down in a long, continuous gulp.

Damn but it felt good to splurge a nickel on a pop. He decided he was going to stop at the hot Spot and get him a dime hamburger on the way out of town. He was going to have to take Cassie out for supper at the Bid A Wee Café this coming payday. He decided that if he was careful and watched what he was doing, there was no telling where Leroy Jones would end up.

Leroy ambled out into the loading area just as the colored boy, Jim Otts finished loading and had tied down the lumber so it wouldn't come loose. The ten eight foot long two-by-twelve form boards were propped up over the cab. The lower ends were tight against the tailgate. He had tied them off well with binding twine. He knew his business. "You done a good job of tying the load down, thank you. You want a pop?"

Jim Otts grinned his appreciation. "Yassuh. I likes it a lot. Could I get me a dope, please suh?" he asked.

Leroy nodded and went in and brought out a Coca-Cola and handed it to the man. Even as late as 1930s, "dope" is what Coke products were known as, because until about 1903 a small amount of cocaine was mixed into the beverage to give it "lift." After the government stepped in, Coca Cola substituted caffeine for the more harmful cocaine. The black man smiled his thanks and nodded politely.

Leroy got back in the pick up and drove to the Hot Spot Cafe and ordered a hamburger. His dime hamburger consisted of a split bun, a small, well-done hamburger patty and a round slice of dill pickle. Mustard or catsup was added as desired. Judge Mack was sitting at the counter eating the meatloaf special. He gave Leroy a friendly wave with his fork.

"Boy, what are you doing with a truck? I was not aware you had mastered even the basic skills needed to operate a mechanical contrivance. Did you steal it?" he asked, only half joking.

Leroy grinned at him, "Well, if you mean do I know how to drive, I just found out today that I drive pretty good if I pay close attention to what I'm doing. We both got surprised, didn't we, Judge. I am now the official truck driver for the bridge project." Leroy was bursting with pride as he got a chance to tell another of his great fortune.

Judge Mack was glad for Leroy's good fortune and told him so. "Congratulations, my friend. I am happy to see your station in life has improved."

"Thanks, Judge, I been pretty lucky here. What with the baby an' all, we need the extra money coming in. Yup, mighty lucky." His hamburger was brought to him and he left. The judge smiled to himself, it took so little to please some people and so much to not half satisfy others. He ate his lunch in silence. The thought again came to him, Leroy had a lot of potential. But would he ever realize it? There was the question yet to be answered.

Leroy munched on his hamburger and noticed some greasy potato chips had been added in. This was sure his lucky day. He threw the paper bag his burger and chips came in out the window. He decided he hated to have a messy vehicle. He took care as he drove, and thanked his lucky stars for the promotion.

Leroy had an inspiration; he decided he would have to do something about his coming up in the world like he had. He couldn't be a snappy dresser because he didn't have much money for new clothes. Besides, he never liked to get all duded up in fine wear.

Then it came to him what to do. In the back of an old Colliers magazine he had found and taken home, was an ad for a mail order course on self-improvement. It cost two ninety-five and they sent you a book on how to learn a word a day. Well shoot, a new word every day? Hell, he'd be a real smart dude in no time at all. That would be almost four hundred new words in a year. He'd be smarter than Judge Mack in no time at all. Now he had to figure out how to get a spare two dollars and ninety-five cents without shorting his drinking money.

Leroy drove the touch into the rutted twin tracks leading from the highway to the bridge site. All thoughts of self-improvement were gone from his mind as he pulled up in front of Milt's office shack. Milt came out and directed him to take the form lumber over to the first piling site and unload it. Leroy complied. As soon as he was unloaded, he drove to the fuel drums and filled the truck up again.

"Leroy, check the oil on the truck," Milt told him.

"How'd I do, Milt?" he asked. "I ain't never checked for no oil in a truck before." Leroy had learned how to check the oil in his car, but was afraid a truck might be different.

"I swear, Leroy, if you was any more dumb than you already are, people would mistake you for a tree stump in clothing." Milt was exasperated a grown man didn't know how to check the oil.

Although Milt's remarks hurt Leroy's feelings, the hurt was well hidden. Leroy did not let it show how much the slur cut. He was long accustomed to the hurt when people put him down. He did the one thing he knew to do in such an instance. Leroy smiled,

"How do I go about it, Milt? You're a smart man and you know all this stuff. But I'm just an old country boy who never had much to do with machines and such. If you will show me so I can learn, I'll do it every day. I just need to be showed, Milt."