“So what do you say?”
“They’re not for sale, man!”
“But they look terrible on your body!”
“So it looks bad! Don’t look at me then!”
“Fine, I won’t!”
“Fine, then don’t!”
Shoulder-to-shoulder, they walked along with few words exchanged between them. They headed to Mergan’s house so Morad could visit Abbas. But neither Abbas nor Mergan was at home.
“Where did they go to, so early in the morning?”
“What do I know? None of us knows much about what the others are up to any more.”
“Are you fighting with your mother?”
“We don’t really speak. What is there for us to talk about?”
“What about your sister? How’s Hajer?”
“I hardly see her. The bastard won’t let her leave the house! Even if she just goes to fetch water, he watches her with four eyes instead of two.”
Morad reflected for a moment, and said, “Well, then …!”
Abrau changed the subject. “Mirza Hassan has started up the water pump. Let’s go and see if he has some work for you!”
Morad said, “What would I do that for? He’d have to beg me to even consider it. You think I don’t have enough? I have savings that will feed me until the next New Year without needing anything from anyone. And if on the day of the New Year I find my pockets are empty with nothing but some fleas in them, I’ll pick up my bag and put on my boots. And who knows, maybe this time I’ll go and not look back — like Ghodrat! What about you? I guess your work’s not too bad then?”
“Me … ah … no. My work’s not bad.”
“If you only could see all the tractors that are everywhere in the next province over! They’re like ants! No one there ploughs with cows any more. They even harvest the wheat with tractors as well. We can’t get work as harvesters, you know. Now we can only work on the summer planting. The summer planting has to be done by hand, so the tractor’s no good for that. And over there, the summer work pays really well, since you’re so close to the capitol. The harvest gets to the market in two hours. Nothing goes bad before it’s sold. But that’s honeydew for you! Each one is three or four man in weight. Sweet as honey. If you eat one, you’re full till sundown. It’s really something!”
“What about the work? Is it hard?”
“Work’s work, you know? Have you ever known it not to be hard? You have to pick and dig at the same time. And that’s under the hot sun, with flies and salt water. You can imagine the rest. You start at dawn and end at dusk. Either the landowner or his brother or his son is standing over your head. If they’re not there, you still have the foreman to deal with. If you’re not in good shape, they can be ruthless! Ghodrat himself ended up going to the capitol mostly because he wasn’t strong enough for the summer work. That’s why he went to find some other nook or cranny for himself. I didn’t want to tell his father this, but I heard he had fainted a few times while working. I was working somewhere that was not far from where he was. I heard they had to drag him out of the field into the shade and they threw a bucket of water on him. The problem is that once something like that happens, you’re stuck with that reputation. You become known as lazy or weak and then no one will hire you any more. That’s why Ghodrat saw the writing on the wall and decided to find some work in the city. If you’re a good worker, you’ll get a good name, but if you’re a bad worker … If you work well, the owners will sing your praises, but if you don’t, they look at you as if you’re worse than a dog.”
“How about you? With this fancy outfit on, you must have gotten a pretty good name, no?”
“I worked as hard as a Sistani bull for people who were totally ungrateful!”
They’d reached the outskirts of Zaminej. Mirza Hassan’s tractor was parked beside the wall. Abrau made a half-circle around the tractor, kicked the tires, and then checked its oil. He climbed on top of the machine like a professional and fit himself onto the seat.
“Jump up!”
“What? You’re going to take it for a spin?”
“Why shouldn’t I? You think I can’t?”
“You mean in the time we went and came back, you’ve become a driver?”
“Are you surprised?”
“No … No … But …!”
“No buts! You went and came back and in that time I’ve gone and ploughed about half of the lands of the villages around here.”
Small-boned Abrau was in the driver’s seat and Morad, with his tight clothes, climbed on board with difficulty and sat next to his friend. Abrau acted as if he were riding on the back of a hawk. His hands moved quickly and confidently. He gripped the wheel in his hands, turning it smoothly from one side to the other. With every movement he answered Morad’s inquiring look.
“This is the gear. You see! Now it’s in its place.”
Abrau held onto the steering wheel with his left hand, and with his right he moved levers that Morad did not know the use of.
“When you move this, it brings the digger down. This one is for the plough.”
Morad didn’t understand anything. He was confused and at a loss for words. This gave Abrau confidence to puff his feathers out a bit and show off even more. He looked into the distance and tried to talk less, with the steering wheel in his hands. He answered Morad’s questions with short, compressed answers. That was all fine, but it seemed to Morad that Abrau was overstating the importance of his work. Perhaps he actually felt this way, but Morad didn’t appreciate the fact that Abrau had obtained the work with difficulty and had to appreciate its value.
“This is a tractor, not a sack of potatoes! How many thousands of tomans do you think has gone into it then? It’s not a shovel or a hoe that they’re letting me take care of! It has the power of a hundred and twenty horses! You should see how much work it does in a day. All this brings in money!”
Morad accepted most of this.
“Well, yes. Driving and working anything isn’t easy. That’s why Mirza Hassan wants you working for him! But tell me, if it has some kind of problem, do you know anything about how to repair it?”
“I can take it apart into ten pieces in a blink of an eye, and then put it back together just as quickly. But of course, you need tools. So sometimes you can get caught in the middle of nowhere. Those are the times that drive you crazy. You don’t know what to do! Then it has to go to the repair shop. And where’s that? You have to take it to town. You know how far away that is! And how can you get it there? It’s like torture. You leave it in the field, and you go to the repair shop. And the guy there is probably busy. So you have to beg and plead to even have him listen to you. If your boss’ name is one that they know, they might send an apprentice out to the field with a few nuts and bolts and a hammer. But it’s like trying to pour water into a cracked jug! Before you know it, you’ve fallen behind ten days. Then the bill is sent to Mirza Hassan and he loses his temper and starts swearing up a storm. And of course, one or two people end up getting the brunt of it. But what can you do? You have to let it go!”