The Grapes of Wrath Page #51

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PA:

You be awright, Grampa.

The truck starts to move heavily. Casy stands watching it.

CASY:

Good-by, an' good luck.

PA:

Hey, wait! Hold 'er, Al!

(The car stops)

Ain't you goin' with us?

CASY:

(after a pause)

I'd like to. There's somethin'

happenin' out there in the wes' an'

I'd like to try to learn what it is.

If you feel you got the room...

He stops politely. Pa looks from one face to the other in

the truck--a swift, silent canvass--and though no one speaks

or gives any other sign, Pa knows that the vote is yes.

PA:

(heartily)

Come on, get on, plenty room!

OMNES:

Sure, come on, Casy, plenty room!

Quickly he climbs aboard. The truck rattles into motion again.

PA:

(excitedly)

Here we go!

TOM:

(grinning)

California, here we come!

As they all look back the deserted CABIN is seen from the

departing truck.

Now we see the FAMILY IN THE TRUCK, as it snorts and rattles

toward the road--a study of facial expressions as the Joad

family look back for the last time at their home. Connie and

Rosasharn, whispering, giggling, and slappings, are oblivious

of the event. Ruthie and Winfield are trembling with

excitement. But Tom's and Pa's smiles have disappeared, and

all the men are gazing back thoughtfully and soberly, their

minds occupied with the solemnity of this great adventure.

In the FRONT SEAT OF THE TRUCK. Al is driving. Granma is

already dozing. Ma looks steadily ahead.

AL:

(grinning)

Ain't you gonna look back, Ma?--give

the ol' place a last look?

MA:

(coldly shaking her

head)

We're goin' to California, ain't we?

Awright then, let's *go* to

California.

AL:

(sobering)

That don't sound like you, Ma. You

never was like that before.

MA:

I never had my house pushed over

before. I never had my fambly stuck

out on the road. I never had to

lose... ever'thing I had in life.

She continues to stare straight ahead. The TRUCK is lumbering

up onto a paved highway.

The scene dissolves to a MONTAGE: Almost filling the screen

is the shield marker of the U.S. Highway 66. Superimposed on

it is a montage of jalopies, steaming and rattling and piled

high with goods and people, as they pull onto the highway,

to indicate as much as possible that this departure of the

Joad family is but part of a mass movement of jalopies and

families. The signs of towns on U.S. Highway 66 flash past--

CHECOTAH, OKLAHOMA CITY, BETHANY.

This dissolves to a HIGHWAY. It is late afternoon. The Joad

truck pulls of the paved highway and stops. The men leap

down quickly from the truck, all but Pa, who lifts Grampa in

his arms and then lowers him slowly, gently into Tom's arms.

In TOM'S arms Grampa is whimpering feebly.

GRAMPA:

*Ain't* a-goin'... ain't a-goin'...

TOM:

'S all right, Grampa. You just kind

a tar'd, that's all. Somebody fix a

pallet.

With a quilt pulled from the truck Ma runs ahead as Tom

carries Grampa toward a clump of woods back off the highway.

The others get down soberly from the truck, all but Granma,

who is dozing. Cars pass-a fast car passing a jalopy. Tom is

letting the old man down gently as Ma adjusts the quilt on

the ground. Death is in Grampa's eyes as he looks up dimly

at them.

GRAMPA:

(a whisper)

Thas it, jus' tar'd thas all... jus'

tar'd...

(He closes his eyes)

The scene dissolves to an insert of a NOTE. It is written

awkwardly in pencil on the flyleaf of a Bible. Tom's voice

recites the words.

TOM'S VOICE

This here is William James Joad,

dyed of a stroke, old old man. His

folkes bured him becaws they got no

money to pay for funerls. Nobody

kilt him. Jus a stroke an he dyed.

A GRAVE, at night. In the clump of woods, lighted by two

lanterns, The Joad tribe stands reverently around an open

grave. Having read the note, Tom puts it in a small fruit

jar and kneels down and, reaching into the grave, places it

on Grampa's body.

TOM:

I figger best we leave something

like this on him, lest somebody dig

him up and make out he been kilt.

(Reaching into the

grave)

Lotta times looks like the gov'ment

got more interest in a dead man than

a live one.

PA:

Not be so lonesome, either, knowin'

his name is there with 'im, not just'

a old fella lonesome underground.

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