Their-Eyes-Were-Watching-God-rmrju9

164 dap Zora Neale Hurston"Tea Cake, Ah got tuh have mah sleep. Definitely.""Good bye, then, Motor. Ah wish you all de luck. Goin' overtuh Nassau fuh dat visit widja when all dis is over.""Definitely, Tea Cake. Mah mama's house is yours."Tea Cake and Janie were some distance from the housebefore they struck serious water. Then they had to swim a distance,and Janie could not hold up more than a few strokes at atime, so Tea Cake bore her up till finally they hit a ridge that ledon towards the fill. It seemed to him the wind was weakening alittle so he kept looking for a place to rest and catch his breath.His wind was gone. Janie was fired and limping, but she had nothad to do that hard swimming in the turbulent waters, so TeaCake was much worse off. But they couldn't stop. Gaining thefill was something but it was no guarantee. The lake was coming.They had to reach the six-mile bridge. It was high and safeperhaps.Everybody was walking the fill. Hurrying, dragging, falling,crying, calling out names hopefully and hopelessly. Wind and rainbeating on old folks and beating on babies. Tea Cake stumbledonce or twice in his weariness and Janie held him up. So theyreached the bridge at Six Mile Bend and thought to rest.But it was crowded. White people had preempted that point ofelevation and there was no more room. They could climb up oneof its high sides and down the other, that was all. Miles further on,still no rest.They passed a dead man in a sitting position on a hummock,entirely surrounded by wild animals and snakes. Common dangermade common friends. Nothing sought a conquest over theother.Another man clung to a cypress tree on a tiny island. A tinroof of a building hung from the branches by electric wires andthe wind swung it back and forth like a mighty ax. The man dared