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82 you to jump and all of a sudden act like John Henry! THEO I have never been lazy. I just didn't wanta break my back for the man! MR. PARKER Well, I can't blame you for that. I know, because I did it. I did it when they didn't pay me a single dime! BOBBY When was that? MR. PARKER When I was on the chain gang! BOBBY Now you know you ain't never been on no chain gang! MR. PARKER (Hold up two fingers.) Two months, that's all it was. Just two months. BOBBY Two months, my foot! MR. PARKER I swear to heaven I was. It was in 19-something, I was living in Jersey City, New Jersey . . . (Crosses to throne and sits.) BOBBY Here we go with another story! MR. PARKER That was just before I started working as a vaudeville man, and there was this ol' cousin of mine we used to call "Dub," and he had this job driving a trailer truck from Jersey City to Jacksonville, Florida. One day he asked me to come along with him for company. I weren't doing nothing at the time, and— BOBBY As usual. MR. PARKER I didn't say that! Anyway, we drove along. Everything 83 was fine till we hit Macon, Georgia. We weren't doing a thing, but before we knew it this cracker police stopped us, claiming we'd ran through a red light. He was yelling and hollering and, boyyy, did I get mad—I was ready to get a hold of that cracker and work on his head until . . . BOBBY Until what? MR PARKER Until they put us on the chain gang, and the chain gang they put us on was a chain gang and a half! I busted some rocks John Wayne couldn't've busted! I was a rock-busting fool! (Rises and demonstrates how he swung the hammer.) I would do it like this! I would hit the rock, and the hammer would bounce—bounce so hard it would take my hand up in the air with it—but I'd grab it with my left hand and bring it down like this: Hunh! (Carried away by the rhythm of his story, he starts twisting his body to the swing of it.) It would get so good to me, I'd say: Hunh! Yeah! Hunh! I'd say, Oooooooooooweeeee! I'm side open now! (Swinging and twisting.) Yeah, baby, I say, Hunh! Sooner or later that rock would crack! Old Dub ran into a rock one day that was hard as Theo's head. He couldn't bust that rock for nothing. He pumped and swung, but that rock would not move. So finally he said to the captain: "I'm sorry, Cap, but a elephant couldn't break this rock." Cap didn't wanna hear nothing. He said, "Well, Dub, I wanna tell you something—your lunch and your supper is in the middle of that rock." On the next swing of the hammer, Dub busted that rock into a thousand pieces! (Laughs.) I'm telling you, them crackers is mean. Don't let nobody tell you about no Communists, Chinese, or anything: there ain't nothing on this earth meaner and dirtier than an American-born cracker! We used to sleep in them long squad tents on the ground, and we was all hooked up to this on big long chain: the guards had orders to shoot at random in the dark if ever one of them chains would rattle. You couldn't even turn over in your sleep! (Sits on throne.) BOBBY A man can't help but turn over in his sleep! MR. PARKER Not on this chain gang you didn't. You turn over on this chain gang in your sleep and your behind was shot! But
