Gump & Co. (27 page)

‘I dunno,’ I says. ‘It’s kinda embarrassin, you astin stuff like that.’

‘It ought not to be. After all, we had our run.’

‘Yeah, well, not all the way. I mean, it kinda got cut short.’

‘That’ll happen. Memories are what counts in life, Forrest; when there’s nothing else left, it’ll be the memories that mean everything.’

‘But, is what you’re sayin is, I won’t get to . . .?’

‘Probly, but look, you got the rest of your life in front of you. An I think you’re okay now. I don’t know how you’re gonna do it, but would you say good-bye for me to my mama an little Forrest – just in your own special way?’

‘Well, sure, but . . .’

‘I just want you to know that I loved you, and also, Forrest, you are very fine.’

‘Hey,’ I says, but when I looked up, they was just the big ole bell buoy rockin back an forth in the mist. Nothin else. An so I rowed on back to shore.

So I gone back into the processin plant that afternoon. Most everbody else has went home now, an I sort of
wandered around by mysef, feelin a little bit alone. In a few offices I could see lights on, people workin late, so’s we could have a successful bidness.

They was one little room in the plant that I liked. It was where we kept the pearls. It wadn’t no bigger than a closet, but inside, with some tools an other stuff, we kept a bucket. Actually, it was the workers that kept the bucket, an in the bucket was the pearls.

They weren’t much as pearls go. Japanese oysters got all the nice pearls, but ever so often our shuckers will find a ole pearl or so, usually kinda funny-shaped or ugly-colored, but by the end of the year, they would usually be enough pearls that was usable for us to sell em an get enough cash for a beer bust for the shuckin an floor crews, so that’s what we did.

But when I gone by the pearl closet, I heard a odd sound comin from it, an when I opened the door, there was Sergeant Kranz, settin on a stool, an when I looked at him, settin under a twenty-watt bulb, I could see his eyes was red.

‘Why, Sergeant, what’s wrong?’ I ast.

‘Nothin’ was what he said.

‘Sergeant Kranz. I have know you for many years. I ain’t never seen you cryin before.’

‘Yeah, well, you won’t again, neither. Besides, I ain’t cry in.’

‘Uh-huh. Well, I am the head of this here operation, an it is my bidness to know what’s wrong with my people.’

‘Since when have I become “your people,” Gump?’ he says.

‘Since the day I met you, Sergeant.’ An we kind of stared at each other for a moment, an then I seen big ole tears begun to roll down his cheeks.

‘Well, damn, Gump,’ he says, ‘I just guess I’m too ole for this shit.’

‘What you mean, Sergeant Kranz?’

‘It was that Smitty, an his crew,’ he says.

‘What happened?’

‘I gone down to check on our boats, an he come after me with his gang. An when I was checkin the lines on our skiffs, he begun to pee in one of my boats, an when I said somethin, he an the others grapped me an begun beatin me with dead mullets . . .’

‘They done what!’

‘An Smitty, he called me a nigger. First time anybody ever done that to my face.’

‘Issat so?’ I ast.

‘You heard what I said, Gump. Wadn’t nothing I could do – Hell, I’m fifty-nine years old. How I’m gonna defend mysef against eight or ten big ole white boys, ain’t half my age?’

‘Well, Sergeant . . .’

‘Well, my ass. I never thought I’d see the day I wouldn’t of fought them. But it wouldn’t of done no good. I’d of just got beat up – an that wouldn’t of mattered, either, cause of what he called me – except you tole me not to get into any shit with Smitty an his bunch. I would of tried, but it wouldn’t of done no good.’

‘You look here, Sergeant Kranz. That don’t matter now. You just stay here till I get back, you hear. An that’s a order.’

‘I don’t take orders from privates, Gump.’

‘Well, you’ll take this one,’ I says.

An so I gone on down to see about this Smitty bidness. All my life I have tried to do the right thing, the only way I saw it. An my mama always tole me the right thing is not to start pickin fights with folks, especially account of I am so big an dumb. But sometimes, you cannot let the right thing stand in your way.

It was a long walk down the street in Bayou La Batre to where the docks is, an so I spose Smitty an his people
seen me comin, cause when I got there, they is all lined up, an Smitty is standin in front of the bunch.

Also, I didn’t notice it, but a lot of the folks from our Gump & Company oyster plant has follered me down there, an the ones that can, are lookin unhappy, like they mean bidness, too.

I gone up to Smitty an ast him what happened with Sergeant Kranz.

‘Ain’t nothin to you, Gump,’ he says. ‘We was just havin some fun.’

‘You call a gang of you beatin a fifty-nine-year-ole man with dead mullets fun?’

‘Hell, Gump, he ain’t nothin but a ole nigger. Whatsittoyou?’

An so I showed him.

First I grapped him by the jacket an lifted him off the ground. Then I thowed him into a pile of seagull shit that had been collectin on the dock. An wiped his nose in it.

Then I turned him around an kicked his big ass over the dock into one of his own oyster boats. An when he landed in it on his back, I unzipped my pants an peed on him from the wharf above.

‘You ever fool with one of my people again,’ I tole him, ‘you will wish you had been brought up as a vegetable or somethin.’ It was probly not the wittiest thing I could of thought of to say, but at the moment I was not feelin witty.

Just about then somethin hit me in the arm. One of Smitty’s men has got a board with nails in it, an let me say this: It hurt. But I was not in no mood to be screwed with. So I grapped him, too, an they happened to be a big ole ice machine nearby, an I stuffed him into it, headfirst. Another guy come at me with a tire tool, but I seized him by the hair an begun swingin him around an around until I let him go, like a discus or somethin, an last time I looked, he
was headin for Cuba or maybe Jamaica. All them other goons, after seein this, they backed off.

All I says was ‘Remember what you seen here. You don’t want it to happen to you.’ An that was it.

It was gettin dark by now, an all the folks from Gump & Company was cheerin, an also booin Smitty an his collection of turds. In the dimness I got a glance of Sergeant Kranz standin there, noddin his head. I give him a wink an he give me the thumbs-up sign. We has been friends for a long time, me an Sergeant Kranz, an I think we understand one another.

About this time, I feel a tuggin at my sleeve. It is little Forrest, who is lookin at the blood on my arm from where the goon hit me with the board full of nails.

‘You arright, Dad?’ he ast.

‘Huh?’

‘I said you arright, Dad; you are bleedin.’

‘What you call me?’

‘I love you, Dad’ was what he said. An that was enough for me. Yessir.

Yessir.

An so that’s how it ends, more or less. After the crowd drifted away I walked on down to the Bayou where they is a point that looks out over the bay an the Mississippi Sound an then on out into the Gulf beyond it, an if you could, you could see clear down to Mexico, or South America. But it was still a little misty that evenin, an so I went an set down on a ole park bench, an little Forrest come an set beside me. We didn’t say nothin, cause I think it had been about all said, but it got me to thinkin what a lucky feller I am. I got me a job, a son proud an tall, an I had me some friends in my day, too. I couldn’t help but remember em all. Ole Bubba, an Jenny, an my mama, an Dan, an Sue, is gone now, but probly not too far, cause ever time I hear a big ole foghorn on the water, or a bell from a bell buoy,
I think of them; they is out there someplace. An there is little Forrest, an Jenny’s mama, an Sergeant Kranz, an all the rest, still here. An I ain’t forgot what Jenny said about Gretchen, neither. An so, in a way, I am the luckiest feller in the world.

They is just one more thing to tell, an that is when they decided to make a movie of my life’s story. That is unusual, even for me. Somebody got wind of the fact that I am a idiot who has made good, an in these days it is what they call a ‘man bites dog’ sort of story.

So one day these Hollywood producers come an inform me I am gonna be in the motion pitchers. Well, a lot of you know the rest. They done made the show, an everbody all over the world went to see it. Mr Tom Hanks that I met in New York that night, he played my part in the movie – an was pretty good, too.

Well, finally it become the night to go to the Academy Awards show in California, an I took everybody that was my friends there, an we set in the audience – I even got to set with Bubba’s folks. An damn if the pitcher didn’t win most of the Academy Awards, an at the end, after they get through thankin everbody else, they decided to thank me, too.

They was a Mister Letterman, as the host, a nice feller with big picket teeth an a trick dog an shit, an as the last item on the menu, so to speak, he announces they is a special award for ole Forrest Gump, for bein ‘The Most Lovable Certified Idiot in America,’ an I am called to the stage.

An after they give me the award, Mister Letterman ast if they is anythin I would like to say to the TV cameras. An in fact, they is, an I been savin it up. An so I look out there on all them fancy dresses an expensive jewelry an pretty women an handsome men, an says the first thing that comes to mind, which is, of course,

‘I got to pee.’

Well, at first, ain’t nobody clappin or commentin or nothin. I think they is all embarrassed, account of we is on national television an all. An after a moment or two, the audience begun a kind of deep mumblin an whisperin to theyselfs.

An Mister Letterman, who feels like he must be in charge, I think he ain’t sure what to do, so he motions behind the curtains for the hands to get a big ole stage hook, an haul my fat ass off the stage. An the stage hook has just grapped me behind the collar when all of a sudden, out of the audience, a missile sails across the footlights. Little Forrest, it seems, has got so excited he has chewed up his entire Academy Award program, account of they don’t serve no popcorn at the Oscars, an so he is armed with what might be the world’s largest spitball. An when they are tryin to pull me off the stage, little Forrest thows the spitball an hits Mister Letterman square between the eyes!

Gretchen is horrified, of course, an cries out, ‘Oh, my goodness!’ But let me say this: It was a sight! All of a sudden, all hell bust loose. People begun jumpin up an hollerin an pointin an shoutin, an the nice Mister Letterman is flounderin around behind the speaker’s platform, tryin to pick the spitball off his face.

But then from out in the audience, I hear one shout above all the rest, an it is this: ‘That’s my dad! That’s my dad!’ An I gotta tell you, that was enough for sure. So I reckon you can say we been there, an then the curtain comes down on all of us.

You know what I mean?

Winston Groom wrote the acclaimed Vietnam War novel
Better Times Than These
as well as the prize-winning
As Summers Die,
and co-authored
Conversations with the Enemy,
which was nominated for a 1984 Pulitzer Prize. His novel
Forrest Gump,
which is also published by Black Swan and to which
Gump & Co.
is the sequel, was made into an Oscar-winning film starring Tom Hanks. Winston Groom lives in New York City and Point Clear, Alabama.

Also by Winston Groom

FORREST GUMP

GUMPISMS: The Wit and Wisdom of Forrest Gump

and published by Black Swan and Corgi Books

TRANSWORLD PUBLISHERS
61–63 Uxbridge Road, London W5 5SA
A Random House Group Company
www.transworldbooks.co.uk

GUMP & CO.
A BLACK SWAN BOOK : 9780552996631
Version 1.0 Epub ISBN: 9781448169870

First publication in Great Britain

PRINTING HISTORY

Black Swan edition published 1995

Black Swan edition reprinted 1995 (twice)

Copyright © Winston Groom 1995

The right of Winston Groom to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988.

In this work of fiction the characters, places and events are either the product of the author’s imagination or they are used entirely fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

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