WINTER ' FOURTEEN
for a bowl of chocolate ice cream; I never had chocolate before always vanilla or peach. I asked the woman
dressed in fancy clothes sitting at the table next to me where the circus was and she told me she was going
by there and would give me a lift.”
“That woman had the grandest carriage I ever saw; it put the Spaulding’s coach to shame. It was
mahogany brown and sparkled in the sun. Her driver looked like a king, dressed in his fancy uniform. The
horses was Clydesdales and strutted with their noses in the air. She was the only nice rich lady I ever met.
She told me not to talk to strangers when she let me off at the circus.”
“Oh! I gotta stop now and fix dinner. I’ll tell ya more tomorrow. Grandma releases Archie, gets up,
and walks into the kitchen.
***
Grandma Johnson is standing on her front porch watching Archie run toward her. When he stops she
says, “You’re late and you’re coming from the wrong way.”
Archie hangs his head and looks at the ground. “I know, Grandma.”
“It’s Paulie and all those other boys. They been chasing you. Ain’t they?”
Archie raises his head and looks Grandma in the eye. “Yeah but they ain’t gonna catch me. I got
everything figgered out.” He turns and runs out on the sidewalk, pointing his finger north in the direction
of Washington School. “When school gits out they all guard the front. I go out the back door and climb
the back fence. I walk out past all the streets and houses to the canal. I walk on the canal ‘till it goes towards
town then I climb through the fence and walk through cow pastures and stuff like that. Nobody sees me
‘till I have to cross Paradise Road but once I cross that everything’s OK. I can come straight here ‘cause
nobody figgers that I come from back that way.” While he’s talking he sweeps his arm in a wide arc with
his finger pointing f &