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about what you got figuratively speakin', why you could get the ass kicked clean off of you a-fore you had time to tip your hat.'

'But these pimps ain't kicked me,' I said. 'They just been sassin' me, and shovin' me around a little.'

'Same principle. Same principle, pre-zackly. Right, Buck?'

'Right! Y'see, Nick, when a fella starts doin' somethin' bad to you, the proper way to pay him back is t'do somethin' twice as bad to him. Otherwise, the best you got is maybe a stand-off, and you don't never get nothing settled.'

'Kee-reck!' Ken said. 'So I'll tell you what to do about them pimps. The next time they even look like they're goin' to sass you, you just kick 'em in the balls as hard as you can.'

'Huh?' I said. 'But-but don't it hurt awful bad?'

'Pshaw, 'course it don't hurt. Not if you're wearin' a good pair o' boots without no holes in 'em.'

'That's right,' Buck said. 'You just be sure you ain't got any toes stickin' out and it won't hurt you a-tall.'

'I mean, wouldn't it hurt the pimps?' I said. 'Me,! don't think I could stand even an easy kick in the balls.'

'Why, shorely, shorely it would hurt 'em,' Ken nodded. 'How else you goin' to make 'em behave if you don't hurt 'em bad?'

'You're actually lettin' 'em off pretty easy, Nick,' Buck said. 'I know I'd sure hate to be in the same room if any pimp sassed old Ken here. Ken wouldn't stop with just kickin' 'em. Why, a-fore they knew what was happening, he'd just yank out his pissoliver and shoot 'em right in their sassy mouths.'

'Pre-zackly!' Ken said. 'I'd send them sassy skunks to hell without no fooling around about it.'

'So you're really being too easy on 'em, Nick. A god-danged sight easier than a proud, intelligent upstandin' officer like ol' Ken. Ken would shoot 'em deader'n doornails, if he was in your place, and you heard him say so yourself.'

'Right!' said Ken. 'I sure wouldn't miss doing pre-zackly that.'

Well…

It looked like I'd got what I came for, and it was getting kind of late by then. So I thanked Ken for his advice, and stood up. I was still just a little wobbly, though; kind of rocking on my heels. And Ken asked me if! was sure! could make it to the station all right.

'Well, I guess so,' I said. 'I sure hope so, anyways. It sure wouldn't seem right for me to ask you to walk me there after everything you've already done for me.'

'Why, you don't need to ask!' Ken said. 'You think I'd let you go all the way to the train alone, a fella that looks as peaked as you do?'

'Well, I wouldn't want to trouble you none,' I said.

'Trouble?' Ken said. 'Why, it's a positive pleasure! Buck, you just heist yourself up out of that chair, and walk Nick to the depot.'

Buck nodded and heisted himself up. I said I sure hoped I wasn't putting him to any bother, and he said it wouldn't be no bother a-tall.

'Just so's you can bear with me,' he said. 'Know I can't be no ways as good a comp'ny for you as a fella like Ken.'

'Well, now, I'm sure you'll be just fine,' I said. 'Bet you'll prove out a real interestin' fella.'

'I'll try,' Buck promised. 'Yes, sir, I'll purely try, and that's a fack.'

6

I had supper down near the depot, buying a whopping big meal for Buck along with my own. Then, my train came and Buck walked me down to the car I was riding in. Not that I couldn't have made it all right by myself-I was feeling pretty good about then. But we were getting along real fine, just like I thought we might, and we had a lot of things to say to each other.

I fell asleep almost as soon as I'd given my ticket to the conductor. But I didn't sleep good. Dog- tired as I was, I drifted into a scary dream, the nightmare that was always a-haunting me. I dreamed that I was a kid again only it didn't seem like a dream. I was a kid, living in the old rundown plantation house with my daddy. Trying to keep out of his way, and never being able to. Getting beat half to death every time he could grab me.

I dreamed I was ducking into a doorway, thinking I'd got away from him. And suddenly being grabbed from behind.

I dreamed I was putting his breakfast on the table. And trying to get my arms up when he flung it in my face.

I dreamed-I lived-showing him the reading prize I'd won in school. Because I was sure that would please him, and I just had to show it to someone. And I dreamed-lived-picking myself up off the floor with my nose bloodied from the little silver cup. And he was yelling at me, shouting that I was through with school because I'd just proved I was a cheat along with everything else.

The fact was, I guess, that he just couldn't stand for me to be any good. If I was any good, then I couldn't be the low-down monster that had killed my own mother in getting born. And I had to be that. He had to have someone to blame.

I don't fault him much for it any more, because I've seen a lot of people pretty much like he was. People looking for easy answers to big problems. People that blame the Jews or the colored folks for all the bad things that happen to 'em. People that can't realize that a heck of a lot of things are bound to go wrong in a world as big as this one. And if there is any answer to why it's that way-and there ain't always-why, it's probably not just one answer by itself, but thousands of answers.

But that's the way my daddy was-like those people. They buy some book by a fella that don't know a god-dang thing more than they do (or he wouldn't be having to write books). And that's supposed to set 'em straight about everything. Or they buy themselves a bottle of pills. Or they say the whole trouble is with other folks, and the only thing to do is to get rid of 'em. Or they claim we got to war with another country. Or… or God knows what all.

Anyway, that's how my daddy was. That's the way I grew up. It's no wonder, I reckon, that me and the girls always got along so well. I reckon I really worked at getting along with 'em; sort of made a trade out of it without really knowing! was doing it. Because a fella has to have someone that likes him. He just naturally has to. And girls are just naturally inclined to like a man.

I guess when you come right down to it, I was making the same mistake that those people I was talking about make. Because there ain't no bigger problem than love, nothing is truly hard to come by, and I was looking for an easy answer to it.

7

Well, sir, danged if I hadn't got back to Pottsville on just about the darkest night of the year. It was so dark that I could have had a firefly sitting on my nose and! wouldn't have been able to see it.

Of course, the dark didn't really bother me. The way I knew every nook and cranny of Pottsville, I could get to wherever I wanted to go if I was walking in my sleep. So the dark was really an advantage to me, rather than otherwise. If anyone was up and around, and of course there wouldn't be at that time of night, they wouldn't see where I was going and wonder why I was going there.

I walked right down the dark middle of Main Street. I turned south at the end of it, and headed toward the river. There was just a speck of light down that way, sort of a little blob bulging up out of the darkness. I figured it came from the whorehouse, or rather from the little pier behind it. Those two pimps would be sitting out there, I knew, taking the night air and drinking themselves stiff.

They'd be feeling their oats for sure by the time I got there. All sassy and nasty, and primed for