happens. Then you run--hear me? Run like the devil--"

"Tommy--"

"Well, what?"

"Nothing--all right." I wanted to say good-by--but you know
Tom.

Mag, were you ever where you oughtn't to be at midnight--alone?
No, I know you weren't. 'Twas your ugly little face and your hair
that saved you--the red hair we used to guy so at the Cruelty.
I can see you now--a freckle-faced, thin little devil, with the
tangled hair to the very edge of your ragged skirt, yanked in
that first day to the Cruelty when the neighbors complained your
crying wouldn't let 'em sleep nights. The old woman had just
locked you in there, hadn't she, to starve when she lit out.
Mothers are queer, ain't they, when they are queer. I never
remember mine.

Yes, I'll go on.

I stood it all right for a time, out there alone in the night.
But I never was one to wait patiently. I can't wait--it isn't in
me. But there I had to stand and just--God!--just wait.

If I hadn't waited so hard at the very first I wouldn't 'a' given
out so soon. But I stood so still and listened so terribly hard
that the trees began to whisper and the bushes to crack and
creep. I heard things in my head and ears that weren't sounding