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fifty for one?”
“I need at least one to get home,” he said reasonably. “And your friend looks like he needs one to
get anywhere.”
“What about all that God loves you, be a good Samaritan stuff ?”
“Well,” the beggar said, thoughtfully rubbing his whiskery chin, “God does love you, but I’m just a
poor old cripple fella. If you don’t like my terms, make like the Pharisee and pass by on the other side.
That’s what I’d do.”
“I bet you would. What if I just snatched them away, you money-grubbing thing?”
“I guess you could, but then God wouldn’t love you anymore,” he said, and burst out laughing. It
was a remarkably cheerful sound for a man who was crippled up bad. He was doing better in the
dental department than the Studebaker cowboy, but not a whole hell of a lot.
“Give him the money,” I said. “I only need one.”
“Oh, I’ll give him the money. I just hate being screwed.”
“Lady, that’s a shame for the male population of planet Earth, if you don’t mind me saying.”
“Watch your mouth,” I said. “That’s my fiancée you’re talking about.” It was eleven-forty now.
The beggar took no notice of me. He was eyeing Sadie’s wallet. “There’s blood on that. Did you cut
yourself shaving?”
“Don’t try out for the Sullivan show just yet, sweetheart, Alan King you’re not.” Sadie produced the
ten she’d flashed at oncoming traffic, plus two twenties. “There,” she said as he took them. “I’m broke.
Are you satisfied?”
“You helped a poor crippled man,” the beggar said. “You’re the one who ought to be satisfied.”
“Well, I’m not!” Sadie shouted. “And I hope your damn old eyes fall out of your ugly head!”
The beggar gave me a sage guy-to-guy look. “Better get her home, Sunny Jim, I think she’s gonna
start on her monthly right t’irectly.”
I put the crutch under my right arm—people who’ve been lucky with their bones think you’d use a
single crutch on the injured side, but that’s not the case—and took Sadie’s elbow with my left hand.
“Come on. No time.”
As we walked away, Sadie slapped her jeans-clad rump, looked back over her shoulder, and cried:
“Kiss it!”
The beggar called: “Bring it back and bend it in my direction, honeylove, that you get for free!”
10
We walked down North Pearl . . . or rather, Sadie walked and I crutched. It was a hundred times
better with the crutch, but there was no way we could make the intersection of Houston and Elm
before twelve-thirty.
Up ahead was a scaffolding. The sidewalk went beneath it. I steered Sadie across the street.
“Jake, why in the world—”
“Because it’d fall on us. Take my word for it.”
“We need a ride. We really need . . . Jake? Why are you stopping?”
I stopped because life is a song and the past harmonizes. Usually those harmonies meant nothing
(so I thought then), but every once in awhile the intrepid visitor to the Land of Ago can put one to
use. I prayed with all my heart that this was one of those times.
Parked at the corner of North Pearl and San Jacinto was a 1954 Ford Sunliner convertible. Mine
had been red and this one was midnight blue, but still . . . maybe . . .