Billy by Albert French Page A

LeRoy's too. Lucy Mae still lived down there on the Patch Road with her mama, Esther Green. Her daddy, Wally Green, fell over dead in them pickin fields out at Hatcher's when she was just a baby, that was twenty-five years ago.

    Cinder was sitting and reading one of them magazmes she has. Every time she gets a little quiet time, she gets one of her magazines out and reads about people in faraway places. She likes those Hollywood movie people, and the big pictures of them in that Life magazine she's looking at.
    Katey comes runni ng up through the dirt yards, ain't saying nothin, just running until she gets close to the sittin porch and sees Cinder, then she starts yelling up to Cinder, "Child , we ' s got troubles, ya hear me? We's got trouble."
    Cinder kept reading until Katey was on the porch stan    48 I Al/Jeri Fnmc/1

    does somethin l ike this? Have mercy, Jesus. Lord, thats poor child."
    Cinder ask quietly, "Is the child dead?"
    "They ain't says yet if she dead. They say she was just a little girl, just a child. Trouble comin , Ah ' s knows it."
    Cinder gets up and goes into the house. It's her Saturday time, she doesn't need this botherin, and the way she walks, she lets Katey know it.

    Gumpy had run down through them thick bushes by the pond, then ran as fast as he could when he reached the tracks and kept running, only slowing some to cross the train trestle. Then and only then did he stop and look back. Then he ran again, ran out in the openness of the tracks, ran out of the sunlight into the shade of the thick bushes, deep into the bushes, where shadows and silence lurk together. He had crawled and slithered over the long, dead log and hid behind its solitude, only peeping out at any sound .
    It was silent. Everything in Gumpy's world was silent ex cept time. Time rumbles in his mind, that same time when the hands reached and grabbed at him, when the yells and screams bit at his ears, when Billy got jumped. That same time had stayed in hi s mind, making his heart pound to a rag ing cadence.
    "Hey, Gumpy, hey, Gumpy, hey, Gumpy." Gumpy jumps, then raises h is head slowly and peers through the thick green of bushes. Billy is calling his name.
    "Gumpy, Gumpy, hey, Gumpy."
    He comes to his knees and peers down to the tracks, sees Billy walking along the rails shouting his name.
    "Billy, Billy, up here. Ah's up here. Where's they at? They
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    comin after ya, they's chasin ya, Billy?" Gumpy whispers to Billy.
    Billy skips off the tracks and comes squeezing into the
    bushes shouting, "Gumpy, Gumpy, where's ya at? Ah can ' t s see ya, where's ya at, huh?"
    "Over here," Gumpy whispers. "What's ya     "Theys git ya? Theys jump ya?"
    "Theys gits me down, but Ah's git up." "Theys come git ya again?"
    "Theys can'ts git me , Gumpy, they's girl s ." "Ya gots blood on ya face, they's got y a."
    "Ah hit em back, Ah hit em good. Ah got em ba c k , Gumpy."
    "They's got ya good, Billy, they's got ya good in the fac e." "Ah got them Gump y , theys can'ts keep me down."
    "They were bigger, they could beat y a. " "Naw, they ain't, Ah gits up and gits them." "Billy, theys beat ya, ya just ain't sayin so."
    "Ah got em, Gumpy. She come gits me agam, Ah stu c k her."
    " Ya ain't stuck her, she bigger."
    "Did so. Ah stuck her. Ah stuck her in her titty." "She bleed? Ya ain't stuck her."
    "She hollered, then she fell down. Ah seen her." "Ya ain't did that , y a ain't stuck her none." "Yeah, Ah did, look . See? Look at m y k