Dreaming Jewels Read Free

task.
    “Horty!”
    He shrank into the fog-swirled shadows of the traffic-light standard.
    “Horton Bluett, I see you.”
    “Kay…” He came to her, staying close to the fence. “Listen, don’t tell nobody you saw me, huh?”
    “But wh—oh. You’re running away!” she blurted, noticing the parcel tucked under his arm. “Horty—are you sick?” He was white, strained. “Did you hurt your hand?”
    “Some.” He held his left wrist with his right hand, tightly. His left hand was wrapped in two or three handkerchiefs. “They was going to get the police. I got out the window onto the shed roof and hid there all afternoon. They was lookin’ all over the street and everywhere. You won’t tell?”
    “I won’t tell. What’s in the package?”
    “Nothin’.”
    If she had demanded it, grabbed at it, he would probably never have seen her again. Instead she said, “Please, Horty.”
    “You can look.” Without releasing his wrist, he turned so she could pull the package out from under his arm. She opened it—it was a paper bag—and took out the hideous broken face of Junky. Junky’s eyes glittered at her, and she squeaked. “What is it?”
    “It’s Junky. I had him since before I was born. Armand, he stepped on it.”
    “Is that why you’re running away?”
    “Kay! What are you doing out there?”
    “Coming, Mother! Horty, I got to go. Horty, are you coming back?”
    “Not ever.”
    “Gee”… that mister Bluett, he’s so mean… ”
    “Kay Hallowell! Come in this instant. It’s raining!”
    “Yes, Mother! Horty, I wannit to tell you. I shouldn’ta laughed at you today. Hecky brought you the worms, and I thought it was a joke, thass all. I didn’t know you really did eat ants. Gee… I et some shoe-polish once. That’s nothin’.”
    Horty held out his elbow and she carefully put the package under it. He said, as if he had just thought of it—and indeed he had—“I will come back, Kay. Someday.”
    “Kay!”
    “’Bye, Horty.” And she was gone, a flash of taffy hair, yellow dress, a bit of lace, changed before his eyes to a closed gate in a board fence and the sound of dwindling quick footsteps.
    Horton Bluett stood in the dark drizzle, cold, but with heat in his ruined hand and another heat in his throat. This he swallowed, with difficulty, and, looking up, saw the broad inviting tailgate of a truck which was stopped for the traffic light. He ran to it, tossed his small bundle on it, and squirmed up, clawing with his right hand, trying to keep his left out of trouble. The truck lurched forward; Horty scrabbled wildly to stay on. The package with Junky in it began to slide back toward him, past him; he caught at it, losing his own grip, and began to slip.
    Suddenly there was a blur of movement from inside the truck, and a flare of terrible pain as his smashed hand was caught in a powerful grip. He came very close to fainting; when he could see again he was lying on his back on the jolting floor of the truck, holding his wrist again, expressing his anguish in squeezed-out tears and little, difficult grunts.
    “Gee, kid, you don’t care how long you live, do you?” It was a fat boy, apparently his own age, bending over him, his bowed head resting on three chins. “What’s the matter with your hand?”
    Horty said nothing. He was quite beyond speech for the moment. The fat boy, with surprising gentleness, pressed Horty’s good hand away from the handkerchiefs and began laying back the cloth. When he got to the inner layer, he saw the blood by the wash of light from a street-light they passed, and he said “Man.”
    When they stopped for another traffic signal at a lighted intersection, he looked carefully and said, “Oh, man,” with all the emphasis inside him somewhere, and his eyes contracted into two pitying little knots of wrinkles. Horty knew the fat boy was sorry for him, and only then did he begin to cry openly. He wished he could stop, but he couldn’t, and didn’t while