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getting to be a big boy now.
    “Vearl! Vearl! Don’t you know Mother? This is Mother, Vearl!”
    He woke up and started to cry.
    “I’m going to take him up to the house now, Susan,” she told her.
    Susan followed her to the door.
    “Miss Lorene, do you aim to take him away?”
    Lorene did not answer her.
    “It would break my heart to see the little fellow go now,” Susan said, unashamed of the tears that fell from her eyes.
    Lorene ran out into the yard and started up the road with Vearl holding her tightly around the neck. She did not hear anything that Susan said.
    When Clay and Lorene reached the middle of the road, Vearl was wide awake. He looked at Lorene strangely, struggling to get away from her.
    “Don’t you know me, Vearl?” she asked fearfully, kissing his face and arms. “Don’t you remember Mother? This is Mother, Vearl! Look at me!”
    “He’s got pretty wild,” Clay said. “In another month or two he would be as scary as a rabbit. Couldn’t nobody catch him, ’less it was Susan.”
    Lorene held him tightly in her arms. He was heavy, and the dust in the road was deep, but she did not mind. She held Vearl as though she would never turn him loose again as long as she lived.
    “This is Mother, Vearl. Don’t you remember Mother?”
    “We’d never have caught him if we hadn’t got him while he was asleep,” Clay said, walking fast in order to keep up. “He’s a little wild-cat.”
    “Mother sure is glad to see you, Vearl. I thought I’d never get back to see you. Did you miss Mother?”
    “Where’ve you been,” he asked her.
    “Down in Florida, Vearl.”
    “That’s where the oranges grow. I’ve seen them.”
    “Yes,” she said. “Just lots and lots of them grow down there, Vearl.”
    “Did you bring me some?”
    “I’ll get you some in the store in McGuffin, Vearl,” she said. “I couldn’t carry any with me. They are too heavy to carry all the way here.”
    “Danny and Jim’s poppa brought them some from Florida,” Vearl said.
    Lorene glanced at Clay.
    “Those are some of the pickaninnies up the road a little way,” he told her. He knew she would not know any of the Negroes living up there. “Pete drives an orange truck. He goes down to Florida for a load of oranges and tangerines for Ralph Stone sometimes.”
    They hurried the rest of the way in silence, and when they reached the gate, they saw Semon Dye standing on the front porch. He motioned to them to hurry.
    “Dene’s got breakfast ready and waiting,” he said. Without waiting for them, he went through the hall to the kitchen.
    There was a chair for Vearl, which Dene placed at the table, but Lorene insisted on holding him on her lap. He ate his grits and drank his coffee hungrily, unmindful of anyone in the room. Lorene did not begin to eat until he had finished.
    “Give me some more coffee,” he told Clay.
    Clay went to the stove for the pot and filled his cup. Clay had finished eating, and he did not sit down again.
    “Here’s this bottle of medicine I got for him in McGuffin,” he said, taking the dusty bottle from the shelf and setting it on the table in front of Lorene. I’ve never got around to giving it to him yet.”
    Lorene looked at the bottle a moment and set it aside. Vearl reached for it, but she put it beyond his reach.
    “You’d better take him to the doctor in town,” she said.
    “I’ve been aiming to do that,” Clay said.
    “Go and get ready to take him now.”
    “Now? Today?”
    “Of course. Vearl needs a doctor right away. I can tell.”
    “I don’t know about taking him today,” Clay protested. “I hadn’t thought about doing that. Wouldn’t tomorrow do just as well?”
    “I mean right now,” Lorene told him emphatically. “Vearl needs to see the doctor before it’s too late to do any good.”
    Clay went out on the back porch and got a drink from the bucket on the stand. He spat out a mouthful before he swallowed any. Then he went down the steps towards the barn