1

This summer was different from any other time Mick could remember. Nothing much happened that she could describe to herself in thoughts or words—but there was a feeling of change. All the time she was excited. In the morning she couldn’t wait to get out of bed and start going for the day. And at night she hated like hell to have to sleep again.

Right after breakfast she took the kids out, and except for meals they were gone most of the day. A good deal of the time they just roamed around the streets—with her pulling Ralph’s wagon and Bubber following along behind. Always she was busy with thoughts and plans. Sometimes she would look up suddenly and they would be way off in some part of town she didn’t even recognize. And once or twice they ran into Bill on the streets and she was so busy thinking he had to grab her by the arm to make her see him.

Early in the mornings it was a little cool and their shadows stretched out tall on the sidewalk in front of them. But in the middle of the day the sky was always blazing hot. The glare was so bright it hurt to keep your eyes open. A lot of times the plans about the things that were going to happen to her were mixed up with ice and snow. Sometimes it was like she was out in Switzerland and all the mountains were covered with snow and she was skating on cold, greenish-colored ice. Mister Singer would be skating with her. And maybe Carole Lombard or Arturo Toscanini who played on the radio. They would be skating together and then Mister Singer would fall through the ice and she would dive in without regard for peril and swim under the ice and save his life. That was one of the plans always going on in her mind.

Usually after they had walked awhile she would park Bubber and Ralph in some shady place. Bubber was a swell kid and she had trained him pretty good. If she told him not to go out of hollering distance from Ralph she wouldn’t ever find him shooting marbles with kids two or three blocks away. He played by himself near the wagon, and when she left them she didn’t have to worry much. She either went to the library and looked at theNational Geographic or else just roamed around and thought some more. If she had any money she bought a dope or a Milky Way at Mister Brannon’s. He gave kids a reduction. He sold them nickel things for three cents.

But all the time—no matter what she was doing—there was music. Sometimes she hummed to herself as she walked, and other times she listened quietly to the songs inside her. There were all kinds of music in her thoughts. Some she heard over radios, and some was in her mind already without her ever having heard it anywhere.

In the night-time, as