"Oh Lord!" said Mickey. "When did you get hurt?"
"It's always been bad. I ain't ever walked," she said.
"Well!" breathed Mickey, aghast. "And knowing she'd have to leave you some day, your granny went and scared you stiff about the Home folks taking you, when it's the only place for you to be going? Talk about women having the sense to vote!"
"I won't go! I won't! I'll scratch them! I'll bite them!" Then in swift change: "Oh boy, don't. Please, please don't let them 'get' me."
Mickey took both the small bony hands reaching for him. He was so frightened with their hot, tremulous clutch, that he tried to pull away, dragging the tiny figure half to light and bringing from it moans of pain.
"Oh my back! Oh you're hurting me! Oh don't leave me! Oh boy, oh dear boy, please don't leave me!"
When she said "Oh dear boy," Mickey heard the voice of his mother in an hourly phrase. He crept closer, enduring the touch of the grimy claws.
"My name's Mickey," he said. "What's your?"
"Peaches," she answered. "Peaches, when I'm good. Crippled brat, when
I'm bad."
"B'lieve if you had your chance you could look the peaches," said
Mickey, "but what were you bad for?"