[Pg 14]

 An' we go to wah— We shall carry de name, Bajan boys for—evah! 

An' we go to wah—

We shall carry de name,

Bajan boys for—evah!

"It are funny," mused Coggins, clearing his throat, "Massa Braffit an' dat chiggah-foot gal...."

He stopped and picked up a fern and pressed the back of it to his shiny ebon cheek. It left a white ferny imprint. Grown up, according to the ethics of the gap, Coggins was yet to it a "queer saht o' man," given to the picking of a guitar, and to cogitations, on the step after dark—indulging in an avowed juvenility.

Drunk with the fury of the sun Coggins carelessly swinging along cast an eye behind him—more of the boys from the quarry—overalled, shoeless, caps whose peaks wiggled on red, sun-red eyes ... the eyes of the black sunburnt folk.

He always cast an eye behind him before he turned off the broad road into the gap.

Flaring up in the sun were the bright new shingles on the Dutch-style cottage of some Antigua folk. Away in a clump of hibiscus was a[Pg 15] mansion, the color of bilgy water, owned by two English dowager maidens. In the gap rock-stones shot up—obstacles for donkey carts to wrestle over at dusk. Rain-worms and flies gathered in muddy water platoons beside them.

[Pg 15]

"Yo' dam vagabond yo'!"

Coggins cursed his big toe. His big toe was blind. Helpless thing ... a blind big toe in broad daylight on a West Indian road gap.

He paused, and gathered up the blind member. "Isn't this a hell of a case fo' yo', sah?" A curve of flesh began to peel from it. Pree-pree-pree. As if it were frying. Frying flesh. The nail jerked out of place, hot, bright blood began to stream from it. Around the spot white marl dust clung in grainy cakes. Now, red, new blood squirted—spread over the whole toe—and the dust became crimson.

Gently easing the 

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