Jim was an outsider--a running mate of poor whites. Most of the
men knew him, condescendingly; he tipped his hat to three or four
girls. That was all.

When the dusk had thickened into a blue setting for the moon, he
walked through the hot, pleasantly pungent town to Jackson Street. The
stores were closing and the last shoppers were drifting homeward, as
if borne on the dreamy revolution of a slow merry-go-round. A
street-fair farther down a brilliant alley of varicolored booths and
contributed a blend of music to the night--an oriental dance on a
calliope, a melancholy bugle in front of a freak show, a cheerful
rendition of "Back Home in Tennessee" on a hand-organ.

The Jelly-bean stopped in a store and bought a collar. Then he
sauntered along toward Soda Sam's, where he found the usual three or
four cars of a summer evening parked in front and the little darkies
running back and forth with sundaes and lemonades.

"Hello, Jim."

It was a voice at his elbow--Joe Ewing sitting in an automobile with
Marylyn Wade. Nancy Lamar and a strange man were in the back seat.

The Jelly-bean tipped his hat quickly.

"Hi Ben--" then, after an almost imperceptible pause--"How y' all?"

Passing, he ambled on toward the garage where he had a room up-stairs.
His "How y'all" had been said to Nancy Lamar, to whom he had not
spoken in fifteen years.

Nancy had a mouth like a remembered kiss and shadowy eyes and
blue-black hair inherited from her mother who had been born in
Budapest. Jim passed her often on the street, walking small-boy
fashion with her hands in her pockets and he knew that with her
inseparable Sally Carrol Hopper she had left a trail of broken hearts
from Atlanta to New Orleans.

For a few fleeting moments Jim wished he could dance. Then he laughed
and as he reached his door began to sing softly to himself:

"Her Jelly Roll can twist your soul,
Her eyes are big and brown,
She's the Queen of the Queens of the Jelly-beans--
My Jeanne of Jelly-bean Town."

II

At nine-thirty, Jim and Clark met in front of Soda Sam's and started
for the Country Club in Clark's Ford. "Jim," asked Clark casually, as
they rattled through the jasmine-scented night, "how do you keep
alive?"

The Jelly-bean paused, considered.

"Well," he said finally, "I got a room over Tilly's garage. I help him
some with the cars in the afternoon an' he gives it to me free.
Sometimes I drive one of his taxies and pick up a little tha