In Baltimore, Adelaide’s harassment had continued unabated. The illegitimacy of the Booth children is now a published fact along with “the dissoluteness of the father and the shame of the mother.” Mother takes the abuse stoically, moving quietly on whenever and wherever Adelaide appears.

But on the streets, in the neighborhoods, at his school, Johnny defends them all with his fists. He could use Edwin’s help, but Edwin is off larking about with Father and wouldn’t be any good in a fight even if he were home.

This also happens in February: June’s wife, Clementina DeBar, the dancer and comedienne, has June and a seventeen-year-old actress named Harriet Mace arrested as they leave the theater. They are accused of the crime of “being entirely too familiar.” June is charged with adultery, Harriet with fornication. June’s bail is four hundred dollars. Harriet’s is fifty. No one in the family speaks of it. They remain on good terms with Clementina, who comes to call whenever she’s in the area.

—

In March, Johnny visits a gypsy encampment, seven covered wagons and a tent, in a field near his school. The field is full of pussytoes in first bloom and knee-high Indian grass. Three beautiful red horses lift their heads to stare at him. Chickens scatter. Pigs grunt. Black pots hang over cooking fires. Skirts and trousers hang over bushes. A small girl with braids so long she could sit on them stares from inside a wagon.

A man in a battered hat takes his pipe from his mouth to nod at him. He points to the tent with the stem, blows a long stream of smoke into the air.

The palmist is tiny and old, her hair all gone to seed, her blouse soiled at the collar and cuffs. Her hands are rough, her eyes bloodshot, one front tooth is gone. A key hangs from a chain around her neck, a key so large and heavy looking, Johnny wonders it doesn’t unbalance her. Nothing in the tent would require such a key and he wonders about that, too.

The palmist looks at Johnny’s hand for a long time before speaking. As soon as he leaves her, he writes down, word for word, what she said. Memorizing speeches has never come as easy to him as to the other sons of Junius Booth, but this one is hard to forget.