Indigo was really glad both her doll-friends were with her. Otherwise she would never have believed what she saw. Uncle John was there all right. Going up Mrs. Yancey’s walk like he would have to, but he was in a tuxedo and top hat. The spats on his shoes gleamed in the lavender sky. He kept his pace up and his back straight with the help of an ebony cane with a gold handle. Plus, when Mrs. Yancey came to the door, her hair wasn’t in braids. It was all over the place like those women in the pictures over bars, the mermaids covering their privates, with their hair flowing like seaweed everywhere. She wasn’t wearing her slippers, either. She had on high heels and a pale blue dress chiseled onto her form like white on rice. Mrs. Yancey took Uncle John’s arm; they virtually floated off the porch, down the walk to the corner.

Indigo kept hearing Mrs. Yancey say, “Uncle John you don’t even have a place to live.” Everybody knew Uncle John lived in his wagon, but nobody had ever seen what Indigo saw. Uncle John went over to his wagon, pulled out a fine easy chair and set it by the curb, then motioned for Mrs. Yancey to have a seat. Next thing Indigo knew, he had spread a Persian rug in the middle of the street, set a formal table, pulled out a wine bucket, and started dinner on the stove at the back of his wagon. Yoki was all dressed up with flowers woven through her mane and violet feathers tied on her hooves. Uncle John put candles on the table, and pinned a corsage to Mrs. Yancey’s dress. She kept looking around like she thought being in the middle of the street in Uncle John’s living room was not really safe, when out of nowhere the guys from the Geechee Capitans, a motorcycle gang of disrepute led by Pretty Man, came speeding down the street. Mrs. Yancey ’most jumped to her roof. Uncle John didn’t exhibit much concern about these young ruffians on their huffing, humming bikes. He looked up, waved his hand, and the Geechee Capitans, who had never done a good turn by anybody in the city of Charleston, South Carolina, made road blocks on either side of Uncle John’s parlor-in-the-middle-of-the-street.