“‘I was just in Atlantic City a hot minute,’ she said. ‘My friends drove me down there for the day to let me catch some cool breezes. I thought about you, Jess. Come on over here and spend the week end. Willabee and Johnny say you can sleep on the sleeping porch tonight. They got good screens and the mosquitoes are not bad.’

“‘I am poison to mosquitoes, baby. The last one that bit me died himself. I will be there no sooner than it takes the bus to go through the Holland Tunnel.’

“And, man, I really enjoyed myself over there in that small suburban. Joyce’s friends make everything so pleasantlike—Budweiser in the ice box, Canadian Club on the sideboard. Righteous, man! Sunday they invited me to church which, to tell the truth, I enjoyed. Setting there with Joyce smelling like a flower, the old folks singing them old-time hymns, I started thinking about my Aunt Lucy and how she used to love Sunday-morning sermons.

“When the minister said, ‘Bow your heads and pray,’ I prayed I could keep on being good like Aunt Lucy taught me.

“When I raised my head, the sunlight was coming through them pretty colored windows. I put my hand over Joyce’s hand. And the choir sung. And the man said, ‘May the Lord watch between me and thee while we are absent one from another.’

“I said, ‘Joyce, don’t you be absent from me too long.’

“Joyce whispered, ‘Jess, I’m coming home Tuesday. I’m going to spend half of my fortnight near you.’

“At that point the minister said, ‘Amen!’

“I Amen-ed also.”

“All of which leads me to the conclusion that you and Joyce are back on an even keel,” I said.

“If keel means back in the groove, then there’s nothing left to prove. Come seven, manna from heaven! Cool, fool!”

“Dispense with the hep talk. You’re not at Birdland. By the way, how’s your protégé getting along?”

“My who?”

“Your young cousin.”

“More hep than me—F. D. is wearing Harlem for a sport coat. He works, he plays. But he comes home in time to get himself enough sleep to get up and work and play some more. He does not drink. And he has not taken to dope yet, which, according to the papers, all young Negroes do. Neither does he smoke reefers. He says he had rather buy himself some clothes, take his girl to Coney Island, else mambo with his money. Also to Birdland to hear bop. That boy gets around, him and Gloria. But he do not get run down—being’s he’s an athlete, he’s got to keep his wind. He says he got four letters in high school. Now, what does F. D. mean by that?”

“Football, baseball, basketball, and track, I think. They must have a pretty good high school where he comes from.”