Tiny tried to save a little money from time to time. It wasn’t easy, because he didn’t make much, and he spent a lot, but he managed to stick back a little here and there. One Saturday afternoon when things were pretty smooth, when she was happy in front of the television with a Tarzan movie on, Johnny Weissmuller in Tarzan Finds a Son!, and a drink in her hand, Tiny told her he was going to go look at another car. He asked her if she wanted to go. She didn’t. She just happily waved him on out the door. Tiny thought, Lord, I love her, and drove eight miles to the driveway of a man with a ’78 Buick for sale, high mileage but clean, good floor mats, the paint faded just a little. Tiny got in and cranked it up and revved it up. It was a smooth-running little engine. The man swore it wouldn’t use a drop of oil. He said there wasn’t any way you could get it to use a drop of oil. He said you could run the dogshit out of it and it would, it wouldn’t ever register the least bit low on the stick. He said it was the best car he’d ever had. He said the only reason he was getting rid of it was because he’d bought a new one, and there it sat in the carport, all shiny and new.

Tiny cut it off and got out and kicked the tires. They didn’t have a whole lot of tread left. But the man was only asking four hundred dollars for the whole thing.

Tiny asked the man if he could drive it. The man said he could. Tiny drove it and liked it. It handled well. It cruised like a Buick ought to. Tiny came back and parked the car and told the man he believed he’d take it. He pulled the money from his pocket, the carefully saved twenties and tens, a whole wad of them, and counted it into the man’s hand. Then he asked the man if he’d mind following him home in the car, since he only lived eight miles away, and then Tiny could bring him back home, and the man said he’d be glad to. So that’s what they did.