* * * * *
I sat down on a railroad tie and tenderly and solicitously took a brown
package out of my inside pocket--the brown paper on which I had
inscribed with enthusiasm the curious songs of jail, cocaine, criminal,
and prostitute life I had heard during my three months' sojourn behind
bars.
I looked them over again. With all their smut and filth, they were yet
full of naive folk-touches and approximations to real balladry. I was as
tender of the manuscript as a woman would be with her baby.
* * * * *
The sky grew overcast. A rain storm blew up. A heavy wind mixed with
driving wet ... chilly ... I found shelter under a leaky shed ... was
soggy and miserable ... even wished, in a weak moment, for the
comparative comfort of my cell again....
The fast freight I was waiting for came rocking along. I made a run for
it in the rapidly gathering dusk. I grabbed the bar on one side and made
a leap for the step, but missed, like a frantic fool, with one
foot--luckily caught it with the other, or I might have fallen
underneath--and was aboard, my arms almost wrenched from their sockets.
Not till I had climbed in between the cars on the bumpers did I realise
that my coat had been torn open and my much-valued songs jostled out.
Without hesitation I hurled myself bodily off the train.
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