Dan steps down.
He is as cool as a green stem that has just shed its flower.
Rows of gaping faces strain towards him. They are distant, beneath him, impalpable. Squeezing out, Dan again treads upon the corn-foot man. The man shoves him.
“Watch where youre going, mister. Crazy or no, you aint going to walk over me. Watch where youre going there.”
Dan turns, and serenely tweaks the fellow’s nose. The man jumps up. Dan is jammed against a seat-back. A slight swift anger flicks him. His fist hooks the other’s jaw.
“Now you have started something. Aint no man living can hit me and get away with it. Come on on the outside.”
The house, tumultuously stirring, grabs its wraps and follows the men.
The man leads Dan up a black alley. The alley-air is thick and moist with smells of garbage and wet trash. In the morning, singing niggers will drive by and ring their gongs… Heavy with the scent of rancid flowers and with the scent of fight. The crowd, pressing forward, is a hollow roar. Eyes of houses, soft girl-eyes, glow reticently upon the hubbub and blink out. The man stops. Takes off his hat and coat. Dan, having forgotten him, keeps going on.
