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Pete’s nose with a mimosa flower. Pete sneezed and Bobby giggled. “See?” he said. “Me and Pete has got a cold.”
    If Daddy was there, he would’ve found a way to make working fun. But I was hot and had blisters on my hands, so I was irritable.
    “Bobby Leroy Honeycutt, if you don’t get to work, I’m gonna write Daddy a letter. And I’ll say a lot more than‘Good night, sleep tight, don’t let the bedbugs bite.’ I’ll tell him you’re a spoiled little brat that won’t do nothing but play with the dog.”
    Bobby started crying then, but he got up and put a few potatoes in a basket. It didn’t last long. By the time the next load of potatoes was ready, he was back sitting in the dirt and scooping dry dust over Pete’s tail and watching it fly around when Pete wagged it off. I didn’t even bother calling him to help. He was way more trouble than he was worth.
    After all, he was only four years old, and the last thing Daddy told him was to play some every day. So I guessed I shouldn’t be so hard on him, even if picking up potatoes wasn’t really that much work.
    By the time we got halfway to the cellar, Bobby was screaming for us to come back and get him. I just kept right on pulling that wagon.
    Ida stopped.
    “Don’t you dare go after him,” I said. “Bobby’s got two good legs the same as the rest of us.” But she didn’t pay me no mind.
    Of course, Ellie followed right after her. Soon they was all three screaming. Momma come out on the porch to see what all the clamor was about, so I let her take over while I laid the potatoes out in the root cellar. Next thing I knew, Momma was hollering too.
    I run down there to see what was the matter. Momma was trying to get Bobby to stand up. But his legs was just crumpling underneath him and his arms was floppy too. I didn’t need no doctor to tell me what was wrong.
    Momma picked Bobby up and took him inside, and the three of us girls was right behind her. She turned to me andsaid, “Jump on the bicycle and go get Junior to bring the truck. He’s got to take us to the emergency hospital.”
    I pedaled that bicycle fast as I could, and my heart was bumpier than that dirt road. All I could think of was how mean I was, making Bobby work when he was really sick.
    But he didn’t seem sick at the beginning. Momma checked his forehead in the morning and he didn’t have no fever. And he was giggling and playing and he didn’t seem sick at all. But still, I knew it was my fault for yelling at him like that. And using that threat about Daddy to shame him into working when he didn’t feel up to it.
    I preached myself a sermon all the way to Junior’s.
    When I got there, Junior was laying under the truck in the driveway. Wrenches and car parts was scattered on the ground by his legs. I started yelling the minute I seen him. “Junior, I need you right this minute! And the truck too. You got to take Bobby to the doctor’s.”
    Junior come sliding out from under the truck and said, “What’s the matter? Can it wait? I got to put this thing back together or we ain’t going nowhere.”
    “Junior Bledsoe, why are you taking Daddy’s truck apart? He said you could use it so you could take Momma places—not take it apart.” I started beating on his chest.
    “Whoa, girl! What has got into you?” Junior grabbed my hands and held me back from him.
    “Bobby’s got polio,” I said. “He has to get to the emergency hospital in Hickory.”
    “Oh, Lordy,” said Junior. “This truck ain’t going nowhere for a while. We better see if the Hinkle sisters can take you.” He run and got his bicycle then. I could hardly keep up with him going up the dirt road to the Hinkles’.
    I knew we was in trouble the minute we got therebecause the Hinkle sisters’ car was not in the garage behind their brick house. “They’re not home,” I said.
    I just knew Bobby was going to die while we rode around looking for someone to take him to the hospital.
    “Then we’ll