RED GROW THE ROSES

The town was small, lonely, sad and slothful on that particular evening.  A steady, driving rain fell from a black sky.  Now and then a heavy burst tore down like millions of silver liquid bullets driven by a sharp, powerful gust of wind and swarmed wetly against the fire house.  Billy walked slowly up the wet concrete driveway.  He looked toward the wide doors.  Inside, he could see the brilliant red engine, the hoses, and the ladders.  He was despondent.  He wanted to go anywhere except to that Fire House.  He was 34 years old.  Under his arm he carried a manuscript; he was a writer.  It had been eleven years since Johns Hopkins.

He saw no one outside but an old man walking across the street, holding a black raincoat over his head and carrying a black satchel.  Billy sighed, stopped, and looked up at the rainy heavens.  He gazed sadly at the firehouse.  His face was starved and pale, his brown hair thin and untrimmed.  He needed a shave.  He wore a pair of worn-out gray flannels and an old tweed sport coat.  He had no raincoat or top coat.  His shoes were old and thin.  His socks were wet from the rain. He wore no hat or cap.  He hadn’t been home in years...

Inside the building now, he could see four blue-shirted firemen around a card table.  He knew them.  They were men he’d met years before.  The nearest old man was gray headed and was bald, blind in one eye.  His name was Jerry, and he laughed almost all the time.  Another was young and clown-faced.  His name was Louis, and he had a gambler’s shrewd face.  One other man was middle-aged and wrinkled and yellow toothed.  They were all playing poker amid a cloud of cigarette smoke.  Beyond them there was a doorway, and this doorway led into the fire chief’s office, which held an old desk and a wooden chair.  Suddenly Jerry cried: “Full House!” holding down his poker hand and laughing and rolling his eyeballs from man to man and laughing louder, until his face was as hot and red as a burning tangerine.  “Look at that bastard!” cried Louis.  It was all in fun.  Jerry chuckled.  He raked in the pot.  Then he took a cigarette paper and a sack of Golden Grain and began to roll a “weed,” as Louis dealt the new hand.