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white prisoner a stare, which was answered by a clown’s grimace. When I nodded to the white con, he smiled
     in answer,
Nuthin’ to it.
    Fearless was released from the cage. His irons were taken off. From under the table the rake brought out a gray cardboard
     box and handed it to Fearless.
    When the guard pointed at a pen and a stack of forms, Milo spoke up.
    “You should check your property before signing the release, Fearless.”
    “Aw, that’s all right, Milo,” Fearless said in that careless friendly voice of his. “Why they wanna steal my paper wallet?
     Wasn’t no money in it in the first place.”
    “Check anyway, son.”

6
    MILO LEFT US in front of the municipal building. I was wearing the same black slacks and loose yellow shirt I had on when Elana Love dropped
     in on me — the only clothes to my name since the fire. Fearless wore gray pants and a black silk shirt with two lines of blue
     and yellow diamonds down either side of the chest. As I said before, I’m a small man, five eight and slim. Fearless is tall,
     over six feet, and though he’s slender, his shoulders warn you about his strength. He’s also a good-looking man. A group of
     passing black women attested to that with their eyes. Even a couple of white women glanced more than once.
    But it wasn’t just a case of simple good looks. Fearless has a friendly face, a pleasant openness that makes you feel good.
     If you look at him, he’ll nod and say good day no matter who you are.
    “Fearless,” I said.
    “Before you say anything, Paris, I have to have me a cheddar cheese omelet, pork patty sausages, and about a gallon’a fresh
     orange juice. I got to have it after three months under that jail.”
    “Momma Tippy?” I asked.
    “They ain’t nobody else,” Fearless said, grinning.
    Momma Tippy had a canvas enclosed food stand on Temple Street not twelve blocks from where we stood. In normal times we would
     have driven there or at least taken the streetcar, but, finances the way they were, we walked.
    Fearless limped slightly, but he could walk at a fast clip. On the way, he regaled me with tales from the county lockup. He
     told about the man he had to beat to be left alone and about the guards who didn’t like him because he never got bothered
     or upset.
    “I tried to tell ’em that I was a soldier,” Fearless reasoned. “That I knew how to take a order if I was in the stockade.
     But somehow they was mad just ’cause I wasn’t sour and moody. Can you believe that?”
    Momma Tippy, a small nut-brown woman from Trinidad, served up seconds and thirds for Fearless at no cost because she felt
     bad that he had been locked up in a cell.
    “M’boy didn’t deserve it,” she said. “Dey always be takin’ ’em. N’you know it ain’t right.”
    After commiserations and eggs, Fearless reached across the table and put his hand on my shoulder.
    “I know you need me, Paris,” Fearless said in an unusually somber tone. “And whatever it is I’m’onna help ya. ’Cause you know
     I got it.”
    “Got what?”
    “At first I was mad that you didn’t pay my fine. But then I was talkin’ to Cowboy —”
    “Who?”
    “That white dude said about me bein’ a war hero.”
    “The one at the courthouse?”
    “Yeah. He asked me if you owed me money, and I told him no. Then he asked was we related or if I had ever pulled you outta
     jail. I didn’t tell ’im ’bout them cops — that’s between us an’ them dead officers. But I started to think that over the years
     you done helped me again and again and I just kept on takin’ like some kinda dog can’t do for himself.” Fearless pointed a
     long finger at a spot over my head. “And that’s wrong, man. You don’t owe me to pay my bail. Uh-uh. So from now on it’s even
     Steven. I’m’a help you and pay you back, and the only time I’ll come to you is for a good meal or a good laugh.”
    It wasn’t true. Fearless couldn’t stay out of trouble. But still, I was