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rocky.” Everybody laughed. “But when I crossed them on the train I wasn’t thinking about scenery. I was feeling too hungry.”
    â€œDon’t the army f-f-f-feed you?” Joe said.
    â€œThey gave me money for the trip, but I spent it all in Washington. I bought medical books, and it took the last dollar I had to buy the train ticket for San Francisco.”
    â€œWhat did you live on?” Florrie said.
    â€œI had forty-three cents left and bought some cheese and soda crackers in the station. I was going to make them last all the way to the Pacific Ocean. I figured if I set quiet on the train and watched the scenery and drunk plenty of water I could make it to the ship. But it takes almost a week to get from one coast to the other. I rationed myself to five crackers and a sliceof cheese each meal. When the other people went to the dining car I stayed in my seat and ate soda crackers and hurried to the fountain for a drink of water.”
    â€œYou must have got constipated,” Florrie said.
    â€œI got constipated and I got all tight with gas,” Locke said. “But that wasn’t the worst of it. By the time we had got past St. Louis and approaching Kansas City all my crackers and cheese was gone. I had to cross the whole West with nothing to eat.”
    â€œDid you pray?” Lily said. “For something else to eat?” She patted the lace collar of her lemon-colored dress.
    â€œI prayed that the trip would be over and I would get to my ship. I set in a kind of daze all the way across Utah and Nevada. You never saw such an empty place. Sometimes I looked out at the stars above the icy peaks. Once I looked down and saw the sparkle of a stream way below as we crossed a trestle that seemed half a mile high.
    â€œI must have dozed off, for suddenly I woke to a kind of humming and roaring. It was completely dark outside the window. I had the feeling it was time for daylight, but there was nothing but blackness outside. The roar was like a high wind.
    â€œSuddenly the train shot out into daylight and I saw the sun on peaks above. We had been going through one of these snow sheds the Chinese coolies built to keep the deep snows from blocking the train. We had been in a kind of tunnel made of timbers.
    â€œWe come down into the valley and passed all these orchards. It was late summer and you could see people picking peaches. Far as you could look was one orchard after another. We stopped at a little town for about a minute and this woman got on and setdown across from me. She put a bag beside her and took out this golden ripe peach. It was the biggest peach I’d ever seen.
    â€œShe spread a handkerchief over her lap and took a little knife out of her purse and begun to peel the peach. It was so ripe juice run off the knife even as she lifted away the long curl of skin. I watched her eat the peach in slices. When she finished that peach she took another out of the bag and begun to peel it.
    â€œIn less than an hour we got to Sacramento and the woman left her seat. She put the handkerchief and peelings in the bag and left it. I waited for her to come back, and tried to figure how many more peaches there might be in the bag. The train started pulling out and still she had not come back. I waited until we was almost outside the town, and looked up and down the aisle, then grabbed the bag. Under the peelings and wet handkerchief there was five more peaches, big and ripe and firm. I held the bag on my lap and ate one like it was an apple. Juice run down my chin but I didn’t mind. When I finished that I had another. By the time we reached Oakland I had eat them all.”
    â€œAnd your constipation was cured,” Florrie said.
    â€œIt sure was,” Locke said. “It sure was.”
    â€œWho wants some popcorn?” I said.
    â€œDid I ever tell you about the time I tricked Brother Joe?” Locke said.
    â€œAbout a th-th-thousand times,” Joe