"
"No'm! Please don't!"
"Bandershanks, when you step on a rusty nail, you've got to
get it out and soak your foot in coal oil right away. Otherwise,
you're liable to take the lockjaw. Mierd, run see if you can find
Papa. Tell him Bandershanks hurt her foot and that I'll have to
take her home. On second thought, you stay with her, and I'll go
tell him."
Mama gave the horseshoe a quick jerk.
I screeched. But not loud.
Later, while Mama had me sitting on our kitchen doorstep
soaking my foot, I got to thinking what strange stuff coal oil
is. You put it in lamps. You can stop a mean man from fighting
with it. You can burn down stores with it. You have to use it to
doctor sore feet. It's funny stuff.
In the days that came next, nobody paid me and my sore foot
much attention. Papa didn't have time. He said he had to go to
town and do lots of things.
He didn't even have time to explain to me what he meant about
"a plain case of arson," and "just circumstantial evidence that
wouldn't stand up in court," and about the Law giving him some
kind of run-around.
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