“Then I went on down the road till I come to a nice town in the middle of big pine trees. It was full of fine white houses and a few brick stores, and two or three great big hotels. I asked a nigger what the place was and he told me it was Thompson, and was a winter resort for Yankees who come there for their lungs; that they spent lots of money and that was what made the place so big. “I always liked to talk with the niggers; they never asked me any questions, and I never was ‘fraid that they’d been in Chicago, and I didn’t really think they took any of the papers, for they didn’t know how to read. Well, I just took one look at Thompson and then went as far from the hotels as I could, and kep’ away from the stores, for I was sure the place was full of people from Chicago, and that all the newspapers would be there, too. I didn’t stop a minute over where all the nice houses was. I seen lots of people out on the porches and settin’ in hammocks and loafin’ ‘round, and I knew they was from Chicago. Then I went along across a little stream and come to a lot of poor tumbled-down houses and tents, and I knew they was the niggers’ quarters, so I went into a little store kep’ by an old fat nigger lady and bought a bag of crackers and asked her about the roads. “Before this I made up my mind to go to Cuba. I remembered readin’ all about it at the time of the war, when a lot of them stock-yards boys went to fight, and I thought that I’d be so far away that I might be safe, so I knew that I had to go to the Gulf of Mexico, and I kep’ on that way. I didn’t dare to take the railroads any more, but just thought I’d walk, so I kep’ straight on down the road all day until I got a long ways from Thompson. I didn’t dare to stop for work, for I’d got it into my head that everyone was after me, and if I waited any more I’d get caught. My shoes was gettin’ pretty near wore out and I knew they wouldn’t last much longer, and I hadn’t got more’n four dollars left, and I knew if I didn’t come to the Gulf pretty soon I’d just have to go to work. “That night I stopped at another old shack, and had about the same kind of dream I did the night before, only I was runnin’, and every time I pretty near got away a cramp would come in my leg and pull me back and give ‘em a chance to ketch me, and they seemed to come just the same without runnin’ or flyin’, or anything, and always she’d come just where I was. Still I got through the night and a nigger lady gave me somethin’ to eat, and I went on.