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Thank You, Ma’m by Langston Hughes She was a large woman with a large purse that had everything

in it but a hammer and nails. It had a long strap, and she carried it slung across her shoulder.

It was about eleven o’clock at night, dark, and she was

walking alone, when a boy ran up behind her and triedto snatch her purse. The strap broke with the sudden single tug the boy gave it from behind. But the boy’s weight and the weight of the purse combined caused him to lose his balance. Instead of taking off full blast as he had hoped, the boy fell on his back on the sidewalk and his legs flew up.

The large woman simply turned around and kicked him right

square in his blue-jeaned sitter. Then she reached down, picked the boy up by his shirt front, and shook him until his teeth rattled.

After that the woman said, “Pick up my pocketbook, boy, and

give it here.”

She still held him tightly. But she bent down enough to permit

him to stoop and pick up her purse. Then she said, “Now ain’t you ashamed of yourself?”

Firmly gripped by his shirt front, the boy said, “Yes’m.” The

woman said, “What did you want to do it for?”

The boy said, “I didn’t aim to.”

By that time two or three people passed, stopped, turned to

look, and some stood watching.

“If I turn you loose, will you run?” asked the woman. “Yes’m,” said the boy.

“Then I won’t turn you loose,” said the woman. She did not

release him.

“Lady, I’m sorry,” whispered the boy.

“Um-hum! Your face is dirty. I got a great mind to wash your

face for you. Ain’t you got nobody home to tell youto wash your face?”

“No’m,” said the boy.

“Then it will get washed this evening,” said the large

woman,starting up the street, dragging the frightened boy behind her.

He looked as if he were fourteen or fifteen, frail and willow-wild

in tennis shoes and blue jeans.

The woman said, “You ought to be my son. I would teach you

right from wrong. Least I can do right now is towash your face. Are you hungry?”

“No’m,” said the being-dragged boy. “I just want you to turn

me loose.”

“Was I bothering you when I turned that corner?” asked the

woman.

“No’m.”

“But you put yourself in contact with me,” said the woman. “If

you think that contact is not going to last awhile, you got another thought coming. When I get through with you, sir, you are going to remember Mrs. Luella Bates Washington Jones.”

Sweat popped out on the boy’s face and he began to

struggle. Mrs. Jones stopped, jerked him around in front of her, put a half-nelson about his neck,and continued to drag him up thestreet.

When she got to her door, she dragged the boy inside, down a

hall, and into a large kitchen enette-furnish hed room at the rear of the house. She switched on the light and left the door open. The boy could hear other roomers laughing and talking in the large house. Some of their doors were open, too, so he knew he and the woman were not alone. The woman still had him by the neck in the middle of her room.

She said, “What is your name?” “Roger,” answered the boy.

“Then, Roger, you go to that sinkand wash your face,” said the

woman, where upon she turned him loose – at last. Roger looked at the door – looked at the woman – looked at the door – and went to the sink.

“Let the water run until it gets warm,” she said. “Here’s a clean

towel.”

“You gonna take me to jail?” asked the boy, bending over the

sink.

Thank You, Ma’m by Langston Hughes “Not with that face, I would nottake you nowhere,” said the

woman.“Here I am trying to get home to cookme a bite to eat, and you snatch mypocketbook! Maybe you ain’t been to your supper either, late as it be. Haveyou?”

“There’s nobody home at myhouse,” said the boy.

“Then we’ll eat,” said the woman. “Ibelieve you’re hungry – or

beenhungry – to try to snatch mypocketbook!”

“I want a pair of blue suede shoes,”said the boy.

“Well, you didn’t have to snatch mypocketbook to get some

suede shoes,”said Mrs. Luella Bates WashingtonJones. “You could of asked me.”

“Ma’m?”

The water dripping from his face,the boy looked at her. There

was a longpause. A very long pause. After he haddried his face and not knowing whatelse to do, dried it again, the boyturned around, wondering what next.

The door was open. He would make adash for it down the hall.

He wouldrun, run, run!

The woman was sitting on the daybed. After a while, she said,

“I wereyoung once and I wanted things Icould not get.”

There was another long pause. Theboy’s mouth opened. Then

he frowned,not knowing he frowned.

The woman said, “Um-hum! Youthought I was going to say but,

didn’tyou? You thought I was going to say,but I didn’t snatch people’spocketbooks. Well, I wasn’t going tosay that.”

Pause. Silence.

“I have donethings, too, which I would not tell you,son – neither

tell God, if He didn’talready know. Everybody’s gotsomething in common. Sit you downwhile I fix us something to eat. Youmight run that comb through yourhair so you will look presentable.”

In another corner of the roombehind a screen was a gas plate

and anicebox. Mrs. Jones got up and wentbehind the screen. The woman did not watch the boy to see if he was going torun now, nor did she watch her purse, which she left behind her on the daybed. But the boy took care to sit on thefar side of the room, away from the

purse, where he thought she could easily see him out of the corner of her eye if she wanted to. He did not trust the woman to trust him. And he did not trust the woman not to trust him. Andhe did not want to be mistrusted now.

“Do you need somebody to go tothe store,” asked the boy,

“maybe to get some milk or something?”

“Don’t believe I do,” said the woman,“unless you just want

sweet milk yourself. I was going to make cocoa outof this canned milk I got here.”

She heated some lima beans and ham she had in the icebox,

made the cocoa, and set the table. The woman did not ask the boy anything about where he lived, or his folks, or anything else that would embarrass him.

Instead, as they ate, she told him abouther job in a hotel

beauty shop thatstayed open late, what the work waslike, and how all kinds of women camein and out, blondes, redheads andSpanish. Then she cut him half of herten-cent cake.

“Eat some more, son,” she said.

When they finished eating, she gotup and said, “Now here,

take this tendollars and buy yourself some bluesuede shoes. And, next time, do notmake the mistake of latching onto mypocketbook nor nobody else’s –because shoes got by devilish ways willburn your feet. I got to get my restnow. But from here on in, son, I hopeyou will behave yourself.”

She led the way down the hall to thefront door and opened it. “Good night! Behave yourself, boy!” she said, looking into the street as he went down thesteps.

The boy wanted to say somethingother than “Thank you,

ma’m,”to Mrs. Luella Bates Washington Jones,but although his lips moved, hecouldn’t even say that, as he turned atthe foot of the barren stoop and lookedup at the large woman in the door.

Then she shut the door.