text: As they walked downtown, Grit asked, "Where do you live, Paulie?"
  
  "Ain't really got a place," Paulie said, "but old Buzz lets me bunk at the stable."
  
  "Where's your family?" Grit asked.
  
  "I's raised by my Uncle Steff and Aunt Bertha, who live over in Olmsted Falls. My aunt was always complainin' about how much I cost 'em, how much I ate, how I never helped even though I did all I could... all of that and more. So one day when I's 13, I just up and walked out of the house. Been on my own for two years now."
  
  "And they never came after ya?"
  
  "Nope, ain't never seen either one since that day."
  
  As they passed Dolly's Restaurant, Grit said, "Let's get some dinner, Paulie."
  
  "Nah, I'll cook myself sump'm down at the stable."
  
  "I'm buyin'," Grit said. "Come on in."
  
  Grit didn't often eat out, but he was so famished, he thought he'd make an exception, and he was sure Paulie was as hungry as he was.
  
  A waitress, a comely young woman about Grit's own age, came with two glasses of water and said, "Need a menu?"
  
  "Not really," Grit said. "What's the special?"
  
  "Roast beef with mashed potatoes and peas and carrots with dinner rolls," she said.
  
  "Sound okay, Paulie?"
  
  "Sounds fine, Grit."
  
  "Bring us two of the specials," Grit told her.
  
  She brought him silverware, a chunk of butter for his rolls and napkins. "We have beer on draft if you'd like one."
  
  "Yes ma'am, I would," he said. "You want a beer, Paulie?"
  
  "Yessir, if you think it's okay."
  
  She brought two beers, and by the time their plates of food came, they'd drunk it all.
  
  "Want refills?" she asked.
  
  "Yes ma'am," they both said.
  
  As they ate their meal, there wasn't much talking, just the resolute sounds of chewing and silverware scraping their porcelain plates. Grit had begun to think of what he could do to earn enough money to go west and build some sort of future. Seemed like such thoughts were always on his mind lately. He was paid a fair wage at the quarry, and he was grateful for it. In Michigan he'd never received a penny for the work he'd done. Now he was on his own, and he constantly thought of the best ways to get the most out of life.
  
  "Would you like a piece of pie," the waitress asked as she came to take away their plates. "We have coconut, chocolate and apple."
  
  "Coconut, if you please, ma'am," Grit said.
  
  "I'll have chocolate," Paulie said, looking at Grit for his okay.
  
  Grit nodded, and the waitress brought huge pieces of pie, and they enjoyed every morsel.
  
  "I ain't been this full... well, I can't even remember when," Paulie said.
  
  "I've never had a better slice of pie," Grit said. Of course, he reflected that there hadn't been many times when he'd ever had pie of any kind.
  
  Afterwards, he settled the bill of a dollar and fifty-five cents and left 15 cents as a tip for the young woman who'd served them. He said goodbye to Paulie and headed home to clean up, wash some clothes and read a while. In the new book he'd bought, Phileas Fogg had bet his fellow members of London's Reform Club half his fortune that he could make it around the world in 80 days, and Grit was anxious to see if Phileas really could do it.
  
  The next morning, Grit was up in the dark loading the stove with wood so that he could cook eggs and bacon for breakfast. First he put on the coffee pot and threw in a handful of Arbuckle's Ariosa coffee. It was the newest thing on the market, pre-roasted perfectly and sold in air-tight packages.
  
  While the coffee was boiling, he washed up and got dressed before cooking a half dozen eggs and six strips of bacon. He cut thick slices of bread from the loaf he'd bought at Gimbel's bakery downtown and placed the slices into the fry pan to brown while soaking up the bacon grease.
  
  He fixed his coffee with a touch of cream, a luxury he'd seldom had before, and a chunk of sugar off the loaf, another luxury he'd rarely had in his life. As he ate his breakfast, he idly thought of the fracas he'd had yesterday, not bothered by it but just wondering if the men would give him any more grief.
  
  When he'd been booted from the orphanage in Chicago at the age of 16 for fighting, he'd gotten a variety of labor jobs, and he'd always prided himself on his ability to work hard. In the orphanage, he'd learned to cipher, write legibly and read well. If his compositions were not written just right, or his ciphering not done correctly, Sister Jane would smack his knuckles with a hardwood ruler. But through it all, he'd learned to love to read and could never find enough books to satisfy him, so he read the old ones over and over, finding that he got joy from second and even third readings.
  
  At work that day, Turk never showed, and his crew kept their distance. Grit kept his sandwiches in his coat pocket, which he took down into the quarry with him. He and Paulie worked all morning and were about ready to quit for lunch when the foreman hailed him and asked that he come up. When he'd climbed from the quarry, he saw there was a policeman there.
  
  "Are you Grit Milburn?"
  
  "That's me."
  
  "We've had a complaint filed against you by a Mister Turk Osgood."
  
  "For what?"
  
  "He claims you hit him with a steel pipe and broke his collarbone."
  
  Grit turned around and said, "Paulie, tell 'im what really happened."
  
  "Turk and his two buddies were waiting for us after work with iron pipes," Paulie said. "They came for Grit, but he grabbed the iron pipe from Turk, and turned Turk to protect himself. One of Turk's friends hit Turk with the iron pipe while trying to hit Grit. When Grit faced the two men who were still holding their iron pipes, he tossed the pipe he'd taken from Turk into the woods saying he didn't need an iron pipe to fight them. Grit ran 'em all off and never swung an iron pipe at anybody, and that's the gospel truth of it."
  
  "Well, now, that puts a different light on the story," the policeman said. "Looks like it's his word against yours, but be careful. Turk's father has friends, and his friends are sayin' you hit Turk."
  
  "What Paulie has told you is the truth," Grit said.
  
  "Oh, I believe you, but I'd be careful if I were you."
  
  When they were eating their sandwiches together, Paulie said, "I'm sorry I've got you in trouble, Grit."
  
  "Aw, it's nothin'," Grit said. "Even so, I think I'll be headin' out."
  
  "Goin' where?" Paulie asked.
  
  "I don't know," Grit said. "Somewhere out west, I suppose."
  
  "I know it's a lot to ask, but could I go?"
  
  Grit looked at him. "You got nobody here, no family, nobody?"
  
  "I got my aunt and uncle, but they don't care 'bout me. In fact, they're glad to be rid of me, just like I told ya."
  
  "Okay then, we'll leave Friday after work," Grit said.
  
  "How we gon' travel?"
  
  "Ah, we'll catch a train west."
  
  "I ain't got no money for a train," Paulie said.
  
  "I got some money but not for a train ride. We'll jump into an empty rail car."