Missie Mae has a beautiful baby boy. Joe’s mother came to their home to assist with the birth and the house(258). Joes mother informs him that the boy looks just as Joe did when he was a baby(259). Joe must have done many hours of soul searching that week after his son was born. He now had a son that was his and a wife who even though she betrayed him, loved him. You can almost see Joe thinking and hoping, wanting things the way they were. Joe Banks, an unusual man. A man who can forgive his wife for her infidelity, a man who can reach down inside himself into his very soul and say, “I forgive you woman, completely.” I could almost feel Missie Mae’s heart pounding when the ring of silver dollars on wood hit her floor, fifteen times(259).

o be dead than for you to have de toothache” he told Missie Mae(253). I tried to imagine what a woman would really feel like, to have a man actually feel this way about her. He would rather see millions of women than to see your wife have a toothache. My first impulse was, how pathetic are you? I had to stop and ask myself what the real problem was. Jealousy. A dangerous emotion, but, one I actually felt for a few seconds. Missie Mae was a lucky woman to have a man like Joe.

How far would you be willing to go to make your mate happy? We all make concessions to our significant other all in the name of love. But, what if you thought the only way your mate was going to be happy was if he had gold? You are poor and there is no way for you to get it for him or her. Joe unknowingly set events into motion he could not possibly imagine. His fascination with the gold gave Missy Mae the false impression that this was what he needed to make him happy. “Ah can’t hold no candle to Otis D. Slemmons” Joe told Missie Mae, “Ah ain’t never been nowhere and I ain’t got nuthin”(255). Imagine leaving your job going home early and finding your wife in bed with another man. That’s exactly what

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