Page 34 - Daphne Hart - 89 and Feeling Fine

legs—it was broken. He took it apart and fixed it before
leaving for school, and it worked perfectly ever since.

He also fixed many other things.

Before we had a telephone, he would run wire through

two empty cans of condensed milk and go a far distance

away, and we could still hear him talking to us. He was
such a genius. But like me, he didn’t get the chance.

The first time we heard a car passing, we were amazed.
So, whenever we heard it coming, we would race up to

the road to look at it—smoke gushing from the back,

sounding like gunshots, and the air stinking of gasoline.

It was many years later that a truck would pass by. Then

an old, rickety bus started coming through, picking up
people to take to Mandeville. You took your life in your

hands when you got on that bus. They wouldn’t just run

out of gas—sometimes they ran out of water to cool the
engine down.

I never rode on it because I couldn’t stand the smell of
the gasoline. So, we would walk—nine miles to

Mandeville, or eight miles to Cross Keys, or eight miles

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