But the fire had established itself; it was not likely to shrink to nothing at the slightest breeze, nor did it seem destined to extinguish itself. It was real, alive, and I leapt off the porch and onto the tall unkempt grass that distinguished the Butterfields’ patch of lawn. I turned back for a moment to look at the house, gothically eccentric, a New England frame house in the middle of Chicago, then at the softly lighted living room window, still empty of curious faces, and then at the stack of newspapers, gauzy now behind the first sheet of smoke and capped by a rooster comb of flame. And then I ran.

The Butterfield house was on Blackstone in the Hyde Park section of Chicago. I ran north, knees locked, toward 57th Street. As far as I remember, I passed no one. And no passer-by walked near the Butterfields to notice those smoldering papers. Hyde Park had not yet turned into an indoor society because of crime- fear. You still had accidental meetings in the street, and though the University of Chicago already had its own private police force and a separate busline to transport students around the neighborhood, Hyde Park was an open, busy place, even at night. (Jade and I, before her parents accepted our love affair and all of its inflexible demands, often walked those streets at two, three, even four in the morning, leaning on parked cars to kiss, embracing and even lying on top of each other on darkened porch stoops, and we never felt unsafe—our only fear was interruption.) But that night, when one watchful pedestrian could have changed everything, I had that long block to myself.

When I reached 57th Street, I went into the second stage of my plan. I paced slowly on the corner for perhaps a minute—though knowing my tendency to rush when I’m uncertain, it was probably less time than that. Then, while trying to invent a quick, plausible excuse for being on that block in case Jade or any other Butterfield asked me, I walked south, retracing my tin-soldier steps back to their house.