"It got my knife in his hand." He dropped to his knees and began scrambling about the floor with his one hand, searching for his severed arm. Blood spouted from his jerking stub as though from the nozzle of a hose. Then he lost consciousness and flopped on his face. Two customers turned him over; one tied a necktie as a tourniquet about the bleeding arm, the other inserted a chair leg to tighten it. A waitress and another customer were twisting a knotted towel about Big Smiley's arm. He was still holding the fireman's axe in his right hand, a look of surprise on his face. The white manager stood on top of the bar and shouted, "Please remain seated, folks. Everybody go back to his seat and pay his bill. The police have been called and everything will be taken care of." As though he'd fired a starting gun, there was a race for the door. When Sonny Pickens came out on the sidewalk he saw the big white man looking inside through one of the small front windows. Sonny had been smoking marijuana cigarettes and he was tree-top high. Seen from his drugged eyes, the dark night sky looked bright purple and the dingy smoke-blackened tenements looked like brand new skyscrapers made of strawberry-colored bricks. The neon signs of the bars and pool rooms and greasy spoons burned like phosphorescent fires. He drew a blue steel revolver from his inside coat pocket, spun the cylinder and aimed it at the big white man. His two friends, Rubberlips Wilson and Lowtop Brown, looked at him in pop-eyed amazement. But before either could restrain him, Sonny advanced on the white man, walking on the balls of his feet. "You there!" he shouted. "You the man what's been messing around with my wife." The big white man jerked his head about and saw a pistol. His eyes stretched and the blood drained from his sallow face. "My God, wait a minute!" he cried. "You're making a mistake. All of you folks are confusing me with someone else." "Ain't going to be no waiting now," Sonny said and pulled the trigger.