Chapter Eight
The storm had continued through the night and left the streets dank and sullen, dying Alfred’s morning a lonelier hue than before. Now taking the earliest of morning measurements, Alfred was the first in the wash room and the only one at the breakfast table as he ate. Mrs. Poplar had insisted on cooking him breakfast despite the much earlier hour, and he hadn’t had the energy to argue. His stomach was full and his body buzzing with caffeine as he bicycled toward the business district, crisscross dirty avenues and smeared sidewalks that were coated with the silt of flooded landscaped gardens and work yards. The earliest trollies wouldn’t run until closer to six-fifteen, which sped up his commute as he whizzed down Church Street and took a sharp turn onto 23rd Street. With onl
