Page 32

By Jack Joseph Smith

8 Mr. Hyde I presume was the way this good nurse did it. Gibbons would always have the Hyde's as friend as alley. Second Hyde down had come into a doctor death scene once. He actually waited ten minutes for the folks in charge to forget about an autograph, and then after reason wasn't good enough any more, Dr. Jim Hyde ripped the place apart. The young man died. Hyde would carry that sadness with him through the leathing mills, the horses in some Green County fields, and those who could understand that he really didn't want to fight in country bars. Coma is finished. I saw him on the street when he was fifteen. He wore blue and white all over, except that his hair and eyes and shoes were black. So the Hyde's left the place alone. Second Hyde said right out: "Everybody knows that I ripe doen pants in hospitals. Gibbons is in trouble." Up in the hall Jim Hyde has not called his older or younger brother. "No. I leave here now. Listen that I have seen. Gibbons is mad as we. There is no more room. But as the toughest family in Mount Lebanon we we wish well too." What did Hyde the second mean when Gibbons was dying? "I ment that he had no family to speak of and I did. It made me defen- sive, it made him crazy." I realize that he is stronger, but I can not help him." Actually the few people Gibvons had ever thought about in his dreams included the three Hydes. He loved to watch them take risks. Sweet things like flying into metal shop and playing at the walls off the big north windows at the same time.

Original Scan

Page 32

AI Interpretation

GPT

Jim Hyde recalls losing a young man in another hospital and explains that his own family made him defensive about Gibbons's lack of family support.

He says Gibbons is stronger but beyond his help. Gibbons remembers the three Hydes with affection for their dangerous behavior around the metal shop and north windows.


Claude

The page sketches the Hydes, 'the toughest family in Mount Lebanon': Dr. Jim Hyde once 'ripped the place apart' at a death scene and carries that sadness 'through the / leathing mills', and Hyde the second declines to stay, saying 'Gibbons is mad as we.' He explains 'he had no family to speak of and I did. It made me defen- / sive, it made him crazy', and the page closes on Gibvons loving to watch the three Hydes 'take risks' such as 'flying into metal / shop and playing at the walls off the big north windows'.

Loyalty and distance sit side by side: the Hydes are friends and allies, yet the second brother says 'I can not / help him.' Family is the dividing line, with Hyde's belonging set against Gibbons's lack of it. The voice shifts between reported scene, dialogue and a first-person memory ('I saw him on the street when he was fifteen'), keeping the draft's loose, overheard quality.