THE BALLAD OF THE SAD CAFE

In the small master-piece which gives its title to this collection, a simple triangle of unrequited love is magically transmuted into a miniature epic with the melancholy atmosphere of a ballad. For this is the tale of Miss Amelia, gaunt and lonely owner of a small-town store; and how she squandered her love on Cousin Lymon, the little strutting hunchback who turned the store into a café; and how her rejected husband, Marvin Macy, the meanest man in town, came back and stole the hunchback's heart; and of the gargantuan fight that followed.