Green-Thumb Boy

Dr. L. H. Pammel Hybridization, cross-breeding, evolution: He takes to new theories like a puppy takes to ice cream. We whisper that our Green-Thumb Boy is the black Mendel, that Darwin would have made good use of Carver's eyes. So clear his gift for observation: the best collector I've ever known. I think we have an entirely new species of Pseudocercospora. And always in his threadbare lapel a flower. Even in January. I've never asked how. We had doubts about giving him a class to teach, but he's done a bang-up job with the greenhouse. His students see the light of genius through the dusky window of his skin. Just yesterday, that new boy, what's-his-name, from Arkansas, tried to raise a ruckus when Carver put his dinner tray down. He cleared his throat, stared, rattled his own tray, scraped his chair legs in a rush to move away. Carver ate on in silence. Then the boys at the table the new boy had moved to cleared their throats, rattled their trays and scraped their chair legs as they got up and moved to Carver's table. Something about the man does that, raises the best in you. I've never asked what. I guess I'll put his name next to mine on that article I'm sending out.