Joyland

As the bunting-draped afternoon of July Fourth wore on, I was excused from all other duties. I'd do my capering, then retreat to Joyland Under and collapse on the ratty old couch in the boneyard for a while, soaking up the air conditioning. When I felt revived, I'd use the alleys to get to the costume shop and swap one fur for the other. Between shifts I guzzled pints of water and quarts of unsweetened iced tea. You won't believe I was having fun, but I was. Even the brats were loving me that day.

So: quarter to four in the afternoon. I'm jiving down Joyland Avenue-our midway-while the overhead speakers blast out Daddy Dewdrop's "Chick-A-Boom, Chick-A-Boom, Don'tcha Just Love It." I'm giving out hugs to the kiddies and Awesome August coupons to the adults, because Joyland's business always dropped off as the summer wound down. I'm posing for pictures (some taken by Hollywood Girls, most by hordes of sweatsoaked, sunburned Parent Paparazzi), and trailing adoring kids after me in cometary splendor. I'm also looking for the nearest door to Joyland Under, because I'm pretty well done up. I have just one more turn as Howie scheduled today, because Howie the Happy Hound never shows his blue eyes and cocked ears after sundown. I don't know why; it was just a show tradition.

Did I notice the little girl in the red hat before she fell down on the baking pavement of Joyland Avenue, writhing and jerking?

I think so but can't say for sure, because passing time adds false memories and modifies real ones. I surely wouldn't have noticed the Pup-A-Licious she was waving around, or her bright red Howie dogtop; a kid at an amusement park with a hotdog is hardly a unique sighting, and we must have sold a thousand red Howie hats that day. If I did notice her, it was because of the doll she held curled to her chest in the hand not holding her mustard-smeared Pup. It was a big old Raggedy Ann. Madame Fortuna had suggested I be on the lookout for a little girl with a doll only two days before, so maybe I did notice her. Or maybe I was only thinking of getting off the midway before I fell down in a faint. Anyway, her doll wasn't the problem. The Pup-A Licious she was eating-that was the problem.

I only think I remember her running toward me (hey, they all did), but I know what happened next, and why it happened.

She had a bite of her Pup in her mouth, and when she drew in breath to scream HOWWWIE, she pulled it down her throat.

Hot dogs: the perfect choking food. Luckily for her, just enough of Rozzie Gold's Fortuna bullshit had stuck in my head for me to act quickly.

When the little girl's knees buckled, her expression of happy ecstasy turning first to surprise and then terror, I was already reaching behind me and grabbing the zipper with my pawglove. The Howie-head tumbled off and lolled to the side, revealing the red face and sweat-soaked, clumpy hair of Mr.

Devin Jones. The little girl dropped her Raggedy Ann. Her hat fell off. She began clawing at her neck.

"Hallie?" a woman cried. "Hallie, what's wrong?"

Here's more Luck in Action: I not only knew what was wrong,

I knew what to do. I'm not sure you'll understand how fortunate that was. This is 1973 we're talking about, remember, and Henry Heimlich would not publish the essay that would give the Heimlich Maneuver its name for another full year. Still, it's always been the most commonsense way to deal with choking, and we had learned it during our first and only orientation session before beginning work in the UNH Commons. The teacher was a tough old veteran of the restaurant wars who had lost his Nashua coffee shop a year after a new McDonald's went up nearby.

"Just remember, it won't work if you don't do it hard," he told us. "Don't worry about breaking a rib if you see someone dying in front of you."

I saw the little girl's face turning purple and didn't even think about her ribs. I seized her in a vast, furry embrace, with my tail-pulling left paw jammed against the bony arch in her midsection where her ribs came together. I gave a single hard squeeze, and a yellow-smeared chunk of hotdog almost two inches long came popping out of her mouth like a cork from a champagne bottle. It flew nearly four feet. And no, I didn't break any of her ribs. Kids are flexible, God bless 'em.

I wasn't aware that I and Hallie Stansfield-that was her name-were hemmed in by a growing circle of adults. I certainly wasn't aware that we were being photographed dozens of times, including the shot by Erin Cook that wound up in the Heaven's Bay Weekly and several bigger papers, including the Wilmington Star-News. I've still got a framed copy of that photo in an attic box somewhere. It shows the little girl dangling in the arms of this weird man/dog hybrid with one of its two heads lolling on its shoulder. The girl is holding out her arms to her mother, perfectly caught by Erin's Speed Graphic just as Mom collapses to her knees in front of us.