In a nearly empty train coach, a charming male passenger, smoking a cigar, sits beside a young boy and his mother. The boy is looking for witches, and the inquisitive stranger asks him if he has seen many. The boy does not answer the question, instead saying his father smokes cigars. All men do that, the stranger replies, and a rapport is immediately established between them. The boy responds to every question put to him with a lie. He says his name is Mr. Jesus and that he is twenty-six. The mother offers the truth. His name is Johnny, and he is four. To the stranger’s question about the age of Johnny’s baby sister, who has been playing with her rattle when she is not crying and laughing, Johnny responds she is twelve and a half. When the man asks Johnny if he loves his sister, Johnny does not answer. Then the man asks if Johnny wants to hear about the man’s sister. Excited, Johnny asks if she was a witch. “Maybe,” the man responds. The little boy laughs as the man begins, “Once upon a time,” a phrase that seems to reassure the anxious mother, who has obviously been wondering about this stranger’s attention to her son. Then the man explains that he put his hands around his sister’s neck,

“And I pinched her and I pinched her until she was dead.”

The little boy gasped and the mother turned around, her smile fading. She opened