“And I laughed because everything was laughter. There was the smell of
fresh earth and yellow dust, and a great pile that was a mountain of
gold (like Pop is going to find); and the gold spouted downward from a
pipe in the sky, falling around my head, mounting above my feet like
golden sand, above my waist and shoulders. And I was looking into the
man’s eyes, far above, and he was looking down into mine, and I knew
that we were playing a game, that he was going to hide me beneath the
gold; and I could not understand why Mom came racing across the field
nor why the man’s teeth bared like a frightened dog’s. But I knew that
everything was good, and I laughed.”

—Jim Thompson, Now and On Earth, 1942.