Summary of Chapter 10 (Rebecca Ashley)

This chapter mainly talks about a boy Frankie and his story with Doc.

Frankie was a nice, good, kind boy having some little problem with coordination and was not able to learn so he was not accepted by schools. His dad was dead and his mom was staying with his uncles who treated him in a really bad way so Frankie began to like working for Doc during the day time and he sometimes slept in the excelsior crate when there was a crisis at home.

Frankie had nothing good to wear so Doc bought him clothing and Frankie became Doc’s slave but Frankie actually liked working for Doc. Although he was trying hard to help Doc group the crayfish, he could not do it. When Frankie finally found that he could not grade the crayfish, he went to the excelsior box and spent a whole afternoon in it. But there is also something Frankie learned to do like lighting Doc’s cigars so he always wanted Doc to smoke.

Another thing Frankie liked was the parties. He loved to hide behind his chair and listened to the conversations and always tried his best to understand those conversations. And then one day, he offered a young woman a beer and received a ‘Thank you’ from that young woman and ‘Frankie is a great help to me’ from Doc. Those two sentences sort of lighten up Frankie’s word because he probably had never received a compliment like those before. It was probably because he loved receiving compliment so much that he decided to serve that young woman again. He carefully prepared for a long time and went to that young woman again. But that was the moment his coordinate collapsed and everything he had on his hands collapsed into that young woman’s lap. After being silent for a moment, Frankie rushed out of the scene to his excelsior, scrabbling hollowly and started to whimper.

Frankie was a really nice boy and he really wanted to be accepted by people around. He cared a lot about what other people thought about him like we can see from his reaction from Doc saying his hands were dirty. He really wanted a family, a peaceful place for him to stay but until he worked for Doc, he didn’t have a place like that. He also wanted to make things right and he really didn’t want to fail in doing something and that is probably the reason why he felt so bad when he was not able to grade the crayfish and felt so good when he could light Doc’s cigar. He wasn’t able to do a lot of things and he was aware of that, yet he still want to be useful and he felt so great when receiving compliment from that young lady and Doc. He liked to be useful but he ruined everything after that collapse, which eventually made Frankie himself collapse.