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When she turned from the stove and bent to set the cup beside Joe’s plate, she saw the yellow coin on the table between them.
She slumped into her seat and wept into her arms.
Presently Joe said calmly, “Missie May, you cry too much. Don’t look back lak Lot’s wife and turn to salt.”

The morning after Joe discovers Missie May and Slemmons in bed together, their charged conversation in the kitchen reveals the uncertain status of their marriage. Missie May is bereft with remorse when she sees the coin, and even though Joe left it out to have an effect on her, he seems surprised by her crying. Joe makes a biblical reference to the story of Lot’s wife who turns to a pillar of salt after looking back at the city of Gomorrah even though Lot instructed her not to. The line is ironic because Missie May has already betrayed her husband by breaking her marriage vows, but it is also hopeful because it implies that Joe intends to forgive Missie May. This will ultimately prove to be true, but at this juncture in the story it only reveals that Joe believes there is no point in looking back on the past because it cannot be changed.

There were no more Saturday romps. No ringing silver dollars to stack beside her plate. No pockets to rifle. In fact, the yellow coin in his trousers was like a monster hiding in the cave of his pockets to destroy her.

After the climax of the story, Slemmons’s gilded coin haunts Joe and Missie May’s home as a symbol of betrayal, pain, and false idols. Joe no longer treats Missie May with love and warmth because her betrayal has fractured their marriage. In place of the sweets and treats Joe once kept for her in his pockets, he keeps Slemmons’s gilded coin as a reminder to himself and Missie May of their broken marriage. Missie May views the coin as a monster even before discovering that it is gilded and not gold. The coin’s presence is a punishment that reminds her of her betrayal on a daily basis.

You oughter be mighty proud cause he sho is de spittin’ image of yuh, son. Dat’s yourn all right, if you never git another one, dat un is yourn. And you know Ah’m mighty proud too, son, cause Ah never thought well of you marryin’ Missie May cause her ma used tuh fan her foot round right smart and Ah been mighty skeered dat Missie May wuz gointer git misput on her road.

Near the end of the story, after Missie May gives birth to a son, Joe’s mother reveals why she has never liked Missie May. Joe’s mother implies that Missie May’s mother was promiscuous and that she believed Missie May would take after her. In the same breath, Joe’s mother claims the new baby looks exactly like Joe. There is dramatic irony in this statement because Joe’s mother is unaware of Missie May’s infidelity but Joe and the reader are. Despite Joe’s mother’s insistence that the baby looks like Joe, the quote still creates ambiguity surrounding who the baby’s father truly is. However, the quote also spurs Joe to reinvest himself in his marriage and new family, implying he either believes the child is his own or has decided it doesn’t matter and he will raise him as his own regardless.

Joe got his candy and left the store. The clerk turned to the next customer. “Wisht I could be like these darkies. Laughin’ all the time. Nothin’ worries ’em.”

One of the last scenes in the story occurs when Joe visits a shop he frequents in nearby Orlando. This scene takes Joe out of the relative safety that is the all-Black town of Eatonville. While the shopkeeper is pleasant to Joe’s face, inquiring after his gilded coin and seeming interested in his answer, he immediately reveals his racism and lack of judgment when Joe leaves. The irony in this excerpt is a powerful statement against stereotypes of the happy slave and the minstrel shows that were popular at the time by presenting Joe as a complex and multi-faceted individual who is experiencing and processing pain and betrayal.

Next section The Deceptiveness of Appearances

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