The story opens on a city street at eleven o’clock at night, as Mrs. Luella Bates Washington Jones walks home with an enormous handbag. Roger, a boy of fourteen or fifteen, runs up behind her and tries to steal her purse, yanking on it so that the strap breaks. However, he loses his balance under its weight and falls. Mrs. Jones kicks Roger then picks him up by the front of his shirt to shake him. She continues to hold onto Roger while ordering him to pick up her purse and hand it to her. She asks Roger if he is ashamed of himself, and he answers yes. When she asks why he did it, he says he does not know, and she says he is lying. A few people stop to watch. She asks if he plans to run if she lets go of him, and since he says yes, she continues to hold him in place by his shirt. Roger whispers that he is sorry. 

Mrs. Jones notes that Roger’s face is dirty and that she is inclined to wash it. She asks if he has anyone at home who keeps him clean, and Roger replies that he does not. Mrs. Jones remarks that if he were her son, she would teach him right from wrong, but at least she can take him home tonight and clean his face. Roger says he just wants her to let him go, but she counters by pointing out that she did not choose to enter his life, he chose to enter hers by grabbing her purse. Roger struggles, but she puts him in a headlock and drags him down the street, into the rooming house where she lives, and down the hall to her rented room. Still holding him around the neck, she asks his name. She orders him to go to the sink and wash his face and finally lets go of him, even though she has left her front door open. Roger looks at the open door, then back at the woman, and then at the open door again. Finally, he walks to the sink to wash his face.

While he washes his face, Roger asks Mrs. Jones if she plans to take him to jail. She answers that she cannot take him anywhere looking so dirty and that she had only been trying to get home to her late supper. She asks if he has eaten, and he says that there is no one at his home, so he has not. Mrs. Jones announces that they will both eat. She says he must be hungry to think it was a good idea to steal her purse. Roger tells her that he really tried to steal it because he wanted a pair of blue suede shoes. Mrs. Jones replies that if that was the case, he could have asked her instead of trying to steal her purse. There is a long pause while Roger considers the open door and realizes it is still possible for him to run. 

Mrs. Jones, now sitting on her bed, tells Roger that she was once young and wanted things she couldn’t get. After a pause, Mrs. Jones says she, too, has done things she’s ashamed of. Mrs. Jones tells Roger to sit down so they can eat. She goes behind a screen where her ice box and hot plate are, leaving her purse on the bed. Roger deliberately sits in such a way that she can see that he is not leaving or stealing her purse. He offers to go to the store if she needs anything, but she says there is no need unless he wants to drink fresh milk. Otherwise, she has canned milk to make cocoa. Roger says that he does not need fresh milk and Mrs. Jones heats up lima beans and ham and puts them on the table with the cocoa. They eat, and rather than asking him questions about his life, she tells him about her job at a hotel beauty parlor. She cuts a cake in half for him and encourages him to eat more, and she calls him son. 

After supper, Mrs. Jones gives Roger ten dollars and tells him to go buy himself a pair of blue suede shoes. She warns him not to try stealing money again, from her or from anyone else, because shoes that he purchases with stolen money will burn his feet. She tells him she wishes him the best but needs her rest as she shows him to the door. Roger wishes he could come up with more to say before she closes the door, but all he manages is, “Thank you, ma’am.” He never sees her again.

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