Touch the Throne

MISTER CAINBRIDGE WAS a West Indian merchant
who owned a small grocery store in Harlem. From
early morning to late evening he sat in front of his store next
to the vegetables, on a wooden milk crate with a faded pillow
on top that served as a cushion.
There, six days a week, beneath the heavy brown canvas
awning, cranked down over the store window, he sat,
representing an approachable throne of earthly grace, where
a familiar face was trusted to buy food on credit, and during
these depressive days of 1938, everybody needed a little extra
time to pay for food.