“But you put yourself in contact with me,” said the woman. “If you think that that contact is not going to last awhile, you got another thought coming. When I get through with you, sir, you are going to remember Mrs. Luella Bates Washington Jones.”
After Roger's failed attempt at snatching her purse, Mrs. Jones lifts him by the front of his shirt and begins dragging him up the street. In this passage, Mrs. Jones cryptically threatens Roger, warning him that his decision to put himself "in contact" is not without consequences. However threatening she may sound, in truth Mrs. Jones doesn't have punishment in mind but rather a lesson in civility. By the end of the story, Mrs. Jones's words will have proved accurate in that Roger will certainly remember his encounter with her. However, he will remember her for the generosity and understanding she extends to him.
It was about eleven o’clock at night, and she was walking alone, when a boy ran up behind her and tried to snatch her purse. The strap broke with the single tug the boy gave it from behind. But the boy’s weight and the weight of the purse combined caused him to lose his balance so, instead of taking off full blast as he had hoped, the boy fell on his back on the sidewalk, and his legs flew up. The large woman simply turned around and kicked him right square in his blue-jeaned sitter. Then she reached down, picked the boy up by his shirt front, and shook him until his teeth rattled.
In this passage, the narrator outlines Roger's failed attempt at stealing Mrs. Jones's purse. Although he is strong enough to snap the strap off, he is so scrawny and weak that the weight of the purse is enough to knock him off balance. With the literal shift in balance comes a shift in power: having fallen over, Roger is at Mrs. Jones's mercy, and she kicks him in the bottom before lifting him by the shirt. In an instant, the power dynamic has been altered, with an almost cartoonish ironic reversal.
“Then, Roger, you go to that sink and wash your face,” said the woman, whereupon she turned him loose—at last. Roger looked at the door—looked at the woman—looked at the door—and went to the sink.
Having brought Roger to the kitchenette apartment in which she lives, Mrs. Jones instructs the boy to wash his dirty face at the sink. Although he is finally free of the headlock that she used to drag him to her home, Roger does not immediately flee. In this passage, Hughes immerses the reader in the boy's bewildered perspective as he contemplates the options before him. Ultimately, Roger obeys Mrs. Jones, feeling that she is someone he can trust before he fully understands why.
“Here I am trying to get home to cook me a bite to eat and you snatch my pocketbook! Maybe, you ain’t been to your supper either, late as it be. Have you?”
After telling Roger she won't take him to jail, Mrs. Jones speaks in a seemingly contradictory mix of registers: Although she is indignant at Roger for trying to rob her, in the next sentence she expresses concern that he has had no dinner yet. This passage is significant because it shows how Mrs. Jones oscillates between being a formidable antagonist to Roger and being an empathetic stranger who is genuinely concerned for the boy's welfare.
“There’s nobody home at my house,” said the boy.
In response to Mrs. Jones's question about whether he has eaten supper, Roger doesn't say yes or no. Instead, he gives a statement that explains much more about his circumstances. With the admission that there is nobody at Roger's house, the reader and Mrs. Jones understand that Roger lives with little or no parental supervision, his family either having abandoned him or having taken on jobs that involve them working late or away from home. This passage is significant because the detail helps Mrs. Jones confirm her suspicion of the boy's desperation and decide to feed him, despite the crime he tried to commit against her.
In another corner of the room behind a screen was a gas plate and an icebox. Mrs. Jones got up and went behind the screen. The woman did not watch the boy to see if he was going to run now, nor did she watch her purse which she left behind her on the day-bed. But the boy took care to sit on the far side of the room where he thought she could easily see him out of the corner of her eye, if she wanted to. He did not trust the woman not to trust him. And he did not want to be mistrusted now.
After deciding to cook supper for the two of them, Mrs. Jones goes to the area of her room that has been screened off for cooking. Roger realizes he could steal her purse and make a break for the open door, but he wants to prove himself worthy of the trust Mrs. Jones extends to him. Rather than take her purse, the boy politely sits where she can see him.
The boy wanted to say something else other than “Thank you, m’am” to Mrs. Luella Bates Washington Jones, but he couldn’t do so as he turned at the barren stoop and looked back at the large woman in the door. He barely managed to say “Thank you” before she shut the door. And he never saw her again.
In this passage, Hughes concludes "Thank You, Ma'am" by depicting Roger grappling with the generosity Mrs. Jones has shown him. Even though he tried to steal her purse, the boy has left her home with a satiating meal, the ten dollars he needs to buy himself shoes, and a mind full of wisdom. He wants to summon up the gratitude he feels and say something meaningful, but he can barely thank the woman before she shuts the door. The moment suggests that the interaction, as significant as it is for Roger, is commonplace for Mrs. Jones, who has likely shown the same trust and generosity to other people like Roger.
