The colors of the countryside continue to comfort the boys. Ponyboy’s appreciation of these colors—“I loved to look at the colors of the fields and the soft shadings of the horizon”—helps temper his view of the world. Ponyboy better understands that he lives not in a black and white world, a world that is either greaser or Soc exclusively, but in a world with many layers in between these two extremes. The colors of the countryside help Pony with this realization. In the city, he was on the same path to understanding, drawn to the beauty of sunsets. Speaking to Ponyboy, Johnny admits, “I never noticed colors and clouds and stuff until you kept reminding me about them.”
Ponyboy recites a poem that he has memorized, Nothing Gold Can Stay, by Robert Frost. The fact that he has committed this poem to memory is another clue to his character’s depth. This poem symbolizes the death of his parents, the goodness of life with them, and the inevitability that all of life will change.
Reciting this poem to Johnny allows Pony to admit that there is still more to understand about not only himself but the world. The colors in the world around him help him see the contrasts present in the world—although sometimes overlooking them is easier. Ponyboy explains, “I liked my books and clouds and sunsets. Dally was so real he scared me.” Dally is as real as any sunset, but he is frightening and, therefore, safer for Ponyboy to overlook.
The poem Nothing Gold Can Stay creates another bond between Johnny and Ponyboy. Pony confides to Johnny that he couldn’t have recited that poem to any of the other gang members, except maybe his brother, Soda. Johnny understands and offers the conclusion that maybe the two of them are just different from the others; Pony disagrees and says that, no, maybe the rest of the gang are the ones who are different.
Ponyboy’s family life with Darry and Sodapop, a life that had seemed so unfair to him, seems more perfect now that he is a fugitive and an outsider to the family. He sincerely misses his brothers. Note that his first questions to Dally when Dally arrives are not about his and Johnny’s plight but about Soda.
Hinton uses the reflective narration technique to lead the reader in many different directions. She encourages readers to be sympathetic toward the boys because of the conditions in which they are living, but makes clear that Johnny did kill a young man.
In this chapter, Johnny reminds Ponyboy of this fact and the implications of Bob’s death. Even though Ponyboy does not want to recognize the consequences of this act, Hinton uses this technique to remind readers to do just that: “Then for the first time since Dally and I had sat down behind those girls at the Nightly Double, I relaxed. We could take whatever was coming now.”
And, just when the reader believes that the foreshadowing in previous chapters has led to the worst the characters must endure, Hinton slips in another piece of foreshadowing in the line, “. . . if that old church ever caught fire there’d be no stopping it.” Combine this statement with her tease at the end of the chapter—the discovery that Cherry is a spy for the greasers—and the reader is efficiently lured into turning the next page.
