I brought out a list of names from the first census made after the War, in 1870, in hopes that Mrs. Richardson would recognize some of them, people who would have been old when she was a child, but her face fell. Mrs. Richardson's eyes looked away, and she was silent. She closed her mouth and her smile went flat. I had embarrassed her. She made a fist.
Some people keep their hand boxed up.
I don't box 'em up. Mrs. Richardson's mood lightened. I was christened in Com'ntee church. Plenty people still went to that church when I was a girl. We used to walk from Sawmill to go to Com'ntee, bare feet and carry our shoes, going to church.