“Look.” He took one hand off the reins and Mister Leland could feel it behind him going through his father’s pockets and then coming out again, heard then tissue paper sizzling and then his father’s hand was coming out from behind him, reaching over his shoulder and he saw the package. “Open it; I want you to see it.” Mister Leland took it, undid the paper, and saw a scarf of yellow silk—somehow he knew it was silk because it was finer, smoother, more delicate than any cloth he had ever seen—with a tiny sewn border like a tube. He held it up and felt it even lighter than the slight wind blowing; it flew bravely, elegantly in that wind. “Yellow’s her favorite color and she likes nice things. I bought it with some of that twenty dollars. Say, you want me to hold that five you got?” And then he added, “You don’t have to give it to me if you ain’t a mind to. It’s yours.” But Mister Leland had already gone into his overall pocket, pulled out the money, and handed it to his father. “I’ll save it for you so you’ll have plenty when the circus comes to New Marsails.” The boy nodded.

His father told his mother he had made twenty dollars fixing a rich tourist’s flat tire, then gave her the scarf. She cried into it, and kissed it and wore it at supper. She looked prettier than Mister Leland had ever seen her.

—

SATURDAY they did not go into town. Mister Leland thought they might, that there might be more to see, but when he asked whether they were going, his father answered, “No; chances are all we’d see would be more Negroes with suitcases going away, and besides, we left your ma here alone for two days, and I figure it’d be a good idea if we stuck around and did everything she asks us, else she might get a little testy and mean. And she’d be right when you think on it, seeing as she been doing all the things we should-a been doing and that weren’t very kind of us. I reckon we’ll stay home today.”