Everyone laughed, and Juanita obligingly slipped off one of Rachel’s bootees. Annabel counted the toes carefully, her lips moving, but no sound coming from her. Adam was staring at Rachel’s head, and when Annabel had satisfied herself in her count, he exclaimed, “Look at her little ears!” They all did, and no one laughed, although only Juanita seemed to be unsurprised at the boy’s having picked the baby’s ears for special comment. They were perfectly formed. Juanita, who knew the baby better than anyone else, beamed at the boy and suggested generously, “You can touch one if you be gentle.”

Adam pointed his index finger carefully, closer and closer to the baby’s head. Finger touched ear. The boy stared at the baby. The baby suddenly cried, as everyone else laughed, and the party broke up. Sarah walked out with them and saw them cram themselves and each other into one large carriage, with much laughter and shouting and a heated discussion of who had sat on whose lap on the way over and what promises had been made of lap-space for the return.

As they drove away, Sarah called after them, “You all look like a big basket of puppies!” Their laughter at this came back to her until the carriage rounded a curve in the drive. Alone in the front yard, Sarah missed and envied the good cheer of the departing family party. Even Bonard had been jokey and lighthearted, and charming with his young nieces and nephews. When she went into the house, Sarah heard from Juanita that Lauretta had gone off to her room “with the headache.”

Most of their county neighbors made a visit, or at least a casual stopping-by on their way to or from town. Late autumn was not a season when work pressed. After a busy summer there was time for people to lift their heads from their hands and look about them, to remember friends, enemies, and acquaintances, and even to talk to them of matters nothing to do with crops and livestock. There were dances, planned and impromptu, and all manner of other country frolics, such as cane grindings and syrup making, candy pullings—and one hasty marriage to accommodate a surprise pregnancy—all these were occasions of social exchange, which included old quarrels as well as new flirtations. Because of Lauretta’s advanced pregnancy when she arrived at Beulah Land, the menfolk among the Kendrick acquaintance were not expected to come calling before the child was born, and the women were too busy preserving foods and dealing with other matters related to harvest time. They all came now to pay their respects to mother and child.