Sugar was overcome with mirth. Nodding his head and laughing heartily, he ducked back into the barn.

Edna took up the reins and made a short turn of the buggy. Then she paused, holding the reins. “It’s made me feel s’much better coming to see you!” she said gaily with a good show of her more customary spirit.

“Come any time, Miss Edna. And come soon now for our—for our cemetery drill! You hear?”

Edna nodded, smiled, slapped the reins lightly on the horse’s back, and started him off at a walk. Sarah followed for a few paces until Edna turned in her seat and called, “How’s the baby? I meant to ask earlier!”

“She’s well and fine! Rachel is fine!” Sarah called back.

Edna laughed her pleasure and approval and set the horse, who knew her ways at least as well as she knew his, into a quick trot down the drive.

20

The two days before Thanksgiving were busy ones. Eighteen turkeys were killed and dressed and roasted in the ovens of the main house, along with scores of pumpkin pies. These were for slaves’ holiday eating, since most of their cabins had no oven to accommodate a big turkey.

On Thanksgiving Day the family’s turkey and a ham were cooked before and during the time the family drove in to church in Highboro. The old coach was used as the only vehicle large enough to transport with dignity Leon and Sarah, Selma and Penelope and Lauretta. There was more room than they expected to have, because half an hour before they were to set off, Lauretta called Sarah into her room and told her she did not feel well enough to go along. She had a headache, and she thought her heart was beating too fast. In any event, she had better lie down while they were gone, she said, and hoped to feel well enough to join them at the dinner table when they returned. She wanted no assistance or attention, she declared, when Sarah offered first to stay with her, and when that was refused, to ask Lovey to look in on her.

So, off to church went the family, leaving Lauretta behind in her room. Juanita watched them drive away, standing at the window of the nursery with Rachel in her arms and lifting and waving one of the baby’s hands at them as they rolled off. They did not see her, and as if to console her, Juanita said to Rachel, “Never you mind, one day you be riding in that old coach, big as anybody!” Lauretta continued to lie down in her room for about an hour, and then quite suddenly, as if having received a cue, she got up and began to move around the room, briskly sorting clothes.