There was no railing around the grave, and it became a sort of focus or meeting place because everyone knew just where it was, like a well in the country or a courthouse in a town. Children played around it; lovers met there before going off into the night to their secret places. Floyd and Leon frequently sat on the grave, smoking pipes or not, talking of any and every thing, large and small. It was more than a year after Ezra died that Leon and Floyd together had bought the marble slab and head- and foot-stones, for the first two years after the fire had been hard ones, in spite of Penelope’s generosity, years when every penny was needed to pay off debts.

Tonight Floyd did not sit, for it was cool and getting cold, and he was restless. He squatted briefly, hand on the headstone, both to steady himself and to touch his father. He talked to Ezra often in his mind, not in a sentimental way, although certainly in a loving and trusting one. He would often think: Now, Papa, what do you think, what would you do? If another thought answered him, fine; if not, fine.

Death and graves were formalities that set limits, but consciousness flew everywhere. Right now he rubbed the headstone on one spot until it took a little warmth from his palm, but his thoughts asked nothing, confided nothing. He got up and went on to his house, where he found Roman in the kitchen shaving. They did not use the room as a kitchen, because both ate in the back-dining room of the big house; so their kitchen had become a washing-dressing room.

“Evening, Dude,” Floyd said, coming in and banging the back door.

“Mm.” Roman held his mouth in a grimace like a silent cry as he shaved his chin and, last thing, his upper lip. Then he rinsed his face in a bowl of fresh water and dried it.

“You and Mr. Proctor got a duet planned for tonight?” Floyd asked, his voice innocent.

Roman whipped the towel he had just used at Floyd, catching him on the forearm. “Ow! That stings.”

Roman laughed and rolled his sleeves down, fitting silver links into the cuffs. They had been a gift from Sarah on his twenty-first birthday, along with his official papers of freedom. “You having a little ball of your own?” Roman said.

Floyd smiled. “Thought of it. There’s a girl got me on her mind.”

“Is she on yours?”

“You know better. Not on my mind’s mind. Just on my dick’s mind.”

“Make her happy and pleasure yourself,” Roman said, fitting a tie under his collar and tying a bow.

“Meow when you come in,” Floyd said. “If I don’t bark back, it means I won’t see you till in the morning. This girl is widowed, and she says her bed is cold.”

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