15 November

A diary is but a partial thing.

The trees have shuddered free their bright leaves, and the bent skeletons greet me again, for this is the season I most long toward. All bares itself now. I think at my best in these months, for nothing shrouds the shape of the world in late autumn. The black lines of tree trunks border the stubbled brown fields, and the dark blue of the sky borders the trees, their tops poking into that fabric. Snow will bring shadows and half-buried objects, but for this month, I rest myself within the clearest eye of the land. What I see out here beyond my window contrasts against the newly hidden nature of our house life. I cannot describe what occurs, as nothing seems to—in reality, nothing has changed—but for this feathery inquisitive silence that flutters up as I walk into rooms, as if I seem suddenly to be possessed of a certain knowledge I do not have, and am regarded now with an uncommon attention by Mother, strange for being new, but not at all unpleasant.

(70 drops today)

28 November

Ludlow Thomas is very quiet. Mother unwell.

(80 drops)

1 December

Mother unwell. Abby to town.

(87 drops)

2 December

We were hard at work unraveling the worn dining room carpet’s border and did not hear her enter the room.

“Why are you not at your studies?” she asked angrily.

We both jumped and looked over our shoulders at Mother, who stood above us in her best navy blue silk, like an elegant ghost, her white face floating above the dark collar. I did not know what to answer. Sue smiled at Mother and reminded her of the list of winter chores she had written up for us last spring after the cleaning. Mother crossed the room to slide herself, bustle and all, in between the arms on Father’s chair, then leaned her head against its high upholstered back. Susannah looked down again at the work in her hands. I ventured nothing, and did nothing.

“Susannah!”

Susannah shook a little and looked back at Mother. “Yes, Mother?”

“What is your opinion on women’s suffrage?”

“On suffrage, Mother!”

“Yes, Susannah.” Mother leaned her elbows on the chair arms and pressed her fingertips together before her, looking every bit the schoolmarm then.

Susannah did not immediately respond, hoping, I think, that this question was a passing fancy of Mother’s.

“Susannah?”

She squirmed and briefly looked at me. “Women should have the vote, Mother.”

“Exactly. Why so?”

A tear fell onto Sue’s cheek, though she did not wipe it away. “We are citizens of a democracy,” Sue replied woodenly.

“Very good. And the freedmen?”

“And the darkies—”

“Tut!”

“And the freedmen also,” Sue whispered. And Mother smiled encouragingly, as if she and Sue were engaged in an actual discussion at which cool Reason sat between and nodded while they spoke. I sat so frozen, I could not unbend my fingers from around the needle. And Mother had turned to me.