Darren knocked again on the screen door with the chipped yellow paint, listening for the sound of footsteps. The baby was home, at least. Darren could hear his squeals and the cheerful chirping of some children’s TV program. He hoped it would be Margaret who opened the door and not Donald or his son. But it was Virginia, Donald’s wife. She had her sister-in-law Sadie’s baby on her hip. She gave Darren a terse smile, and sucked her teeth as she said, “E’-nah is inside.” She stepped back to let Darren through, eyeing him as he took off his hat inside the house. The dining-room table and every piece of furniture in the front parlor were covered in fabric in some stage of transformation. Dresses nearly done, shawls with fringes being mended, the baby’s moccasins that his mother was sewing up the toes on. Even Ray, Donald’s son, had a sewing machine in front of him and was carefully sewing a strip of ribbon across a man’s turquoise shirt. He looked at Darren but didn’t speak. The colors—oceanic blues and buttercup yellows, rose pinks and the red of life itself, of the dirt of East Texas—and the bustle of activity looked festive at first. But it was the slow, mournful tuning of Donald’s guitar that kept the energy in the house down to a low pitch. Margaret’s son was tucked into a corner with a few other cousins and friends, preparing instruments, waiting for something to start. Margaret emerged from a back room wearing a brick-red dress and carrying a fringed white shawl embroidered with red flowers and bits of blue and green. Her graying hair was pulled into a single braid that was crowned by a round silver comb that wrapped around the back of her head. The braid itself was threaded through with ribbons, bits of leather, and beads. She looked at Darren and put her hand to her chest. “Leroy is okay?”

“Last I heard, yes.”

“If he will hold on, the spirits are coming. We start the Vine Dance at sunset, borrowed from our Cherokee brothers and sisters to bring health and wholeness for Leroy, the last of his tribe. We will dance for days in prayer.”

“Mrs. Goodfellow.”

“Margaret, please. Or tayshas…for friend,” she said with a smile.

“Tayshas,” he repeated, hearing his whole world in that one word. Texas. Friend. “What exactly did Leroy tell you about the sale of this land?”

“That we would be protected.”

“By having the land established as a Caddo reservation?”

Margaret turned to Donald and said, “Go get the papers from above my bed, son.” As he stood, the notes of his guitar faded like fog at dawn.

Darren heard the buzz of Ray’s sewing machine and also someone banging pots and pans in the kitchen. He smelled roasting squash and again the smoky scent of those black-charred beans, the onion and chili powder.