“Well, I hopes he does,” Aunt Hager said. “But I’d rather he’d be ugly ’fore he turns out anything like that good-for-nothing Jimboy what comes here an’ stays a month, goes away an’ stays six, an’ don’t hit a tap o’ work ’cept when he feels like it. If it wasn’t for Annjee, don’t know how we’d eat, ’cause Sandy’s father sho don’t do nothin’ to support him.”

All the colored people in Stanton knew that Hager bore no love for Jimboy Rogers, the tall good-looking yellow fellow whom her second daughter had married.

“First place, I don’t like his name,” she would say in private. “Who ever heard of a nigger named Jimboy, anyhow? Next place, I ain’t never seen a yaller dude yet that meant a dark woman no good—an’ Annjee is dark!” Aunt Hager had other objections, too, although she didn’t like to talk evil about folks. But what she probably referred to in her mind was the question of his ancestry, for nobody knew who Jimboy’s parents were.

“Sandy, look out for the house while I run down an’ see how is Mis’ Gavitt’s niece. An’ you-all play outdoors. Don’t bring no chillen in, litterin’ up de place.” About eleven o’clock Aunt Hager pulled a dust-cap over her head and put on a clean white apron. “Here, tie it for me, chile,” she said, turning her broad back. “An’ mind you don’t hurt yo’self on no rusty nails and rotten boards left from de storm. I’ll be back atter while.” And she disappeared around the house, walking proudly, her black face shining in the sunlight.

Presently the two boys under the apple-tree were joined by a coal-colored little girl who lived next door, one Willie-Mae Johnson, and the mud balls under her hands became mud pies carefully rounded and patted and placed in the sun on the small box where the little chickens lived. Willie-Mae was the mama, Sandy the papa, and Buster the baby as the old game of “playing house” began anew.

By and by the mail-man’s whistle blew and the three children scampered towards the sidewalk to meet him. The carrier handed Sandy a letter. “Take it in the house,” he said. But instead the youngsters sat on the front-door sill, their feet dangling where the porch had been, and began to examine the envelope.

“I bet that’s Lincoln’s picture,” said Buster.

“No, ’taint,” declared Willie-Mae. “It’s Rossiefelt!”

“Aw, it’s Washington,” said Sandy. “And don’t you-all touch my mama’s letter with your hands all muddy. It might be from my papa, you can’t tell, and she wants it kept clean.”

“’Tis from Jimboy,” Aunt Hager declared when she returned, accompanied by her old friend, Sister Whiteside, who peddled on foot fresh garden-truck she raised herself. Aunt Hager had met her at the corner.

“I knows his writin’,” went on Hager. “An’ it’s got a postmark, K-A-N-, Kansas City! That’s what ’tis! Niggers sho do love Kansas City! . . . Huh! . . . So that’s where he’s at. Well, yo’ mama’ll be glad to get it. If she knowed it was here, she’d quit work an’ come home now.... Sit down, Whiteside. We gwine eat in a few minutes. You better have a bite with us an’ stay an’ rest yo’-self awhile, ’cause I knows you been walkin’ this mawnin’!”