“It’s all we can do to keep bread in the children’s mouths,” Mother told Father. “Even if they are your blood kin, we can’t feed them much longer.” Mother knew the strings of shucky beans dried in the fall would not last until a new garden could be raised. A half-dozen soup bones and some meat rinds were left in the smokehouse; skippers had got into a pork shoulder during the unnaturally warm December, and it had to be thrown away. Mother ate just enough for the baby, picking at her food and chewing it in little bites. Father ate sparingly, cleaning his plate of every crumb. His face was almost as thin as Mother’s. Harl and Tibb fed well, and grumblingly, upon beans and corn pone. They kicked each other under the table, carrying on a secret joke from day to day, and grimacing at us as they ate. We were pained, and felt foolish because we could not join in their laughter. “You’ll have to ask them to go,” Mother told Father. “These lazy louts are taking food out of the baby’s mouth. What we have won’t last forever.” Father did not speak for a long time; then he said simply: “I can’t turn my kin out.” He would say no more. Mother began to feed us between meals, putting less on the table. They would chuckle without saying anything. Sometimes one of them would make a clucking noise in his throat, but none of us laughed, not even Euly. We would look at Father, his chin drooped over his shirt collar, his eyes lowered. And Fletch’s face would be as grave as Father’s. Only the baby’s face would become bird-eyed and bright.

When Uncle Samp, Father’s great-uncle, came for a couple of days and stayed on after the week-end was over, Mother spoke sternly to Father. Father became angry and stamped his foot on the floor. “As long as we’ve got a crust, it’ll never be said I turned my folks from my door,” he said. We children were frightened. We had never seen Father storm like this, or heard him raise his voice at Mother. Father was so angry he took his rifle-gun and went off into the woods for the day, bringing in four squirrels for supper. He had barked them, firing at the tree trunk beside the animals’ heads, and bringing them down without a wound.