So, now that Yugi has gone back to his mother’s house, it is to my own mother that I must go. As I walk along I am putting together my words, gathering them one by one. By the time my mother’s cabin comes in sight, I am certain of what I have to say. But as soon as I walk through the door and my mother looks at me—in that way of hers which suggests that she is reading my mind—I cannot remember even one of the fine words I have been stringing together like the shells in a necklace.

“Ah,” I say, “ah . . .”

My mother turns her head sideways to study me. I feel ever more uncertain. Then she smiles. “Sit, my son. You look hungry.”

I had not realized it, but like almost everything my mother says, her words are true. As soon as I sit down at her table, my mouth is watering and my spoon is in my hand. I eat the corn bread and the rabbit stew that she places in front of me as if I was starving. Food is such a great gift from the Creator that when one eats, that food is all that one should think about. And so it is with me. Eating my mother’s good food is the only thing in my thoughts until I pick up the last golden crumb from my plate and run my finger along the edge of the bowl for the last drop of stew.

But now that I have finished eating, now that my bowl is empty and I am sitting across from my mother, now I have to turn my thoughts back to the reason I just came back home.

I look over at her. Her face is calm. I’m not sure that mine is.

“Mother,” I say . . . and that is as much as I can manage to say. I swallow and try again. “Mother . . .” I hold my breath.

“Yes, Uwohali,” my mother says, “that is who I am.” Then she smiles and that smile of hers is so reassuring and says so much that I am able to breathe again and relax.

“Do you know what I want to talk to you about?” I ask her.

In reply she reaches down into her lap and lifts up a piece of paper, a very familiar piece of paper that she places on the table between us. It is the sheet on which I have been practicing my father’s designs. I should have known that there was no place in her house that I could hide anything from my mother. I bite my lip, but the smile has not disappeared from her face. She doesn’t seem to be upset or afraid of those markings that struck such terror into the hearts of some of our people that they have been speaking even louder about . . . doing something.