‘Tim McNeal? I don’t know. He went off. He went off last year.’

Hank began to tease again. ‘Aye, Jonas! Mrs Jonas Prather, that-there is. Mrs Jonas is to have a new flowered dress to wear to a shin-dig a Saturday over to the Glen. It’d tickle me plumb stiff if he forgot to take you and went off by his own self.’

Sallie Lou would look up quickly and her face would change from hard anger that gathered in the eyes to the half-smile of the squared mouth where the inner softness of flesh quivered in and out of view. Ellen looked at her unhindered, watching through all Hank’s teasing. She saw Sallie Lou’s anger and how it ran out toward Jonas, holding him, offering, taking, tightening. Tim had gone off. ‘Don’t you dare go,’ her anger said. Ellen could feel this force run in upon herself. She felt Sallie Lou winding through her body and calling to her. In another moment she knew what it would be to kiss Sallie Lou’s mouth and what it would be to want to kiss there. She felt near to Jonas on the instant, nearer than she had been for many months. She felt herself merge with Jonas. It was somehow true and necessary that Sallie Lou should hold Jonas for the moment, and she herself was forgotten. A long while passed while she sat invisible, her breath scarcely moving in her throat. But finally she remembered, conscious of her own confusion again.

‘I must be a-goen,’ she said. ‘I’m right obliged to you all. I was right glad to drop down to rest a spell. It was hot a-riden up the branch. I thought this-here way would be a little nearer, but I believe it’s every bit as far as the pike. You come.’

She played a moment with Hank, who had been shy of her at first. Then Mrs Seay told the child to ride down to the pike with Ellen so that she would not have to dismount to open the gates, and this proposal pleased him very much. A hush had come to Ellen’s breast. On the horse they talked eagerly as they went down across the stubble field, and at the last gate the child had not finished singing his song.

If I had a needle and a thread,

I’ll tell you what I’d do,

I’d sew my truelove to my side,

And down the river I’d go, dog-gone!

Ellen waited while he climbed out on the gate to finish it. His eyes were clear and his way had the frankness of a bird singing, so that he merged with every other beautiful object she had ever known, and she almost wept to see him.

‘Could you sing me a song, Ellen Chesser?’ he called from the gate.

‘Sometime I will, Hank Seay.’

‘Could you sing now, Ellen Chesser?’

‘Sometime, Hank Seay.’

She rode away down the highroad, leaving the child sitting on the gate. At every few paces of her progress he would shout a goodbye and she would answer, sometimes waving her hand.