“I mean, we made beans,” he said proudly to Florry.

Nothing more was said about the boots. The soles were loose. He tied them to the uppers with binder twine, but they continued to flap under him. He decided to speak.

“How about them bootses, Cap’n?”

“Oh, yes.” The man frowned impatiently.

Matt saw him glancing over the mail-order catalogue. When the boots came, Mart could see they were so flimsy they would not last the summer.

“Them soles is paper,” Florry said. “One good wettin’, like, ’ll jest turn ’em to mush.”

Mart drew them on and laced them slowly.

Florry went barefooted always. When she kept out of the sand-spurs, the light sand was soft under her feet. Her toes were spread wide. Her thin muscular legs were strong and straight. Even when she carried the baby lightly on one shoulder, she walked erect and firm. Her gait had the quality of a trot, so that she seemed to be walking with determination to some certain place.

One afternoon nigger Will stopped by with a post-card addressed to Mart that had been left in his box. It had a picture of a red house and some printing on it. Mart had gone to town with the mules to get feed. He would not be back before dark. It might be something very important. She lipped a little of Mart’s snuff and pondered. Better find out. She tucked the baby over one hip, his little wizened head hanging down, and walked over to the side porch of the Yankee house. The Yankee woman saw her coming on her first call. There was something a little alarming in the fixed swing forward, the steady Indian-like tread of the lean body.

Florry said, “Evenin’,” and thrust out the card.

The woman turned it over, uncomprehending.

“Will you please to read hit?” Florry explained.

The card was an advertisement from a raw fur house. It quoted probable prices for the coming year. Florry listened gravely as the woman read aloud the list of wanted skins.

“Be that all?”

“The name of the firm and their address.”

“Read hit.”

Then, “I thank you.” The girl reached out to take the card again and turned to go.

The Yankee woman had a strange feeling of bafflement.

“How are you getting along?” she called to the straight thin back.

Florry half turned.

“Purty good.” Then, truthfully, “Nothin’ extry.”

“Is your house comfortable?”

“Hit’ll do, now I got it cleant.” She paused. “The antses is bad. I cain’t keep the antses out o’ Mart’s breakfast.”

She paced back to the tenant house.

The Yankee’s family went north early and in late May he followed. The mosquitoes in the grove were very bad. The tall grass, which Cap’n did not want cut until August, bred them. They came up from the marsh in high-singing droves. All night they sounded like a high-pitched machine. The few old screens in the tenant house were gaping with rusty holes. Florry stuffed the door-cracks with paper and tried to block the paneless windows. But the old house itself was settling, wall from wall, beam from beam, timber from timber. They could see sunlight through the gaps by day and stars by night. They kept smudges going in the yard, but there was no keeping out the mosquitoes.