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Hattie nodded as she slid into her chair. A plate of fried
pork and brown beans appeared before her. “She made me
do the dishes this time. I expect they’d been sitting there
for days.”
Mama sat down with her own plate with a sigh of relief.
“Now, Hattie, she’s an old woman and her rheumatism
is bad. She cain’t do such chores, and that no-good
housekeeper don’t show up half the time.”
“I don’t know why I have to do all the work,” Hattie
said bitterly, between bites. “She never pays me for the
extra.”
“Because the good Lord gave you a strong body and a
quick mind,” Mama said. “And you’ll use those gifts to help
others in need.”
She didn’t understand how a white woman who lived
in a big house could be someone in “need,” but Hattie kept
eating and said no more about Miss Bradford.
Papa nodded as Abraham tore across the room,
dropping biscuit crumbs like snow on the clean, worn wood
floor. Hattie watched Mama quietly eating her supper as
Papa grabbed Abraham in a tickly hug just to hear him
