"They open to the sun, but not the birds, 'cause snakes down in there and the birds know it, so theyjust grow — fat and sweet — with nobody to bother em 'cept me because don't nobody go in thatpiece of water but me and ain't too many legs willing to glide down that bank to get them. Meneither. But I was willing that day. Somehow or 'nother I was willing. And they whipped me, I'mtelling you. Tore me up. But I filled two buckets anyhow. And took em over to Baby Suggs' house.

　　It was on from then on. Such a cooking you never see no more. We baked, fried and stewedeverything God put down here. Everybody came. Everybody stuffed. Cooked so much there wasn'ta stick of kirdlin left for the next day. I volunteered to do it. And next morning I come over, like Ipromised, to do it." "But this ain't her mouth," Paul D said. "This ain't it at all." Stamp Paid lookedat him. He was going to tell him about how restless Baby Suggs was that morning, how she had alistening way about her; how she kept looking down past the corn to the stream so much he lookedtoo. In between ax swings, he watched where Baby was watching. Which is why they both missedit: they were looking the wrong way — toward water — and all the while it was coming down theroad. Four. Riding close together, bunched-up like, and righteous. He was going to tell him that,because he thought it was important: why he and Baby Suggs both missed it. And about the partytoo, because that explained why nobody ran on ahead; why nobody sent a fleet-footed son to cut'cross a field soon as they saw the four horses in town hitched for watering while the riders asked questions. Not Ella, not John, not anybody ran down or to Bluestone Road, to say some newwhitefolks with the Look just rode in. The righteous Look every Negro learned to recognize alongwith his ma'am's tit. Like a flag hoisted, this righteousness telegraphed and announced the faggot,the whip, the fist, the lie, long before it went public. Nobody warned them, and he'd alwaysbelieved it wasn't the exhaustion from a long day's gorging that dulled them, but some other thing— like, well, like meanness — that let them stand aside, or not pay attention, or tell themselvessomebody else was probably bearing the news already to the house on Bluestone Road where apretty woman had been living for almost a month. Young and deft with four children one of whichshe delivered herself the day before she got there and who now had the full benefit of Baby Suggs'

　　bounty and her big old heart. Maybe they just wanted to know if Baby really was special, blessedin some way they were not. He was going to tell him that, but Paul D was laughing, saying, "Uhuh. No way. A little semblance round the forehead maybe, but this ain't her mouth." So Stamp Paiddid not tell him how she flew, snatching up her children like a hawk on the wing; how her facebeaked, how her hands worked like claws, how she collected them every which way: one on hershoulder, one under her arm, one by the hand, the other shouted forward into the woodshed filledwith just sunlight and shavings now because there wasn't any wood. The party had used it all,which is why he was chopping some. Nothing was in that shed, he knew, having been there earlythat morning. Nothing but sunlight. Sunlight, shavings, a shovel. The ax he himself took out.

　　Nothing else was in there except the shovel — and of course the saw. "You forgetting I knew herbefore," Paul D was saying. "Back in Kentucky. When she was a girl. I didn't just make heracquaintance a few months ago. I been knowing her a long time. And I can tell you for sure: thisain't her mouth. May look like it, but it ain't." So Stamp Paid didn't say it all. Instead he took abreath and leaned toward the mouth that was not hers and slowly read out the words Paul Dcouldn't. And when he finished, Paul D said with a vigor fresher than the first time, "I'm sorry,Stamp. It's a mistake somewhere 'cause that ain't her mouth."Stamp looked into Paul D's eyes and the sweet conviction in them almost made him wonder if ithad happened at all, eighteen years ago, that while he and Baby Suggs were looking the wrongway, a pretty little slavegirl had recognized a hat, and split to the woodshed to kill her children.

　　"SHE WAS crawling already when I got here. One week, less, and the baby who was sitting upand turning over when I put her on the wagon was crawling already. Devil of a time keeping heroff the stairs. Nowadays babies get up and walk soon's you drop em, but twenty years ago when Iwas a girl, babies stayed babies longer. Howard didn't pick up his own head till he was ninemonths. Baby Suggs said it was the food, you know. If you ain't got nothing but milk to give em,well they don't do things so quick. Milk was all I ever had. I thought teeth meant they was ready tochew. Wasn't nobody to ask. Mrs. Garner never had no children and we was the only womenthere."She was spinning. Round and round the room. Past the jelly cupboard, past the window, past thefront door, another window, the sideboard, the keeping-room door, the dry sink, the stove — backto the jelly cupboard. Paul D sat at the table watching her drift into view then disappear behind hisback, turning like a slow but steady wheel. Sometimes she crossed her hands behind her back.

　　Other times she held her ears, covered her mouth or folded her arms across her breasts. Once in a while she rubbed her hips as she turned, but the wheel never stopped.

　　"Remember Aunt Phyllis? From out by Minnoveville? Mr. Garner sent one a you all to get her foreach and every one of my babies. That'd be the only time I saw her. Many's the time I wanted toget over to where she was. Just to talk. My plan was to ask Mrs. Garner to let me off atMinnowville whilst she went to meeting. Pick me up on her way back. I believe she would a donethat if I was to ask her. I never did, 'cause that's the only day Halle and me had with sunlight in itfor the both of us to see each other by. So there wasn't nobody. To talk to, I mean, who'd knowwhen it was time to chew up a little something and give it to em. Is that what make the teeth comeon out, or should you wait till the teeth came and then solid food? Well, I know now, becauseBaby Suggs fed her right, and a week later, when I got here she was crawling already. No stoppingher either. She loved those steps so much we painted them so she could see her way to the top."Sethe smile............