Page from a Tennessee Journal (AmazonEncore Edition)

“Henry,” she commanded, “give your sister some water, and get those sticks over to the barn so Cleveland can sharpen them for the staking.”
    Annalaura took a menacing step toward her son. The child scrambled to his feet, grabbed at the sticks, and ran them to the barn. Lottie, her back to her mother, climbed to her feet and started a slow walk back toward Doug. Before the child disappeared between the rows of still-growing tobacco, she called out to Annalaura in a singsong.
    “I’m still hot and I’m still hungry. Hot and hungry.” The child took off running. Annalaura had no intention of chasing her daughter. A flash of anger fought with a shade of regret for just an instant as mother looked after her fleeing child.
    John Welles had left them in this predicament. She was working her children worse than what Aunt Becky told her the overseers had done in the days of slavery. With her sleeves rolled up past her elbows, Annalaura brushed a bare arm across her eyes. Only some of the dampness clinging there was from her sweat. She swallowed hard. Blubbering was not going to help any of them. John had left her without a word, either angry or peaceful, and that was that. There was no one else in this world to save her children from certain disaster other than herself. She clamped down on her lower lip. Maybe that pain would stop her from feeling sorry for herself. After all, the Lord had answered part of her prayers.
    She looked up at a sky streaked in white clouds. None of them bore any resemblance to rain. Two weeks earlier, she had prayed mightily for rain that never came. Now she knew she had prayed for the wrong thing. It might have been all the hoeing and weed pulling that did it rather than her prayers, but the tobacco had miraculously stretched itself above the ground to a just passable height for spearing. This would be no bumper crop, but if she, Cleveland, Douglas, Lottie, and even little Henry worked fourteen-hour days, maybe they could bring in half of McNaughton’s forty acres. If she had the time, she would drop to her knees and pray like she had Sunday last. She wouldn’t pray for rain this time. Rain would be a disaster. All she wanted was another miracle.
    Henry came walking in slow motion back to the pile of sticks that needed to be sharpened. Out of the corner of her eye, Annalaura saw the little boy’s toes poking out way beyond the sole of his sliced shoe. She raised up from stacking the sticks to look at her youngest. He was only three years old, but already, he walked like an old man. From this distance, she swore she could see frown lines etching themselves into her baby’s forehead. As he approached his mother, the tot began to sway. Annalaura dropped the sticks in her hands, swept up her skirt, and caught the child before he toppled into a tobacco plant.
    “Momma, can I have some soup?” Henry whispered.
    Annalaura tried to gauge the heat coming from the sun. She knew it couldn’t have been over eighty degrees—a fairly cool September day. It wasn’t the heat that made her baby swoon. Picking up Henry, she cradled him in her arms and carried him to the barn. There, in the stifling air of a building smelling of cows and pigs, Cleveland sat surrounded by two stacks of sticks.
    “How many more you reckon we need of these, Ma?” Cleveland pointed to the shorter pile as Annalaura laid Henry on a slim bundle of hay.
    At least the cows had food for their supper.
    “That pile there,” Annalaura pointed to the already sharpened sticks, “is enough to spear about five acres. Cleveland, we’ve got to bring in at least twenty so we can stay on this place this winter.”
    Her boy looked at her with the certainty of impossibility on his face.
    “I’ll get Doug to help with the sticks while you get the rafters ready to string up the tobacco once it’s speared.” She lifted her head to the top of the barn.
    McNaughton had built their lodgings to take up less than a third of the rafter space. The rest was to be used for the hanging and curing of the tobacco.
    “Doug don’t like to work in the barn. That dryin’ tobacco gives him the wheezin’ attack,” Cleveland reminded her, though Annalaura needed no help remembering her second son gasping for breath when he had a bout of what John called the “asthma.”
    If she had any other way, she would spare Doug the frightening experience. Hell, if she had any other way, she would spare all her children this misery. She turned toward