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chair and stepped back from the table. “Woman, you have gone stark raving mad. I’ve half a mind to let the authorities come lock you up in the insane asylum.”  He took three long strides toward Livonia and grabbed hold of the pitchfork handle. She was a tall woman but narrow built and certainly no match for a man of William’s size, her heart started beating faster and beads of sweat rose up on her face, but still Livonia kept a firm grip on the pitchfork. “I’ve been a patient man,” he said, and pushed his face up into hers. “You wanted Abigail Anne to go to school and I let her, even though I knew a girl didn’t need book learning. I give in on that, then you start in filling her head with Suffragette nonsense, telling her how women now got the same rights as men—well, it ain’t so. It ain’t never gonna be so! That little she-devil ought to learn about the truth of life or she ain’t gonna grow up fit to be any man’s wife!” With that, William yanked the pitchfork from Livonia’s hand and heaved it right through the screen door. Then he banged open the door, stormed out and slammed it behind him.      
    The spring had barely snapped shut before Livonia straightened her back and resumed her seat at the table. She sat there with her eyes unblinking and her mouth rigid in grim determination—it was a look of fierceness that could make an onlooker believe Livonia had been the one who heaved a pitchfork through the screen door. Seeing Abigail and her mama sitting side by side as they were left no doubt as to where the child got the strong tilt of her chin
    “Can they really lock you up in the insane asylum?” Will asked.
    “Of course not, dummy,” Abigail snapped. “He’s just trying to scare us.”
    “Well, he sure enough scares me .”
    “You children stop talking such nonsense,” Livonia said. “Your papa and I just had a family disagreement. Lots of families have disagreements and nobody ever gets locked in an insane asylum. Now, finish up that soup.”
    “I’m not the least bit afraid of him,” Abigail said, her chin tilted exactly like Livonia’s but the stony set of her eyes an indication that there was something only she knew. “Papa’s got a terrible mean heart and I hate him, but I’m not afraid.”
    “It was just a moment of anger,” Livonia reached across the table and touched her fingers to Abigail Anne’s face. “Your papa didn’t mean to do this; other troubles just set him off. You’ll see tomorrow, there’s no reason to be afraid of your papa.”
    “Oh yes there is!” Will said. “He’s got it in for Abigail now! He’ll get hold of her when she’s sleeping and poke her eyeballs out so she can’t see to ride Malvania no more.” 
    “Hush talking nonsense. He’d do no such thing!”
    “He just might do it,” Abigail said. “He sure hates me enough. He hates me more than even I hate him and I hate him more than bee stings. I got enough hate for him to last long as I live!”
    “Enough of this,” Livonia snapped. “Will, you go get washed up for bed and Abigail, come with me so we can get some salve on your face.” Livonia quickly dismissed the thought that William might harm the girl, but that night, and every other night for as long as she lived, she slept in the bed alongside Abigail Anne.
     
    A t a time of year when a cold wind blows through the Valley and the sky is thick with heavy clouds that threaten snow, William Lannigan once again unlocked his grandfather’s secretary and took out the family Bible. Beneath Abigail Anne’s name he wrote Livonia Lannigan, died January 1926.
    Two days later, William clumsily shifted a long wooden box onto the back of the wagon. It was a simple unadorned coffin made from wood that came from the oldest orchard on the Lannigan farm; apple trees planted two generations back. The two children sat beside their father as the plow horse carried Livonia across the north plateau and down to the far meadow