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a telegram to my mother? Margaret Hendricks in Downington, Oklahoma. Could you tell her . . . what happened?”
    His shoulders sagged as if I’d handed him a fifty-pound sack of flour to carry along with his regular load. But he didn’t falter as he jotted the information onto a pad of paper, then climbed into his buggy. I stood in the yard, arms across my chest.
    In the morning we would bury my mother’s sister. By tomorrow evening, I hoped to hear from Mama. She’d tell me what to do next.

T he next morning didn’t proceed as I’d imagined. But how could it? Four children clustered about me, eager for adult attention, while the weight of my aunt’s unattended body hovered over all.
    “Can’t we see Miss Ada?” James pestered.
    “Not now.”
    Dan turned the doorknob of the bedroom.
    “No!” I flew to him, frightening Janie to tears, dragging Dan away as his feet kicked air. James’s wide, solemn stare poked holes in my resolve to be strong.
    “Ollie, spoon out the oatmeal. Boys, sit down and eat.” I set Dan on the bench and scooted him close to the table. They all complied, eventually. Just as they scraped the last bits of breakfast from their bowls, heavy footsteps paraded across the back porch.
    I pulled off my apron and wiped Janie’s face. “Ollie, take everyone upstairs.”
    As soon as the stomping quieted, I opened the kitchen door. Water dripped from the brim of one man’s hat. Two others stood behind him, a coffin on its end between them. Older men. I guessed the younger ones were all off at war.
    “You’re here for . . . her.” The words stuck in my throat like a spoon in overcooked oatmeal.
    The man nodded. “Mr. Crenshaw said to tell you he’d come for y’all in his automobile.”
    “Mr. Crenshaw?”
    “Owns the store over t’town. Don’t know if that new-fangled car of his will make it through this mud, though.”
    I let out the breath I hadn’t realized I’d been holding. Mr. Crenshaw with a car. We wouldn’t have to ride with Aunt Adabelle’s body.
    The men stepped inside. I couldn’t bear to see the coffin enter the house empty and leave full, so I hurried upstairs and helped dress the children in their Sunday best, all the while listening to the bumps and stomps of men shouldering their sad load through the house and out the back door.
    A little while later, the jangle and squeak of horse harnesses called me to the window. I watched the wagon pull away, the plain box filling the bed, the horses splashing mud and water with every step.
    “Mr. Crenshaw will be here soon.” I spoke more to fill the silence than to inform the children. “In his automobile.”
    A spark lit in the boys’ eyes, grief over Miss Ada momentarily forgotten. They hurried down the stairs and planted themselves at the front window in the parlor, next door to the room where their caretaker had lain. Thankfully, the men had closed the door when they had taken her from the house for the last time.
    When the ah-ooga of a horn shouted Mr. Crenshaw’s arrival, James and Dan beat us outside. Ollie, Janie, and I arrived on the front porch to find a scarecrow of a man holding a boy in each lanky arm. An umbrella teetered over his head, keeping them dry and clean. For the moment, at least.
    “Mr. Crenshaw?”
    “Yes, miss.” He turned and stalked down the front walk, his long legs needing only a few strides to reach the car. Ollie dashed between raindrops and climbed into the back seat with the boys. The baby and I settled in the front beside Mr. Crenshaw.
    The tires spun in the deepening mud, but they soon took hold and we jumped forward. I stared straight ahead, wondering where the cemetery was located, who would be there, and if Mr. Crenshaw would bring us home again. And I worried about the children. Janie, I knew, sat blissfully ignorant while Ollie remained painfully aware. She’d explained to her brothers about Miss Ada yesterday. At least, she’d said she had. I waited for their questions