“Nancy, wasn’t your mistress kind to you?”

“Mistis was sorta kin’ to me, sometimes.  But dey only give me meat and bread, didn’ give me nothin’ good—­I ain’ gwine tell no story.  I had a heap to undergo wid.  I had to scour at night at de Big House—­two planks one night, two more de nex’.  De women peoples spun at night and reeled, so many cuts a night.  Us had to git up befo’ daybreak be ready to go to de fiel’s.

“My master didn’ have but three cullud people, dis yuh was what I stayed wid, my young master, had not been long married and dus’ de han’s dey give him when he marry was all he had.

“Didn’ have no such house as dis,” Nancy looked into the open door of the comfortable octtage, “sometimes dey have a house built, it would be daubed.  Dus’ one family, didn’ no two families double up.”

“But the children had a good time, didn’t they?  They played games?”

“Maybe dey did play ring games, I never had no time to see what games my chillus play, I work so hard.  Heap o’ little chillun slep’ on de flo’.  Never had no frolics neither, no ma’m, and didn’ go to none.  We would have prayer meetings on Saturday nights, and one might in de week us had a chairback preacher, and sometimes a regular preacher would come in.”

Nancy did not remember ever having seen the Patterollers.

“I hearn talk of ’em you know, heap o’ times dey come out and make out like dey gwine shoot you at night, dey mus’ been Patterollers, dey was gettin’ hold of a heap of ’em.”

“What did you do about funerals, Nancy?”

“Dey let us knock off for funerals, I tell de truth.  Us stay up all night, singin’ and prayin’.  Dey make de coffin outter pine boards.”

“Did you suffer during the war?”

“We done de bes’ we could, we et what we could get, sometimes didn’ have nothin’ to eat but piece of cornbread, but de white folks allus had chicken.”

“But you had clothes to wear?”

“Us had clothes ’cause we spun de thread and weaved ’em.  Dey bought dem dere great big ole brogans where you couldn’ hardly walk in ’em.  Not like dese shoes I got on.”  Nancy thrust out her foot, easy in “Old Ladies’ Comforts.”

“When they told you were free, Nancy, did the master appear to be angry?”

“No’m, white folks didn’ ‘pear to be mad.  My master dus’ tole us we was free.  Us moved right off, but not so far I couldn’ go backwards and forwards to see ’um.” (So it was evident that even if Nancy’s life had been hard, there was a bond between her and her former owners.) “I didn’ do no mo’ work for ’um, I work for somebody else.  Us rented land and made what we could, so we could have little somethin’ to eat.  I scoured and waited on white people in town, got little piece of money, and was dus’ as proud!”

Nancy savored the recollection of her first earned money a moment, thinking back to the old days.

“I had a preacher for my second marriage,” she continued, “Fo’ chillun died on me—­one girl, de yuthers was babies.  White doctor tended me.”