The night of July 4th was to be a “big interprise” at Aunt Susan’s. Three “good altone songsters” were coming to lend added luster to the meeting, and make the “buildin’ rock wid ole-time shoutin’ praise.” Aunt Susan was over the stove the greater part of the day, making pies; and to give the gumbo an extra flavor, Tom had gone crawfishing and brought home a basket full of crawfish, which he would give as his donation. Bell told him she would boil them and pick them, a wifely condescension which pleased Tom as much as it caused him to wonder. “Maybe her min’ done change at las’. An’ maybe she’ll go ’long wid me tonight to Sis’ Susan house,” thought Tom, as he dragged a chair out on the front gallery and sat down in the shade of the honeysuckle vines. “Bell alright; ’cep’ for her nasty, jealous-hearted ways,” he argued to himself. The afternoon was hot and still. A quivering, dancing heat was visible in the brilliant sunlight. Not a leaf stirred on the chinaberry trees by the front fence. A few dejected chickens hid under the castor oil bush by the step, their wings drooping, their mouths open, panting like jaded runners after a weary race. Bell was inside, looking after the pot of crawfish boiling on the charcoal furnace. The swampy smell of the crawfish mingled with the odor of red pepper, floated through the house and over the gallery, where Tom was already in a deep slumber. Bell came out to the front door and looked at him, then went back to the kitchen. She sat down, gazing at the pot on the furnace, a strange expression creeping over her face. For a long time she sat like one in a profound study. Her eyes contracted, and she began to gnaw her thumb nail abstractedly, a mask-like vacancy covering her face with dark inscrutability. Passing her hand across her face slowly, she got up and looked at the boiling crawfish. They were bright scarlet; they were done. Taking a colander from the wall, she put it in the dishpan on the table; then, lifting the pot from the fire, she emptied the seething mass into the colander, shaking it well until all the water was out, then put it on the window-sill to cool. Passing her hand across her mouth in a cryptic manner, she went again to the front door and looked at Tom furtively. He was sleeping soundly. She went back to the kitchen, and taking the dishpan of hot water from the table, walked out to the front gallery. Tom was asleep. A deep, manly, snoring sleep held him fast. “He wouldn’ know.... It’s so easy to trip,—to stumble. For de handle to slip out my han’”.... The thoughts went chasing through her mind, as she stood over him with the steam rising from the crawfish water like an ominous mist. “Dey say linseed oil good for scaldin’.... Tom got some in a bottle yonder in de woodshed.... I know how to look aft’ him. Den he _gotta_ stay ’way from Susan”....