The church gave her some outlet. She joined the various Ladies' Aids, took over an advanced Sunday School class, wheedled different ones of her night-restless brothers to escort her to the Zion sociables, the chitterling suppers, the frequent revivals. But here an obstacle lay in the women of the congregation. No newfangled notions for them, thank you. They considered her careful accent, her ideas borrowed from more progressive members of her race, an affront to Lilydale's time-hallowed way of doing things; she was shouldered into the background. The few educated negro men, Wyatt the druggist, Tom Strickland, who owned the five-story building in the city, the young lawyer who lived in Lilydale, were married, or were disagreeable. They found in her only a desire for expanding culture, not its achievement; they did not seek her out. The isolation frequently overcame her. Nauseated by the glut of the slipshod home living, she would pull open one of her text books ... often to sit and cry, unable to read a line. "You're gettin' peaked, Diany," Stella worried. "Huc-come you ain't so pert as when you come back?... You got a good job." "I'm all right, mother." One night she overheard the older boys fussing at Babe. "You too little, kid. Ef a cop started chasin' you, yo' short legs wouldn't do no good." "Ah kin run faster 'n you, Ed. An' 'Banjo' said Ah could come along," he whined. "Maw, tell Ed 'n' Will 'n' Jim not to leave me behin'." "Where are you boys going?" asked Diana. Ed fidgeted sourly. "Aw, nowhar." "Ah'll tell you," said Will boastingly. "Goin' to de Union Depot, to see what we kin pick up." "Mother, will you let yo' boys rob cars?" "Shut up, won't you?" Ed injected savagely. Stella looked helpless. "You boys'll be careful, won't you? Yo' pappy got caught.... Babe's too little." "You know that that 'Banjo' Strickland is a regular criminal, ma--even his brother Tom says so." Stella closed her mouth. "Dey kin look after dey-selves, Ah reckon. Dey's growed up." To belong to a family of day-laborers and common thieves! In passionate rebellion she told herself that it was more than she could bear. For several days she studied the poison labels in the Judson medicine chest. If she only knew which would be painless.... She picked her dark way, a few nights later, over the rough planking across the nearest ramp--the excavating had begun, which meant better pay for the boys, and a mountain full of white and negro workers. The chill breathing of the Autumn wind drove her limp calico skirts swirling around her body. As she entered the darker tree-shadows beyond, she stopped suddenly, a chiller fear shaking her. A dark figure stood squarely in front, a figure that made no motion of stepping out of her way. "Where you goin', nigger?" He was one of the men she had seen working, a slouching young fellow--a white man. "Home," she said, in a roughened voice.